Did you know that (as of this Sunday) there are only 78 days until Christmas? That’s right. And retail stores are already helping you prepare. Why wait until Advent, or after Thanksgiving, when you can start buying Christmas gifts, candy, and decorations in early October? There is an art to waiting, especially for those of us who live in an “on-demand” culture that becomes frustrated about having to wait ten minutes to download a two-hour movie. LinC talks about waiting and what it means to live in God’s time. Key Scriptures: Genesis 15:1-6; 16:1-16; Deuteronomy 34:1-5; Jeremiah 29:4-14. Last month students at a school in West Branch, Michigan, voted one of their classmates, Whitney Kropp, onto the homecoming court as a prank. Kropp considered not attending the ceremony at the school’s homecoming football game but instead decided to stand up to her bullies. Many of her peers and other people in the community rallied around her, and she walked onto the field last weekend to thunderous applause. The topic of bullying comes up a lot. And while we often talk about the damage done by bullies, we don’t always talk about how we should respond to them. Next week we’ll do exactly that and look at how to answer bullies with the strength of God’s love and the Holy Spirit.
