He likes to be called “King James,” playing off the namesake of the King James Bible. When he answers his phone he refers to himself  as “The King.” He embraces his nickname as “The Chosen One.” He encourages his fans to “Witness” his greatness. He posed for the photo you see to the left and approved of having three lions photoshopped at his feet. And he flippantly refers to God as “The Greater Man upstairs.” I used to love Lebron James. He came from humble beginnings in a small Ohio town, [Read more...]

I have long been an admirer of Gandhi the man, though when I was still an atheist (nearly 20 years ago) I thought very little of him. Being a fairly contemporary foreign figure, he wasn’t presented in American history books when I was a kid, and with only ETV to provide educational programming students of my day were left with encyclopedias and magazines as our sole sources of daily information (unless of course you were raised in an educated family with the time and resources to teach above and beyond, which I was not), so I thank God that my US Navy blue class parents had the gumption to buy me a set of World Book encyclopedias [Read more...]

I hadn’t spoken with my childhood friend Rick Ruonala since high school, so learning of his own transformation into a true disciple of Christ was a wonderful encouragement to me. He was a couple years ahead of me in school, so I always looked up to him, especially since his younger brother Ray was one of my best friends and the only guy my age that I KNEW was a better athlete than me… and their Dad being the Chief of Police also added to the intrigue of the Ruonala family, especially since Rick and Ray were better role models for jocks and other “big-men-on-campus who like cheap thrills,” far from models of moral living. How things change… [Read more...]