7 June 2026

Dear Friend,

“Here’s Your Hat. What’s Your Hurry?”

I don’t know where my dad got the expression, but he frequently would say, “Here’s your hat; what’s your hurry?” if someone had to leave quickly. (And, come to think of it, I heard him say it when he wished someone would leave!)

Like I said, it’s a long trip!

Well, even though I don’t normally wear a hat, I am in a hurry packing to leave tomorrow, June 8th, for a long ministry road trip. When I say long, I mean that Google Maps tells me that I’ll log over 3,500 miles (about 5,600 kilometers) between now and when I get home (around July 2nd). My spirit was uneasy until I postponed a July 1st doctor appointment so that I could extend the trip just a bit. As soon as I did that, I was released in the Spirit to finish planning.

So this short newsletter is mainly a prayer request [continue reading…]

Jim Kerwin
(1952- )

To discover more hymns, visit our growing list of Powerful Poetry.

Palm Sunday, March 2026

An Easter Verb

(See image credit below.)¹

Dear Friend,

I’m writing these words on Palm Sunday 2026. And I’m putting off the conclusion of our series on Little Faith and God’s Faith because a word has been impressed on my heart. It’s a Greek word that sneaked up on me during my morning Greek research this past week; but now it’s also an abiding Easter verb for me because of its special association with the Resurrection.

Here’s the background: Oikos (οἶκος) is a very common New Testament noun. It means a house or dwelling or just about any place a person might live; and by simple extension, it also means household, that is, all the people who live in the oikos. There’s a closet full of oikos-related words in the New Testament, some of which come down to us in English, like our word economy (oikonomía / οἰκονομία — management of a household).

A related verb—oikéō / οἰκέω—means to dwell [in a home]. It’s used of a married couple dwelling with each other (1 Corinthians 7:12-13), and of [continue reading…]

6 November 2025

Dear Friend,

I’m showing a magnification of black mustard seeds here, but lest you think that they’re anywhere near this big…¹
…here’s a small pile of “yellow” and black mustard seeds compared with 2 centimeters (20 millimeters), or a smidge less than 13/16 of an inch.

In the last newsletter, we explored our human state of oligópistos — “little faith.” I say it’s a “human state,” because each of us, created in the image of God, has a measure of faith. But like all the elements in natural man, that measure of faith is diminished, enervated, and spoiled by sin. Human faith can accomplish certain things (the old phrase from the 50s and 60s—“positive thinking”—comes to mind), but in Kingdom matters it has its limits; and all too often we crash up against those limits.

The original “ye of little faith” Apostles were keenly aware of such crashing failures, and each of the Synoptic writers (Matthew, Mark, and Luke) has Jesus addressing these men when they’ve reached their limit. Two incidents are similar. In Matthew 17:19-20, nine of the Apostles, perplexed by their inability to deliver a demon-possessed boy, ask Jesus, “Why could we not drive it out?” “Because of the littleness of your faith,” is Jesus’ reply. And Luke 17:5-6 records their plea to Jesus at another time: “Increase our faith!” (As for Mark’s contribution, we’ll get to that in a bit.)

In both cases, Jesus’ response is the same: “If [continue reading…]

25 May 2025

Dear Friend,

One helpful benefit of extra shelving: my grew-up-in-Africa missionary-kid wife gets to display many of her African treasures and mementos in special ways.¹

At long last we are seeing a light at the end of the tunnel of unpacking and “moving in.” As our three recent family deaths fall farther behind us, the Lord has been enabling us to give more focus and energy to completing our task of getting settled. In practical terms, the most helpful step forward has been the building of bookshelves. Those erected in Denise’s office and the living room have allowed the emptying and displaying of many boxes of books, photo albums, family photos and heirlooms, as well as other memorabilia. Two new bookcases for my office have added sufficient shelf space for the rest of my boxed books.

What’s ironic is that all the time we’ve been building those bookcases and emptying boxes, I’ve been thinking about “being shelved” spiritually for the last year or more. There are those times in our Christian walk and ministry during which God takes us and sets us aside— puts us “on a shelf,” so to speak, taking us out of normal ministry and duties. These times of “being shelved” used to be very worrisome for me: Was God displeased with me in some way? Had I offended Him? What could I do to get back in His good graces?

One advantage of being an older Christian is [continue reading…]

31 March 2025

Post-Resurrection Miracles

Dear Friend,

Last month I shared about the spiritual prosperity that comes from meditating on the Bible. I’d like to re-visit the subject of the Scriptures from a slightly different angle this month. It so happens that the material coincides well with the upcoming celebration of Jesus’ Resurrection. As an early Holy Week gift, I offer the following meditation.

“First Dinner” Discrepancy?

If the “Last Supper” was the last meal Jesus and His disciples ate the night before His crucifixion, would it be too much of a stretch to call the first meal they shared with Jesus after the Resurrection the “First Dinner”? Three Gospel writers record the event (Mark 16:15-18 ∥ Luke 24:36-49 ∥ John 19:19-23). Luke and John, in their reports of that gathering, seem to focus on different things that Jesus emphasized. Each records a miracle Jesus performed on those who were present; but they don’t agree on what it was.

Or do they?

In Luke’s mind, the supernatural change that [continue reading…]

28 February 2025

Dear Friend,

“In Whatever He Does, He Prospers”

¹How blessed is the man
who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked,
Nor stand in the path of sinners,
Nor sit in the seat of scoffers!
2But his delight is in the law of the Lord,
And in His law he meditates day and night.
³He will be like a tree firmly planted by streams of water,
Which yields its fruit in its season
And its leaf does not wither;
And in whatever he does, he prospers.
–Psalm 1:1-3 NASB–

“He will be like a tree…”
(in this case, a date palm)¹

A new year is well underway, already bringing with it sadness (we’ve had two deaths in the family since I last wrote) and gladness. Let me dwell on the gladness a bit, because it has been a source of wonder and joy.

I finished reading through the Scriptures again in January. No, I wasn’t behind schedule; my reading schedule follows a non-calendar fiscal year which ends on July 31st, my spiritual birthday. Theoretically, I could have [continue reading…]

12 December 2024

Dear Friend,

Intervening According to Jesus’ Example

Among the many reassuring messages of the Christmas season, this one is speaking especially to me this year — God lovingly and personally intervenes in the affairs of human beings. He got so “involved” as to come and live among us before dying in our place.

2024 has been a year of upheaval for us. We’ve lived in transition for most of the year, shuttling back and forth to Virginia, mostly living with our daughter and her family. Having been led to move to Florida to live out “being family,” we have obeyed; yet obedience has meant a loss of personal space, privacy, and (at times!) sanity . But after more than 15 months of living together (including 4½ months in 2023), we still love each other.

More importantly, Denise and I have been knit, stitch by stitch and day by day, into the life of our daughter, who is about to lose her husband, and the lives of two of our grandchildren, who are about to lose their daddy. Those stitches can only be made one [continue reading…]

9 September 2024

Dear Friend,

So shalt thou find favor and good understanding
in the sight of God and man.
– Proverbs 3:4 kjv –

The slip of paper is long since lost; but the spiritual direction hasn’t changed.¹

Something happened this past month that put those two verses (above) into a different focus. Way back around October 1969 I attended a Saturday morning meeting somewhere in Southern California, where I lived at the time. The speaker was evangelist Dick Mills, a man soaked in the Scriptures, and a great Bible teacher (as I recall) with a one-of-a-kind prophetic ministry.

After Bro. Mills preached, he would invite folks forward for prayer. Then he and his wife would go down the prayer line. He would pray over each person, after which he would speak forth a Bible reference or two as the Holy Spirit led. Let me be clear: he wouldn’t speak the text of the scripture(s). Rather, he would give out [continue reading…]

Copyright © 2024¹

by
Jim Kerwin

Getting a “Händel” on a Mystery

Available also as a Kindle e-booklet

Several decades ago, I was listening through Georg Frideric Händel’s magnificent oratorio, Messiah. I would make this an every-Christmas personal indulgence, if I could block out three solid hours sometime during the Yuletide holidays.

One year as I was listening, the chorus finished up part 1, scene 3, movement 10,² singing the words of Isaiah 60:1 (kjv)—

Arise, shine;
for thy light is come,
and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee.

Then the bass soloist started to make his way [continue reading…]

The “deeper dive” continues
a discussion in Overshadowed!
from The Curious Corners of Christmas.

In addition to using the phrase born of the Spirit in chapter 3 of his Gospel, John also employs another similar phrase in his First Epistle — the simple form of gennáō [γεννάω, the verb be born]+ ek toũ theoũ (ἐκ τοῦ θεοῦ — born of [or out of] God.

Scripture Reading: Luke 1:26-38

What Is That to Me?

The last chapter of
The Curious Corners of Christmas
is now complete!

Way back in 1964, four years before I became a Christian, a devoted Christian brother, the famous band leader / songwriter Ralph Carmichael, wrote a song titled, “He’s Everything to Me.” In the second verse of that song, he asks an important Christmas-related question:

I will celebrate Nativity
For it has a place in history;
Sure, He came to set His people free—
What is that to me?²

Especially in light of the second Christmas name we discussed in the last chapter³ — Christian — we each need to have that question answered: What is that to me?

Mary asked an important question, too: “How can this be?” How is God going to do all that you said, Gabriel?

Gabriel had a very profound answer for her. And, as it turns out, his answer [continue reading…]

A Prophetic Name—Immanuel

The other prophetic, more intimate,
name may surprise you!
(Available as a Kindle e-booklet)

Remember from our last chapter how the Christmas story foreshadows the work of God in the human heart, how New Birth is wrought, and how we come to share in God’s nature? If Christ’s coming doesn’t produce an individual heart-impact, to what purpose is the Christmas story? Without this powerful, personal transformation, the effect of the Incarnation becomes little more than sentimental religion.

That which God the Father seeks is a supernatural metamorphosis, the regeneration of the human spirit, the deliverance and cleansing of the human heart, even though He starts with the “raw material” of a corrupted, sinful human being. To be able to do this is a work of awe and wonder. But to do all this with the goal of dwelling in such a transformed human life is a matter of loving intimacy.

The Lord God gave an intimation, a clue, a hint at His intimate intentions when He gave a certain name to a human child. From our perspective, it was a very “Christmas-y” name, and a gloriously [continue reading…]