Joe Barnett

He has risen! He is not here.               —Mark 16:6 It was in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel classifieds … “Used tombstone for sale: real bargain for someone named Dingo.” OK, my curiosity piqued … I would really like to know who Dingo was and why the tombstone where they […]

In the same way you judge others, you will be judged.        —Matthew 7:1 On boarding the cruise ship he was given the location of his cabin and the name of his cabin mate. After checking out both, he went to the purser’s quarters and asked if he could leave his watch and

Who makes you different from anyone else? What do you have that you did not receive?                        —1 Corinthians 4:7 The Fortune 500 CEO was picking up a prescription at the pharmacy when he saw his wife talking to a drugstore employee she had dated

Love your neighbor as yourself.                    —James 2:8 According to a Wall Street Journal article, the average American commits three crimes a day, unknowingly violating some of the more than 300,000 federal laws. The U.S. Tax Code alone weighs in at over 60,000 pages. You have to

A cheerful heart is good medicine.               —Proverbs 17:22 In The Hiding Place Corrie ten Boom introduces us to Bep, a bitter old woman who had come to live with them. Bep constantly compares the flaws of the ten Booms to the perfection of the Wallers, with whom she

Justified freely by his grace.            —Romans 3:24 Marilyn vos Savant, long-time Ask Marilyn columnist for Parade Magazine, nailed the highest I.Q. score ever recorded at the time—228. It’s brash for someone with a two-digit I.Q. to challenge Marilyn, but here goes … “Sometimes,” she wrote, “I just wish that we

He does not treat us as our sins deserve.                          —Psalm 103:10 Do you have any regrets? Sure you do. We all get the shivers thinking about the foolish things we’ve done. We wish we could retract thoughtless words we’ve spouted and get do-overs

Let us purify ourselves from everything that contaminates body and spirit.              —2 Corinthians 7:1 Today we continue with John Wesley’s 21 questions for self-examination. Do I get to bed on time and get up on time? Do I disobey God in anything? Do I insist upon doing something about

Examine yourselves … test yourselves. —2 Corinthians 13:5 In 1729 John Wesley jotted down 21 questions for his own self-examination. Those questions remain as relevant today as the day he wrote them. Am I consciously or unconsciously creating the impression that I am better than I am? In other words, am I a hypocrite? Am

The Sovereign Lord comes with power.                         —Isaiah 40:10 The nation of Judah paid a high price for her sins. We sometimes wonder if there is any hope for ours. God dispatched Isaiah to remind Judah—and us—that this is his world and he is