Covering topics that impact today's Christian: family, marriage, raising kids, spiritual growth, forgiveness, etc.
Today my boss offered to pray with me. She knew I was nervous about a big webinar I was about to present to 65 local business leaders and she offered to pray with me. And it’s not what she prayed, or how important this project felt to both of us that matters, it’s that she was brave enough to offer. Because I think so often we don’t. Especially in the workplace. We’re worried about offending others, or making them uncomfortable,
The Advent season officially kicks off this week. Many churches celebrate Advent every year as a fixed part of the church calendar. But if you didn’t grow up in one of these churches or aren’t sure what Advent is all about, here’s a simple definition…
The first day of school is always a weird jumble of emotions for me. I vacillate between being ecstatic that they have some place to be other than home, happy for a normal routine after a long summer without much structure, and pushing down that giant lump in my throat that forms knowing they are one more day closer to walking out the front door for good. I think I’m probably not alone in this and most parents have a
He told them, “My soul is crushed with grief to the point of death. Stay here and keep watch with me.” (Matthew 26:38) I had the privilege of teaching the message at our church this past Sunday. The message was on Jesus’s prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane. I love this story. Oh, I know that might sound strange. After all, it’s not an uplifting passage, like the Sermon on the Mount or one that demonstrates Jesus’s mighty power, like
Today my three kiddos started back to school for another year. The first day of school is always a weird jumble of emotions for me. I vacillate between being ecstatic that they have some place to be other than home, happy for a normal routine again after a long summer without much structure, and pushing down that giant lump in my throat that forms knowing they are one more day closer to walking out the front door for good, and
Two nights ago I lay awake for hours, unable to find sleep no matter how much I willed it to come. One painful, desperate thought kept going through my mind: I had failed my son. It’s been a really hard year for my boy. It’s been a really hard year to parent him, as well. We’re not strangers to difficult years, though. The early years were especially challenging. When he was four my son’s pre-school teacher basically gave-up and asked
Did you make any new year’s resolutions this year? We’re a little over 1 month into 2016, and according to Statistic Brain Research Institute, 36% of all resolutions have already been ditched. I’m personally not a big fan of new year’s resolutions. In general I find them to be lofty goals, like lose weight or quit smoking, at which you can either succeed or fail, with little room for anything in between. I am, however, in favor of trying to be
It’s 4:30 a.m. I cannot sleep. I feel a burden deep in my soul and it is so heavy sometimes I feel like it’s crushing me from the inside and I can’t breathe, my stomach hurts, my heart aches and all I can do is let the pain leak out through my eyes. There is so much hurt and pain all around me. Friends with broken marriages, broken hearts, broken bodies, broken dreams. Those mourning the ones they love the
Today is kind of a big day for me. Nope, it’s not my birthday. Not my wedding anniversary either. One year ago today I mailed my capstone and finished grad school. Yeah, so what? (you’re probably thinking) Lots of people finish graduate school. And you’re right. But this anniversary is really not so much about finishing grad school or even finishing my capstone project and handing it over to the FedEx guy. It’s really about what happened when I walked out of
I could see from his moist eyes and furrowed little brow he was upset. “What’s the matter, honey?” I asked my 9-year-old son. And the emotions burst out of him like a water balloon hitting a brick wall. “I ruined Easter,” he cried. My heart broke for this little boy as I held him and tried to sooth his tender feelings. It had been a bit of a rough day for him. From the moment he woke up to get ready for church there