Paul W. Powell Legacy Library

Here is a typical day for any pastor in America today. Received a telephone call from a young lady who recently married outside of her faith. She is now having trouble from both sides of the family.  Worked on a funeral sermon for a dear friend who passed away. Visited with a young couple. They are new here in town. She is lonely. Her parents live in a distant...

I’ve discovered that people usually just drift away from Christ. People are like sheep. Sheep don’t get wild, but sheep do wander. What do you say when you go after these people? Well, you don’t hound them. You just go to visit them, to be friendly with them. To have a cup of coffee with them and let them know that you are interested. When the time c...

God left Titus in Crete because he wanted to use him as his instrument to change the world. Paul tells Titus that he was left in Crete to “set in order” things that were wanting. The term set in order is a medical term that means to “set in joint.” It describes what a doctor does when you go to him with a broken bone. Because the parts of that...

1 Paul, a servant of God, and an apostle of Jesus Christ, according to the faith of God’s elect, and the acknowledging of the truth which is after godliness; 2 In hope of eternal life, which God, that cannot lie, promised before the world began; 3 But hath in due times manifested his word through preaching, which is committed unto me according t...

Some things are harder to repair than to build originally. One of these is a broken friendship. The Bible says, “A brother offended is harder to be won than a strong city; and their contentions are like the bars of a castle” (Proverbs 18:19). Nothing is more valuable than our friends. Asked the secret of his life, a great man said, “I had a friend.&...

There are many people who see no need of going to church. They say, “I can be just as good a Christian by staying home, so why attend? This question deserves an answer and I have it.  First: We should go to church to worship God. This is by far is the most important reason for church attendance. We do not go to church just to hear a sermon or to see o...

D.L. Moody, one of America’s greatest evangelists, weighed a hefty 280 pounds. He once made a visit to Charles Haddon Spurgeon, the great preacher from London, England. When Spurgeon came to the door he had a cigar in his hand. Moody was taken aback and reportedly said to him, “How can a man of God like you smoke like that?”  Then Spurgeon poke...

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...

When someone suggested that rowing become a part of Clemson University’s athletic program, then athletic director Frank Howard declared, “We aren’t gonna have no sport where you sit down and go backwards.” In our churches, cities, and individual lives we must spend our time looking ahead, not backwards. Satchel Page, the great baseball pitche...