Matthew Burkholder

When I got home from work yesterday, my head was pounding - the kind of headache that pain killers don't touch. This was the moment my daughter unleashed a full on, 20 minute, scream competition winning, angry at the known world, tantrum. It all started because my daughter had barely been drinking all day. She has been just getting over a cold, and I, because I wanted my daughter to you know, "feel better", offered her a cup of water, even from her favourite Montreal Canadiens cup. She proceeded to show her gratitude by launching herself off the couch, and kicking the cup of water out of my hand with ninja like accuracy. (Dear Leaf fans, you can insert your joke here.) A few minutes later, after a mutual break from each other, I sat her down to eat dinner. She was hungry. I knew, as a parent, that she was pretty angry because she was hungry and thirsty. She needed food. I am afraid that my condition, which I like to call "Bruce Bannerism", a condition that t...

The whole, then, comes to this: As soon as the minutest particle of faith is instilled into our minds, we begin to behold the face of God placid, serene, and propitious; far off, indeed, but still so distinctly as to assure us that there is no delusion in it. In proportion to the progress we afterwards make, (and the progress ought to be uninterrupted), we obtain a nearer and surer view, the very continuance making it more familiar to us. Thus we see that a mind illumined with the knowledge of God is at first involved in much ignorance, - ignorance, however, which is gradually removed. Still this partial ignorance or obscure discernment does not prevent that clear knowledge of the divine favor which holds the first and principal part in faith. For as one shut up in a prison, where from a narrow opening he receives the rays of the sun indirectly and in a manner divided, though deprived of a full view of the sun, has no doubt of the source from which the light comes, and is benefited by...