About this time last year, I was walking down the sloping hill from the cross on the church property toward the lake, a niece on my hip, my kids just in front of me, my nephews, nieces, parents, aunts, uncles and closest friends surrounding me. We were holding lanterns with handwritten messages on them, intending... Continue Reading →
Several years (and a battery of tests that nearly killed me) ago, I was diagnosed with a string of autonomic nervous system disorders. After months of attempting to regulate my heart rate and blood pressure with medications, which resulted in more near death experiences of allergic reactions and other side effects, my cardiologist recommended I,... Continue Reading →
You know, it’s funny, I could not have imagined I would still have any new words left about all of this at this point, but they still keep pouring forth, though I know the theme is the same: Jesse is dying. Our kids are yearning for something we cannot give them. I am increasingly shattered... Continue Reading →
He was dying the day a butterfly alighted on his shoulder and stayed for several minutes. He was dying as he twirled his small daughter around on the dance floor during the reception of a beloved unbiological sister (a term my family uses to describe two of our siblings the good Lord gave us through... Continue Reading →
I whispered into the stillness of his slumber, “I wanted to grow old with you.”, as hot liquid poured down my cheeks. Blazing liquid sorrow. You'd think the tears would run cold by now. They do not. The pain of loss to come digs deeper in as the time goes on with him living dying.... Continue Reading →
Three times…more than that…I pleaded with the Lord, “Take this from us. Heal him, God. What good is he to your kingdom, dead? What love is this, making children fatherless?” And He answered with a tiny flower growing out of thorns in the middle of my wilderness as I watched a dying father guide his children down a steep path.
"My grace is sufficient-enough-abundant, for you.”
I've prayed a thousand prayers of unintended self in my life. My desire to be free from pain and hurt-to be free from oppression, from judgement, from suffering- has often trumped my desire to be in the will of God. Surely, if the Lord really loved me as He says He does, then He wouldn't... Continue Reading →
I don't sleep well at night. I never have, really. I am intimately acquainted with the dark part of the morning because of this, the part where sleep won't come and there is nothing but me and my thoughts and the seemingly endless impenetrable blackness of nightfall. The part where half the world is midway... Continue Reading →
The contrast of the peppy chirping out of the words to "Walking in a Winter Wonderland” through the speakers above me and the guttural, barely audible groaning of my momentarily atrophied spirit were so absurd it grew comical in my mind. My face felt detached from my thoughts and my expression must have reflected the... Continue Reading →
I sat in the back of a darkened sanctuary this morning for the Celebration of Life service for a young mom I never had the privilege of meeting. A dear friend lost her sister-in-law, Christina, to stage 4 colon cancer a few days ago. She was 33. She left behind a husband, two very young... Continue Reading →
Every Little Jot & Tittle 