Proof The Bible Is True

So many beautiful items lined the tables at the craft booth where my husband, Tony, and I were shopping, but my eye went straight to the woman behind the counter. She had long, snow white hair and an air of…  I didn’t know how to describe it, but she was the first thing to have gotten my attention all day.   I’d spent the day before in the hospital, visiting a good friend in the mental health ward. The hospitalization wasn’t a surprise. It came after months of worry, late-night phone calls and troubling conversations. Nothing Tony or I had done—listening, [More]

“Mom, you really need to find a new home,” my daughter Tammy Sue said. “Don’t wait until your lease runs out.” After we hung up, I started on the dishes, gazing out the window at my bird feeders. Moving was going to be harder than I thought. There was a lot I liked about my double-wide mobile home.   No stairs. Room for an office. A front and back porch. A shower stall instead of a slippery bathtub. And best of all, my kitchen-window view of the trees and my beautiful bird feeders. Problem was, my home had a toxic [More]

Staring out at the highway, I could barely keep my eyes open. Already I’d been driving for more than four hours. Now it was long past midnight and we still had hours to go to reach our home in a small town in the foothills of southeast California.   Please, God, help us get there safely. The thought, more reflex than prayer, jolted my consciousness for a split second. I looked over at my 16-year-old daughter, Katie, sleeping peacefully in the seat next to me. I hated to wake her. She was as exhausted as I was. She would have to take over for me at [More]

Two more dives. That’s all my husband, Larry, and I had left in St. Lucia. We’d spent a week here in paradise. It was almost time to go back to Kentucky. Almost, but not quite.   “What a gorgeous day!” I said as we boarded the dive boat. On the agenda was viewing a wrecked ship plus whatever tropical life we’d encounter: fish, coral, maybe even some sea turtles.   “Look who’s here.” Larry pointed to another couple waving to us, the Brits we’d sat with at dinner the night before. They were novice divers who wanted to hear about [More]

I had tried repeatedly to stop smoking, but my resolve never lasted. I had built up a powerful nicotine addiction. It had started in the Marine Corps when I was 17. By the time I was city editor of a Pennsylvania newspaper 23 years later, I was up to a four-pack-a-day habit.   One afternoon I was walking down the street puffing away when I had an urge to go into a used-book store. While browsing among the dusty bookshelves, I spotted a worn volume whose title, Direct Healing, caught my eye. I snapped it up.   At home in my apartment that evening [More]

  One cold winter morning as I looked out my bedroom window at the gray, bleak landscape. I wondered, What is my life worth? Where do I fit into the scheme of things? I felt completely overwhelmed by rejection. I couldn’t see any hope in my future. And when I considered my past, I didn’t like anything I saw. I was 45 years old, and had recently lost my job. I was getting no response to the dozens of resumés I sent out.   The idea of taking a drink occurred to me, but I had already been down that road. Alcohol had wreaked havoc on [More]

Four years ago, in the dreary lull that comes with the New Year, I was battling a familiar foe: depression. I’d gone into town to run a few errands, but the looming gray hills only added to my gloom. I bought beer and put gas in the car. Squeezing the metal handle of the nozzle, I tried not to dwell on the parallel between a car’s need for fuel and my dependency on alcohol.   Depression and alcoholism ran in my family. Knowing that my feelings were inherited did little to make them more bearable. It was worse, in fact, [More]

Firefighters will tell you that a fire is like a living thing—a living engine of destruction. And each blaze has its own personality.   There’s a sound and smell to a wildfire that you never forget. Burning brush and searing wind roaring like a jet engine. The acrid odor of scorched earth. Then there are the trapped and smoke-poisoned firefighters hunting for any avenue of escape. It’s a world I know all too well.   I’ve battled many large blazes in my 18 years of firefighting. So I had no illusions about what was ahead when the call came last [More]

Here I was again, back in Memphis, Tennessee. I stood in front of the massive wrought iron gate, shaped like a songbook and dotted with musical notes. A sense of calm washed over me. Like I belonged. Like I was home. I pushed the gate doors open and made my way up the long, winding driveway. The mansion rose before me, its white Corinthian columns and stone lions unmistakable. He was calling me closer with every step. The King himself. Elvis Presley.   My eyes snapped open and I sat up in my bed on the couch with a start. [More]

Every July, my two sons and I drive up to a reservation in the White Mountains of Arizona for a guys-only camping vacation. On the second night of our trip one year, the three of us sat around a roaring fire. It had been raining off and on the whole weekend, but we’d brought plenty of firewood with us. My older son, Parker, made sure the fire was always crackling.   “Where’s the rest of the wood?” he asked, adding more logs to the fire.   “It’s all over there, behind that tree,” I said, pointing to the spot where [More]

I shuffled through the articles I’d brought, trying to look like I belonged here—the offices of the Wichita Eagle, the biggest newspaper in the city. The receptionist spoke to someone on the phone in hushed tones, probably discussing how to politely turn me away. After all, I’d walked in off the street to ask for a job, even though I knew they weren’t hiring. If I told them I was following the command of a strange voice, they’d probably call security.   Just a few months prior, I never imagined I’d be looking for a job. My husband was the [More]

Disappointment was all too clear in my husband’s eyes when I came home from the store empty-handed. “I just didn’t come across anything special,” I said. “Don’t worry. I’ll try again tomorrow after work.”   Tom nodded, but he was out of ideas too. This gift was important for both of us. The very first birthday present for his very first grandson, Vito. But I felt added pressure as Tom’s newlywed. Tom was a widower when we married. I wanted so badly to please him, impress him, to be the kind of loving, capable wife he was used to. Vito [More]

I woke up feeling sorry for myself. I was tired of hobbling around with a cast on my leg. I’d broken my ankle on a family outing in the country, and now autumn had rushed in overnight. The house was downright chilly. “Brrr,” I shivered. “This would be a good soup day.”   I craved the comfort of a homemade soup. You can’t get that from a can. But my refrigerator didn’t have much to offer, and a trip to the store seemed like too much effort. Still, all day I couldn’t get that soup idea out of my head. [More]

Another Thanksgiving without Mom, I thought, picking halfheartedly at my turkey and stuffing. This was a particularly hard holiday since Mom’s death because food and family were her hallmarks.   Mom worked as a short-order cook at the old H.L. Green drugstore in downtown San Antonio. I would grab a seat on one of the big swivel stools, and no matter how busy Mom was behind the counter she’d always stop to hug her “babies” and fix us a grilled cheese or a thick milk shake. Always there with a kiss or a kind word or some little treat to [More]

Dottie Pratchard recalls a harrowing close call she experienced while rafting down the South Fork of the American River and the prayer that changed everything for her.

The phone rang as I was pulling my elf hat out of the closet.   Every December my husband, Jerry, and I help the Lions Club deliver presents to the 40 students of a nearby residential school, Green Chimneys , for kids with special needs.   Tomorrow everyone would gather at the local firehouse, and in addition to “Santa” and his “elf,” there’d be a magic show and a buffet lunch. The kids would even get a firehouse tour. I couldn’t wait.   But on the other end of the phone was a distressed volunteer. “Peggy, we’ve got a big [More]

“Dot, you’ll know God’s voice when you hear it,” Mama always told me. I needed to hear it now. It was an unusually cold evening in Jacksonville, Florida, but that wasn’t what made the hairs stand up on the back of my neck. I hurried down a dark, deserted street, eager to get to my Auntie’s place and escape the menacing hum of an old engine. The pale blue sedan was back. It had circled the block to pass me again—for the third time—slow, deliberate. Whatever the driver wanted from me, I didn’t want to find out.   I wasn’t [More]

Worst. Birthday. Ever. The second my husband was out the door, I collapsed in a heap on the living room sofa and cried my eyes out. He’d gone off to work without so much as a “goodbye” or “I love you.” Not even a “happy birthday.”   Our seven-year marriage was over. That much was clear. We’d just come home after a long weekend in San Francisco, where we’d intended to celebrate my 41st birthday with friends. We were trying to work through our problems. Maybe a mini vacation was just what we needed. But he’d ignored me the entire [More]

I sat at the kitchen table to read the paper, a quiet moment in a stressful morning. A familiar face smiled up at me from the obituary page—Eleanor, a grandmother figure I’d befriended in church. Everyone knew her as a deep and caring person, someone who would listen to your problems, pray for you, and know exactly the right thing to say to put you at ease. If only I could talk to Eleanor now. I felt like a terrible mother and I needed a friendly word.   My only son, Michael, and my two other girls didn’t give me [More]

 I drove slowly down the road, peering through the frozen rain striking my windshield. My 12-year-old son, Eric, shivered in the passenger seat while the car warmed up. I should have headed straight home after church, especially in this weather. But we had gone to visit a friend in Grymes Hill, a neighborhood in Staten Island, New York. By the time we left, the sun had set and a sleet storm had begun.   My friend’s townhouse was at the top of the hill and the way down was steep. There were patches of black ice everywhere along the winding [More]

For over 20 years, I had prayed for Joe, my stubborn, beer drinking, pool shooting father to become a follower of Jesus Christ. My mother had prayed for 30-plus years of marriage for the man she dearly loved who had no time for God and little time for her or me. At times Dad’s belligerence toward the things of God grew so hostile, his salvation seemed an impossible dream. Yet, our Christian family and friends prayed and waited. Then around 1980, God’s “still, small voice” impressed upon me to fast and pray every Saturday for my father. “Fast? Me…fast?” I [More]