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.
Jul 24, 2017 | Dating & Marriage
So – you like him. Actually, you love him. If he’s the guy you grew up with, this love is probably the phileo-agape real deal. You’ll love him even if he moves on or you move on or both. Which is, of course, not your ideal ending – but always a possibility. You love him, and the timing is absolutely horrible.
You’re about to graduate and take a job in another state.
He has two years left at a school you don’t attend.
You’re not even out of high school, looking at a minimum of five years before marriage is on the table.
What do you do?
Jul 18, 2017 | Dating & Marriage
For Christians, the wedding night is a treated with sacred significance – and for many young women, a whole lot of fear. Because of the biblical emphasis on sex within marriage, Christian culture has placed a burden of weight on the wedding night that this one evening really doesn’t deserve.
That said, pretending the wedding night doesn’t exist and refusing to educate young women about their sexuality, their bodies, and the act of intimacy itself is a foolish decision. It is bad stewardship of a very good gift. So how much should one think about the wedding night before it happens, and should they do it at all? I think young women should absolutely consider this before the big day, but within some healthy boundaries.
Jul 17, 2017 | Christian Life & Theology
I tried to diet and exercise my body into submission, but I could never arrive at a place of contentment. I went through my twenties thinking a man’s love might help me feel better. But, all my comparing only seem to exacerbate once we said, “I do.”
Naively, I assumed that some day, I’d be free from all my comparison struggles. And, I thought that day would come when I changed my title to, “Mom.”
