life. faithful.

I thought I was alone in the dark, lost. It was cold and lonely there, in that waiting place. No matter how much I craned my neck--no matter how hard I squinted my eyes against the dark--I simply couldn't see God. Like Job, I wanted to say, "My days fly faster than a weaver's shuttle. They end without hope." (Job 7:6) It's easy to feel alone in the dark, especially when it feels like that darkness is around you because you're stuck down deep in a hole.No matter which direction you turn, there just doesn't seem to be a way out. And sometimes, it seems like the harder you fight to get out of that hole, the deeper you get. It's almost like quicksand, sucking you in faster the more you struggle against it. The thing is, I was reminded in a blog post from Ann Voskamp that the dark waiting place isn't unusual. In fact,it could even be called an integral part of faith: ~Moses's mom waited for her baby to be pulled from the river. ~Noah ...

Happy Birthday, Sarah! According to my mom, she walked in one night as I was saying my prayers just in time to hear me asking God to send me a baby sister... The result of that prayer was a baby born October 17, 1989. I can remember Pop bringing her out, all wrapped up in a receiving blanket and asking Michael and me if we thought it was a boy or a girl. My prayers were answered with a brand new sister... Through the years, she drove me crazy. We shared a room for my elementary school years, sponge painted pink... She wrinkled her nose when she smiled, a dimple showing in her cheek... That little girl who annoyed me beyond belief when we were little has grown into one of my best friends... A beautiful, strong, amazing wife and mother to the little girl who is quite possibly the best niece on the planet... I love you, kiddo :) Happy 26th!

I was greeted a couple of mornings ago by a word of warning from my sister. Her post went right along with a series of sermons a friend from high school--a pastor now--has been giving at his church lately. In Sarah's own words (and yes, I got her permission first!): "I believe there is danger in taking a verse out of context. Every verse was put in its place for a reason, picked by God himself. If you remove that verse and use it to fit your own purpose you have changed the very essence of it." by Sarah It seems like such a common thing lately--people pick and choose which verses they want to put on display for one reason or another. I guess that's been happening since the Scriptures were first written down, but is sure seems prevalent now. No matter which side of an issue someone is on , it seems like they twist verses to show how Jesus would be on their side. People dismiss the verses that make them uncomfortable or that don't fit in line with the po...

I have to confess something to you. I've been a wimp lately. I've been turning the news off most of the time. because I'm tired of listening to it. I'm tired of hearing about heartbreak, wars, and death. I' tired of hearing about the culture wars going on right now. I'm tired of hearing politicians bash each other (and we're still over a year away from the election--good grief!). I'm tired of evil, and of people trying to pass evil off as good. I've stopped following people on facebook simply because I was frustrated by what they were posting. Basically I'm tired of all of it, and my solution has been to just ignore it. Pop called me on it a while back--he has a tendency to do that. He doesn't do it in an obtrusive way. If you know him, you know that he has the ability to put the equivalence of a lecture into a single question. I was talking about the facebook thing and some post I didn't agree with, and he asked me what I said i...