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imperfect
Perfectionism … fair warning, friends, I’m going to rip this thing wide open. I’m guessing you might be cringing right now, because you’re right in there with me. God, how many women have become entangled by the enemy’s lies on this subject? And oh, how You want us to be free! So let me pick up where I left off: perfectionism is hell. I don’t use either word lightly. Perfectionism has been camouflaged as pretty, dismissed with nervous laughter, excused as a personality trait, even lauded as a strength. It is none of the above. It is a trap, a torment, and the worst kind of betrayal, for it allures…
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of truth and fairytales
I am caught up in a fairytale, somewhere near the middle. The beloved is confined to her chamber, making her preparations and counting the hours, for she knows her promised Bridegroom will come. Terrors lurk on every side, hardship and pain beset her from within, but the bride-to-be is undaunted. Her beloved one has pledged His love, and she is confident He will make good on His word. It’s somehow easier for me to process this strange reality we’ve fallen into if I view it through the lens of an epic misadventure. Case in point: I am not just nondescript little me, sitting alone day after day, scrambling to teach…
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awakening
Spring is teasing at the edges of my cozy winter world. If I’m honest, I’m not sure I’m ready to see it come. True, there has been a lift to my spirits as I witness the watery edge of blue peeking shyly out beneath the dark skirts of the morning sky earlier each day. I know better than to expect the season’s full advent here in the dark wilds of February. Yet the pale sunshine and mild winds that accompanied my walk yesterday afternoon were decidedly springlike, and not at all unwelcome. Normally, I would be kneeling for a closer look at the signs of new life stirring just beneath…
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expectant
I’m not a mother myself, though I still hope to be someday. Even without the benefit of personal experience, I can never separate the word “expectant” from the adventure of childbirth. To me, it’s the perfect picture of all that word entails. Everything from joyful anticipation to anxious apprehension; the bliss and the discomfort; the excitement, pain, inconvenience, and hope; all of it is rolled up into that precious, holy season. Of course, this idea is not original to me. It’s woven into the story of Scripture from beginning to end. Over and over, God speaks to His people in terms of the cycle of life: growth and death, rebirth…
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walking upside down
Grace gifts. Some of them are easy to identify, like a snow day descending in early November. Others take a little more digging to uncover, wrapped as they are in uncomfortable packaging, or even seeming disaster. But in this upside down Kingdom, they can be the very things to shake us from our precarious perch on the familiar and catapult us into the terrifying freedom that waits beyond. a case of mistaken identity A few weeks ago, I read the modern classic Stellaluna to my students, a picture book by Janell Canon. It’s a sweet story about a lost baby fruit bat who is taken in by a family of…
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blaze forth
I stepped outside early this morning and was brought nearly to tears by the beauty of our Creator God. The moon hung in a pristine white sliver among stars so startlingly clear and close they seemed poised to drop into my hand. Words from Romans throbbed with the beat of my heart: For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that we are without excuse (1:20). So clear, so close, so infinite and yet personal … love for my God swelled large in my spirit and His praise danced on…
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solid rock
Few lives in Scripture have been painted in such vivid strokes as that of Simon Peter. A faithful reader can trace his character arc from rough fisherman to zealous disciple, fearful turncoat to bold apostle. More than once recently, I’ve had cause to remember the final interactions Jesus had with Peter surrounding His crucifixion. Etched deeply in all our Sunday school memories is the story of Peter’s three denials of His professed Messiah. Following closely on its heels is his parallel restoration, when the resurrected Christ offers Peter three chances to reaffirm his love. But the episode that has long been dear to me, and the one which has captured…
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hope deferred
One by one, I’ve been flinging open the doors to all the hidden closets in my heart, inviting the Spirit to blow through with His cleansing, invigorating breath. All the doors, that is, except this one. This one has remained tightly latched, painstakingly guarded, deliberately ignored. Until now. I wasn’t ready yet to write on this topic in my 20s, or even in my 30s. I’ve had to endure the long wait, to experience both love and loss, to learn to find hope on the other side of heartbreak. And now — now that I’ve spent time in all these excruciating, unsought valleys — I find myself in a new…
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great expectations
Expectations are such tricky things, aren’t they? They parade themselves around as pleasant and harmless, but too often they end up ruling like tyrants, extracting an impossible price for our contentment. I still remember a conversation about expectations from a bridal shower I attended more than a decade ago. Somewhere between sampling the refreshments and sailing into all her pretty gifts, the guest of honor shared her most enlightening moment from premarital counseling thus far. Their pastor had begun by asking the couple to each make a list of the expectations they had for the other heading into marriage. Perhaps intending to be self-sacrificing, the husband-to-be promptly announced that he…
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just a touch
“And the woman was healed from that moment…” It’s a beautiful, hopeful ending to a redemptive story — but what a long, painful road this unnamed woman traveled before realizing herself in it … Twelve years she had carried around in her body this painful, mysterious bleeding — twelve years! Bound by Levitical laws, such bleeding made her unclean — and not only her, but anyone she touched, or anyone who touched anything she touched. Twelve years without human touch — save the painful, mortifying examinations of the endless stream of doctors and so-called “healers” she consulted until her money ran out. Not one could give her what she craved…
