In the Zone

Have you ever been in a strange place with nowhere to stay?  It can be very disconcerting. A few years ago, I experienced such a thing.  My dad and I had traveled to attend a NASCAR race.  We have hotel reservations, but when we arrived, they had no record of our reservation.  Even with a confirmation number, nothing showed up. To make a very long story short, we spent the night sleeping in my dad's van because there was literally no room for us in the inn, or any inn, for that matter. It can frustrating to get somewhere only to find out you have no place to go.  I imagine Joseph and Mary experienced that same frustration that first Christmas night.  Only there frustration was magnified because of Mary's pregnancy and Jesus's imminent birth. Luke 2 tells us that Jesus was laid in a manger - which is a feed trough - because there was no room for them in the inn.  Now, the Greek for inn may refer to a guest room and not a hotel, but the implicati...

I love Star Wars. If you didn't know that, then you don't really know me.  I have a Star Wars room. I collect Star Wars action figures.  I read Star Wars books.  Two of my top 10 movies of all time are Star Wars movies.  I am well-versed in Star Wars and can pretty much quote the Original Trilogy. This week is Star Wars week for me.  With the release of Star Wars: The Force Awakens, I am so excited.  I have waited 30 years for this movie to be made.  I am giddy.  I got work done early this week just so the thought of the movie wouldn't distract me from getting things done. I love Star Wars.  I will see the first showing in just a few hours. That being said, Star Wars is just a story.  It has heroes and villains and a plot and characters.  It's themes are echoed not just in the Star Wars saga, but in many tales of adventure.  In fact, Star Wars is not an original concept.  It was based on the S...

When I was a young teenager, I knew exactly what I was going to be when I grew up.  I was going to be an attorney. Now, this decision didn't come as a result of me wanting to help people or because I had an affinity for the law. No, at the ripe old age of 13, I wanted to be a lawyer because lawyers were rich.  They made a lot of money, and coming from a family that didn't always have a lot of means, that was one of my desires as an adult. Thankfully, I soon found a new love:  journalism.  That one, though, comes at a much discounted salary from an attorney.  But I loved writing and covering sports and it's what I decided to do. Not long after I began my sports writing career, God called me to the ministry.  It wasn't long after I started serving as a part-time youth minister that I knew God had called me to full-time vocational ministry.  I've been doing that ever since. It's funny to think about how I got from a desire to be rich to a call t...

Do you have a flying car?  How about a hoverboard? Yeah, one of the big stories of 2015 was Back to the Future Day - the day in the movie Back to the Future 2 when Marty and Doc went into the future.  Leading up to the day, you could view any number of videos or stories about what the movie got right and what it got wrong. Obviously, no one is flying in a car.  Hoverboards don't really exist.  And, the Cubs didn't win the World Series.  So, they got a few things wrong. However, it's amazing how much they got right.  Video conferencing, wall-mounted televisions, and 80s nostalgia were all real things in our current day and age.  And while Jaws didn't produce double-digit sequels, 3D movies are bigger than ever. Now that we're approaching 2016, we're going to start hearing predictions for the upcoming year. We'll hear about Presidential elections, economic forecasts, upcoming movies and even anticipated weather.  A lot of these predictions ...