Some people divide time by seasons, some people by weeks and months, but I live according to semesters. Instead of saying that something happened “last year,” I am more likely to say that it happened “two semesters ago.” If I do use the term “last year,” I probably mean last school year, not last calendar year. One of the things …
Am I Technology’s Slave Whether I Like It (And I Do!) Or Not?
Let me start with Facebook as an example of a technology that people now consider optional. I know plenty of people who still don’t use it. Some never have, and a few eccentrics I know had Facebook accounts but gave them up. Will they always have that choice, or will Facebook, like various other technologies, someday become essentially a requirement …
When Life is Unfair, Can I Know God is Good?
Our guest blogger this week is Jim Davis, author of the upcoming book, Why Me? (And Why That’s the Wrong Question). I met Jim earlier this year at the Blue Ridge Mountains Christian Writers Conference. He was part of a wonderful group of writers who took part in a practicum I taught there, and he was working on a book …
Some Thoughts on That Planet Made of Diamond
Imagine a planet made of diamond. It exists. According to National Geographic, this planet, which has been given the unimaginative name “55 Cancri e,” is twice the size of earth but has eight times its mass. At least a third of the planet is composed of pure diamond. I am endlessly fascinated by astronomy and the discoveries that are being made …
The Lake Isle of Innisfree
I am happy to welcome guest blogger Michael Bruner, a popular and gifted Honors professor at Azusa Pacific University. Michael was born and raised in the Philippines to missionary parents. He moved with his family to the US when he was ten and received his B.A. in English from University of Washington in 1988. He received his M.Div. from Princeton …
Why Christians Shouldn’t Run From Their Own Terminology
One of the issues I raise in the opening chapters of my new book, Pieces of Heaven: Recognizing the Presence of God, is how people shut out God from their conversations and thinking. People’s own mental distractions shut him out. Rules of etiquette shut him out in many social and business settings. The current academic and scientific assumptions of our …
Five of the Eighteen Reasons I Write (by William J. Torgerson)
Editor’s Note: This post is the third in a series that features former students of mine who have become professional writers. I asked each of them to focus on the topic, “Why I Write.” Today’s post is by Bill Torgerson, whom I first met when he was one of my writing students at Olivet and who is now an award-winning screenwriter, …
Why I Write (by John Small)
Editor’s Note: This post is the second in a series that will feature former students of mine who have become professional writers. I asked each of them to focus on the topic, “Why I Write.” Today’s post features my friend and former student, John Small, whom I met during my early years of teaching at Olivet Nazarene University in the …
Thanks for “Pieces of Heaven” Birthday Book Launch!
Today is my birthday, and I wanted to take a moment out of our regularly scheduled blog content to thank my wife and friends for the birthday book launch they sponsored for my new book, Pieces of Heaven: Recognizing the Presence of God. They asked friends to help celebrate my birthday and the release of the book by doing one …
This is How I Know I’m a Writer (by Michael Clark)
Editor’s Note: This post by Michael Clark is the first in a series that will feature former students of mine who have become professional writers. I asked each of them to focus on the topic, “Why I Write.” Dr. Michael Clark has had an inspiring journey as a writer. He has worked professionally as a journalist, a high school English …