There are mountains we will traverse in life, places, where one thought becomes seven prayers—a provision and help from the Lord that takes us beyond our own abilities. It’s what I imagine at Pentecost, a single tongue of fire, a flame splitting into many. When I am weak, then I am strong. -2 Corinthians 12:10 These simple words compete for the wonder of first light trembling on the horizon in.. Read More
Many a morning comes with cautionary tales, some of which are true. But true doesn’t always mean stop. We need the wisdom of perspective to let truth and mercy lead, especially when life comes to us as narratives that give pause. In the Psalms, Selah is a musical term often spoken of as a pause, it was meant for meditation. It is a call to depth over width. Maybe that.. Read More
I want to write that it’s taken me twenty years of marriage to become something close to the wife I want to be to my husband. It’s taken all sorts of letting-go-of-old to make space for the now. I simply have not always done this well, often because I was not aware I needed to, other times because I mistook running away from myself for truth-telling, truth-bearing, truth-living. That thing.. Read More
It occurred to me this week the way the river can have a similar illusion as an airplane does when you look at it from the opposing direction. If we didn’t know better it could seem as though both were moving in slow motion. How similar this is to family, to life. Sometimes from certain angles, we can look at our lives and buy into an illusion that it’s going.. Read More
In the Pacific Northwestern United States there are four distinct seasons, two with incredible contrasting “glory”, that is, presence—summer and winter. It strikes me as something to behold because it is new to me that the marked difference is not hot and cold as I have been accustomed to in the Midwest, but rather dry and wet. This year from the late Spring and throughout Summer to early Fall we.. Read More
Hello friends, I hope you’ve had some time to seek gentleness lately. If you don’t know what I’m talking about click that link later, but for now travel with me a bit? I felt the wind and let things fly away. Weights flew. Hair flew. Concerns about my abilities…flew. Certain ways of eating, seeing, thinking, praying, seeking, flew, flew, flew, flew, flew. All at once, I feel light and like.. Read More
Sometimes the more you say or hear a word the more foreign it becomes. Sometimes the more greasy, from handling, a concept gets the harder it is to get a grasp. I think joy can be like that, which is really sad because…joy. I’ve been thinking on a particular string of words most of this week, the joy of Jesus. I learned of an old song by one of my.. Read More
I don’t even know where to begin writing tonight. It has been a wild week or so. If you follow along with me here a bit, hopefully you know I don’t really use that word lightly. On one hand, in the world of much talk of which I likely contribute far more than needed, the word wild seems a good many times less appropriate compared to the amount of its.. Read More
Five months ago, when we first transplanted our family of eight from the Midwest to our new home in the Pacific Northwest, we would see deer families seeming to play tag in our field many days. Tag! It was such a surprise. And, gorgeous Stellar Jays, five or six at a time, would flock to and seem to be playing hide-n-seek in the magnolia trees. It didn’t occur to me.. Read More
Did you know that the word for holy in the Bible, kadosh, was first used in reference to time, a day? “And God blessed the seventh day and made it holy…”—Genesis 2:3(a) There’s a song we’ve sung, “Holy, holy, holy Lord, God of power and might. Heaven and earth are filled with Your glory. Hosanna! (Save me!) Hosanna! Hosanna! In the highest.” My husband and I sang this at our.. Read More