I do not know what I would do without my desk calendar. I cannot begin to list or mention what I would forget to do without having it written down on my calendar. Once I hear about a meeting or deadline, I immediately write it on my desk calendar so that I don’t forget. I even need to write the important events…
In the small towns of Island Lake and Wauconda where I grew up, there were not many Lutherans. Between the two cities there were about 17,000 people, and maybe about 100 Lutherans. Growing up, it seemed that everyone was Roman Catholic. Every year when Ash Wednesday would come around, I would hear my Roman Catholic friends talking about what they would be…
Hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth; for the LORD has spoken: “Children have I reared and brought up, but they have rebelled against me. The ox knows its owner, and the donkey its master’s crib, but Israel does not know, my people do not understand.” Ah, sinful nation, a people laden with iniquity, offspring of evildoers, children who deal corruptly!…
Now after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the king, behold, wise men from the east came to Jerusalem, 2 saying, “Where is he who has been born king of the Jews? For we saw his star when it rose and have come to worship him.”-Matthew 2:1-2 In the Kooi household, we have a tradition with our…
With Christmas coming just around the corner, we have lots of preparations to do to make sure that we are ready. We have to stock up on salt, and make sure that our shovel or snow blower is good to go for that first snowfall. We need to make lists of the things that we would like, and we need to get…
Psalm 146: Praise the Lord! Praise the Lord, O my soul! 2 I will praise the Lord as long as I live; I will sing praises to my God while I have my being. 3 Put not your trust in princes, in a son of man, in whom there is no salvation. 4 When his breath departs, he returns to the earth; on that very day his plans perish.…
25 “Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? 26 Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father…
Psalm 46 (NRSV) God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. Therefore we will not fear, though the earth should change, though the mountains shake in the heart of the sea; though its waters roar and foam, though the mountains tremble with its tumult. There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God, the holy…
Psalm 23 (NRSV) The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want. 2 He makes me lie down in green pastures; he leads me beside still waters; 3 he restores my soul. He leads me in right paths for his name’s sake. 4 Even though I walk through the darkest valley, I fear no evil; for you are with me; your rod and your staff— they…
Psalm 51 (NRSV) Have mercy on me, O God, according to your steadfast love; according to your abundant mercy blot out my transgressions. Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin. For I know my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me. Against you, you alone, have I sinned, and done what is evil in your sight, so that you…