Some day all will cease to be fuzzy. Some day the Lord will pull back the curtain and let us enjoy clarity. In the meantime, mysteries abound.

So here are the enigmas I find pummeling me this morning:

Chemtrails: Are "they" spraying stuff from the backs of some aircraft in an effort to]]> Sat, 14 Feb 2009 01:59:21 -0800 http://virb.com/boundless/posts/text/1087839 http://virb.com/boundless/posts/text/1087838 Given recent conflict over the merits of the massive so-called stimulus bill -- especially provisions to include contraception -- it's more important than ever to make the case for babies. Even in an economic downturn. Of course, so is making the case for parents taking responsibility for those babies once they're born. Frank Pastore's commentary in Crosswalk gets it wrong. He writes:

But something is wrong, very wrong, when we're growing so many citizens who don't even try to pay their own way, who willfully choose to take limited resources away from deserving others, and who live in such a way that they just assume it's someone else's responsibility to take care of them.

Babies aren't the problem. Government programs that displace fathers and encourage promiscuity and irresponsibility are.

I returned last night from my annual trip to the National Religious Broadcasters Convention in Nashville. This year, two of my team members came with me, and in addition to staging photo shoots to chronicle our trip (see my FB page), drinking expensive coffee drinks (hail to a latte called the Jittery Monkey), and occasionally doing the work actually assigned them (good job, ladies) they spent their time trying to set me up with any guy who looked remotely unattached. Turns out some of the guys were actually attached (awkward), but the girls remained undaunted.

On our flight to Nashville, I wore a Boundless T-shirt. A flight attendant asked me what "Boundless" is, and I gave him the scoop. He looked at me and my coworkers and countered with "You look more like the cast of 'Girls Gone Wild.'" We're still not sure where that came from. I recovered when we landed in Nashville and there was a Bill Gaither sign above baggage claim that proclaimed "Welcome Home." Yay! The rest of the week was a flurry of meetings, presentations, events and handshakes with friends old and new.

One of the highlights of the trip was meeting Katie and Liza, two listeners to the show. Katie was at NRB with her company, so we met and chatted for about an hour. What a fun girl! She gave me some good show suggestions, but, while helpful, they were slightly overshadowed by the box of homemade white chocolate peanut clusters she presented me. Liza wasn't at the convention, but lives in Nashville, so drove all the way to the hotel to say "hello." I learned about her plans to go to seminary, and she gave me the inside scoop on the Christian music industry. Good times. If I'm ever in your area, or if you're in Colorado Springs, make sure we arrange to meet!

Valentine's Day Smackdown -- 00:00
Has a year passed since our last Valentine's Day show? Hard to believe. The VDay gift from my sister arrived yesterday, but I'm holding out until tomorrow to open it. In the meantime, the team (including new team member Ashley Harris!) joins me to discuss what's in and what's out when it comes to making plans for the holiday.

The Sonflowerz -- 16:21
This week's music is provided by The Sonflowerz, a fun sister duo whose new album All Over the World is making an impact in]]> Sat, 14 Feb 2009 01:59:20 -0800 http://virb.com/boundless/posts/text/1087837 http://virb.com/boundless/posts/text/1086516 If there's one reason I'm thankful that the campaigning season is over, it's so that I don't have to hear the "individual story" (or the "personification" of an issue or whatever you wanna call it) anymore.

You know, when an interviewer asks, "So, Senator, why are you in favor of a homeschooling tax break?"

"Well, let me tell you," Senator Smith says, "because of people like Ted Slater of Colorado Springs, a hard working man, trying to educate his kids at home, blah, blah."

Or, "So, Senator, why do you favor providing subsidies for stay-at-home Christian bloggers?"

"Well, let me tell you," Senator Jones says, "it's because of people like Heather Koerner of Tulsa, Oklahoma, who is slaving away right now on her PC, but hears everyone talking about how great Macs are. We should not be a nation of have-Macs and have-not-Macs, so I think that Heather, blah, blah, blah."

Makes we want to throw a shoe at the TV.

It's not that individual stories aren't instructive. They can, and sometimes do, have something to teach us. It's just that individual stories aren't necessarily prescriptive. National PC policy should not be made just because I want to try a Mac.

That's what made me a little hesitant about passing on this article: "Madonna syndrome: I should have ditched feminism for love, children and baking" in the Times.

In it, author Zoe Lewis, talks about how she was imbued by her feminist mother with "the great values of choice, equality and sexual liberation" but that how "now, nearly 37, those same values leave me feeling cold."

Here's the thing. One feminist denouncing feminism doesn't necessarily make feminism wrong, in the same way that someone denouncing the Christian faith doesn't make Christianity wrong. What makes feminism right or wrong is how it lines up with Scripture. As Christians, we start with the Truth, God's Word. We learn what it tells us about being male and female, about being husbands and wives and about being mothers and fathers. We strive to make sure that the Word, not the world, shapes our priorities.

But, still, stories like this can be instructive to us. They can show us how even a woman who doesn't share our faith, still shares our Creator and still feels the pull of His design.

She writes:

"I was led to believe that women could 'have it all' and, more to the point, that we wanted it all. To that end I have spent 20 years ruthlessly pursuing my dreams - to be a successful playwright. I have sacrificed all my womanly duties and laid it all at the altar of a career. And was it worth it? The answer has to be a resounding no."

"...Somewhere inside lurks a woman I cannot control and she is in the kitchen with a baby on her hip and dough in her hand, staring me down. She is saying: 'This is happiness, this is what it's all about' It's an instinct that makes me a woman, an instinct that I can't ignore even if I wanted to."

"...I argue that women's libbers of the Sixties and Seventies put careerism at the forefront, trampling the traditional role of women underneath their Doc Martens. I wish a more balanced view of womanhood had been available to me. I wish that being a housewife or a mother wasn't such a toxic idea to middle-class liberals of yesteryear."

"...In the future I hope that there can be a better understanding of women by women. The past 25 years have been confusing and I feel that I've been caught in the crossfire. As women we should accept each other rather than just appreciating 'success'. I have always felt a huge pressure to be successful to show men that I am their equal. What a waste of time. Wife and mother should be given parity with the careerist role in the minds of feminists."

"... I wish I'd had the advice that I am giving to my 21-year-old sister: if you find a great guy, don't be afraid to settle down and have kids because there isn't anything to miss out on that you can't do later (apart from having kids)."

In case you haven't noticed, evolution is becoming quite popular. Even confessing Christians are jumping on the bandwagon. It's not surprising really. Just look at the controversial Clergy Letter Project which began in 2004. As of today, almost 12,000 confessing Christian clergy in the U.S. have signed the "Open Letter Concerning Religion and Science." It begins,

While virtually all Christians take the Bible seriously and hold it to be authoritative in matters of faith and practice, the overwhelming majority do not read the Bible literally, as they would a science textbook. Many of the beloved stories found in the Bible - the Creation, Adam and Eve, Noah and the ark - convey timeless truths about God, human beings, and the proper relationship between Creator and creation expressed in the only form capable of transmitting these truths from generation to generation. Religious truth is of a different order from scientific truth. Its purpose is not to convey scientific information but to transform hearts.

What a contrast to today's Boundless article from Dr. Jonathan Sarfati, "Lousy Creationist Arguments." Instead of separating religious truth from scientific -- as Bible illiteralists -- Dr. Sarfati unapologetically offers his framework for all considerations ... Scripture.

The authority of the Bible is the main emphasis of Creation Ministries International. We don't try to "prove" the Bible with science; rather, we accept the Bible's propositions as true without proof, i.e. as axioms or presuppositions.

All philosophical systems, not just Christianity, start with axioms. There are good reasons for accepting the axioms of Scripture as true, because it can be shown that they lead to a consistent view of physical and moral reality, which other axioms can't provide.

Genesis contains a number of Hebrew grammatical features that show it was intended to teach a straightforward history of the world from its creation. Genesis, backed up by the rest of Scripture, unambiguously teaches that:

• The heavens, Earth and everything in them were created in six consecutive normal days, the same as those of our working week (Exodus 20:8-11).
• Earth is about 6,000 years old, since Jesus said mankind was there from the "beginning of creation," not billions of years later (Mark 10:6).
• Adam sinned and brought physical death to mankind (Romans 5:12-19; 1 Corinthians 15:21-22).
• Since man was the federal head of creation, the whole creation was cursed (Romans 8:20-22), which included death to animals, with the end of the original vegetarian diet for both humans and animals (Genesis 1:29-30).
• God judged the world by a globe-covering Flood, which Jesus and Peter compared with the coming Judgment (Luke 17:26-27; 2 Peter 3:3-7). This destroyed all land vertebrate animals and people not on the ocean-liner-sized Ark.
• God then judged the people by confusing their language at Babel -- after they had refused to spread out and repopulate the Earth after the Flood.

It's important to realize that all "facts" of science do not speak for themselves, but are interpreted within a framework.

Evolutionists start with the axiom of naturalism or materialism, i.e. God (if He even exists) performed no miraculous acts of creation.

Biblical creationists interpret the same facts and observations, but within the framework outlined above.

So before you break out your ape suit and throw a primordial soup dinner party, consider which framework]]> Fri, 13 Feb 2009 09:19:13 -0800 http://virb.com/boundless/posts/text/1086515 http://virb.com/boundless/posts/text/1086514 Several college students nearing graduation responded to my post "Layoffs and Survivor's Guilt" expressing concerns about getting a job. And it's definitely more difficult to do during a recession. But as I've written previously, young adults are probably most able to absorb the tough job market. An option many have chosen is simply riding out the recession by pursuing more education.

According to this article, graduate school applications at U.S. universities are experiencing a surge.

Historically, graduate school applications spike during economic downturns, and already, many U.S. universities have seen significant increases.

Applications to the University of Texas' Masters in Business Administration program have soared by 24% for the spring semester, George Washington University graduate programs experienced a 7% hike and the University of California, Berkeley, saw an overall 6% rise in applications to its graduate academic programs, in which engineering and computer sciences dominate with an 11-point increase, according to Corinne Kosmitzki, director of graduate admissions at U.C. Berkeley.

Graduate school's expensive; so who's paying? Not the parents, most likely.

"I'm kind of thinking my future husband will pay it off," Miriam jokes. "Just kidding," she says after a short pause. "I'm paying for the loan."

She may be kidding, but that's exactly what happens to many couples. It's why some financial planners encourage students to pursue graduate work for the right reasons.

More and more young adults in the 22-26 demographic are taking on a financial burden in order to make themselves more marketable in an unstable economy. After paying for their children's undergraduate education, struggling to put food on the table post-layoffs or saving for a near-approaching rainy day, mom and dad are all tapped out, notes Catherine Williams, vice president of financial literacy for Money Management International, a non-profit, Houston-based credit-counseling organization.

Williams says many students she speaks with realize that taking out loans during an economic crisis "is crazy;" however, they choose to take on more debt in order to acquire degrees that would bring them sustainable income. However, Jeremy Vohwinkle, About.com's financial planning specialist warns, "Students need to be sure they are pursuing the degree for the right reasons with a high likelihood of maximizing the return on that money spent. Getting a degree for the sake of getting it because it's hard to find a job could do more harm than good."

I agree.]]> Fri, 13 Feb 2009 09:19:12 -0800 http://virb.com/boundless/posts/text/1086514 http://virb.com/boundless/posts/text/1086513 Tomorrow Lisa will write her usual, amazing podcast summary. You know the one. It will make you laugh; it will make you cry; it will make you update your iTunes subscription. You can wait to laugh and]]> Fri, 13 Feb 2009 09:19:11 -0800 http://virb.com/boundless/posts/text/1086513 http://virb.com/boundless/posts/text/1086512 Everyone experiences suffering. As I type this, individuals in Colorado Springs and Toronto and London and Makati and Auckland are hurting.

And folks throughout Australia -- with its bushfires and flooding -- are suffering in heartbreaking ways.

This morning I received the following e-mail from Cate:

Hi there,

My family (Mum, Dad, myself and my three little sisters) lived in the small town in Victoria. There were warnings that bushfires were 5 kilometres away and we were getting ready to evacuate. We had grabbed the family photos, important documents, blankets for the night in the evacution centre and some extra clothes but just as we were about to leave the fire came surging over the hill north of our property. We all scrambled for the car and sped off along the south road from our property. My two youngest sisters were crying and screaming about the pets my dad forced them to leave behind. Mum and I were trying to calm them down and praying God would spare our house. But just as we turned around the next corner we saw fire coming up on the south of our property. We were being closed in on both sides. We all began to panic but Dad said nothing and turned the car around and started heading towards the dam, there wasn't enough time to take any other route out.

We got to the dam, by this time we were coughing really badly and sky was black with smoke. Dad made us all get in the water, he grabbed the blankets and wet them and we all started to swim out to the raft ancored in the middle of the dam. We could see the fire coming and started to feel the heat. My parents and I dragged my sisters through the water because they were too distraught to swim properly. Finally we climbed on the raft, we lay there with the wet blankets on top of us. The plan was that when the fire came we would all slide off the raft into the water with the blankets over our heads and tread water until it passed around the dam. My dad kept looking out the side of blanket to see how close it was. He could see headlights in the distance through the smoke and realised that our neighbours were also driving to our dam.

He said he had to go and help despite our pleas. He said he'd be back in a few minutes and jumped off the raft swam to the edge and got into the truck and started out towards the lights. That is the last we ever saw of him. We don't know what happened ... we know they didn't make it. Him and our neighbouring family of 5 were caught in the fire 1/2 a km from the dam.

The fire came and we slid off the raft into the water, the smoke and heat were incredible and but the wet blankets were amazing in keeping the air breathable and the heat manageable. While we tread water we all cried, we all knew Dad hadn't made it, there was no way. In all honesty I didn't feel like treading water, this was a nightmare and I could have easily just let myself slip away. I know that sounds selfish because I was there with my mum and sisters but that's the way it was.

The fire passed. We survived and climbed back onto the raft, we didn't know what to do next we couldn't go back to shore because the ground was too hot. So we just sat in silence, holding each other. After a while my youngest sister started to ask questions 'Do you think the dog is alright? Do you think our house is ok?' all my mum said was 'Sweethearts, it is well with our souls and that's all that matters' I'm sure she was saying that to herself as much as she was saying it to us. We were rescued half an hour later by the Fire Service and taken to a shelter. That night at the shelter is a story in itself. The death toll stands at 181 and still climbing.

We are now staying at my Aunt's house 3 hours away. The amount of support is incredible but nothing replaces the horrific memories and my sisters have nightmares every night. We are left wondering what is next. What is the point of rebuilding if my Dad is gone and can't farm and support us? Where do we go? Most of our friends are dead, half our church is dead, what life do we have left? Do we sell? and if so will we make enough money to pay out our mortgage, who wants to buy black burnt piece of land?

Everyday is a battle to see God's faithfulness and righteousness above the loss we have experienced. I'm not quite there yet, I'm angry, confused and bitter. We all miss Dad, he was quiet but strong man who loved the Lord. He put his family first and lead us with incredible wisdom, he saved or lives that night and died trying to save more. There should be some comfort in that but I haven't found it yet, I wish he was selfish and had of just stayed with us. If he were here to lead us now things would feel that much more secure but he's not and I feel abandonned, everything secure and familiar is gone. I am immensely thankful for my family but even that feel different right now.

I am reminded of the Gaither song Because He Lives.

Because He lives, I can face tomorrow,
Because He lives, all fear is gone;
Because I know He holds the future,
And life is worth the living,
Just because He lives

- Cate

Cate's father was a very brave man, a man who brought honor to Christ by sacrificially serving his family and giving his life in an effort to save others. I've never met Cate's father, but am provoked by the way he modeled a godly life, a life putting others' well-being over his own. I've never met Cate or her family, and yet I'm moved to tears by the agony they are experiencing right now.

I've prayed for Cate and her family, for their comfort, for their provision. Please consider doing the same.

* * *

We do lift up your concerns to the Lord in prayer. If there is anything we can do for you, please do not hesitate to contact us right now. When you complete the form on that page, the information you provide is hand-delivered to my co-workers and me. When we receive your prayer request, we push away from our computers, close our eyes from things that distract us, and we talk with the Lord about what is on your heart.

Please also feel free to e-mail us at editor@boundless.org or leave a comment below. It's our privilege to share your burdens.

Once a guy was asking me on a first coffee date the week before V-Day. Even though February 14 was open for both of us, we agreed to meet on the 15th. It just seemed...well, less weird. 

Here's another observation I have about Valentine's Day: Women who aren't dating like to plan man-free parties. I've already been invited to three. I don't want to read too much into it, but these parties -- with catchy names like Ro-tic (romantic without the "man") and S.A.D. (singles awareness day) -- seem to be a rebellion against romance.

I remember one year some friends of mine were planning this type of party -- the "we-don't-need-boyfriends" kind. At the last minute, my friend said, "We're changing it. I've been convicted that this kind of attitude is wrong, so we're just getting together for some worship. Anyone can come." I still admire that girl.

Valentine's Day is a fine holiday, in my opinion. Sure, it's commercialized (and it ruins those New Years resolution diets), but so is Christmas. I think it's nice that couples have a special day to celebrate their love and commitment if they so choose. And I think singles should be good sports and not see the holiday as some type of excuse to mourn or be bitter.

How will you spend Valentine's Day? Offer to babysit so a couple can go out Saturday. Get some friends together for a meal. Send someone a Valentine. Deliver a pink cake to your grandma. And if you're brave, meet someone for coffee -- if things work out it will make a good story. Just do the unexpected. Love is a wonderful thing, people. And that should be celebrated year round. 

P.S. Join us today for the Search for a Godly Spouse Forum at 4-6 p.m. (EST)

It's not a bailout bill. The last bailout bill came to $700 billion.

It's a so-called stimulus bill, a simple]]> Thu, 12 Feb 2009 00:13:02 -0800 http://virb.com/boundless/posts/text/1084116 http://virb.com/boundless/posts/text/1084115 Last week, Ashley mentioned the special forum event we're sponsoring.

It's going on right now (from 4-6 p.m., EST, or 1-3 p.m. Pacific Time), over here. Please feel free to join us!

Either way, I timidly took my find to the counter where a Rip Van Winkle-esk clerk rang me up. He didn't seem to notice my purchase (which I was sure indicated I was desperate and undesirable). I guess he was still a little groggy from his 20-year nap on the mountain. Or maybe he was used to women buying Behrendt's little pink book.

I cracked the cover of the pink hardback book in the privacy of my room later that evening. Reading the words, "he's just not that into you" was oddly freeing.

Don't get me wrong, it wasn't a warm, fuzzy freeing. It was like an intervention freeing. Kara Schwab, Boundless author, described it this way, "in-your-face ... as if the authors broke into your apartment and sat you down on your couch to say, 'Girrrrl, you gotta get it together.'"

And indeed, I needed to get it together. I know I said I didn't remember if I had a "he" that wasn't that into me, but as I write this, it's all coming back. He had not been into me for a decade. Yeah, that's right, a decade. I had a crush on "He" since grade school. We were the best of friends in high school and had gone on a couple of weird and undefined dates in college. I waited for "He's" phone calls for weeks at a time. I knew that deep down he had feelings for me and one day he would DTR and we would live happily ever after.

Ladies and Gentlemen, that never happened.

While I'm glad for the wake-up call I received from Behrendt, I wish it had come from a wiser, truer source. I wish someone who loved me and cared about my life had gently told me that I needed to hang up my pipe dream and move on.

The only truth I recall finding in the 175 pages of He's Just Not that Into You was the title. The content of the book was full of hook-ups and f-bombs. And from what I've read over at Plugged In, the movie's not much different. So if you choose to see it, go with discernment. Give Kara's article a read before you head for the theater.

Here are some ways survivors can be affected:

The terms psychologists toss around to describe these feelings include survivor's guilt (why him and not me?), survivor's envy (thinking you might be better off gone too) and emotional contagion (the tendency to pick up your laid-off colleagues' feelings of gloom and desperation). These feelings are with us in every recession, but as layoffs spread to more industries, people in all walks of life are increasingly experiencing them.

I've experienced a combination of these feelings as coworkers and friends have lost their jobs. There's a lot of "why him and not me?" and "feelings of gloom" for them as they try to pick up the pieces. However, both of these responses can be healthy.

The first gives me a renewed thankfulness for my job. The realization that my job just happens to be (for now) within Focus on the Family's strategic vision for the future is sobering. Meaning, it could just have easily been me that got laid off (not that it's like that with all layoffs).

The second has me empathizing with those that have been laid off. So when I meet them, I ask how they're doing, if I can help, and how I can pray for them. Which, according to Time, is what the "survivors" should do.

People who lose their jobs often feel ostracized, which is partly a function of how the still-employed, going through internal turmoil of their own, treat them. "Most people say nothing, most people are afraid of you," says Damian Birkel, a career counselor and founder of the nonprofit Professionals in Transition, which provides services to the unemployed. "For someone to come in and offer any type of support during what is the most awkward and embarrassing time you're going to have -- that is a courageous act."

How have you been affected by the recession?

Like a mutating chain letter, though more artful and less threatening, 25 Things arrives as a Facebook note from a friend. That friend posts 25 facts about himself and "tags" 25 people and asks them to do the same thing.

The phenomenon continues to snowball. Facebook can't quantify activity specific to 25 Things as it does applications such as Flixster. But spokeswoman Brandee Barker says that over the past week the number of daily "notes" has more than doubled and the number of daily tags of a Facebook member in a note has grown by five times.

This Sunday I'm teaching the sixth grade class at my church. One of my points is how our favorite topic of conversation tends to be ourselves. That's why Paul has to remind us: "Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others."

That's what makes "25 Random Things" such an appealing craze. But there's another reason I think this note is so popular. People want to be known.

"I would say that anecdotally I've never seen a note spread as quickly as this has on Facebook," Barker says. "What is really unique about this is it's a really meaningful piece of content. Some of the these notes are touching and frankly very insightful."

We all long to feel significant. And this Facebook note could essentially be called "25 Things That Make Me Unique and Valuable." So go ahead and read some of your friends' lists, and if you must, create one of your own. If you are on Facebook, Boundless wants to be your friend and hear your 25.

HT: Denise Morris

I am a young man currently in Bible college and I have a "lady-friend" whom I have known for about a year now that I like and am seriously considering dating. Spiritually, I have found her to be mature and our beliefs are essentially identical.

Then it took a twist:

However, I feel somewhat shallow/guilty because I have been struggling to decide whether or not to date her because of her health. She has had this medical condition....

In reply, Boundless Answers columnist John Thomas wrote the article "Dating Someone with a Medical Condition." His conclusion: "If God leads you to marriage with your friend, you can unequivocally trust Him to provide all you need for both of you to thrive."

We've received a few e-mails in response to John's article. This one, from a young woman who herself struggles with a disability:

As a single young woman with a chronic medical condition, I was naturally intrigued by the title of this article. However, as I read it, I felt a little incensed, both by the question and the response to it. However, I do not wish to judge the young man who sent in this question -- as fallen creatures, we are all prone to superficiality. I would also not wish to discourage anyone from asking questions like this (no matter how shallow they may appear), as I appreciate personally how important it is to have a website like this, where such questions are answered anonymously and with careful consideration of God's Word. While I do not dispute the advice that was given per se, I do feel that there were some extremely important factors that were not considered. First of all, where was the consideration of the young woman's feelings in all of this?

I appreciate that it is difficult for a "healthy/normal" person to understand what it is like to live with a chronic illness -- I had very little concept of the difficulties before I developed health problems. However, I do believe that the young man concerned should have been advised to consider this issue very carefully. Even though the young woman considered here has probably adjusted very well to her condition, this does not mean that she doesn't worry about it herself. She is probably a little nervous of what the future may hold -- even though she is single, she has probably thought about the effect of pregnancy on her diabetes (and vice versa), and worried about developing complications in later life. She may even be concerned about passing on the condition to any children she may have.

Eclipsing all of this, however, is the overriding feeling that having such a condition renders a young woman "damaged" or "abnormal." The effect of chronic illness on a person's lifestyle can be very insidious (many of my colleagues and acquaintances do not know the true extent of my health problems), but any restrictions on lifestyle (no matter how small) can have a deep impact on a person's self-esteem -- especially if one is young and supposed to be "in the prime of life." Having to inject insulin in a public place, having a coughing fit in the cinema, or feeling so exhausted that you're always the first one to leave a party reinforces the idea that you are "different" and not "normal."

If this woman knew this man's misgivings about dating her, I have no doubt in my mind that she would be extremely upset at this -- she has probably had moments where she has felt that life is unfair and her condition has placed one too many restrictions on her life, and now she may feel that it is costing her the opportunity for a loving relationship and all that may follow that -- marriage, children etc.

Furthermore, I do not understand how the perceived logic in "avoiding what could be a problem down the road for her and ... our children." Do you seriously believe that if a "healthy" couple married that they (or their children) may not have health problems in the future? Either partner may develop a medical condition, or become injured in an accident etc etc. I'm sure we all know individuals who were perfectly healthy when they got married but developed medical problems later in life.

Conversely, there are many people who were living with medical conditions when they married, but have had a normal family life and healthy children. Any couple may also carry recessive (i.e., imperfect) genes, which result in any children being at risk of having a genetic illness.

In short, none of us can predict our (or anyone else's) future health -- only the Lord God knows what lies ahead. Even though I am a doctor and have a good understanding of my condition, and make any necessary adjustments for it (working hours and specialty choice etc), I do not believe that the presence of my medical condition should automatically preclude me from marrying and having children -- there are very few absolute restrictions. Above all, it is important (as mentioned in the article) to consider all the risks, and of course to seek God's guidance in prayer. Apologies if this sounds like a rather wordy rant -- that was not my intention. I just felt compelled to give the other side of the story (maybe it hit a raw nerve?), and I hope that this will be of some use to you.

This young woman's e-mail did give me insights I didn't have before reading it. How about you? Are you open to dating someone with a "medical condition"? And if you have one yourself, what are your thoughts about all this?

Prayer changes things. Life is tough -- pray hard. The family that prays together, stays together. You've heard the cliches. You also know that it's easier to talk about prayer than it is to actually pray. Our prayer bumper stickers, magnets and screen savers prove that point.

This week I prayed. Like, really prayed. It was the first time in a while that I prayed in a "God, I have to talk to you right now and it may take a while so please pull up a chair and put your phone on vibrate" kind of way. Tuesday night I sat down to work on my weekly Bible study homework. Thus began what quickly became a full-blown tear-fest as I worked through my lesson material and meditated on a few chapters of Scripture. I then began to pray. And pray. And cry. And pray. I did what I can only imagine people do when they "pour out their hearts to the Lord." I looked for my heart on the floor and behind my chair, because I was pretty sure it had spilled out of me at some point. But long story short, God met me. I have to say this (even though it's another cliche), because it really happened. And because I've been a Christian for over 30 years, yet I still apparently doubt that God can and will do this if I only ask. The next morning I woke up with a peace that I cannot describe. Perhaps we can call this a "peace that passes understanding" (hello, reminder to review AGAIN God's promises). All I know is that I unloaded some major issues on the Lord, and He scooped them up.

Fast forward to last night. My Husband Prayer Group met at my house. Yes, I'm in a Husband Prayer Group. We pray for husbands. We also pray for other things, but we call it the HPG because we are taking Candice's advice to PRAY BOLDLY for a mate.]]> Sat, 07 Feb 2009 09:12:42 -0800 http://virb.com/boundless/posts/text/1075525 http://virb.com/boundless/posts/text/1073004 Okay, I realize this isn't going to be relevant for a lot of you, but I suspect many Boundless readers might be interested in a marriage event Focus on the Family is hosting at the end of this month.]]> Fri, 06 Feb 2009 01:52:10 -0800 http://virb.com/boundless/posts/text/1073004 http://virb.com/boundless/posts/text/1073003 Yes, I know the Super Bowl was four days ago, but I've been busy. I can't let a few matters go uncommented on, though.

The Arizona Cardinals have nothing to be ashamed of. I thought last year's Super Bowl was the most exciting I'd ever seen. I stand corrected: This ]]> Fri, 06 Feb 2009 01:52:09 -0800 http://virb.com/boundless/posts/text/1073003