It was an exceptionally trying day. My energetic and precocious two-year old had gotten away from me more than once during our quick errands to the library and post office. Employees at both venues laughed and nodded and offered commiserating quips about the “terrible twos.” I forced laughter while wrestling my squirrelly toddler to the…
God is faithful
5 Tools for the Christian Struggling with Anxiety
I knew when I turned out the light that I would be up in a couple of hours. I could feel the unsettling burning in my stomach. I was tired enough to fall asleep quickly, but when the clock read 2:30 a.m, I was predictably awake with a pounding heart, sweat-soaked pajamas, and a brain…
The Strongest Thread
It was mid-October a year ago when my mom had brain surgery to remove a tumor from her left frontal lobe. Hovering over the place where her speech and emotions live, the tumor had grown quickly enough to cause a seizure and lost time. I remember how nervous we were when it all happened on…
There’s Blessing in the Longing
I want to run away from these words. I hit “publish” so you wouldn’t feel alone when your hopes rise and fall in a tumble of confusing might-have-beens. It’s embarrassing to admit after thirteen years of one-lined tests that sometimes I still find myself entertaining a glimmer of hope that my situation might change. It’s…
What Do You Say to the Suffering?
“It was suicide,” she said. Her eyes swam with tears that leaked down her cheeks while she explained what had happened earlier this year. I whispered, “I’m so, so sorry,” and wrung my hands uselessly the way you do when there is nothing that will make a situation any better and you know it. The…
Real Love Awakens Us to Real Life
Last week I fell down a rabbit hole of remembering. It began with a search for my journal from the year we adopted our oldest son and ended with me digging through a musty pile of notebooks in the basement. I swiped away cobwebs from the dark corner of the cellar where the box of…
Future Discipleship Part 2: God’s Part in Our Perseverance
When my husband and I first settled into rural church ministry twelve years ago, I was a little unprepared for the pace of life offered by the farming community where we had made our new home. We had left a much larger college town buzzing with traffic and commutes, a life where I’d had a…
Future Discipleship: Perseverance Now Means Perseverance Later
A few hot summers ago, the first week of August found me in the early stages of marathon training. For accountability’s sake, I had already signed up for the St. Jude Marathon in Memphis, Tennessee, and paid my registration fee. My financial investment was the impetus for faithful training. I’d spent the previous year working…
Anxiety: Should I Be Stronger Than This?
It comes at night. Almost always, it comes at night. It begins with just a whisper of urgency, a small note of concern. It travels the currents in my brain, hitching a ride with firing neurons, grabbing the wheel of logical thinking and veering sharply off course. Anxiety wrecks my nights. These episodes began right…
I Prayed for Healing. He Answered with His Presence.
These are slow summer days, stretching long at the ends from first light to last. We drink them in deep swallows, savoring the absence of hurried schedules. We sleep later than normal and wear pajamas longer than we should. The hours unspool without our notice or care. It seems a luxury. I’ve not had such…