Does God Ever Seem Unreachable?

The lovely Debra Pedrow is featuring an article of mine on her website today about a time when a classmate and I failed to summit a volcano in the Mexican wilderness.


Anton Repponen

Here's how it begins:

In 1943 a Mexican farmer named Dionisio Pulido smelled something like rotten eggs. Thinking little of it, he continued working to prepare his land for spring planting. 

Not long after he noticed a crack forming in his field. 

Residents of Paríctuin and surrounding towns in south central Mexico had reported hearing thunder for days, even though the skies were clear. 

Within a few hours of spotting the crack, the farmer saw smoke billowing upwards from the hole. Dionisio Pulido had stumbled upon a developing volcano. 

By nightfall the volcano was in full eruption, spewing forth ash and liquified rock. The entire town would soon be under lava. After nearly ten years of eruptions, Parícutin, as the volcano came to be known, stood over 400 meters tall. 

That’s what Ben and I had come to see.

Are We Alienating People from Christ?

One of the things they don't tell you when you're a teenager trolling the shelves at Barnes and Noble, envisioning your name on one of the covers, is the amount of marketing you have to do when you're an author.

They really should train the staff to spy out aspiring book geeks like myself. Once spotted, the be-smocked bookseller could politely tap him or her on the shoulder and say, "You realize writing the books is just the beginning, right?" Then those whose bubbles are tough enough not to burst from the reality check could double down on their dreams, gird their loins, and pick up a marketing book while they're there.


Alexander Ronsdorf




As an author trying to create a career from my writing, my favorite source for practical marketing advice is the podcast interview. They are free sources of information from people in the trenches of online advertising and content marketing.

(Want to know which Christian podcasts I listen to? Click here).

Several months ago, while listening to one such interview with a well-respected marketer, the interviewee made an offhand statement, tangential to the conversation. The aside served as a metaphor to illustrate popular ignorance. He said, essentially, that evolution is a scientific fact, yet millions of people reject it. The implication was clear: these people are idiots, and no amount of logic will cut through that.

How to Find Peace This Election Season




I'm guest posting at Kevin Halloran's site today about how not to freak out in response to the upcoming presidential election. Here's a snippet:


If you were to ask just about any Christian his or her take on the status of America today, I can bet the answer would be more negative than positive.
Respondents might cite moral decay exacerbated by the embrace of postmodernism, debilitating national debt, racial violence, erosion of freedoms, and the list goes on. Were I to assess the situation myself, I would be inclined to agree with such a summation. The nation appears headed in the wrong direction morally, politically, financially, and just about every other “ly” word you can think of.
But as bad as things seem to us in the 21st Century, Jews in 2nd Century BC Palestine had it much worse.


Click here to read the rest on KevinHalloran.net.


P. S. My most recent book, Under the Sun: Discover Your Calling and Live a Meaningful Life is on sale today for 0.99. Hurry up and grab your copy!