Well, I decided to attempt the Christian Books Reading List for this year––the light one––where I have to read only one book ever four weeks. However, I made the fatal flaw of thinking shorter meant easier.

I have made this error twice before. First, when selecting French poetry in college as my foreign language literature option. I don’t know what I was thinking. I don’t even understand poetry in my own language. Then I did it again when I chose Melville’s Billy Budd as a novel option for a class. (The word “novella” sucked me in.) It was the longest seventy-six pages of my life. I sat with book in one hand and dictionary in the other as I tried to maneuver through thick symbolism and monstrous vocabulary.

Anyway, I am a C.S. Lewis fan, primarily because of the excerpts and quotes I have read of his, of his book The Screwtape Letters, and of the Narnia series, which if you didn’t know was written for his goddaughter, who was young.

I knew Lewis was an Oxford academic, an intellectual, and an apologist, so I selected a short book––The Problem of Pain. It was only 154 pages and fit the category of “a book about suffering.” But once I started reading, memories of French poetry and Billy Budd immediately returned. However, I persisted and was rewarded.

It was challenging but enlightening. While some apologists want to dive right to the heart of the matter, Lewis starts at the beginning, laying the groundwork for his argument. He begins with God’s Omnipotence and then proceeds logically from there, discussing every question or objection or concern.

I cannot discuss everything here, but if you are willing to focus, concentrate, reread, look up words, and think, then I would encourage you to read this book, which discusses the questions surrounding Divine goodness and man’s wickedness; human pain verses animal pain; heaven and hell.

No one quote can encapsulate the entire problem of pain, but the need is founded in God’s desire to have us His while our desire is to have anything and everything but. I found that the following section hit the heart of the matter and one to which I could wholly relate:

“I remind myself that all these toys were never intended to possess my heart, that my true good is in another world and my only real treasure is Christ. And perhaps, by God’s grace, I succeed, and for a day or two become a creature consciously dependent on God and drawing its strength from the right sources. But the moment the threat is withdrawn, my whole nature leaps back to the toys: I am even anxious, God forgive me, to banish from my mind the only thing that supported me under the threat because it is now associated with the misery of those few days. Thus the terrible necessity of tribulation is only too clear. God has had me for but forty-eight hours and then only by dint of taking everything else away from me. Let Him but sheathe that sword for a moment and I behave like a puppy when the hated bath is over––I shake myself as dry as I can and race off to reacquire my comfortable dirtiness, if not in the nearest manure heap, at least in the nearest flower bed. And that is why tribulations cannot cease until God either sees us remade or sees that our remaking is now hopeless.” (pages 106-107)

If you have read or are reading a book that you think the rest of us would enjoy and/or benefit from, please let us know. There are many more categories to check.

Their is an urban myth that states it is safe to pick up dropped food within a five-second window and eat it. Actually, it started as the three-second rule and was stretched ( I think) when it took longer for certain ages to recover the food in the required time. Regardless, this hygiene action is a total myth––so take as long as you want.

However, I am learning that the five-second rule does have some benefits if you are hoping not to eat something––your own words.



I have a very––very––bad habit of speaking much too quickly. I interrupt. I react. I quip (which at the moment I think is funny, but really isn’t.) Anyway, I have decided to try to impose the five–second rule on myself. Count to five, and during those five seconds determine why I am going to say what I am going to say. If it falls under any of the following categories, then don’t say it.

Is it to prove someone wrong? Sometimes correction is necessary, but much too often, it isn’t. The right or wrongness of the statement doesn’t matter. So don’t say it.

Is it to make someone feel small? No wiggle room here. Don’t say it.

Is it to draw attention to myself? Really don’t say it.

Does it interrupt someone? Keep mouth shut.

Am I responding out of anger? Nope. Not a good time.

Is it not true? Probably shouldn’t even be thinking it let alone saying it.

I am sure I will encounter more reasons to keep my mouth shut, but I am thinking this is a good start. It also won’t be easy.

There are close to forty verses about guarding the tongue. Two that have spoken to me are the following from Proverbs.

Proverbs 10:19––When there are many words, transgression is unavoidable,
But he who restrains his lips is wise.

Proverbs 21:23––Whoever watches his mouth and tongue keeps himself from trouble.

Now, for a moment of silence.

Like most words that end up in our dictionary, the main criteria is usage. Once a word reaches a certain threshold, in it goes, which explains why many nonstandard words like “ain’t,” as well as slang words like “guac” and “marg” and texting acronyms like “TL;DR” (Too Long; Didn’t Read) are now in there.

Likewise, the word of the year, as determined by the two major dictionaries, Merriam Webster and the Oxford English, is also based on how often a word is used as well as the stories it embodies, the interest it has generated, and its impact on society.

So it should come as no surprise that the words chosen for this year were “vaccine” for Merriam Webster and “vax” for the OED.


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But Faith Salie, a contributing reporter for CBS Sunday Morning, has her own choice for the word of the year, and it’s one I believe is the best. Please listen.

Today is the first day of a new year. And with it comes all sorts of hopeful expectations. That is how it is with anything new. There is always something exciting about it. It is spotless. Untarnished. Full of possibilities.

But as we have recently learned through the current stress of the supply and demand chain, used can be very valuable too. In fact, in the auto industry, a used car’s value has suddenly skyrocketed.

This escalation in value of used items reminded me of our God, who besides creating brand new things (days, weeks, mercies), takes this whole concept of using used one step further, for He is in the business of renovation––of not just giving value to the used, but taking it and making it new all over again.

Below are just four verses about God’s renovation/replacement program. All of them should give us hope for not only the new year, but our future as well. Happy New . . . and Renew Year.

2 Corinthians 5:17

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!

Isaiah 43:18-19

Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland.

2 Corinthians 4:16-17

Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all.

Revelation 21:1-3

Then I saw “a new heaven and a new earth,” for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea. I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Look! God’s dwelling place is now among the people, and he will dwell with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God.