I well remember the exhaustion of brand-new motherhood. When my first son was born, I didn’t pick up my Bible for months. I was so sure that I’d arrive at the magical land of discipline later when my baby wasn’t so needy. I didn’t realize that keeping the habits of Bible reading and prayer when…
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And Yet—
It doesn’t seem to matter if you know the end is near. You can still be surprised by death. You can feel its weight on your chest when you open your eyes in the morning almost three weeks later and wonder how in the world it happened. Has the sun really risen and set seventeen…
I Lift Up My Eyes to the Fields
In the afternoons, I spend more than an hour sitting in two different carpool lines to pick up my kids. Living in a rural area, one of those lines is flanked by fields. Cotton on one side, soybeans on the other. This afternoon, I rolled down the windows in my van and let the breeze…
Please, Take a Bite
It looks like one of my kids is going to follow in my footsteps as a foodie. A couple of months ago, I walked my twelve-year-old through the process of making a simple pasta dish. He is terrified of cutting his finger with a knife or burning his hand on the stove—things he’s seen me…
The Gift of Tangled Roots
On a trip to the California coast with my sister, I had the opportunity to explore Muir Woods National Monument, a redwood forest. As we walked through the woods, my sister and I noted how the massive redwood trees grew in groves. The national park signs throughout Muir Woods didn’t call them groves or circles…
The Word is a Scalpel
The first time I picked up a scalpel, I was fourteen years old and standing over some poor dead creature in the biology lab at my high school. It was a frog, I think. I had quite the enthusiastic anatomy and physiology teacher. We moved from frogs to sharks, then squid and cats. (Yes, cats.)…
Every Stitch
I learned to knit about ten years ago. I watched dozens of YouTube videos to master the basics of casting on, perfecting the basic garter stitch, purling, casting off, and binding off. I’ve never stepped much outside of basic patterns, and I’ve never knitted anything that wasn’t a square or rectangle. Though I’m a very…
Drinking From the Pool of Bitterness
I went to bed that night with bitterness in my heart. It was a pretty ugly offense I was mad about—something that wounded me and others I loved. I’d spent much of the day just good and mad. Good and mad. Is that really how it is? I guess it feels good to be mad…
Hiding God’s Word in Our Hearts: The Ins and Outs of Scripture Memory
Author’s note: Since penning this article six years ago, I’ve put everything I know about Scripture memorization into my book, Memorizing Scripture: The Basics, Blessings, and Benefits of Meditating on God’s Word, which was published by Moody Publishers in 2023. This book gives you all the most helpful tips and tricks I’ve found to train…
Feel Your Weakness, Feel Your Need
I lay on my left side facing the screen. The sonographer squirted a clear jelly on the wand and rested it near my sternum. Fascinated, I watched images of my heart fill the screen—pumping, beating, opening, closing. This is amazing, I thought, until I felt the familiar flutters and off beats pounding in my chest….