Scripture: 1 John 4:1-6

“It’s too good to be true!”

We’ve all heard this phrase before right? We’ve probably even said it a few times ourselves.

Usually when we’re talking about something being too good to be true, we’re hearing about a really good deal on something. And when we see such a good deal, we want to be sure it’s not someone trying to sell us a rip-off.

We’ve all heard stories of someone getting what they thought was a really good deal, only to realize it’s not what they thought it was. There’s stories like this in the news all the time!

Our phones ring at dinner times with offers just like these on occasion, often too many occasions!

We are wise to recognize that someone might be trying to take advantage of us. The hard part is often these people are good salespeople, who are well trained, and are really good at putting on the pressure to make the sale.

Typically I do not respond to high pressure sales. There have been times when I know I’ve needed something, we’ve gone to the reputable store, and the salesperson keeps making offers trying to sweeten the deal so we’ll just have to leave with a purchase. High pressure sales make me uncomfortable, especially as one who tends to be a frugal shopper and likes to research before I buy. read more…

Scripture Reading: 1 John 3:11-24

The past few weeks, I don’t know about you, but I can’t watch the news right now. It’s hard on the heart to see everything that’s been happening in the world, and in particular the United States.

First there were fires. Then there were hurricanes and floods. There are still more fires going on. Mass shootings. It is completely heart-breaking watching the news these days.

But on top of all that, at a time when we look for help and hope from the government… we look to Trump. I’m sorry if this offends anyone who might support this guy, but he guts me of any hope.

People have died violently at the hands of a mad man in Las Vegas. People are suffering without the basic necessities of life in Puerto Rico: food, water, electricity. Thousands of buildings have been destroyed by fire in California, and dozens of people have lost their lives.

It’s hard to watch as some of the deadliest hurricanes ever hit populated areas. It’s hard to watch one of the deadliest mass shootings in American history. It’s hard to watch the deadliest wildfires in California history.

It’s hard to watch as the government, and not just Trump, but other men and women elected to represent the people, vote against releasing funds for those in desperate need of help.

Is this how Jesus would respond in a crisis? read more…

Scripture: 1 John 2:29-3:10

On Wednesday, Craig, Shirley, Grace, Bev and myself drove to New Glasgow for lunch. Seems to be a long way to go just for lunch. What we really went for was to hear more about this Church Renewal journey we’ve begun here at Carman.

We met Pastor Ray from the church in Steinbach, and he shared with the gathering of about 60 people what he has heard and seen in the church over the last 30 or so years.

He shared a story about his first church, a brand new church he had planted in Ontario. He shared his struggles to see people grow in their relationship with God. He met with other pastors in the area who agreed there needed to be a revival in the churches of the town. They didn’t know what to do exactly, but Ray had heard about a small group of evangelists that had done really good work, so they brought them in for 2 weeks of revival meetings.

It went really well. People we’re giving themselves to the Lord every night, even some of the most hardened people in his church!

The problem was though, the group left town. And within 6 months everyone had returned to their old ways. Ray was frustrated, and a bit angry about it all.

Why didn’t it work? What was wrong with his church? What was wrong with his people? read more…

Scripture: 1 John 2:18-28

While I was driving to New Glasgow last Sunday afternoon, I was listening to CBC Radio and heard a story of how technology is helping, of all places, lawyers’ offices as they prepare legal cases.

I’m sure we all remember the lawyer movies where people carry in a couple of boxes full of papers which may help in a case. Turns out this is kind of true. While in the movie it might take a few hours to sort through all the papers in these boxes, in reality it would take days, possibly even weeks!

The greater challenge today is there are more than just one or two boxes to go through. In today’s digital world, there are hard drives full of terabytes of data which needs to be sorted through in order to find a few golden nuggets which are needed for the case.

If it took days to go through a couple of boxes, how long would it take to sort through terabytes of emails and other documents?

This is where technology has come to the aid. There has been a system developed where you simply load in all the data and the computer uses a learning method to sort and collate data. Once everything is in, it spits out a few thousand samples to review, and the lawyer tells the computer which are relevant and which are not. The computer now takes this additional information and adjusts it’s parameters and spits out a few thousand more samples to be reviewed. read more…

Scripture: 1 John 2:7-17

Did anyone else get excited by the eclipse last month? We were driving back from vacation and stopped in Orangedale to see Bev’s family on the day of the eclipse. We got there just before the eclipse started and we quickly made a pinhole camera so that we could watch the moon pass over the sun, even though we knew it wouldn’t be very much coverage here in Cape Breton. Still, this was our first eclipse with the kids, and we wanted them to see what they could. It certainly wasn’t as dramatic as other parts of North America, but it was a fun experiment to try.

For weeks leading up to the eclipse, we were all told by the news and social media “DO NOT LOOK AT THE ECLIPSE!!!!”

We all know staring at the sun is generally a bad idea. Right? But it appears as though some people took this warning a little too far.

In some parts of America, school starts in mid-August. Some schools were ordered to keep children inside during the eclipse for “their own safety.”

I heard of a town pool, here in Nova Scotia, that closed for the afternoon of the eclipse for safety reasons. read more…