A website at healthline.com reports interesting information about IQ’s (intelligence quotients). A score of 116 or more is considered above average. A score of 130 or higher signals a high IQ. Membership in Mensa (the High IQ society) includes people who score in the top 2 percent, which is usually 132 or higher. But does a high IQ […]

You may want to “hang” me after your read the next sentences. I warn you ahead of time I am going to be “hung up” on the word “hang” for a few moments. Like many other words in the English language, the word “hang” can have several different meanings according to context and usage. In […]

Somebody observed that the amazing thing about disturbing the peace these days is that they could find any peace to disturb. Conflict and violence are constants in spite of all the peace talks, peace tables, peace conferences, and peace summits. From 1914 to 1918 the world engaged in “the war to end all wars” (WWI). […]

John Randolph said, “Time is at once the most precious and the most perishable of all possessions.” We often talk about “spending time” and that is a very accurate phrase. Besides meaning to pay out money, another definition of time is “to concentrate one’s time or energy on an activity; to pass time; to use […]

The great English poet Alexander Pope [died in 1744], published his “Essay On Criticism” in 1711. That poem is the source of the familiar saying, “To err is human; to forgive is divine.” The saying echoes the Bible’s teaching that all accountable human beings sin (even those who are Christians – Romans 3:23; 1 John 1:8-10), […]

Talking About Jesus!                      by: Dan Gulley, Smithville, TN A six-year-old boy stirred his parents interest on the way home after church one Sunday. The child said, “My Sunday school teacher must be Jesus’ grandmother.” When they asked why, he replied, “Because she talks about Him all the time.” As my wife and I prayerfully and […]

A better Bible? Let me shout, “No, NO, NOOO!” We not only don’t need a “better” Bible, it would be impossible to write one. Inspired men refer to the one we have as “given by inspiration of God”, profitable for doctrine, reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteous- ness”– and the result is “the man […]

Oprah Winfrey is credited with saying, “Where there is no struggle, there is no strength.” I don’t know the context of Winfrey’s words, but there is great truth in them. A muscle remains flabby unless it is pushed and pulled and stressed and strained. For a long time athletes have motivated themselves with the mantra, […]

I want to begin this little meditation with four simple, one-syllable words we hear Jesus speaking in Mark 11:22 – “Have faith in God.” Do you have faith? What do you have faith in? Jesus said, “Have faith in God.” Careful study reveals Jesus is within five days of His death on the cross in […]

What does it take to “get your goat?” The phrase “get your goat,” like the expression that it is “raining cats and dogs,” is an “idiom” – a phrase commonly used but having a meaning not deducible from the literal meanings of the individual words. The common understanding of “get your goat” refers to someone […]