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Finding Joy in the Mourning
There is something about heartbreak that teaches us more about love, than love alone ever can. There is something about living in darkness that makes us long for light. There is something about being lied to that makes the truth, once we hear it, that much clearer. There is something about living in bondage that makes the taste of freedom that much sweeter. I don’t know why it has to be this way. But for light to come. For truth to come. For change to come. And for love to come – there is always pain. Our very lives begin and end with it. Being born and then dying. Pain…
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And the Two Shall Become One
After being married to the same person for 17 years, I am beginning to understand why marriage is so important to God, so sacred. In a world full of disposable relationships, ghosting and unfriending have become our go-to methods of relationship management. We pick people apart; god-breathed, beautiful, and fearfully made souls, discarding and shelving them for the most arbitrary of reasons. Oftentimes we take the easy way out. To stick with someone through all of their junk is just plain hard. Sometimes even impossible. And when something feels impossible or even just a little too hard, we are tempted to give up. If you have been through a divorce,…
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It’s a Girl
When you wake up sun will shine. We will not go under any cloud. Let balloons go up in town, ring out every bell. Happy birthday, beautiful, all the birds of this day sing a song, sing a song. Dream of trains carrying you through the state parks with the cherry flowers. When you wake up it will be the beginning of the world. Happy birthday, beautiful, in the fields of this day hear a song, hear a song. Oh, undeserved sweetness and light, stay by my side. We will go out in the morning now, a crown of maple leaves, a crown of flowers circling your sweet head. Happy…
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Weakness is Strength
I used to think that when I prayed for God to give me strength in my weakness that He would somehow infuse me with a kind of strength magic, and I would feel my spiritual muscles cartoonishly growing, like Popeye after eating a can of spinach. Now I know. I know that when I pray for strength it means: When I am hurting I can have the guts to admit it. I can cry instead of getting angry and lashing out. Instead of denying my feelings I can admit them. Instead of pretending I can tell the truth. When I have a need I tend to it, and I don’t…
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You Have a Right to be Here
“The world could be fixed of its problems if every child understood the necessity of their existence.” Dwight D. Eisenhower Every single person on this planet has a right to be here. If you are alive, you have the right. If you are breathing, the right. If you have a pulse, you have that right. When God dreamed you up and breathed life into you and put you on this planet, you were granted that right. People will tell you otherwise. Maybe you have been waiting your whole life for someone to give you permission to feel like you belong. And maybe the world, or even the very people who…
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No Clue
Each time he said, “My grace is all you need. My power works best in weakness.” So now I am glad to boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ can work through me. That’s why I take pleasure in my weaknesses, and in the insults, hardships, persecutions, and troubles that I suffer for Christ. For when I am weak, then I am strong. (2 Corinthians 12:9-10, NLT) I’m going out on a limb here to make an earth-shattering confession: I have no idea what I am doing. I am staring at 40 years old. I’ve been married for almost 17 years. I’ve been raising children for almost…
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A Song of Advent
Advent – The juxtaposition of the longing of the ancients with the unforeseen coming of our Christ. Longing for home. Sick. Eager. Expectant. Fighting nagging feelings that once again things are not as they ought. Restless souls, Weary travelers. Parched and perplexed. Sick and tired of waiting – For our luck to change. For our earth to give way. For wrongs to be made right. For circumstance to have mercy. For that bend in the road. That crest of the hill. Ready to coast, Ready to reap. Tired of ceaseless striving and sowing. Arms and muscles ache from our work. Weary for rest. Ready for harvest. Longing for favor, opportunity,…
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Jesus Isn’t Toothpaste
I grew up afraid to fail. Therefore, I grew up afraid of trying anything new. Afraid of what others would think of me. Afraid of the whispers behind closed doors. Afraid. Afraid. Always Afraid. Fast forward to adulthood. I got pretty good at covering up all that fear and doing everything right. I hid behind an impenetrable shield of righteousness of my own fashioning. Or so I thought. I became a Christian at 19. In 20 years of church attendance, I have missed maybe 10 Sundays. 4 of those were because I had just given birth. Check. I’ve served. I’ve led worship. I’ve preached. Helped in children’s church. I gave.…
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Olive
You know things are getting sad and desperate when you start writing about your cat. For all you cat haters out there, I apologize. Bear with me. First let me just say that I am a dog person, through and through. I have always hated cats since I was a kid. Well, I wanted to like cats, they just never liked me. As a young, spasmodic child, I would try to pick them up, hold them, squeeze them, and kiss their cute furry faces. Turns out cats hate that, and now I have the scars to prove it. True story. Then one day, 15 years ago, I adopted two, young,…
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Throw Me a Frickin’ Bone Here
In my previous post, I referenced the rich young ruler and his interaction with Jesus. Today I want to contrast that scenario with another we find in the gospels and one of my personal favorite stories: the faith of the Canaanite woman. But first, a little history. Because I love history. We find this story in two of the four gospels of the New Testament – Matthew 15:21-28 and Mark 7:24-30. Matthew’s account refers to her as the Canaanite woman, and in Mark’s she is called a Syrophonecian. What might seem at first as a conflict between the two stories reveals, with just a little digging, an interesting and astonishingly…
