Category: Encouragement

Are You Longing for Light?

I can’t wait for Christmas. In a year of “I can’ts,” there’s almost a desperation when we say it. Like we need it. Like our lives depend on it. The earliest displays of holiday lights and nativity scenes went up in my neighborhood in October. October. Where I live, it’s 90 degrees in October. Sorry, Read More

Letting Grace Whoosh In

You never really can go back. You can rekindle friendships that still fit like a good pair of jeans. You can retrace contours of familiar country roads. You can even pull the flyers on a few for-sale homes just for fun. But you never really can go back. I spent seven years in my 20s and Read More

Church is not about the building. It never was.

“Your faith might feel shaky this Easter. But Jesus would rather you limp through the door than keep Him at arm’s length. And he knows a thing – or two – about arm’s length.” I wrote that two years ago, back when church doors were open.  Back when we said the church wasn’t a building Read More

Time to Dust Off Your Dream

Maybe it’s time to dust off your dream. Think it’s too late? Think you’re too old? Past your prime? Here’s a little 411: Julia Child enrolled in cooking school at age 36. Madeleine Albright started her diplomatic career at age 40. Nora Ephron (who started as a mail girl when Newsweek told her they didn’t Read More

Get a Midlife!

If you love Princess Bride like I do (and if you don’t, that’s inconceivable) you are well-acquainted with the sound of ultimate suffering. The sound belongs to heroic Wesley, whose agonized screams pierce the idyllic countryside as he endures a medieval torture device called the Life-Sucking Machine. Poor Wesley. He winds up mostly dead. Anyone Read More

Love Flows South—and That Includes the Kids

The Nile famously flows north but loves flows south. Love goes top down and that includes the kids. It’s easier when they’re little. Sure, they fight us on that 1 p.m. naptime and test our patience with long, made-up stories—but at the end of the day we know it’s them and us, us and them.  Read More

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