Gaining a heart of wisdom
C.S. Lewis famously said, "No man knows how bad he is till he has tried very hard to be good." Any foolishness about humanity's innate goodness goes out the window the first time we try to break a bad habit, adopt a godly practice, or keep our mouths shut in the company of an annoying family member.… Continue reading 6 Course Corrections to Avoid Settling for a Mediocre Righteousness
One of the most frequent questions I've been asked over the years (and one I struggled with myself as a young woman) is this: "I know I'm supposed to be having a devotional time with God every day. What does that look like?" The short answer is that there's no short answer to that question! My… Continue reading What Makes a Rich and Meaningful Devotional Life?
On this collision of holidays with ashes for mourning and hearts for love,We are grateful, Lord Jesus, for your perfect love and for your wrath-absorbing sacrifice. We confess that our own love is unreliable, intermittent, and usually utterly dependent upon our feelings and our circumstances. Thank you for your steadfast love that extends to the… Continue reading On this Day of Hearts and Ashes—You Are Deeply Flawed but Also Deeply Loved
Our son sawed lumber, hammered nails, and used a paintbrush dipped in Mediterranean Olive Green to create custom-made doors for our bathroom closet. There are any number of things a twenty-year-old guy could have done with his Saturday. He chose to give his away. Loving and giving are inseparably linked in Scripture. In the Old… Continue reading Six Encouraging Resources To Prepare Your Heart For Lent
Spaghetti sauce bubbles in a pot on the stove, the rich red depths of the kettle wafting fragrance throughout the house. The annual ritual spans three decades: garden-grown tomatoes, hand-picked, and placed into a basket become jars of winter provision. After all, my four sons could eat a lot of pasta! But this pot of… Continue reading How Can Mothers Instill Vibrant Faith in Their Families?
I awoke at 3:00 a.m. with the remnants of a dream taking up every square inch of my brain space. Never mind that it was only a dream. At 3 a.m., dreams are more real and more frightening than they deserve to be. I laughed about the dream in the morning, and it made a… Continue reading How to Fear Wisely—What Are You Afraid of Today?
Most of the time, my habit of living by a list keeps my days on the rails. If I submit to the requirements of Monday's list, I can begin Tuesday with a clean slate and a clear head. But sometimes there are tasks on my list that I'd rather not tackle: The stick horse with… Continue reading When You Wish You Had Just Done the Right Thing
Like beads on a string, our minutes slide by. Poor, cynical Solomon bemoaned the futility of it all, dismissing his significant accomplishments as a chasing after the wind. Author Annie Dillard speaks a better and more hopeful wisdom: How we live our days is, of course, how we spend our lives. The most common complaint about time… Continue reading 4 Habits for Managing Moments When Time Is Scarce
The baby wakes up an hour early—the hour you had planned for quiet study and prayer.The teen driver totals your car on her way to a ballgame.The job interview seems to go so well that you let yourself hope, but the postion goes to another candidate. In ways that are both trivial and seismic, life… Continue reading How Can I Love My Given Life When It’s Not What I Had Planned?
Every year, I set a goal of reading 52 books—one per week, and I usually read at least that many. Then I show up here with a weekly book review. According to Goodreads, I read 87 books in 2023, and I'm going to cap off this year of reading and writing with a reflective post… Continue reading Favorite Books 2023—The Best and Brightest from My Reading Year
Living Our Days 