30 More Days of Grace

I stumbled into church Sunday morning a whopping 7 minutes before the service started, and I was feeling pretty good about that accomplishment.  I wandered over to my typical, might-as-well-be assigned, seat in the back corner and dropped my purse onto the chair, but before I could even sit down, I was intercepted by a great friend whose mother-in-law in the hospital with end stage vascular disease.  His wife has been camped out at the hospital with her mom for the last 10 days or so, and he was at church with the family and extended family.  I hadn’t heard an update for the morning, yet, so he quickly filled me in on the night and the exhaustion they all were feeling.  I’ve sat in that same hospital, in those same rooms, and even worked with those same surgeons, and as he explained all the things happening in that hospital, I felt that weight on my own shoulders from my own hours in their shoes.  Before he even finished updating me, a friend from bible study st...

Life Lessons from Winnie the Pooh: I’m from the era of Saturday morning cartoons.  When we were kids, my brother and I would get up on Saturday mornings, park ourselves in front of the tv in our living room, and spend the morning watching Saturday morning cartoons because that was the only time cartoons were on and we were actually able to control the tv! Winnie the Pooh was always on, so we grew up with Winnie the Pooh, Eeyore, Piglet, Kanga, Roo, Rabbit, Tigger, Christopher Robbin, and Owl.  Every episode of Winnie the Pooh involved the characters getting themselves into some type of trouble or trying to solve some type of problem. And, in every episode, Tigger was getting himself in some type of trouble, Winnie the Pooh was guilty by association, Eeyore was the nay-sayer cloaked in self-pity, and Owl was just waiting to bestow wisdom and advice on his friends. I think, if we take a minute to be a little self-reflective and introspective, we can all agree that...

Middle School Angst I met her in 7th grade. Her name was Angie. And she hated me. And that is a problem when your class is a whopping 100 kids, and you only have one honors class for each subject. Thank God she wasn’t musical at all, or we probably would have had every single class together in junior high and maybe even high school. She didn’t go out of her way to be mean to me; she just made it blatantly obvious that she hated me whenever she got the chance. You know, run of the mill 90s girl drama before social media (thank you, Jesus, for that small blessing). I survived middle school with Angie, and we moved on to high school. We had many of the same friends, but I took more of the sporty, involved route, and she took more of the rebel, party route. We still had tons of classes together, and she still expressed her hatred of me whenever she had the chance, still with no explanation. Finally, during my junior year, we were in a club together, and we were elected Pre...

Sunday School Stories: What Causes Fear I think I was in 5th grade the first time a Sunday School teacher scarred me with the “sins on the big screen” illustration.  Maybe you’ve heard it, and maybe you’ve even been equally scarred by it, but, just in case you aren’t familiar with it, please let me share.   Luke 12: 1-3 says,  “Meanwhile, when a crowd of many thousands had gathered, so that they were trampling on one another, Jesus began to speak first to his disciples, saying: 'Be on your guard against the yeast of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy. There is nothing concealed that will not be disclosed, or hidden that will not be made known. What you have said in the dark will be heard in the daylight, and what you have whispered in the ear in the inner rooms will be proclaimed from the roofs.'”   Somewhere along the way, that scripture has been interpreted by some to mean that when you die and face judgment, you are obviously going to stand bef...

This Thing We Call Life Do you ever think about all the ways people describe this thing we call life? A Journey Hills and Valleys A Roller Coaster I don’t know about you, but lately I’ve been thinking life is more like trying to get through a corn maze that doesn’t actually have an exit while blindfolded, intoxicated, and with a screaming toddler hanging on to your leg.   Yep.  That seems about right. Or maybe it’s like trying to navigate a river full of twists and turns in the night, while it’s storming, and you’re being chased by hungry alligators. Uh-huh.  That’s pretty accurate too. And, honestly, there was a point where I started to think that all was lost and the boat was about ready to sink, but Grace showed up.   Because Grace always shows up. Grace in Christianity I spent the majority of my 39 years knowing simply of Grace and then the last few years merely knowing Grace as a casual acquaintance.  Throughout my childhoo...