Pastor's Devotions by Tim Harris

Those of you who read this Pastors Devotion may or may not know that this past month my wife Kim got a new job.   Just about one and a half weeks before school began, she received a call from a Christian school here in North Jersey, asking if she would be interested in a teaching position.   For the past few years, Kim has been substitute teaching.   Most recently, she had been working on her NJ teaching certificate and looking for a full-time teaching position. Specifically, she was preparing for and looking for a position in middle school math.   However, the position for which she was being considered was beginning Spanish for 8 th and 9 th graders and 6 th grade history!   After a couple of interviews, Kim was offered the position and she accepted.   That was then just a few days before the start of the new school year.   You can only imagine how busy she has been since.   Considering that all the material is new to her an...

Now that both our boys are away at college, grocery shopping has become quite different for Kim and me. Rather than buying food for a family of five, we are now buying and cooking for three.   Not only that, but the two who are currently not here, were and are the biggest eaters in the family.   With Jonathan and Nathaniel away, you can only imagine how much less food we go through in a week!   Nowhere is that more evident than in the amount of milk we use.   During the summer when everyone was home, we would go through four gallons of milk per week.   Now, however, we can’t get through one gallon in two weeks.   In fact, yesterday Kim had to discard about half a gallon because it had gone bad. But, even with that, as I was in the supermarket, I had to stop myself from picking up another full gallon of milk.   After all, it’s been almost a habit to pick up a gallon of milk every time we stop at the supermarket.   But, we are ...

At least a few days a week I have been trying to follow an exercise routine. After all, I am over fifty and if I’m not purposeful about it, things can go downhill pretty quickly (physically, that is)!   Most days I go to a local park and do a few laps of fast-paced walking and running for a total of 2 ½ to 3 ½ miles.   There is also an outdoor workout area with bars and beams on which to do pull-ups and sit-ups, etc. If the weather is bad, I’ll go to the gym.   Since I usually go to the park about the same time each day, I see many of the same people. There is the older woman who wears big sunglasses, a scarf, and a baseball cap.   There’s the guy who always wears his hat backwards.   There’s two groups that consistently walk in the middle of the pathway: two older guys who seem to be always joking with each other and three ladies who love their morning chat and are pretty much oblivious to anyone who is trying to get by them.   In the wor...

In the New York metro area we call it “rubbernecking.”   In Philadelphia they call it a "gaper delay.”   Whatever you call it, it’s a terrible phenomenon that affects all of our lives in a negative way.   In fact, it happened to me again this morning. As I was traveling east on the Cross Bronx, the traffic suddenly came to a near stop.   The reason for the slow down was an accident that had happened in the lanes heading west.   Of course, it was understandable as to why the traffic heading west was a mess.   But, going east there was no obstruction.   There was nothing to stop us from moving at a normal pace.   There was nothing in front of us that should have brought us to a near-standstill; nothing except for the fact that, the drivers heading east just naturally slowed down to take a look. They were distracted by what was happening in the westbound lanes.   They couldn't help but “gape” and “rubberneck.”   So let...