Episodes

Why Have You Forsaken Me? is a musical reflection inspired by Psalm 22—the Psalm that begins with an anguished question and ultimately moves toward hope. From David’s cry to Jesus’ words from the cross, this song explores those seasons when God seems distant, wounds remain, and answers refuse to come. Yet beneath every question remains a stubborn confession of faith: Still, You are my God. A song for the questions, the wounds, and the hope—and for anyone discovering that even in the darkest pl...

On September 18, 1905, Scottish minister, novelist, and fantasy writer George MacDonald died—never knowing how far his stories would travel. Years later, a young C. S. Lewis discovered MacDonald’s Phantastes and said it had “baptized my imagination.” That seed would eventually bear fruit in one of Christianity’s most influential writers. Today on Moments Almanac, we explore the remarkable legacy of a man whose pulpit may have disappeared—but perhaps only because it got larger. It’s a reminder t...

Psalm 22 — He Has Been Here Too “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?” — Psalm 22:1 Few passages of Scripture bring human suffering and the suffering of Christ together as powerfully as Psalm 22. David begins with one of the most anguished prayers in the Bible. God seems distant. His cries appear unanswered. His enemies surround him. His strength is disappearing, and yet he continues to address the One who seems absent as “My God.” Centuries later, Jesus would take these words upon His o...

September 17, 1942. In wartime Romania, a Pentecostal believer named Voicu Rusin stood before a military court and faced a devastating choice: compromise his convictions and go free—or remain faithful and pay an almost unimaginable price. This episode of Moments Almanac tells the little-known story of an ordinary Christian whose quiet refusal became an extraordinary testimony. It’s a story about conscience, courage, and the moments when faithfulness comes down to one simple question: What are ...

A doghouse in South America. Some confused disciples. And one forgotten loaf of bread. Sometimes we can hear every word and still completely miss the point. In this Scattered Moments episode, a funny misunderstanding becomes a reminder to slow down, listen carefully, and let Scripture do more than pass through our minds. Maybe the Bible isn’t something we’re supposed to get through. Maybe it’s something God wants to get through us. Share Your Thoughts

September 16 — Joseph Samuel Murrow: He Stayed On September 16, 1857, twenty-two-year-old Joseph Samuel Murrow was ordained to the ministry. Soon after, he headed west to serve among Native peoples in Indian Territory—and what began as a missionary appointment became a lifetime of service. Murrow helped establish churches, train Native pastors, strengthen schools, care for orphans, and share the gospel across generations. But perhaps the most remarkable thing about his story is also the simpl...

On September 15, 1963, a bomb exploded at Birmingham’s 16th Street Baptist Church, killing four young girls: Addie Mae Collins, Cynthia Wesley, Carole Robertson, and Denise McNair. The tragedy came on a Sunday when the church’s Youth Day carried an almost unbearable theme: “A Love That Forgives.” In this installment of Moments Almanac, we remember four lives, a nation confronted by the horror of racial hatred, and a difficult question that still reaches across the decades: What does forgiveness...

Psalm 21 — Come Back I’ve noticed something about my prayer life. I can be incredibly detailed when I need something from God. When there’s a problem, I can give the Lord a complete briefing. Background information. Supporting documentation. Possible outcomes. People involved. Deadlines. And, occasionally, a few suggestions about how He might want to handle the situation. “Lord, here’s what’s happening. Here’s what I need. Here’s when I need it. And while I certainly don’t want to tell You ho...

“Lord, I believe; help my unbelief!” — Mark 9:24 Sometimes faith and doubt live closer together than we’d like to admit. In this episode of Scattered Moments, we meet a desperate father who brings his suffering son to Jesus—and brings something else with him: a faith battered by disappointment. His prayer is one of the most honest in Scripture: “I believe; help my unbelief.” What if faith isn’t having all the answers? What if it’s deciding where to lean when the answers don’t come? We’ll spen...

On September 14, two remarkable lives meet across more than thirteen centuries. John Chrysostom — the famed “Golden Mouth” of the early church — died in forced exile in 407 after years of preaching with unusual courage against corruption, luxury, and indifference toward the poor. His words could fill a cathedral, but they also unsettled powerful people because he refused to let the comfortable forget the suffering around them. On that same date in 1736, Robert Raikes was born in Gloucester, E...

Jesus had an unusual prescription for worry: Go look at the birds. Birds don’t have retirement accounts. They don’t check the stock market, worry about a shortage of worms, or gather in support groups to discuss their fear of squirrels and power lines. They don’t spend sleepless nights wondering whether their children will ever leave the nest. They don’t worry. They just bird. In this slightly humorous Scattered Moments episode, we wander through Jesus’ words in Matthew 6 and discover what bi...

On September 13, 1865, a young Welsh missionary named Robert Jermain Thomas reached the coast of Korea carrying Chinese-language Bibles into a country largely closed to the outside world. He could not have known how costly that calling would become—or how far the seeds he planted would travel. Today’s Moments Almanac is a story about courage, Scripture, and faithfulness when you may never live to see the harvest. Share Your Thoughts

On September 12, 1846, Elizabeth Barrett slipped away from her family home and married fellow poet Robert Browning in secret. Their unlikely love story crossed boundaries of family, temperament, health, and expectation—and became one of literature’s great romances. Today on Moments Almanac, we remember a love that found understanding where others saw only differences, and consider the remarkable power of being truly known—and loved anyway. Share Your Thoughts

On September 11, 2001, evil left a terrible mark. But it was not the only thing present that day. In this solemn Moments Almanac, we remember the loss—and the courage, compassion, sacrifice, and grace that appeared in the darkness. Share Your Thoughts

On this day in 1819, Joseph Scriven was born in Ireland — a man whose private grief would one day give the church one of its most beloved hymns. In this episode of Moments Almanac, we trace the quiet, sorrow-shaped life of a man who endured deep personal loss, served others with unusual humility, and discovered that friendship with Christ was not sentimental language for easy days, but solid ground for hard ones. Sometimes the songs the church sings most confidently were first written through te...

What happens when you reach the end of your strength? Paul knew that place. In 2 Corinthians 1, he describes being under pressure “far beyond our ability to endure”—so overwhelmed that he despaired of life itself. Yet it was there, at the end of his own resources, that Paul discovered a deeper dependence on “God, who raises the dead.” Years later, poet Annie Johnson Flint would express the same truth beautifully: when our endurance is exhausted and our own resources are gone, God’s supply has...

Four hundred and thirty-eight years apart, Philipp Melanchthon and President Dwight D. Eisenhower faced very different questions of authority. One helped articulate a Reformation conviction that Scripture stands above human institutions. The other signed the first federal civil rights legislation since Reconstruction, as America wrestled with whether justice could be left to the will of individual states. Two moments. Two very different struggles. And one enduring question: Who gets the final w...

What do you trust when the day of trouble comes? Psalm 20 reminds us that faith is not the promise of a life without battles. It is the confidence that God hears, strengthens, sustains, and remains present in the middle of them. “Some trust in chariots and some in horses, but we trust in the name of the LORD our God.” This original song is inspired by that powerful confession. The resources around us may change. Plans may fail. Strength may fade. But the character and faithfulness of God rema...

When the Walls Don’t Hold On September 8, AD 70, the Roman siege of Jerusalem came to its devastating end. On the same date in 1941, Leningrad was cut off from the outside world, beginning a siege that would last nearly 900 days. Two cities. Two sieges. Nineteen centuries apart. One story remembers people who fled when warned. The other remembers people who had nowhere to go and endured. Sometimes faith means go. Sometimes faith means hold on. And both stories remind us of something we easily...

Psalm 20 is a prayer for the day of trouble. It does not promise that God’s people will be spared from difficulty. Instead, it offers something deeper: the assurance that God hears, helps, strengthens, and sustains His people in the midst of it. Originally, this Psalm appears to have been a prayer spoken over Israel’s king before battle. The people ask God to answer him, protect him, remember his sacrifices, establish his plans, and grant victory. But beneath those requests is a deeper confes...

On September 7, 1807, Robert Morrison arrived in China with a Bible and a calling, beginning decades of quiet missionary work that would help bring Scripture to the Chinese people. Ninety-four years later, the Boxer Protocol marked the bitter aftermath of an uprising fueled partly by resentment toward foreign influence. Two moments on the same date offer both a calling and a warning: carry the gospel faithfully—but be careful what else you carry with it. Share Your Thoughts

On September 6, 1529, Anabaptist preacher Jörg Blaurock was executed for a conviction that had already cost him his position, his freedom, his friendships, and ultimately his life. Four years earlier, Blaurock had knelt in a small house in Zurich and asked to be baptized upon his own confession of faith—helping ignite the Swiss Anabaptist movement. Arrested, beaten, banished, and threatened with death, he kept preaching. Even during his final weeks in prison, he wrote hymns rather than pleas fo...

What do yellow jackets, a homemade tractor-tire boat, the first day of junior high, and forgetting where you live have in common? In this episode of Scattered Moments, I look back on one of the most embarrassing and unforgettable days of my childhood—and the surprising gift it left behind. Sometimes suffering gives us a language for compassion. It teaches us how to sit beside someone else and say, “I know how you feel.” And that points us to something even greater: Jesus doesn’t understand our...

On September 5, 1997, Mother Teresa died in Calcutta after a lifetime spent among the poor, the abandoned, and the dying. To the world, she seemed to embody unwavering spiritual certainty. But letters published after her death revealed a surprising private struggle: for decades, she often lived without any felt sense of God’s presence. In this episode of Moments Almanac, we look beyond questions of Catholic sainthood to something every Christian can understand—the experience of praying when God...