In mid-2021, I reconnected with a friend who had briefly been a coworker. Although we had stayed in touch over the years, mostly via email, our contacts were sporadic. That is, until he emailed me to relate his cancer diagnosis and imminent kidney removal. Not only did I start praying for Dave regularly, we began…
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When it comes to Artificial Intelligence, I feel like an old-time railroad hobo whose shoe is stuck between the rails. A locomotive is headed his way, but there isn’t much he can do about it, short of going barefoot. With AI, my leading concern is where to find the time to adapt to it. One…
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Being one of the last holdouts when it comes to digital readers, I can’t proclaim that acquiring a Kindle Fire 11 recently puts me on life’s technological cutting edge. In my case, the reason was utilitarian: a magazine I used to write for (and still read) went all-digital after its July issue. I tried poking…
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It’s hard to believe how quickly a year can pass. This month marked one year since I flew to Portland, Oregon to take in the beauty of the Willamette Valley. Aside from the combined business and personal nature of the trip, there is another reason I remember it so well: the huge gulps of time…
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Gamal and Amal Gerges are planning for Thanksgiving dinner with 150 of their closest friends. That’s how many came to the first-ever holiday meal last year at Hope Arabic Church in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. “It was a good opportunity to expand the message of the gospel,” says Gamal, founding pastor of the mission of Harrisburg First…
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One of my favorite Bible verses is found in the book people are still trying to fathom 2,000 years after it was written: “They overcame him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony” (Revelation 12:11 MEV). Testimonies seem to have fallen out of favor in recent years. Maybe we’re…
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I have long tried to pick winners in several pro contests, but had never played fantasy football. However, in August when a friend volunteered to act as the commissioner for a Yahoo Sports league, I signed up. We had real preseason festivities. With a pair of pizzas, participants seated around an oval table, and a…
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When the lockdowns of 2020 shut down almost every facility in town, including the YMCA, I resorted to walking on a track at the city park for exercise. On the days I had an early morning meeting, I would stop at the park on the way home before starting work. Several times that fall, I…
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With the sporting world, blogosphere, and all things musical going ga-ga over whether singer Taylor Swift and Kansas City tight end Travis Kelce really are an item, I turned my attentions in a different direction recently: the soccer pitch. Nobody was more surprised by this turn of events than me. For two decades, my wife…
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Earlier this year, an acquaintance talked about the estrangement she has observed in her family. She complained about some of her grandchildren telling their parents inquiring about their general wellbeing or academic pursuits that it was “none of their business.” “Where do they get this stuff?” she asked with a tone of incredulousness. One could…
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