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Every year around Halloween, I start seeing the billboards and yard signs for Hell Houses, Hell' Gates, and other versions of a "Christian" haunted house experience. At some point, some churches decided an effective means of evangelism would be to literally scare the hell out of people. The whole approach reminds me of the travelling evangelist we used to encounter when I was growing up in the 1970's. He was a loud guy who turned red in the face, beating on the pulpit and his Bible, jumping and shouting "Turn or Burn!" and "REPENT!" OK, so let me just ask you this simple question. Have you ever been scared or threatened into any relationship with anyone that you would want anything to do with in the first place? Yes, we need to understand our sinful nature and that the wages of sin is death. But my experience has been that most folks understand their personal failures. In fact, the majority of people that I have met do not need to be convinced ...

OK, I admit it. I have had a cynical view of the millennial generation, the 20-somethings. But a couple of weeks ago, I got a glimpse of a couple hundred millennials that seriously restored my faith in this generation. I was invited to attend a Hive Gathering . In a nutshell, it is a group of a couple hundred people coming together to discuss what their dreams are, and to support them and help them move forward with their endeavor. When I began talking with some of the attendees, I quickly realized that there are a lot of people in this age range that are passionate about improving their communities and their world which was refreshing and encouraging. When I told them about Feed Forsyth , they all seemed to get excited about what we were doing and eager to find how they could help. The other big discovery for me was that so many of them had great ideas and ambitions but were stuck somewhere in the process. And, for many the sticking point was something on the horizon. I found m...

Over the last couple of months, it seems no matter where I turn, there is a steady stream of sad news. During a routine visit to a physician, a high school friend of mine discovered she has a tumor on her lung. She has been a trooper enduring test after test and finally surgery to remove part of her lung. I took a day of vacation to make preparations for the big canned good drive our nonprofit was holding at the local fair. At the end of the day, we drove up to where my SUV was parked to discover someone had run into the passenger door. They did not feel obligated to leave a note and assume responsibility for the damage. The next day, I had my hand squashed between a pallet jack and a slab of concrete. Later that afternoon while loading supplies in my SUV, we kept hearing sirens. I turned around to discover a neighbor's house was on fire. Fortunately, the family escaped without injury, and the Fire Department got it extinguished before it spread to other homes, but sadly,...

There has been a lot of talk in the news lately about Congress and State legislatures cutting the funding of the SNAP program (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program) . For those of you that might have missed this bit of news, SNAP benefits are scheduled to be reduced $11 a month for a family of one to a reduction of $36 a month for a family of four. All told, SNAP benefits will average under $1.40 a meal. (source: Center on Budget and Policy Priorities ) (Image Credit: Cbpp.org ) This discussion soon turns to the abuses of the system, people needing to work to qualify for assistance, and more. I have been stopped a couple of times over the last few weeks for my thoughts on the situation. While I know there are those who abuse the program, much like I know many people abuse many government programs, I also know that there are a lot of elderly and struggling families that need food assistance. I  also know that when the government reduces SNAP benefits, it sends thos...

A few weeks I go, I learned that I had been nominated for an Epoch award. If you have not heard of the Epoch awards, they seek to honor the unsung heroes that are quietly working to overcome poverty, drought, HIV/AIDS, sex trafficking, homelessness, and fear. There will be six winners chosen from a plethora of nominees and $50,000 will be awarded among the six winners. I had several reactions to learning of the nomination. First, I was humbled and honored to be in the nominations among the throngs of individuals and ministries. Every time I read the listing of the nominees and the work they are doing, I cannot help but feel like one guy trying to bail the ocean with a spoon. But I also am reminded that when an army of individuals do their part, a great deal of good can be accomplished. I keep getting hung up on the "unsung hero" part of their description, because I do not consider myself to be a hero with what we are doing. The real heroes to me are the volunteers that u...

I have loved the beach as long as I can remember. One of my fondest memories as a small child was going to Ft. Myers, Florida where my Grandfather retreated in the annual pilgrimage known as the flight of the blue hairs. Grandpa had a boat and loved to fish. I fondly remember the boat had a closed bow where he stored all of the life jackets, and this was where I would crawl up and sleep while the boat was in motion. In high school, the local Baptist Church youth group held a retreat every Summer at Panama City, and I made sure that my parents signed me up for it. I could not have given two shakes about the roll-a-coaster rides and amusement parks. I just wanted to be on the beach. When I was old enough to drive, I convinced my parents to let me go to the beach with a couple high school friends for Spring Break. While the some of the other kids were trying fake IDs to get into the Red Rooster bar, I was walking the beach - multiple trips a day. During college, I was 60 miles away...

(image source: http://www.spring.org.uk/ ) Earlier this week,  I was a part of a conversation regarding Twitter and how it seemed to be getting saturated with promotion and advertising while quality conversations were diminishing. I had been thinking this for a few months, but had been so busy finishing all of the work for graduate school and dealing with the needs of our nonprofit, I had not give it much attention. But the conversation gave me pause to consider that over the last several months I had begun to scroll through what was in my Twitter conversation stream trying to glean out anything of value and skipping the rest. It had gotten to where I was just scrolling and scrolling and scrolling and finding it quite annoying. What had changed? Was Twitter simply not of value anymore? As I began to consider the situation, I began to consider why I had originally begun to use Twitter and what value I had found in it. As I considered this, I started recalling conversatio...