The Big Sandy Mountaineer -

My wife and I moved to Big Sandy from a community with nearly the same population as the entire state of Montana. The peace and quiet are amazing. Having a tight knit community and the lack of traffic are even better. The one thing we find ourselves...

Over the last few weeks, I’ve been researching questions about the origins of various Easter observances, traditions, and practices. As I’ve progressed, I’ve had folks approach me and add their own curiosities to the list. There is one...

Recently, the testing scores for Intelligence Quotient (more commonly known as IQ) have been observed to be in decline. Specifically, scores related to abilities in verbal reasoning (logic, vocabulary), visual problem solving/analogies,...

Where did “Easter” come from? This question isn’t about the Christian observance of the death and resurrection of Jesus. Rather, it’s about the name of the holiday. Though some churches call it “Resurrection Sunday” in order to avoid the...

During the first few centuries that the church existed, it face a handful of internal struggles on top of persecution from the Roman Empire and hostile neighbors. Most of the struggle, both internally and externally, came about because the gospel...

Easter weekend is fast approaching, landing on April 9th this year. For years, I wondered why it moved around so much. In addition, when I began to learn more about my faith, I wondered why Easter doesn’t always land during the Jewish Passover....

One of the neat features of Facebook that turns up in my timeline every day is the flashback from the same day in past years. Last week, an 11 year old picture popped up. It was my wife in a borrowed coat, holding our 1 year old daughter, in a...

It is the Lenten season, which is the 6 weeks preceding Easter in the church calendar. Last week, I dug into the origins of fasting or giving things up for lent. In the process of researching the early church origins of the practice, I was surprised...

Your time is like water. Water naturally flows from higher places to lower ones. In the same way, everyone has both strengths (higher places) and weaknesses (lower places). We tend to spend less time in our areas of natural talent and more in areas...

“What are you giving up for Lent?” For years growing up and as a younger adult, I heard this question bandied about every year. While living in Indiana near Notre Dame, the heavily Catholic community introduced me to Fat Tuesday and the various...

The 18th century Danish Philosopher Søren Kierkegaard once wrote a story about a circus performance. With a large crowd out front, the performers were preparing to a start the show, when suddenly a fire broke out backstage. Knowing that the huge...

“I got the bug that’s going around.” We’ve all heard it more than a few times in the past few weeks as sick season rolls through Big Sandy, as it seems to every year about this time. There’s never any shortage of rumors and theories about...

While doing sermon prep this week, I came across an obscure quote from a book from the period between the end of the Old Testament and the birth of Jesus. The book of Sirach was written by a Jew who was watching his country struggle to remain...

The Big Sandy Booster Club makes a significant impact on our student athletes and participants in extracurricular activities. I spoke with Cheryl Strutz about the club’s direct impact on our kids. Cheryl is a member of the Booster Club and the...