In Jesus Mean and Wild, author Mark Galli discusses the challenge of repentance in American culture:

I look at myself some days and it's hard to imagine that I am a miserable offender and that there is no health in me [as the Book of Common Prayer suggests]. I go to church. I read my Bible. I help at the homeless shelter once a month. At home, I do the dishes, take out the trash, and don't beat my ...

Haddon Robinson writes about something the apostle Paul could certainly identify with, namely, the tendency of the law to put ideas in our heads:

The law can prompt us to sin. I am told that several years ago a high-rise hotel was built in Galveston, Texas, overlooking the Gulf of Mexico. In fact, they sank pilings into the gulf and built the structure out over the water. When the hotel was about ...

Based upon a true story, The Exorcism of Emily Rose tells the story of Father Moore (played by Tom Wilkinson), a priest on trial for the murder of a young girl named Emily Rose (Jennifer Carpenter) who died during an exorcism he supervised. As the movie progresses, the priest's formerly skeptic lawyer comes to believe that there may be actual supernatural forces at play. She begins to argue that Father ...

I took a job as an accountant in downtown Chicago. As your basic 9-to-5 bookkeeper, my duties included managing the petty cash. Salesmen would come in from the road and turn in their receipts. I'd give them cash and put the receipts in the petty-cash drawer. At the end of the day, I'd have to reconcile what was in the drawer with the receipts. It was always close, but it never balanced. At five o'clock, ...

"Injustice is relatively easy to bear; what stings is justice." —H. L. Mencken

In the film The Shawshank Redemption, Ellis "Red" Redding has spent his prime wasting away in prison because of a reckless act of violence he committed as a teenager. After 40 years of incarceration, Red finally receives his release to enjoy the freedom for which he's longed.

However, he can't free himself from the habit of asking for permission each time he wishes to use the men's room. He's become ...

It's amazing what some people will do to be spiritual. On September 18, 2003, Genshin Fujinami, 44, a Buddhist priest nicknamed the "Marathon Monk," finished a seven-year, 24,800-mile journey in the Hiei Mountains of Japan. It was intended to be a trek to enlightenment.

Once a monk starts this journey he must finish or kill himself. According to an Associated Press article, for the first three years ...

In the spring of 2002, I left work early so I could have some uninterrupted study time before my final exam in the Youth Ministry class at Hannibal-LaGrange College in Missouri. When I got to class, everybody was doing their last-minute studying. The teacher came in and said he would review with us before the test. Most of his review came right from the study guide, but there were some things he ...

I often compare the role of the law in history to the role typewriters have played in the development of word processing. The technology and idea of a typewriter was eventually developed into an electronic, faster, and far more complex computer that does word processing. But when typing on a computer, we realize that we are still using the old manual typewriter's technology. Further, we realize that ...

Ben Rogozensky was already in big trouble. He was waiting with his lawyer for a court hearing in an empty room at the DeKalb County Courthouse near Atlanta. He was facing charges of obstructing officers and giving false information. While meeting with his attorney, Mr. Rogozensky excused himself to go to the bathroom and used a stool to climb into the ceiling in order to make an escape. He was on ...