Sterling Griggs

A favorite movie of mine is the surfing documentary "Riding Giants." The film is about big wave surfing across the globe and it tracks the history of surfing from it's roots in Hawaii to the tow in revolution today (tow in is where surfers are towed by watercraft into giant waves that are often considered to big to hand paddle into). The movie begins with a spoofy animated bit about surfing in Hawaii in the 1800's.  Apparently, surfing was typically reserved for Hawaiian royalty but other islanders had taken to the sport.  When Christian missionaries arrived on the islands later in that century, they were shocked at the indecency of the surfers, who wore little more than loin cloths as they rode their boards in the surf.  As a result, part of the missionaries' evangelistic efforts included discouraging surfing altogether, and because of the their influence many believe surfing disappeared almost entirely. Of course surfing didn't go away and the point of ...

This past year and a half my wife and I have enjoyed the tremendous privilege of walking alongside a very special group of high school students. We joined them at the beginning of their junior year and are almost to the point of seeing them graduate and move on to college and career choices.  Part of the satisfaction has been how they have welcomed us to join them on their journey, allowing us to invest in their lives and to share their triumphs and struggles along the way. I have also enjoyed the honor of mentoring a few of the guys one-on-one, engaging them in their spiritual walk and encouraging them in their personal life decisions.  You could say that my wife and I are like proud parents as we've watched these students grow and flourish in their walk with Christ and as they transition into the next phases of their lives. Reflecting on this season in my life is a little bittersweet since not only are we about to say goodbye to this group of students as they move on from ...

Today we "officially" acknowledge and celebrate the life, ministry, and achievements of the late Dr. Rev. Martin Luther King.  As I was reading online news stories and blogs this morning, I was drawn to one blog in particular that was written by a woman who painted a moving picture of her response to Dr. King's life and legacy as a humanitarian and champion of freedom. While reading her article, I realized that politically at least we were not of the same genre, yet there was definitely a connection between our desires for there to be justice in our world as well as the need to honor those who give their lives for such causes.  A section toward the end of her post immediately caught my attention: Martyrdom can and does interpose a veil of incomprehensible goodness and nobility over those who sacrificed their lives for us.  Our own psyches seem to guard us from understanding what it means that someone has laid down his life - the ultimate act of nonviolence - for us....

When I was a kid growing up, I used to enjoy building model airplanes and cars.  These models were the ones that came in the box with hundreds of pieces that had to be glued together with this special model glue that came in a tube.  I would use a toothpick to apply the glue to the pieces and would have to sometimes wait for hours before continuing while a certain section of the model's glue took time to dry.  For a young kid, this waiting period wasn't always easy.  There were many times I would lose patience and continue with the construction without letting the glue dry or I would bypass certain steps in the instructions because I thought I knew a better way.  It was at those times that my models turned out less than perfect and these models often wound up being the main characters in crash up scenes with my action figures or Black Cat firecrackers. It's kind of funny (and tragic at the same time) how many times in my life that I have plunged down my own pa...

If you have ever watched a sporting event that relies on quick reflexes, such as football or baseball, then you understand just how important a matter of seconds can be.  The quarterback who holds on to the ball for a second to long without throwing it down field will most likely find himself at the bottom of a pile of big sweaty men.  The batter at the plate has only a fraction of a second to determine whether or not he will swing at a baseball that is just being released from the hand of the pitcher.  In either instance there is no real room for hesitation. So how does a quarterback or batter know how long is too long to wait?  Practice, discipline, and experience.  If an athlete has not conditioned his mind to be prepared to handle split second decisions, then he or she won't last very long in the lineup or on the field.  Basically, an elite athlete knows what he or she needs to do before they actually have to do it.  The Bible is not a book abo...

How many of you have Facebook accounts?  Of those of you who do, how many "friends" do you have on Facebook?  I have over 1,300 "friends" on Facebook, most of which I have casually added to my list of "friends" because they sent a request or I went to high school with them or something like that.  My wife makes fun of me because she knows that I really don't know many of these 1,300+ all that well but I still call them my friends.  She has a point with all of this.  There are times when I see someone's status update appear on my news feed and I will wonder to myself who this person is.  And then there are those "friends" who update about how funny their cat is or what color socks they are wearing for the day and I realize just how little I have in common with that person.  So in order to remedy this I have recently begun to "unfriend" some people on Facebook that I realize I truly know very little about if I know anything abou...

"I have neither silver nor gold, but what I have, I give to you..." (Acts 3:6)   Have you ever wanted to give more than your means would allow?  I'm not talking about buying something that you wanted and realizing that you didn't quite have enough to pull off the purchase.  I'm talking about those times where you see a need and in your heart you have a desperate desire to meet it. There are people and circumstances that will cross your path that will force you to reevaluate everything that you hold dear in life.  It might be the family with the newborn child who is barely holding on in a neonatal intensive care unit of a hospital.  Or, it could be the friend with kidney failure who is desperate to find a donor.  Maybe it's the report on the news of children who have been found hungry and cold in an unheated apartment who now are wards of the state with nowhere to go.  The list is long of those things that grip our hearts, urging us to do something-...