Shabazz Muhammad is a freshman basketball player at UCLA.  The Los Angeles Times recently ran a story about his path to college, and prospectively to the NBA, and how it was all neatly arranged and planned by his father, Ron Holmes.  How was this planned?  The details are to say the least, icky…   According [...]

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I am a huge fan of the Lord of the Rings books and movies.  The movies do take on different meanings and scenes then the books do sometimes, but they are both enjoyable.  There is a scene in the 2nd LOTR movie, The Two Towers, that speaks volumes to me about foster care and adoption. [...]

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My family jumped into the foster care arena in the spring of 2012.  After finishing classes, we waited until August to officially go on the list, and got placed almost immediately with a 4 day old boy.  We still have him, and have also fostered a newborn girl for a week, as well as another [...]

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DAY 26 :SERVICE  ”Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves.  Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interest of others.” – Philippians 2:3-4 {ESV} When my oldest daughter Katie was 5, I took her with our church group to [...]

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DAY 16 : FORGIVENESS “Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you. ” – Ephesians 4:32  {ESV} Forgiveness.  The very concept of forgiveness is the core of the faith.  God forgave us through Christ, not by our merit or works, but by His love.  When it comes to family and [...]

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DAY 10 : PREPARATION “Train up a child in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from it.” - Proverbs 22:6 {ESV} This verse is often used as a “promise” or guarantee verse among well-intentioned people.  Many parents over the years have dealt with the guilt of a wayward child [...]

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I read a news story today concerning a recent arrest made in the Phoenix Valley.  2 girls, ages 14 and 18, were taken into custody after propositioning 2 men to exchange sexual favors for fast food.  As I read through the story, some familiar statistics repeated themselves.  The average age a girl enters prostitution in [...]

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Take a walk through most any bookstore, be it a Christian based store or a secular one, and you will see that parenting books are like opinions – everyone has one.  Some are full of great wisdom, and some are full of practical application, but seldom do the 2 mix in 1 work.  Grace Based [...]

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Do you remember that kid in church?  You know the one – he knew all the big biblical answers in youth group, worked recreation every summer for VBS, and sang solo in the church youth choir.  All the little old ladies who sat in the back of the church sang his praises while all the [...]

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I was watching a reality show the other day – the ones where the little girls look like 20 year olds for crowns and money.  I don’t normally watch the show as I get disgusted by it, but this one advertised a Christian mother and daughter in it and I usually watch shows like that [...]

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