A little blonde girl stood perfectly still in a beautiful white dress, tears streaming down her soft pink cheeks, falling gently into a basket filled with petals. She quietly watched as a man made lifelong vows to her mother. Vows that would forever change the course of her own little life.

I think that is a particular malady of old men…especially old men like me with ADD. Boredom has in it a touch of cynicism and a dash of not caring. I guess all of us have some of that, but the problem with boredom is that it spills over into things like one’s walk with Christ. And if you’re a preacher, that’s when it gets dicey. Not only that, when ...

In 1955, The Ed Sullivan Show was one of the most popular television programs in America. Those of us born in the age of cable, let alone the age of the Internet, can hardly imagine the cultural impact of a show like this.

It isn’t that we aren’t doing things right, that we aren’t trying, that we don’t care. It isn’t that we have ignored God’s commandments or been unfaithful to Christ; it isn’t that we have become apostate. I spend a considerable portion of my time traveling around the country and for the most part, God’s people—with, of course, some significant and noteworthy exceptions—are doing what they ought to do.

The other day a friend told me about his divided family—an atheist brother, a sister married to a woman nobody in the family likes, and a stepsister with kids who are hellions. He is the only Christian in the bunch and, to make it worse, the only Republican.

I have an “open door” policy at Key Life but with a closed door. There’s a lot of noise in our office (we are, after all, a media ministry), a lot of laughter (you can always tell Jesus is present when there’s laughter) and a lot of music.