A world of silence
When I open the front door, I am overwhelmed by the silence outside. How absolutely quiet the world has become! Usually there is at least some noise and movement at this... »
Personal Accounts
The best Christmas
The year we had very little money to spend on Christmas turned out to be our best ever! After a recent move to a new country, we’d had to leave behind all of our Christma... »
Celebration, not perfection
If you’re like me, you have an idea of what the perfect Christmas should be like. Maybe you have a mental picture of the perfect tree and decorations, somewhere ideal to... »
A time of miracles
A number of years ago, I lived and worked in a small volunteer center in the south of Russia. A week before Christmas, a snowstorm blew down the main power line for the w... »
Why the stable?
She brought forth her firstborn Son, and wrapped Him in swaddling cloths, and laid Him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn.—Luke 2:7 The Lord of th... »
Following the star
Every Christmas I picture the three wise men as they traveled through the desert in pursuit of that mysterious star. I can visualize them crossing the hot, sandy deserts... »
Alone at Christmas
I’d been trying not to think about Christmas, dreading the day, hoping against hope that some angel would come into my life and make everything okay. I even tried pretend... »
The caverns
For my son's twelfth birthday, he wanted to explore underground caverns near our home. I was less enthusiastic, but despite my efforts to come up with alternatives, he co... »
No challenge too great
The voices seemed muffled as I slowly woke out of the anesthesia following a medical procedure on my back. I heard the doctor’s gloomy prognosis: “She might not be able t... »
Life as a climb
The other day, some friends took me on what I thought would be a short climb. We parked the car and took a look at the summit. We got out our climbing gear and started pu... »
Painting a rainbow from life’s darkest storm
I first learned about Fu-Hua Chuang when my family and I watched a documentary that featured several severely disabled yet talented young people. I was struck by the radi... »
The secret supply
There is an old fable about two neighbors who planted similar orchards. One watered his plants every day, but the other, only every few days. When the dry season came, th... »
A card full of hope
He looked so sad when I first saw him. He was quite a few years older than I, but like I did during my first days in that impersonal hospital ward, he felt scared and wor... »