I still remember the winters at the Vasgenyan Seminary in Sevan. Sometimes the snow fell for days without stopping. We would go out with our shovels and clear the walkways and driveways until the paths were open again. A few hours later, it would start snowing again. By evening, the path we had just cleared was often covered. Sometimes it felt like all that work was for nothing. But it wasn’t. The path had to be clear when people needed to walk on it. And when the snow came b

Problems feel heavier at night. During the day, we can usually handle them. There are people to talk to, work to do, and places to go. But at three o’clock in the morning, when the house is dark and quiet and everyone else is asleep, our minds can become very loud. We go over old conversations again and again. We worry about tomorrow. We think about what we should have said, what others should have done, what might go wrong, and how we will fix everything. But some things can

In ancient times, people did not have glass bottles or plastic containers to store their wine. Instead, they used something called a wineskin. A wineskin was a container made from the skin of a goat or sheep. The skin was carefully cleaned, treated, sewn together, and sealed so that it could hold liquids, especially wine. There was something very important about these wineskins. When new wine was poured into them, the wine continued to ferment, releasing gases and creating pr