Have you ever heard of unpaired words? Language experts consider a word unpaired if it stands alone even though on the surface it looks like it should have a straightforward opposite. For example, “dismayed” has no corresponding opposite (“mayed”). Here are some more examples: If you’re not disgruntled, are you gruntled? Since disheveled means you […]
Welcome can be defined as “a word of kind greeting to one whose arrival gives pleasure.” As I consider the definition, it seems to me that part of it can be faked, but part of it can’t. When the Welcoming Spirit Is Absent “A word of kind greeting” can be given with a cold heart […]
As I traveled through a major city in Ohio en route to a hospital visit, my eyes were drawn to a neglected commercial building located on the west side. The bright yellow structure showed the typical signs of abandonment including boarded up windows and entry doors, a testimony to the economic decline of the inner […]
A deacon’s meeting had gotten out of sorts. Tempers flared, temperatures rose, and words got ugly. One deacon tried to calm the group by saying, “I think we should just stop and pray.” Another deacon said, “Has it come to that?” Why is prayer often a last resort as opposed to a first concern? Prayer […]
Atheists must contend with hard questions. If God doesn’t exist, how did our complex universe arise from nothing, and how did morality come from amorality? Without God, on what grounds shall we determine what is right or wrong? If we are not created in God’s image and human beings are nothing more than fortuitously evolved […]
