Cleansing

Copper kettle cleaned up (illustration)

A woman once wrote that at a garage sale she had spotted a handsome antique copper kettle for only $2.50. It was badly tarnished, so she asked the woman running the sale if the discoloration would come out. She cheerfully offered to try some copper cleaner on it and disappeared …

“Wash Me” (illustration)

“Wash me!” was the anguished prayer of King David."Wash!” was the message of John the Baptist."Unless I was you, you have no part with me,” said the towel draped Jesus to Peter.Without our being washed clean by the blood of Christ we will all die i …

Making Resolutions (illustration)

Those who refuse to make New Years resolutions because they always break them anyway are missing the point. Making resolutions is a cleansing ritual of self-assessment and repentance that demands personal honesty and reinforces humility. Breaking them is part of the cycle. (Sourc …

Doctor Born into a World of Dying Women (illustration)

In 1818, Ignaz Phillip Semmelweis was born into a world of dying women. The finest hospitals lost one out of six young mothers to the scourge of “childbed fever.” A doctor’s daily routine began in the dissecting room where he performed autopsies. From there he mad …

Tony Campolo - Jesus Took Our Sins on Himself (illustration)

While spending a few days as the religious-emphasis-week speaker on the campus of a Christian college, I talked with a senior who seemed quite casual about the sins in his life. He told me about having an affair with a married woman. Then he said, “Whenever I commit sin, I r …

Why Didn’t The Pastor Just Spank Him? (illustration)

A three-year-old daughter, at a baptismal service, asked her parents, “Why did the pastor push that guy in the water?’ The wife tried to explain briefly and quietly, but the little girl just wouldn’t be satisfied. Later that night she tried to provide an answer that a chil …