Will Vaus

A woman was watching her granddaughter play with her dolls one day. At one point the little girl staged a wedding. First, she played the role of the bride’s mother, assigning duties to everyone; then she suddenly became the bride with a teddy-bear groom. The little girl picked up the teddy bear and then said to the minister presiding over the wedding: “Now you may read us our rights.” Without missing a beat, the little girl then took the role of the minister and said, “You have the right to remain silent, anything you say may be held against you; you have the right to have an attorney present. You may kiss the bride.” What an amazing perspective on marriage in our society today! Out of the mouths of babes! Sadly, many start out marriage these days already anticipating the possibility of needing an attorney present at some time in the future to execute a divorce. The New Testament invites us to think in a different way about marriage. Listen for God’s word to you from 1 Corinthians 7:10...

Many years ago, the Senior Pastor of the National Presbyterian Church in Washington, DC, Craig Barnes, offered a sermon entitled,   Finding Good Sex . After putting the sermon title on the sign in front of the church he had more comments about it than any other sermon he had ever preached.     As we have discovered already in our study of 1 Corinthians, sex was a hot topic in Corinth. And Paul continues that hot topic in chapter 7. Listen for God’s word to you…   Now for the matters you wrote about: “It is good for a man not to have sexual relations with a woman.”   But since sexual immorality is occurring, each man should have sexual relations with his own wife, and each woman with her own husband.   The husband should fulfill his marital duty to his wife,   and likewise the wife to her husband.   The wife does not have authority over her own body but yields it to her husband. In the same way, the husband does not have authority over his own body...

Christian pollster George Barna once said, “Americans are the loneliest people in the world today.”   One evening I was on my way home from work, and I stopped at a supermarket to pick up some items for dinner. As I went to the checkout line I was served by an older gentleman. He asked me how my day was. I said that I was tired, and I was glad it was the end of the day. Then I said, “It’s probably not the end of the day for you.” He responded, “No, I get off at 11:30, then I go home and watch the late-night shows on TV.” I asked him what he thought of one of the late-night hosts and the man’s response turned into a monologue that lasted for a few minutes. He stopped ringing the cash register, and with other people waiting in line, he just went on talking. As I left the store I thought, “That man probably never has anyone ask how he is doing. And he probably never has anyone to talk to in a meaningful way. He jumped at the chance to tell me something about his life.”   Today in...