This next week will see many of our folk away for the Spring Break. I understand how important it is to take time off from the pressures and demands that families juggle on a regular basis, which a week at this time of the year affords. Hopefully, everyone who gets away will return to their responsibilities refreshed and renewed.

Sacrifice is a word that has attained taboo status today. No one relishes the idea of giving up anything. All around us are voices telling us that to be happy and whole we have to be adding stuff on a continual basis. Unfortunately, no matter how hard we try to fill the holes in our souls with things we find such consumption to be an exercise in futility.

This weekend a major cable news network released two new documentary series that in their own way dealt with dynasties – one political, the other religious. As a student of both secular history and church history, I found both series riveting and will continue to watch them to their conclusion. The series on religious dynasty, though spellbinding, was also somewhat painful, as it focused on the manner in which after Christians came to power in the age of Constantine, believers quickly turned on one another over matters of doctrine. In the 1800 years that have passed since the reign of Constantine that scenario has played out far too many times. We Christians were most definitely at our best when we were not in a dominant position because of how we needed one another in order to survive. Once our interdependence goes away, domination becomes the order...