Bad days were common, but this day – four years ago – was distinct. Everything set me off. I couldn’t talk without snapping at the kids, both of whom were active toddlers at the time. I was harsh with them over minor infractions. I raged around the house and threw one of their books in the trash. I recognized something…
Mornings at our household may or may not resemble a circus getting kids ready for school. We prep the night before, but papers teleport, shoes shrink, or clothes disappear. Someone forgets to brush their teeth or hair – or both. Murphy’s Law requires all of these things to happen on the mornings we’re most pressed for time. It was one…
Armed with a camera, in finally gorgeous weather, I hunt beauty in our barely waking yard. Something… Anything…? I spy three dandelions and drop to my belly in the grass, possibly looking like a fool. My five-year-old daughter wants to pick them. “After I’m done taking this shot.” The shot’s a flop. But the perfect shot emerges – my daughter’s…
I was in the dingy basement, bent over the dryer, wrestling with a mess of clean clothes. My mood matched the ineffectiveness of the lone light bulb ill-positioned on the wrong side of the heating duct. Laundry, like “This is the song that never ends,” is just annoying and pointless. Condemning prisoners of war to meaningless, endless work – dig…
When we get stuck. When we fall and fail. When we slip and our sword slices the person we love, instead of the true enemy. We need to know to our core that our identity is neither in our victories nor our failures. Rather, it is enmeshed in the person of Jesus Christ and His unable-to-be-undone victory. There’s nothing quite…
Chains of fear have restrained me from really living more often than I care to recount. Which explains the level of relief and gratitude I experienced after reading a profound explanation of the cliché story, found in 1 Samuel 17, of David and Goliath. You know: Goliath, the 9-foot tall giant, insults the God of Israel and the Israelite army…
I am somewhere between the apples and the strawberries in the produce section when it grabs hard and stops me in my tracks. My insides feel twisted. An all too familiar feeling. I grip the handle of my grocery cart with one hand and stare down at my list in the other, pretending to read but unseeing. Hope desperately no…
The words are easy to miss. Stamped small over a dark ocean wave towards the bottom, there it is. Three calm, coppery words. A quiet invitation: Look up sometimes. It was a housewarming gift we received from my parents three years ago. A painting of the sea at sunset, by Seward Whitfield. A stunning shadowbox showcases real oyster shells and…
