Paul W. Powell Legacy Library

In Paul and Barnabas, we find these two good men, these longtime friends, divided over a very small, insignificant question. The question is bound to come to our minds—how in the world does something like this happen?  It can happen because the best of men are not infallible. You know we need to understand that though a man is a good man, it does not mean...

Several years ago word came to me that a fellow pastor was critical of me. I knew that it had to be something in his own life because we had never had any dealings with each other before. We had never had any conflict; we had never had any differences. We had had very few dealings at all. So I just ignored the first word that came to me. Then there came a second word...

I read some time ago that one of the directors of the Rockefeller Foundation said that the members of that organization are either patrons or they are partners. A patron is a person who lends his name and his support to an organization. He occasionally will attend one of the annual meetings. There is some kind of slight attachment to that organization. A patron intend...

Stanley Tam said that one day a man visited him and asked him a question that changed his life. “Do you have a friend?” he asked. Stanley said, “Well, sure I have some friends.” The man said, “No, I mean the kind of true friend who will stick with you. Suppose you fell into some great sin. Would he still love you and would he still help y...

A Roman Catholic bishop was visiting one of the churches in his diocese for the purpose of administering confirmation, and with the priest of the parish at his side, was examining a little girl candidate. Naturally the priest was especially anxious to have his charges make a good showing. Also, the candidates were nervous in the presence of the great man. The bishop...

In his book Life’s Sentence, Chuck Colson says this: “We humans obviously have a problem of maintaining a steady level of spiritual fidelity. One solution is the continual checking and encouragement of a Christian friend.” He came to that conclusion when he was going to his first television interview concerning his book Born Again. He began to realiz...

“What I need is a cheerleader, not a critic.” This man was talking about his wife. Part of the problem in their marriage from his perspective centered around the fact that when he got home from a hard day’s work she met him with a barrage of complaints and criticism. He said, “I get enough of that at work. When things go wrong, I catch it...

Raising children has been a challenge in all generations. The Bible spends so much time talking about parent-child relationships that we know there were problems even in those days. There are four approaches that parents can take in dealing with their children. First, you can ignore them. Some parents are so busy climbing the social ladder or the ladder to succe...

You may know couples who are loveable, likable, normal people who can get along with everyone except each other. Obviously they know how to relate well with other people because they do so. But they will not apply the same effort to their own marriage. Through the years bitterness and resentment have grown until they no longer care or try to make their marriage work....