Hello friends. I hope you and your family had a lovely and peaceful Christmas!

As the new year approaches, please plan ahead on starting a Bible reading program for 2025. If it’s your first time reading the Bible, you may want to read the New Testament books first. Harvest ministry’s New Testament Bible has very good references and easy to understand commentaries. It’s inexpensive. Here is the link to purchase this Bible. 

store.harvest.org

Christian publishing company Zondervan has a new Bible. I looked through their pages and I found it very helpful and informative. Please take a look inside their sample pages.

NIV Upside-Down Kingdom Bible – Marketing Pageszondervan.com

I’m starting this chronological Bible reading plan in January if you want to follow this plan. (It took me about a year and half to finish my last Bible plan since I read about five days a week. There are many free Bible plans available online.)

The One Year Chronological Bible NLT, Premium Slimline Large Print (Softcover)

a.co

Hello friends. As Christmas Day approaches to celebrate the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ, I hope these resources will inspire you and draw you closer to our beloved Jesus Christ. 

https://www.davidjeremiah.org/whythenativity

If you watch this movie, you’ll see toddler Jesus. That toddler reminded me of this picture that I saved few years ago. 🥹

I recently read an article from a NYC divorce lawyer who said that most clients contact him during the months of December and January to proceed with divorce. His thoughts on the reasons why are not important. What’s important is that we have a heads-up on this vulnerable time frame for marriages. Knowing this, please make sure that you pray and plan ahead.  

Hello friends. 2024 year has been rocked by more scandals and big exposures in the evangelical Christian community. I’m not going to summarize every scandal but I want to share a few resources for your review. Please make time to hear these podcasts because foreknowledge is essential in order to keep you safe in a church community. 

The topic of Christian cults came up in our parent prayer group because a former student of IU came into our Facebook group to warn us about a local church who actively recruits in the student community. She was involved with this church group and she informed us that ex-members are now working together to warn parents and students about this church.

From their church website, they appear biblically sound but ex-members say that the leaders are very controlling and isolate their members from their families and friends. That is a very big no-no! In addition, the church leadership is exposed for sexual misconducts and other dark secrets. This exposé report is written by the student newspaper. Thank goodness for brave young student journalists.

Here is the article – https://specials.idsnews.com/members-allege-spiritual-abuse-high-rock-church-bloomington-network/

Warren Buffet has been in the news recently. He is 94 years old. He is a very wise and successful man in investing and business management. I thought his advice in this article for parents was very good. 

https://www.cnbc.com/2024/11/25/warren-buffett-one-thing-all-parents-should-do-with-their-estate-plan.html

This exert from Warren Buffet’s article on CNBC stands out to me:

“In his letter, Buffett recalled that over the years he witnessed “many families driven apart after the posthumous dictates of the will left beneficiaries confused and sometimes angry. Jealousies, along with actual or imagined slights during childhood, became magnified.”