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Butterfly A man found a cocoon of a butterfly. One day a small opening appeared. He sat and watched the butterfly for several hours as it struggled to force its body through that little hole. Then it seemed to stop making any progress. It appeared as if it had gotten as far as it could, and it could…

Poem by Annie Johnson Flint

When they frightened this nation years ago with the rumor of an invasion by the French, the Russians, or somebody or other, what was the result? Everybody became warlike. Our young men joined rifle clubs and our elderly men furbished up their old blunderbusses. Everybody hastened to arm himself to protect…

Philipp Melancthon mourned in his day the divisions among Protestants, and sought to bring the Protestants together by a parable of the war between the wolves and the dogs: The wolves were somewhat afraid, for the dogs were many and strong, and therefore they sent out a spy to observe them. On his return,…

When a man has been drowning, I have heard that his sensations have often been very pleasant. But when the circulation of the blood commences again, pain begins at once. And the more pain he suffers, the more surely is he being restored to life. It is just so with the spiritual blood that is circulating…

Going down to Sheerness on Friday, I was told by someone that during the recent gale several of the ships there had their anchors rent up. They had gone dashing against the other ships and had done considerable damage. Now, if their anchors had held fast and firm, no damage would have been done. Ask…

Police in New Jersey say a man has been charged with leaving the scene of an accident and reckless driving backing his car into a utility pole. David Scarpa turned himself in to authorities the following day and told them he had left the scene of the accident because he did not want to deal with his…

In The Culture Map: Breaking Through the Invisible Boundaries of Global Business, Erin Meyer writes, “There’s a wise Bahamian proverb: ‘To engage in conflict, one does not need to bring a knife that cuts, but a needle that sews.’” —Jim L. Wilson The Culture Map, 218 Colossians 3:13 (CSB) bearing with…

Major league baseball has been trying to eliminate some of the arguments from the game. One recent innovation that has reduced many contentious moments is the instant replay. A team of umpires located in a New York studio with video feeds to every big league ball park view close, contested plays review…

Two California drivers were willing to spend part of their evening vying for a parking spot and their struggle was captured and narrated by a neighbor who watched the events unfold. Mariah Flores saw the parking battle and dubbed the participants, the black car and the silver car. The battle began as…

Mary Ziegler and Bill Henrichs were high school sweethearts who later married. Things didn’t work out however, and 23-years ago they were divorced. They kept in touch and remained friends. Then last year, Bill discovered that his kidneys were failing. All his family and some 40 family friends were tested…

Greg Snider pulled into a parking lot in Houston to make a business call. While he was there, a homeless man approached the car and asked for change, so Snider gave him 75 cents and drove off. When Snider pulled onto a nearby freeway, police stopped him and surprised him by how aggressive the officers…

The quick eye of a Goodwill worker in southern New Jersey turned up a valuable piece of U.S. history. The worker saw that a donated frame contained pages of an original newspaper from 1774 with the iconic “Unite or Die” design in the masthead. The pages from the “Pennsylvania Journal and the Weekly Advertiser”…

Caroline Hacker used social media to urge people not to park at the airport when she returned from her family vacation. Why? There were so many ants in the car that her eleven month-old daughter had ants crawling on her during the trip home. Airport officials offered to pay the cost of cleaning, and…

District Attorney in Pasco County in Florida charged Curtis Reeves, 71, a retired Tampa police officer with a second-degree murder after he shot and killed Chad Oulson in a movie theater. According to the report, Reeves was angry because the victim was using his phone to send a text. Reeve’s personnel…

When writing a screen play for a movie, the author needs to be aware of the importance of conflict. Without conflict there is no plot. The only way to make a story interesting is to have conflict between characters, internal conflict, or conflict with nature. In the arts, as in life, conflict happens.…

Yusuf Alchagirov is an 80-year-old Russia shepherd. While picking raspberries in a field near the Russian border with Georgia he was confronted by a large bear. Yusuf and the bear had a tussle with the shepherd continually head butting the bear. Finally the bear tossed Alchagirov off a cliff. The shepherd…

Antonius Hart Sr. and his son Antonius Hart Jr. drove away from the Pirtle’s Chicken restaurant without realizing the server forgot to add the wings they ordered. When they returned and complained the restaurant offered them replacement wings but that did not satisfy them--they demanded extra chicken…

During the heated rhetoric, protests, and counter demonstrations on their University Campus, the University of California at Berkeley set up a tent for the two sides to communicate and find common ground. During one session, passions began to run high until a fistfight broke out and almost knocked over…

In his book, The Insanity of God, Nik Ripken tells the story of a Southern Gentleman, “Bubba”, who responded with kindness in a difficult situation. The setting is war-torn Somolia, where Ripken served as a missionary, bringing relief to those caught in the war-famine-refugee-poverty cycle. It was a…

A month and a half after Election Day in 2016, Joe Chandler, from Georgia, is refusing to find out who won the presidential election. He says that on the day after the vote he woke up feeling happy and relaxed and decided not to ruin the mood by seeing the election result. So, for 6 weeks he has avoided…

In Flickering Pixels, Shane Hipps writes, “Without a framework for healthy conflict, diagnosing problems—let alone solving them—becomes extremely difficult. When we learn to welcome conflict as a natural part of human community, we can dispel some of its destructive power. In fact, under the right circumstances,…

In Flickering Pixels, Shane Hipps writes, “Even though face-to-face conflict is often avoided in individualistic cultures, that doesn’t mean it goes away. Conflict simmers in the shadowy back alleys of relationships. Eventually, it will find more insidious ways to disrupt our lives if we don’t keep it…

In Every Congregation Needs a Little Conflict, George Bullard writes, “Simply defined, conflict is the struggle of two objects seeking to occupy the same space at the same time. Purposes, objectives, or goals can be in conflict among individuals, groups, or organizations. Conflict is not an objective…