In the Pasadena Public Library you will find a book entitled Van Alstine Family History.* It outlines the generations of this Dutch settler family from before 1655, the time when Jan Martense Van Alstine built a homestead at Fort Orange, in the Hudson River Valley near what is now Albany, NY. On page 439 of […]

Dr. Walter Chalmer Smith was a respected minister in the Free Church of Scotland when he published  his book of hymns in 1876. The only one that is still regularly sung in churches today seems to have been his favorite. He took his cue from a spontaneous doxology expressed by the Apostle Paul in his […]

One afternoon last week, I had a surprise encounter I want to tell you about. I got out of my car and walked toward our back door. I stopped short when my eye caught movement in the bush to my right. There in the bright afternoon sunlight, I saw a gorgeous Tiger Swallowtail butterfly sitting […]

In writing about “Your Facebook Profile Picture” last week, I suggested that many people keep posting “updated” profile pictures because they’re not really sure who they are or who they want to be. I quoted the passage in the Bible book of James that talks about people who “look at themselves in a mirror; they […]

The only social media site I’ve dared to venture onto is Facebook. I almost gave it up after last fall’s national election, but I’m still hanging in there. I don’t post often, but I occasionally make drive-by comments on posts of friends and casual acquaintances. Recently, I’ve begun to take interest in the “Profile Pictures” […]

That’s what you can expect to hear about when you turn on the news these days – wars and rumors of wars. A guided missile strike on a Syrian airfield in retaliation for a chemical attack on civilians that went viral on the internet. North Korean display of military troops and hardware, along with the […]

The Stations of the Cross have been an important part of the devotional experience of Catholics for many generations. This is an exercise in which a worshiper tries to follow Jesus through his final journey to his horrible execution — death by crucifixion. The practice originated in the actual experiences of pilgrims in the Middle […]

Here’s a poem that had a powerful effect on me when I first read it fifty years ago: The golf links lie so near the mill That almost every day The laboring children can look out And see the men at play. Today, for some reason, this poem flashed through my mind, and I just […]

This is one of those weeks when I seemed to have no inspiration to write an article for the ABC Messenger. I allowed my mind to flit all over the place, but nothing came. Finally I picked up a random book from my office shelf. It was Check Book on the Bank of Faith: 366 […]

Writers certainly have a goal of communicating information, but their first concern has to be capturing the readers’ attention. Since approximately 50% of my readers today (mostly the male 50%) are intrigued with the NCAA men’s basketball playoffs, I thought that’s where I’d better start. I apologize to the other 50% of you; I’ll try […]