Paul W. Powell Legacy Library

Advice columnist Ann Landers once wrote, “More marriages are wrecked on the rocks of religious difference than most people can imagine.” It is a fact that religious differences are one of the principal causes of problems in marriages. How could it be otherwise? It could not be, unless our faith were unimportant to us. The only way religious differences can...

William E. Gladstone, the great statesman of England, once said to E. DeWitt Talmage, “Talmage, you talk about the questions of the day. There is only one question, and that’s the question of religion in the home. Settle that and you will settle all questions.” There have been many changes in our world since those words were spoken but they are still...

If ever there was a generation that needed what people once felt they got from prayer, it is ours. Anxiety, fear, suicides, drugs, and a thousand similar problems indicate our need of help beyond ourselves. With the need of prayer so great, why don’t more people pray more? Some people don’t pray because they believe that life and the universe are too mech...

In the play, “The Fool,” by Channing Pollack, there is a powerful scene. A rich woman speaks of her furs as “a substitute for my husband’s time and love and companionship.” The husband’s father is listening to this and reacts with frustration, saying, “I don’t know what you women want. A man works his heart and soul out...

Former advice columnist Dear Abby once said: “If my mail rings true there are almost as many marriages on the rocks as there are rocks.” This is tragic! Marriage is supposed to bring joy, completeness, and fulfillment to life. However, I don’t know of anything that starts with such tremendous hopes and fails so regularly as marriage. What does it ta...

I wrote this piece on the day that my wife and I celebrated our 25th wedding anniversary. As you could guess, in our 25 years we’ve had many ups and downs, joys and sorrows, victories and defeats, but all in all, for me, it has been a confirmation of the scripture, “Whoso findeth a wife findeth a good thing and obtaineth favour of the Lord” (Proverbs...

For forty years Jane, the wife of Scottish philosopher Thomas Carlyle, was a loving and devoted wife. She encouraged and helped him in every way, but Carlyle was a crosswise old man who never expressed to her the kind of love that he felt for her. When she died suddenly, he wrote these sad words, “O that I had you for five minutes by my side that I might tell yo...

Actor Ed Asner said, “Raising kids is part joy and part guerilla warfare.”  Boy, do I agree.  But if you think kids are worse now than they have ever been consider this: Cain, the first mortal man born on earth, murdered his own brother. Noah was a preacher but his sons disgraced him. Abraham threw his son Ishmael out of the house when he was fo...

The first thing in all creation that God named as not being good was loneliness. He said of Adam whom he had created, “It is not good for man to be alone.” It’s as true now as it was then. Maybe you remember the song by Elvis Presley, “Are You Lonesome Tonight?”  He sang that song with such feeling that it was one of his longest runn...