by Barry Creamer | Mar 1, 2023 | Devotionals
Age 9, I slept bedroom door closed, lights off, and ground-floor window wide open. Then I saw “The Legend of Boggy Creek.” The movie itself—a B-grade documentary of cherry-picked evidence and sensationalized reenactments—was terrifying enough. (If you’ve seen it, or...
by Daisy Reynolds | Mar 1, 2023
Barry continues his trip down memory lane to share some things he has learned the hard way through his many (many!) years in ministry and teaching scripture. Some of the surprising juxtapositions include balance over simplicity, patience over victory, and tension over...
by Daisy Reynolds | Feb 22, 2023
Barry takes a trip down memory lane prompted by his recent 60th birthday to highlight an important issue. In sharing his experience of race relations growing up in Texas he hopes that people younger than him will learn what he did not—until he was much older than he...
by Barry Creamer | Feb 22, 2023 | Devotionals
Peter declares the skeptic’s assumption: “All things continue as they were from the beginning of creation.” We live persistently in the skeptic’s rationale—not the skepticism, mind you; just the rationale. For us, confidence in the present provides comfort: air...
by Barry Creamer | Feb 15, 2023 | Devotionals
From my bedroom, my 13 year old ears heard my 17 year old sister and her friends (I think from church) hooting in the living room to a Sunday night episode of British comedy on public television. Already supposed to be asleep, I crept down the hall unnoticed to watch...
by Daisy Reynolds | Feb 15, 2023
Because every person is made in the image of God, we should admit that others are valuable regardless of what they can offer us. Some of the most significant contributions to society may bring the least economic gain. And sometimes the greatest test of how much we...
by Daisy Reynolds | Feb 8, 2023
We normally think of God as a dwelling place for us, a place of safety and a fortress, and He is. But Barry reminds us, from Psalm 43, that even though God was hesitant to live in a beautiful temple, he is eager to dwell in the somewhat rickety tabernacle of our...
by Barry Creamer | Feb 8, 2023 | Devotionals
I had already proven to many an accusatory fellow chorister that my voice was not the one dragging us flat when I recorded myself alone in an acoustically friendly room on a cassette recorder. Playback was not kind. Either the batteries were low, or my voice was less...
by Daisy Reynolds | Feb 1, 2023
Barry talks about the power of presence and populations disadvantaged by being out of sight and out of mind. That’s why the unborn need us to speak for them. But it’s also why we have to see the humanity in those we speak to, including those who have forgotten the...
by Barry Creamer | Feb 1, 2023 | Devotionals
A lane-wide clearing wound miles through dense woods to my destination. Reaching 30mph on obviously-not-maintained-by-county caliche was challenge enough for me. To my right, 3 whitetails glided through the autumn-browning olive green bramble of briar, brush, and...
