I am at Crossroads College in Rochester, MN, and am honored to have been chosen to give the Earl Grice Lectures, and my subject is atonement. I have been hosted by Mark Weedman and Mike Benson, and they have been wondrous hosts. And I had a workout yesterday: a lecture, a luncheon with pastors at which time I presented some ideas from Embracing Grace, and then a bookstore session of signing and talking, dinner with Mike, Mark and their wives, and then the Rochester Lecture on Jesus Creed at Autumn Ridge Community Church.

I could go and on about each, but I won’t. It has a been a rewarding experience for me — in fact, I always feel I get more out of these kinds of events than I give. Crossroads is a salt-of-the-earth school teaching students the Bible and what it means to be a disciple in this world of ours.
One more observation; Ben, who was my contact at the very fine Christian book store here in Rochester, is a man after my own heart. The guy loves books and he has as fine a selection of biblical studies books as I’ve seen. If you get here, please check out this bookstore — and I don’t for the life of me know its name.
On top of this, I had two special experiences: first, someone brought me a picture of our Bichon, Webster, printed from a picture I posted on the blog, and asked me to sign for Webster. Pretty fun.
Last night just before I was getting up to speak I saw a man — about my age — whom I instantly recognized as a high school friend that I studied the Bible with some 30 years ago — Kent Brobst. He and his wife had seen I would be there and they wandered over to the event. It was great to see Kent and meet his wife. I wish I could have spent more time with them to catch up on our lives.
Today I give the second lecture and then I’m off to the airport for O’Hare.