I remember how I would pause with my morning coffee. I wrapped my hands around the body of my mug, the curve of the handle the perfect size through which to lace my fingers. I noticed the smooth pottery, the way it felt as the warmth pressed into my hands on the crisp morning. I…
Chores on our farm have been rarely routine since a batch of four male kittens was born in our barn a few months ago, delivered unceremoniously in the corner of one of the horse stalls by a first-time mother. There was a horse occupying the same stall and the new little family was staying warm…
As Hurricane Laura pounded the coasts of Texas and Louisiana, I thought about the gale-force winds that have blown through my life. I have lived through several hurricanes, even though I am a resident of New Jersey. One was so devastating that my young family was without power for 11 days and had to be…
Chemotherapy had not diminished her humor. Nor her wisdom. As she sat on the stage and regaled us with encouragement to write our stories with passion and purpose, I listened in the back of the auditorium utterly grateful for this human—cancer survivor, God’s servant, and my friend, Liz Curtis Higgs. “Don’t worry so much about…
God’s goodness. In the depths of our being, do we believe that he really has good in store for our lives? What about those times when life feels anything but? When situations seem to show otherwise, how can we glean the good? This has been my quest: discovering God’s goodness in the land of the…
What did you do during quarantine? Since we all had to act like hermits during the coronavirus pandemic, I decided to tackle my closet. As I sorted through much-loved outfits and unworn clothing, I tossed out rejects, sewed on missing buttons, and rediscovered favorite items that had been buried in the tangled mess of clothes….
The past paralyzes, and the future is unknown. My calendar captures future events as my “to-do” list increases with things I should have done yesterday. In the meantime, social media drags me down in the game of “what if”: The world will come to an end if democrats win, and the world will go to…
Your rolling and stretching had grown quiet that stormy winter night, but no labor came as it should. A long ten days overdue post-Christmas, you clung to amnion and womb, not yet ready to emerge. Then the northeast wind blew more wicked and the snow flew horizontal, landing in drifting piles, the country roads impassable,…
I was six time zones away from the tragedy, yet I felt the concentric circles of its pain. It was Friday the 13th. Gunmen and bombers had taken to the streets of Paris, attacking citizens at a soccer stadium, a concert hall, and restaurants along the streets. The iconic city known for its quaint cafes…
A few weeks ago, my husband, Rick, and I were on our way to New Hampshire to be with a sweet friend of ours who was graduating from a discipleship program. I wasn’t in the best of moods because I was in a bit of pain due to my recently diagnosed spinal stenosis (spinal column…
She wasn’t always called Aunty. Her grandfather named her Romawii, which means “beautiful treasure” in her native language of Mizo. Her grandfather was one of the first Christians in her northeastern India homeland, and he delighted in traveling to villages to share the love of Jesus. Aunty says God blessed him for his work by…
…to be loved by God, not merely pitied, but delighted in as an artist delights in his work or a father in a son—it seems impossible, a weight or burden of glory which our thoughts can hardly sustain. But so it is. (C.S. Lewis) I experienced the impossible in the twilight of a morning….
The Old Testament enthralls me: the poetry, the heat and sand, the incomprehensible language, the culture and mystery (Who was Cain’s wife? What are the Nephilim? What about Pangea and the dinosaurs?). But the characters I am supposed to identify most closely with—the Hannahs and Rebeccas and Rachels and Sarahs—I don’t. While I have known…
“Most blessed of women be Jael, the wife of Heber the Kenite, most blessed of tent-dwelling women.” The sun was peeking over the edge of the mountain ridge when the rumblings started. Jael looked up from the fire she was kindling to bake the day’s bread. In the fringes of pink that touched the grey…