I received the following email from Dawid: In 2014, we really struggled financially and I couldn’t even give my wife flowers or a card for our 45th anniversary! Under a peach tree in the garden I found a yellow autumn leaf and wrote the following message on it: “I love you!” with that day’s date. […]
Read moreI remember this incident from the time I worked in the corporate world as if it happened yesterday. Our leadership group had a session with a skills development consultant. the subject was the ethics on which you built your life, not only at work, but at home as well. We were asked to write down […]
Read moreIn today’s terms, Paul is Timothy’s Google. Whatever information Timothy needs to manage the churches flows from Paul’s pen. Whether it’s about the role of women, what they may or may not do, or about what the leaders should do and not do, Paul has something to say about everything. Indeed, it is a description […]
Read moreIn this section it is very clear that Paul has a lot of respect for the people of Thessalonica. He is so excited about them that he would like to go and visit them again, but repeatedly something prevents him from doing so. Paul is excited about their faith. He is filled with joy because […]
Read moreHow do you live right? Nowadays right and wrong are so interwoven that you hardly know which way to go. This struggle to know where the line between right and wrong is, is illustrated very well in this story: One day a daughter wanted to do something her mother really did not approve of – […]
Read moreEphesians 6:10-20 A friend of mine had a big business. I was surprised to see his business growing from a small one-man job to a big organisation employing hundreds of people. One day I went to see him and saw that not much was going on. No trucks driving in and out. The people were […]
Read moreEphesians 5:6-18 A friend of mine is always unhappy. One mishap after the other befalls him. At one time he nearly lost everything. Although he is now doing well financially, he is very lonely. His friends hang around, but when they leave there is a deep loneliness inside him. He comes to see me, close […]
Read moreA friend of mine gave me a few kilograms of olives to bottle. But bottling olives is not a simple job. First you have to get rid of the bitterness. I normally choose to take the long method. For months on end the water has to be replaced daily. And as the old water is […]
Read moreSome people in Ephesus were still going in completely the wrong direction. They confessed in words, but it had not yet become visible in their conduct. The things that they did told a different story, the story of what their lives were like before Jesus. I suspect that they had assumed that they could simply […]
Read morePaul repeatedly speaks directly to the congregation of Corinth. He speaks to them in a way that everybody can understand. It’s so practical that we don’t have to say much more to understand it ourselves and to make it part of our lives. Take verse one of Chapter 7: 1With promises like this to pull […]
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