I once sang the lovely song, “I Want to Know You More.“ One line comes and goes very quickly, but it has such poignancy for me. When I sang it, I meant it, yet how could I really mean it?

The assertion is too grand: “And I would give my final breath, to know you in your death and resurrection-oh, I want to know you more.“

Matthew 8 changed my life. It was this passage that made me get a pencil and begin writing prayers in my Bible.

When Jesus came to Capernaum, the centurion sought him out and asked him to heal his suffering servant. Jesus offered to go with him, but the centurion said he did not “deserve” to have Jesus to come under his roof. He also said he was acquainted with “authority,“ and he knew all Jesus had to do was say it was done, and it would be.

I am impressed by the sensitivity to and devotion for God that made Nehemiah so tenaciously seek to do each thing God put before him to do.

He wasn’t too, too important, too busy, too apathetic.

The list of why life’s not easy is long.

Wouldn’t you agree that making mistakes ranks high on the list?  But sometimes the dreadful experience of making a mistake is not made worse with criticism, but instead an encourager offers help.

He or she does this in many ways, from something as simple as sharing a “war story” or as grandiose as planning another missionary trip.

That was how Barnabas encouraged John Mark.