“But what I am learning as a parent is that rather than try and save my children, I need to show them what to do when things are difficult because, friends, there will always be difficulty.”
Jesus asks us to do things that seem backwards but it is because He knows our human hearts. He knows that if we do not pray for our persecutors we risk becoming just like them.”
But Dolly’s work with her employees and poor children definitely sparks my imagination, and hopefully yours too, of what the Kingdom coming to earth looks like.
“As I redeem the wall and make it beautiful, I remind myself that God is doing the same thing in the world. That He is alive and well and at work. That paint, like love, can cover over a multitude of nicks, scrapes, and sins.”
“God is the same God on the other side of a painted room.”
“I am learning to ask God to lift the veil so that I might catch a glimpse of His presence.”
“No matter what has happened, no matter what has been lost or marred or broken or destroyed. Come and see the one who is making all things new. The one who loves you in all your hardest places.”
“And maybe, just maybe, we can reach across the aisle, the pew, the hallway and the street to offer a helping hand. And in so doing we can hold onto an egg or two, lighten the load just a bit.”
“God was reminding me that I could ask for Help even if I had no idea what I needed and no idea how it could come about. God’s imagination is vastly greater than my own.”
Jesus wants to heal our past for the sake of our future.
“The journey is greater than you or I. But, here is the good news - God is greater than the journey.”
“I realized that a Resurrection Sunday service is the exact right place to cry about loss. It is the perfect place to lay bare our grief.”
“Lent reminds us that “becoming” always involves the death of something. New life can come no other way.”
If there is anything I can tell you that will bring true and abundant life into your mind, body, and soul it is this - get into the habit of repentance.
Jesus looked at what might have appeared as almost empty hands and He praised it. He took his absolute poverty and thanked God for it.
The longer this pandemic wears on, the more I am convinced that the ministry of interruption might be a something we can actually do in a time of so many don’ts.
“Jesus is here. He has not left. His sovereignty has not been diminished by disease or chaos. He is still reigning. He is still here. And he has compassion for you in your fear.”
“This Advent, Jesus is inviting you and me to come with no agenda or checklists and bask in the beauty of His love. He is inviting you to sit at His feet and be satisfied by the only thing that is needed - Jesus himself.”
Death and disease and suffering cannot cancel Christmas. Death, disease, and suffering are exactly why we celebrate. Death, disease, and suffering are what Jesus clothed himself in and came to heal.
“When I pray like this, I am reminded that I do not have to muster up hope and joy inside me but, instead, receive them from God with open hands.”
“Hope is about expectation of God’s promises and Faith is about confidence. Hope and Faith believe that there is more than this moment and that suffering does not erode that which God has said He would do nor who He is.”
“We can trust in the goodness of God, even when we cannot see the evidence of it.”
To have children is to find out just how out of control we truly are.