Posts by John Staiger (Page 104)

Trigger warning—this might sound like an anti-booze diatribe! Eighteen is the legal age to buy alcohol in New Zealand. Like some other Western countries, it is considered a rite of passage into manhood to go out and get wasted. You would think that it was tantamount to a Sunday picnic the way some talk. The bits about fights, rapes, domestic violence, car accidents and suicides seem to be left out of the ‘war stories.’ As far as I can tell…

When I ask young people what lessons they have learned the hard way, they speak of fake friends, wasted money and lost opportunities (usually all in the same sentence). It is naturally hard for them to understand that life is God’s classroom, and that much pain can be avoided if godly instruction is heeded first. Some things are best NOT learned the hard way. But they are best learned the hard way than not at all. So, here are my “Seventeen…

In my youth I borrowed $1000 dollars from a finance company. I paid my installments by the monthly due date as stipulated. A few days later a very official letter would arrive telling me that failure to pay had serious legal ramifications. It scared my 17 year old personage half to death. Following line upon line of legal jargon, right at the end of the depressing missive, I read a statement which read: “If payment has been made, please ignore…

Apparently, Lord Nelson attributed all his successes in life to being 15 minutes early on every occasion. “To that quarter of an hour I owe everything in life,” he is quoted as saying. If you are 15 minutes early to everything, then I would guess that there is to be found in the act either commendation or pity. Commendation for your cast iron resolve to first get everything and everyone where they need to be, or pity for the poor…

When Jacob clamped eyes on Rachel, he was smitten (Gen.29ff). He apparently didn’t even give Rachel’s older sister, Leah, a second look—poor Leah. Rachel became his sole focus for the duration of the seven-year contract he made with Uncle Laban. The contract designed to secure Rachel as his bride. The years passed quickly, the work seemed as nothing, the wedding was a raving success, and the new day’s sun was set to rise on the best day of…Rachel’s sister’s life.…

Teenagers are amazing. They are incredibly insightful, overloaded with energy and untapped potential that is seemingly inexhaustible. Teenagers are truth-seekers, they weigh your words and actions down to the micro-gram, look straight through your mask to see if there is more than one face in there and can feel the genuineness of your heart from 50 paces. All this is true and just the tip of the iceberg. There is no ‘but’ coming. I have raised three teenagers and preached…

It depended on the day as to what kind of answer you got from my mother about being the mother of 14 children. I am sure that a good day was looking back with satisfaction at a job well done. A bad day was probably the memories of utter exhaustion at all the work required to keep things moving. I was the twelfth child, and two more followed. Looking back, I see the good. Problem solving must have been a…

The rise of Pentecostalism in the 20th century caused much discussion about apostleship. One old brother, during a discussion on modern day apostles, expressed in no uncertain terms: “There will be no apostles in this congregation while I’m alive.” Of course, no one was saying there should be. Sadly, and as is often the way, he killed study on the subject ‘dead!’ When Judas went the way of all flesh, the apostles saw in scripture the solution to the numerical shortfall…

They say that there are two kinds of drivers. The first says, “Look the fuel gauge is on half full, where’s a petrol station?” The other says, “Yeah, I see the gauge is on empty, but I know my car!” Somebody suggested that these two people are usually married to each other. The parable of the 10 virgins (Mt.25:1-13) is Jesus’ way of saying, ‘If you want to follow me home, you had better not run out of fuel. Otherwise,…

The battles that took place in Genesis 14 would be lost to history, but for Abraham’s nephew, Lot. Kedorlaomer and his 3 allied kings soundly defeated the other confederation of 5 kings, and in the process carried off Lot from Sodom and Gomorrah. Subsequently, Abraham mobilized his 318 fighting men to rescue Lot. Many a prosperity preacher has justified their riches by pointing to Abraham as a man of obvious wealth and resources. No one can argue with the latter point.…