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Soul Days
I’ve always loved Fall. I love how the leaves turn all kinds of brilliant, especially the crimson and fire orange ones that I wish could linger longer than the Kansas wind. On the rare calm days, right after the leaves have just turned, it’s hard for me not to just stare and inhale the crispness of the air. There is simplistic beauty in changing seasons. Most days, especially as of late, my days have been brimming with a laundry list of to-do’s. There has been loud, lived-out noise in the chaos of a constant stream of life. Most of it all wonderful things I welcome. Such as racing my sweet…
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The White House
Nearly three years ago I received a random e-mail, “What do you think?” In the e-mail was a picture attached of a little white house with black shutters and a beautiful large tree in the front yard. The e-mail was from dad. Usually dad’s e-mails were short and to the point. This one, while short, was so exciting, special even. You see, for years my dad had lived adrift. My parents didn’t have much and they lived from one apartment complex or facility to another. My dad even spent the sum of a year living at a Rescue Mission shortly before my mother passed. He was broke and broken. When…
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It Will Be Okay. . .
Could it be possible that pain is simply planting season for God?
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Do You Know Who, or Rather Whose, You Are?
Both you and I were intentionally created. We don’t meaninglessly exist one moment and cease to exist the next. We were carefully chosen and purposefully knit together with more love and intention than you and I can possibly even begin to wrap our minds around. We are individually unique, uniquely called, and called to proclaim Him who claimed us. We are NOT designed to live individually independent of each other or of God. We are NOT to be mini-gods. Our culture’s foundation rests on the premise that “self” matters more than anything or anyone. Not only is it a multimillion dollar market but an entrenched and deepening mindset, whether we…
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Why Back-Story Should Matter to the Believer
Over the past couple of weeks this video has gone viral. It portrays the surprise reunion of ex-lovers separated over the span of 30 years. The title alone is alluring. In watching the video I was honestly so moved by the raw emotion, the obvious display of recognition, connection and care these two individuals had for each other that I was seconds away from joining in on the viral share. The video it’s self just focuses on a shared moment. No back-story is given, barely even mention to the individual’s names. Innocent: a story to marvel and celebrate, right? But what was the story? What precipitated the moment gone-viral? Who…
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The Measure of a Moment
So much happens in a moment. In one moment a person is born and in the blink of an eye another is gone. There are moments that build up, others that tear down. Moments of strength, moments of weakness. There are times of plenty and times of known scarcity. Seasons of joy, seasons of pain. Days of sun and days full of rain. There are frigid cold days and others brimming with the sun’s warmth. Moments that just happen and others that don’t, moments of adjustment and moments of appointment. Even seasons of adversity seem to be appointed by God himself. (Hebrews 12:6) There are times to put the peddle…
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When Words Fail
Simply tune into the news and you know words are not lacking in today’s world. There are rising tensions in Gaza, a 6.0 earthquake in Napa Valley, the West Africa Ebola outbreak that is 6 months ongoing, a massive chemical spill in Mexico turned two rivers red, the atrocities and threat of ISIS, and the sobering CDC statistic that every 30 seconds in the United States another baby has been killed by abortion. If this were not enough to sober the heart there was also the recent news of Robin Williams suicide. It seems so contradictory that a man known for his exuberance and talent for humor could succumb to…
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This Is All I Have To Give: Letting Go
One of this week’s Bloghop themes for P31 Ministries online Bible Studies, Am I Messing Up My Kids? just hit home in a big way. In last week’s post I shared a bit about how transition currently feels like a long endurance swim through life. It’s been tough to say the least. And then it got even more tough, more complicated, more “messy”. The little bit of security and stability I was grasping for became a tabled option for the time-being as more questions than answers surfaced in the middle of this re-location. The truth is we are resting in a period of great unknown. Our little family desperately desires…
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The Comparison Trap
Honestly, sometimes I feel like this guy. Exhausted. Stretched beyond my limit. Feeling like I’m not measuring-up; that somehow I’ve managed to come-up short yet again. Feeling simply like a failure. Anybody relate? Those feelings are certainly not due to a lack of effort either. Oh, no. You see I’ve strained, grunted, and reached with what has seemed akin to super-human effort only to fall measurably short of the end goal. It’s as if at times every fiber of my being has been stretched, pulled, and utterly taxed by the effort. Yesterday, as I was showing my husband the “re-launch“, which he’s heard me talk and brainstorm through for…
