Category: Christian Life
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Gird for the Morning After
Post-election, there will be hand wringing, mud slinging, insult ringing, fallacy breeding, identity clinging voices that vie for your mind’s attention, your heart’s devotion and your hand’s action. We don’t need to wait for the results with dread and bated breath. We can breathe deeply and rest in God’s character now, before the results are…
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An Unsettling Question
I simply took it for granted. There is no other explanation or excuse. I didn’t even know what questions to ask that would help me creep out from behind the veil of intellectual certitude. When I asked the question, I didn’t understand the burden that would arise when I heard the answer. We were driving…
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Stewardship of another type
[This is Part II of a series. For context, please start with Part I before proceeding.] I recently wrote about stewarding our vehicle. While it may seem a trivial matter, the minivan made a difference in the lives of those who were served with a warm ride to a migrant processing center in the middle…
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Yes, but. . .
It’s like the guy who enters a coffee shop and takes a seat at a table next to a group of women. One woman begins to share her recent account of a traumatic labor and delivery. In the company of friends, she recounts how she wanted to have a natural birth at home, but after…
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Extended Grieving and the Contemplation of Legacy
My dad’s parents each died when I was in high school. In both instances, I received the news via phone call and began the moments of grief alone. When my grandmother died, the school staff were made aware and quickly came to comfort and surround me with love. Days later, my parents and siblings traveled…
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The Season After
Several times a week our grandmotherly neighbor in Romania would knock on my door and deposit a warm 1.5 liter bottle of fresh milk in my hands. She was the delivery, providing the service for another neighbor whose primary means of income was the cash she received from the milk of her one cow. I…
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The chore of responsbility
Shoes, soled with layers of dense mud, lined the porch. It had recently rained, turning the dirt driveways and road-side pathways into sludge traps. In this environment, shoes don’t come into the house. This was my front porch in Romania during the wetter seasons. In no time at all, the children’s shoes were trashed. I…
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Distance and incense
Just as a crash test vehicle comes to an abrupt halt as it smashes into the brick wall, so the Christmas season is over. Some people feel like a crash test dummy, head bopping around, still in a daze as the whirlwind subsides. Aside from a lone aisle with clearance items, the decor in stores…
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A murder in Romania hits close to home
Sunbeams burst through the fog that nestled among the fields and groves along a rural, two-lane road in southern Romania. On this early morning I was headed to the airport several hours away. Normally my car was loaded with three carseats and rowdy kids. On this day I felt the infrequent release of freedom that…
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Children, are you lost?
It was a new-to-us botanic garden. Shaded pathways led through the foliage of South Africa and plants of New Zealand. Each curve brought curiously shaped leaves and vibrantly blooming flowers. I allowed the three older children, the oldest nine, to explore freely. After an hour of bamboo groves, manzanita habitat and all type of herbage…
will travel with kids 