Gaining a heart of wisdom
Twenty minutes on ice. Twenty minutes on my feet. Then back to the couch and the ice pack -- and that was how I made it through the early days of mothering. Degenerative disc disease and pregnancy make for some painful and complicated logistics when they converge, but, oddly, it's not the pain I remember… Continue reading A Story of Waiting
No one has to remind the forsythia bush outside my dining room window to break forth into yellow luminescence as an announcement that spring has come. The sassy gray squirrel steals shamelessly from the bird feeder "according to his kind," and the chickadee scolds and stitches up the air behind her -- because that is… Continue reading Attending to the Details of Congruence
I started listening to NPR a few years ago because I had entered a season of needing to hear a different voice, of wanting to listen to viewpoints and encounter opinions that I did not share. In these days of challenging conversations around politics and race, it's important for me to remember that I am called… Continue reading God Bless the Whole World — No Exceptions
When C.S. Lewis wrote (famously) of desires unmet that set our hearts toward the journey of further up and further in, it's obvious that he was writing in the days of snail mail and expensive long-distance phone calls. The truth is that life on planet Earth is beset with longings of every kind, but chief… Continue reading Loneliness: An Opportunity and a Sign of Hope
It is a trick of human nature that if we walk by the sock under the coffee table enough times, it will eventually disappear. We will have stopped seeing it. This is unfortunate for pristine housekeeping practices, and even more so when we're reading the Bible. It's tragic when we've heard the stories so many… Continue reading Hearing the Stories Anew
Saying "I do" at any age carries a freight of challenges and adjustments along with the joy, but a 57-year-old newlywed, married for the first time, brings a unique perspective to marriage. Using the parable of her wedding preparations, Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth begins Adorned: Living Out the Beauty of the Gospel Together with a challenge to adorn… Continue reading Love and Truth Made Visible
Shrouded in mystery, the ways of God are stitched into stories, carried on the smoke of a burning sacrifice, and sung from the heart with both joy and tears. Through promises and prophecies, God hints at a plan that will reel in rebellion and undo death and loss -- until the silence of four hundred… Continue reading Old and New Testaments: One Great Story
Our first summer living on this country hill, the budget was tight and luxuries were few. I had planted a garden that seemed huge to me at the time, and a friend, intending to surprise me, weeded the entire plot as a generous gift from the heart. How could she have known that those random… Continue reading Culture Care: Filling Up the Longing for Beauty
Wood stoves do not render their comforting warmth without regular tending. Fires must be coaxed along with frequent ministrations, and I never give this much thought -- unless my good husband is away, for he miraculously tends to this important detail, and our house stays cozy and warm. Similarly, since the beginning of our marriage,… Continue reading Your Marriage: From Disappointing to Delightful
"Write what you know." It's good counsel, and, if followed, results in a kind of authenticity that can't happen if the author attempts to write outside her realm of real-life experience. Maybe that's why people are still reading Stepping Heavenward by Elizabeth Prentiss, a fictional journal that follows the life of Katherine Mortimer from her first entry… Continue reading Stepping Heavenward: A Timeless Classic
Living Our Days 