Aug 28, 2017 | Christian Life & Theology
Loneliness is a human condition – not relegated to singleness, but present in marriage, motherhood, work, and home as we experience seasons of relational and spiritual drought. We want it to go away, and for good reason. The gnawing feeling of “aloneness” is uncomfortable. But when we rush through these seasons, desperate for them to end, we’re missing out on their purpose.
Your loneliness can glorify God. In fact, when this trial – because that’s what loneliness is – is permitted to accomplish its full work, loneliness always points to the goodness and glory of Jesus Christ.
Aug 22, 2017 | Christian Life & Theology
“Follow your heart” – this is Disney’s recommendation for those seeking life direction. But it’s not just Disney; it’s the kindergarten curriculum and the children’s books, the songs on the radio and graduation cards. When choosing a life path, we’re supposed to “do what we love” – because if we’re doing what we love, we’ve found our calling. Right?
Six years of my career was spent in higher education, five of those years as a college counselor. As I sit down with parents and students, some starry-eyed and optimistic, others uncertain and under pressure, I frequently come back to the “Disney lie”: That doing what you love is the ticket to success, and that success – in and of itself – will lead to long term happiness.
Aug 21, 2017 | Dating & Marriage
I know what you’re thinking: these last eight months were pointless. The emotions, the time, the dates, the gifts – useless, wasted, the stuff you throw away like scraps of paper. Except the scraps are your heart, and the wasted time was your life. He’s gone, you’re here, and though you know how to move on and you’re walking forward with the Lord, it’s hard to see the purpose in an ended relationship.
So here’s some hope to tape up your heart: Your broken relationship was not a waste of time.
Aug 15, 2017 | Dating & Marriage
“Fear tricks us into living a boring life.” Donald Miller wrote those words, and how true they ring in my ears and heart. I want to stay safe. I want to avoid risk, pain, and difficulty. I don’t want to be stretched or pulled beyond my comfort zone, my natural limitations; I want to stay on the safe side.
I wanted the same when I was single. I wanted things to go according to The Plan – my carefully laid out, neat and tidy plan, the one that kept me safe and comfortable. But in each season God has pulled me over my line in the sand into an adventure I never anticipated. I was not a willing participant in many of these excursions, but each one left me stronger than the one before. My singleness was no different.
Aug 14, 2017 | Dating & Marriage
Today’s singles are far lonelier, I think, than singles of decades past. It’s a theory for which I have no real proof outside of my own observation, but given the nature of western culture and the habits of my millennial (and younger) peers, I think it’s fairly valid. Singles are lonelier, and there’s a very obvious reason why:
Today’s Christian singles lack real community.
Aug 9, 2017 | Christian Life & Theology
God’s will and our desires don’t always coincide. Yesterday I talked about the reality of this in my own life; how our waiting season has tested our desires against our faith. And though we do not grieve and wait as those who have no hope (1 Thess. 4:13), the knowledge that God answers according to His sovereign will, not always according to our ideas, can be frightening at times.
It behooves us, then, to prepare our hearts to accept God’s will – no matter what His answer may be.
Aug 8, 2017 | Christian Life & Theology
I look out the window of the plane and the desert landscape falls away from me. The few days I spent in Oregon last week encouraged, refreshed, and equipped my heart for the unknown days ahead – days of waiting, praying, and expecting great things of our good, good, Father.
But I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t afraid. Josh and I have now been facing a very difficult family situation for almost six weeks. We continue to pray, to seek, to knock – but even in the seeking and the knocking we know that God is sovereign, and His timing is not ours. The thing we’re asking for is good. But we have yet to receive an answer to our prayers.
Aug 1, 2017 | Dating & Marriage
I’ll never forget the phase of my early teen years in which I believed that showing young men any amount of kindness was equal to flirting and therefore must be avoided. Though that idea may sound completely laughable to some of you, it was, and sometimes still is, a pervasive mindset in some circles.
Jul 31, 2017 | Christian Life & Theology
I will never have a “thigh gap”.
My body is physically incapable of producing this cultural phenomenon. My hips are too narrow, my quads are too big – and no amount of working out and eating well can change that. If anything, working out makes my already-big quads even bigger, my already-broad shoulders broader, and the whispy, ectomorph body that much more unattainable for my athletic build.
Jul 25, 2017 | Sexuality
Dear church, you’re wrong about sex.
Not all the time – but a lot of the time. There’s been some truth sprinkled here and there. There’ve been some speakers and ministries who’ve done this tender topic the justice it deserves. But in general, the sexual narrative Christian women have heard over the last four decades is not one of gospel freedom. It is a message burdened by fear, guilt, shame, and legalism – sometimes all of these at once. It’s why Christian girls are done with courtship culture. It’s why many are fleeing legalism and others flee the church. Through one ear, women are being taught about the love and grace of Jesus Christ, while into the other pour proof-texted, fear-based half-truths about female sexuality.
