I finished my college coursework in December of 2019, and I graduated with my Associate in Arts general education degree in May of 2020. The at-home, just-us ceremony lasted about five minutes, and it was absolutely perfect.
My parents taught me a lot about the sacrificial, unconditional love that parents have for their children, no matter how those children are! While I would never want to repeat the circumstances that led to us living with my parents for three weeks, I look back on that time as a gift to our family and to my parents.
I still don’t have my “daily devotions” or “quiet time,” as is traditionally thought of in regard to the spiritual disciplines like reading the Bible and prayer. But pursuit of God has been weaving its way through our days more consistently now than ever before.
For Christmas 2019, I splurged on the purchase of a full-access pass to the 2020 US Figure Skating Championships, which was being held about 40 minutes from where I live. I had never spent that much money on something so “frivolous,” but it wasn’t frivolous to me. It was a grueling almost-full-week of being away from my family for 12 hours at a time on top of driving back and forth to the arena, but it was worth every minute and every penny!
2020. I don’t know how it’s possible to simultaneously have both the worst year of your life and the best year of your life. But I suppose if it was possible for Charles Dickens, maybe it was possible for me. It is my hope and prayer that you are encouraged by the 20 2020 stories I will tell in this series. I hope that they will make you smile. I hope they will remind you of God’s amazing faithfulness.
It’s been 17 days since I broke my leg in three places. It’s also been 1,118,681,654 years since this virus quarantine stuff started. At least that’s how it feels.
Our local church is hosting a missions conference unlike any missions conferences I’ve ever seen (and I’ve seen a lot). The “Grace on Mission Conference” is running for the entire month of March, and this is what it’s all about: As part of this conference, members of our local church are presenting the para-church ministries … [Read more…]
I am made in the image of God, and that is beautiful. Every person has within him or her the image of God. It is our role…our job as His creation to bear that image well and show that image to those around us. Order is part of God’s personality. When I lean in to those parts of myself that He created, I am demonstrating that part of Him in my life. Whether you are a “type A mama” or disorganized, beautiful mess, I pray that you feel God’s love upon your life and find ways to bear His beautiful image in your personality.
A deep and broken love…a star is born. Not the star of a woman thrust into fame, but the star of sacrificial love that burned bright because a woman gave herself away by loving in the deep end. I want to love like that.
This is the moment everything up til this moment formed into this realization of healing. Because not once during the last few days had I been triggered. Not one hymn. Not one shudder induced by a smell or a sight. No anger. No pain. No regret. Just genuine gratitude and bittersweet joy for my family, for my grandma’s prayers, for the good old hymns, for each and every last memory.