Thank You and Goodnight by Adam McHugh

Afraid I had lost it... I found this blogpost some time ago on Adam McHugh's blogsite. After some time, I tried to find the blogpost, but discovered it had been taken down. Luckily, I found that I had saved this blogpost on my computer, having read it multiple times through. Hope you find just a …

Christmas and Family Unity – Highschool Sermon

Sermon: HS Students, 12/20/20, Christmas and Family Unity Introduction: Thomas Kinkade [Our Highschool Pastor] has asked me to preach today, continuing his series on ‘This Christmas’. There are two points of interest: first, to give you a few thoughts about how to have a wonderful Christmas; and, second, to focus on the role of the …

Family as First Society

About a week or so ago, I had the opportunity to address a small gathering of friends and acquaintances regarding any topic of my choice. Below is a general outline for how I introduced an existential defense of the family and provided for the beginning of an engaging conversation. The original structure was in two-parts, …

A Reflection on a Friend’s Reflection…

Every so often, I find my way back to an old house I once lived... Walking down the street, probably looking something like a weird-o out of a horror movie. Last time, I knocked at one of the houses down at the end of the cul-de-sac to tell them their van door was open - …

Walk, Wiggle, Freeze – Ice Breaker

During my time at Mount Hermon last summer, I met with the adventure specialists and we decided to run the high elements event more like an activity for business executives instead of free-time for my highschool students in leadership training. When we arrived down by the creek, at the base of the redwood trees, our …

Federalist No. 1 by Madison: Quotations

The Federalist Papers were written in response to the inefficacy of the Articles of Confederation to produce a sustainable and perpetual government for the 13 states. The most marked failure of the United States Confederation was their inability to suppress Shays' Rebellion, instead, relying upon the local state and privately funded militias. In the Federalist …

State of the Union Speech by William Seward (1861)

During my research on Abraham Lincoln - his policies, character, and positions - I began to discover how interesting the political speeches were of that time. So many were against the civil war, so many tried so hard to prevent its occurrence, and, even when the ship had tipped over the falls, there were some …

Why Ice Breakers?

My blog has become inexhaustibly useful as an online filing cabinet of all things I find useful, provocative, and amusing. If they've been quotations from books I've read, an increasing expansion of book reviews or sermons I've written, or merely reflections on life events and the slow tossing around of ideas, I have found it …

What is Unconditional Love? – Highschool Sermon

Soon after giving this sermon, one of the high school students came up to me and said, "I have a few questions for you because I want to walk away with something from your sermon." I appreciated the direct-line he took in questioning what I said, but I suppose this sermon was a bit more …

Lincoln Unbound by Rich Lowry: Quotations

"Why if the old Greeks had this man, what trilogies of plays - what epics would have been made out of him!" - Walt Whitman, "Death of Abraham Lincoln," 1879 Recently, I was asked to read through this book and pull any quotes I found interesting or representative of Lincoln's "do-it-yourself-through-hard-work" philosophy. Somewhere along the way, …