As I write tonight, I am sitting beneath a Strawberry Moon. Blindingly bright, it rises over the low pasture, and up onto the ridge, her beams picking their way through the blueberry rows, bush by bush. I settle into a creaking Adirondack chair – a gift given with memories to keep and memories to create […]
Maybe The Answer You’re Praying For Is Already Here.
Sometimes we wait impatiently on God when he is patiently waiting on us, waiting for us to recognize what he’s already given as part of the answer. What little pot of oil have you neglected to notice? What little shred of possibility have you chosen to ignore? What little patch of time have you disparaged? […]
Sacred Smallness: A 31 Day Series
“With joy you will draw water from the wells of salvation.” Posts in This Series Boundaries in Marriage Boundaries in Parenting Shake Out and Play, Mama (a poem) Grace Applied: More Thoughts on Boundaries Still The Loneliness Reeks (a poem) Things Reset Weaning Contrite and Lowly: Thoughts on Isaiah 57 The Gift Of You (a […]
Ashes, Ashes, Body and Blood
The ashes in my mouth taste like talc and powder. I swallow, move the tongue, wipe between teeth. It’s always like this, always a material experience that solidifies the visceral into something I understand. It’s candles to facilitate prayer, it’s arms raised to worship, it’s dancing on a cliff’s ledge to break before the Spirit. It’s […]
Brave April (the post that almost wasn’t)
I’m just going to start. I tried to think of some fancy – or even coherent – way to put this, but I don’t have those type of words in me. It’s April, and April is the month I focus on writing brave words, which sounds silly because actually it was only one April, last April, […]
Tearing Down The Fence: the grief and healing of re-entry – a guest post by Hallie Ziebart (survivor songs #29)
Tearing Down The Fence by Hallie Ziebart __________________ __________________ I mourn. Oh, have I learned how to mourn! My life became not what I expected, or hoped for, or thought I was promised. Life unfolded, joys and sorrows have come and gone. Sometimes I feel bewildered. Sometimes angry. Sometimes thankful. And sometimes I feel nothing […]
Joy Forged Through Mourning (survivor songs #11)
:: a guest post by Heather Lee :: Mourning. Wow. That’s a pretty wide topic. The scope is so wide in fact that it’s hard to know where to start. I mourn over industrialism. I mourn over the loss of green spaces. I mourn over our polarity. I mourn over the existence of hate. […]
Fiery Gift
The first sermon I ever preached was on the infamous Love Chapter. Having worked myself into the position of Religious Vice President (it was a small school, these things happen), I was slated with the first Wednesday in February for the chapel devotional. Valentine’s Day being so close, the subject of love seemed appropriate. I was “then […]
On Dreaming Those God-Sized Dreams
“God-sized dreams.” The words had been popping into blog posts all over the internet before I tracked them back to Holley. And I should have known it would be her, because Holley Gerth writes the type of words that give permission to fully live. Holley writes about God-sized dreams almost as if the dreams are […]