In a Nutshell
Tidbits – July 2026
If Dad told only dinosaur jokes - Part II
- How can you tell a dinosaur from a peanut? Try lifting it up. If you can’t, it’s probably a dinosaur. (Though it might be a heavy peanut.)
- What’s the difference between a dinosaur and a pencil? A dinosaur is harder to sharpen.
- Why did the dinosaur cross the road? It was the chicken’s day off.
- What’s the difference between a dinosaur and a cup of coffee? A dinosaur doesn’t keep you awake at night. (Usually.)
- What’s red, has a long neck, and hates to be touched? A dinosaur with sunburn.
- How are dinosaurs and bluebirds alike? They both have wings. Except for the dinosaurs.
- What do you do with a green dinosaur? Wait until it ripens.
- What do you do with a blue dinosaur? Cheer him up.
- What do you do with a white dinosaur? Try not to lose him in the snow.
Source: inspired by, and some borrowed from Charles Keller’s “Colossal Fossils: Dinosaur Riddles”
How he learned he needed to preach Mark 2:28
Some years ago, on an early Sunday morning, a young Dutch pastor faced a quandary. A snowstorm had closed the roads between his house and the church and there seemed no way he could make it there to preach. But then he had an idea. The canal running behind his house went right to the church, so he could still make it there if he skated.
But was that a good idea? Bringing the Word was important; however his church was very firm on Sunday observance, and skating was simply not an acceptable Sunday activity.
He hemmed and hawed before finally deciding that if it was at all possible, he just had to conduct worship. So the pastor strapped on his skates, and though the wind was howling, he managed to speedily make his way down the frozen canal right to the church building.
When he walked up the steps, he saw the congregation was already in place, and as he stepped in the door, the consistory was there waiting for him, grim expressions all. The elders weren’t pleased, but they liked their young pastor and weren’t eager to publicly rebuke him. So after some hurried discussion among the men, one elder asked the pastor a question: “Did you enjoy the skating, reverend?”
“No,” he replied, “I didn’t enjoy it at all.”
“Phew!” the consistory said as one. It was all right – skating on Sunday could be allowed, just so long as there was no joy in it!
Source: adapted from Michael Hodgin's “1001 More Humorous illustrations for Public Speaking”
Big Brother can’t be father or mother
“We fear the government may be powerful enough to destroy families; we know that it is not powerful enough to replace them.” – Ronald Reagan
Never read a Bible verse
Mark Twain once quipped that a cat that’s sat on a hot stove will never do so again… but he’ll never sit on a cold one either. In other words, that the lesson the cat learned had been applied broadly, even to circumstances where it isn’t warranted.
That notion – that we shouldn’t overlearn our lessons – has biblical backing. God regularly tells us to do one thing in one place, and nearly the opposite elsewhere. The starkest contrast is Proverbs 26:4-5, where God begins with why we shouldn’t answer a fool (lest we appear like him), before, in the very next verse, telling us why we must answer a fool (lest he appear wise in his own eyes). So when should you do which? That’s where wisdom is required.
Another contrast? Solomon’s advice to be like the hard-working ant who diligently plans ahead (Prov. 6:6-8), and Jesus’ encouragement not to be anxious about tomorrow (Matt. 6:25-34). Contradictions? Not at all – just different lessons for different circumstances. Solomon’s advice was for the lazy, and Jesus’ correction was to those fixated on the here and now rather than on God.
So don’t be like Twain’s cat who let one incident shape its whole understanding. God gave us a Book, not just a verse, so we should be sure to never read just a Bible verse – read His Word in the context of what else God thought it important for us to know.
Know your history
"Any man who thinks he can be happy and prosperous by letting the Government take care of him better take a closer look at the American Indian!"
– commonly attributed to Henry Ford, but without any clear sourcing. Whether from him or not, the truth it captures makes clear the foolishness of socialist schemes.
Have scientists created life?
Every few years media outlets share a startling scientific advancement about how a group of scientists have "created life." A couple recent examples include J. Craig Venter back in 2010 for creating "the world's first synthetic life form," and Elizabeth Strychalski and her crew in 2021 who "crafted a single-celled synthetic organism that divides and multiplies just like the real thing." Why is this so important? Because there's only two explanations for how life began: God, or godless. And these supposed "creations of life" are seen as steps towards coming up with a godless explanation.
So have scientists actually created life? No. They've tinkered, placing engineered DNA in already living cells. So, they began with life and ended up with life. And as Jonathan Sarfati noted:
"It took an enormous amount of intelligence to make this cell, and they borrowed a lot of information from already-existing cells. In particular, they synthesized the genome of Mycoplasma mycoides, with 1.08 million base-pairs (bp)3 and about 985 genes.... it cost US$40 million and 200 man-years to produce."
So with their brilliant minds, supercomputers, lab equipment, refined chemicals, all sorts of intentionality, and a living cell to start with they've managed to create life. Which is supposed to show us something about how it all could have happened accidentally and unintelligently?
Tell that to a devoted evolutionist and they'll probably tell you it's only a matter of time before scientists figure it out. But time hasn't proven to be their friend. When Darwin proposed his theory, he thought the cell was made up of "membrane, nucleus, and nucleolus" which was all that could be seen under his day's microscopes. The ribosomes, Golgi apparatus, mitochondria and other microscopic machines were missed entirely, and the nucleus was a black box – unknown and disregarded – which made it a lot easier to ignore God's fingerprints evident all over the cell's design. But since then every new discovery has shown how much more complicated single-celled life is than previously realized. That means the more we are discovering, the more and more impossible abiogenesis – life from non-life – is revealed to be. And the more obvious the need for a great Genius to be behind it all.
Just be yourself, they say
There’s a story told about Abe Lincoln, that when he was at a hometown soiree, he approached the lady of his interest and told her, “Mary Todd, I want to dance with you in the worst way.” And after a turn around the floor together, she could only say, “You wanted to dance in the worst way, and you certainly did.”
Why not fund my educational trip to Europe too?
Our professor had written for the local daily newspaper for decades, and explained that before universities started offering journalism programs, his newspaper would put all their new hires through a 3-month training program. When journalism degrees became a thing, the paper cut back their own training program to just a month or two, and required all applicants have a journalism degree. So a young man or woman who wanted to be a journalist now had to invest 2 to 4 years of their life, and a lot of their own money and taxpayer money too on tuition, to get a piece of paper that would save the newspaper just a month or two of training.
That doesn’t math.
Meanwhile the government could talk about how it was directing so much new money towards post-secondary institutions so we could have a more educated workforce. But at what cost? As has been said:
“If your college degree doesn’t have enough value for you to pay it off, it certainly doesn’t have enough value for me to pay it off.”
Boys, do you want this to happen to you?
Dinosaurs didn't read. And now they're extinct.
When John MacArthur visited a philosophy class…
We, as Christians, are called to walk humbly (Micah 6:8). But let’s not get confused about who or what we are being humble about. It’s us, not God.
That’s a point worth pausing on. We so often get things wrong and muddled, so we have good reason to be humble. But not about God or His Word. Yet somehow, there are all sorts of topics the Bible is crystal clear on that we’re still acting quite “humbly” about, reluctant to speak up in His Name. It’s time to get confident. For inspiration, here’s a story from the late John MacArthur. This is a man who’d proclaim God’s Truth just as boldly sitting across from a newscaster as he would standing up in a pulpit, but the point here isn’t his example, but his basis – he had God’s Word.
"As a Christian, you and I share this in common: I see things clearly. I see the world clearly. In fact, I often wonder why I'm not on more programs giving the right answer to everything. It's all very clear to me. Everything is clear to me. I understand where the world came from, where it's going. I understand all of that. I understand why things happen the way they happen. I understand life and death and life after death and heaven and hell and morality and immorality. I understand it all. I understand why the world is the way it is. Why people act the way they act. Am I particularly intelligent? No. Am I particularly wise? No. I just have the mind of Christ here in this book.
“I remember one time, years ago, being invited to Cal State Northridge to speak to the philosophy class and the professor was a former rabbi who liked to chew on an occasional fundamentalist. And so, I was going to be the bone for that experience. I went to the class and I was supposed to talk on the subject of Christianity and culture. Well, I didn't want to talk about Christianity and culture. I wanted to talk about the gospel. I think I opened by saying, something like, ‘….I know this is a philosophy class, and I know that you're searching for the truth, and I'm here to bring your search to an end.’
“That was enough to lose them all. They looked like somebody had shot off a gun in the room. So, I said: ‘I'm here to tell you the truth. Tell you the truth about the origin of the universe. Tell you the truth about why the universe holds together. Things that Einstein couldn't figure out. I'm here to tell you where the universe is going in the future, how it will end. I'm here to tell you about life and death and the afterlife, morality, everything you want to know. I'm here to tell you all of it.’
“And when I said this, the rabbi professor was as stunned as everybody else.
“I said, ‘But no matter what I say, you're not going to understand it and you're not going to believe it.’
“And one student at that moment spoke for all of them and said, ‘How do you know? How do you know we won't understand it? We won't believe it?’
“I said, ‘Because there's a prerequisite. For you to understand this, you have to have been transformed by faith in Jesus Christ so that your understanding is opened.’
“To which he replied, ‘Well, how does that happen?’
“And I said, ‘Good. Now we'll talk about how you become transformed by Jesus Christ.’ And so I went into the gospel, which was no small irritation to the professor. I remember an extended time of sharing the gospel with some of the students out in the hall after the class was over. A number of them came to church and a couple of them actually joined our ministry here and professed Christ. The Word brings light to absolutely everything."
