By Valerie Jones A feeling of expectation and desire for a certain thing to happen. A thing longed for, an aspiration, a desire, or a wish. These definitions attempt to describe the word hope, yet hope is so much more. Elizabeth Sherrill writes that psychologists are discovering the value of hope. Thousands of college freshmen […]
By Valerie Jones It’s that time in the worship service when the music plays and the offering plate is passed around. Week after week we reach for the check written to the church. We are mostly familiar with the command that calls us to give back to God 10 percent of what he has given […]
By Valerie Jones It seemed so trivial, but a trivial disagreement with my husband that morning seemed to knock the wind out of me. Our three-month-old marriage was still new and apparently, not yet perfect! Embarrassingly enough, I couldn’t hold back the tears as we both boarded our 50-minute bus ride to a small Middle […]
By Valerie Jones The crowd shouted, “Hosanna!” and laid their palm branches at his feet as Jesus made his entry into the town. We imagine the scene so clearly: women, children, and men so aptly attuned to this humble man riding on a donkey. This is the scene and memory we celebrate every spring in […]
By Valerie Jones Time, either too much or too little of it, is often a part of daily conversations. Children want time to move faster because it takes “forever” to arrive at that next birthday, that next day off school, or that next privilege of driving a car or a later curfew. But as an […]
