I have learned that my assignment is to write books for people who do not like to read books. I really try to connect with people who are not given to spending a lot of time with an open book. Pay day to me is when somebody comes up to me and says, "I never read books but I read yours." I have a heart for that person.

Scripture often reminds us that it's not enough to have ears - we must use them.

Maybe your life resembles a Bethlehem stable. Crude in some spots, smelly in others. Not much glamour. Not always neat. People in your circle remind you of stable animals: grazing like sheep, stubborn like donkeys, and that cow in the corner looks a lot like the fellow next door. You, like Joseph, knocked on the innkeeper's door. But you were too late. Or too old, sick, dull, damaged, poor, or peculiar. You know the sound of a slamming door.

Our society is just less open to platitudes, more open to stories.

God wants us to know we are saved, for saved people are dangerous people, willing to face off with the world, unafraid of the consequences since they know that, whatever happens, they will have eternal life.

In our grandparents' generation news of an earthquake in Nepal would reach around the world some days later. In our parents' day the nightly news communicated the catastrophe. Now it's a matter of minutes. We've barely processed one crisis, and then we hear of another.

It works well for me to go ahead and prepare the sermon with a chapter in mind. What that does is to force me to be very thrifty in my language, tighten up my words and not ramble so much. It puts some fiber in the sermon.