Deserts

Lately I’ve been feeling….dry. And by “lately” I mean for like the last 6 months. And by “dry” I mean a little dead on the inside. Spiritually. I have heard about spiritual desert seasons people go through. When they feel distant from God. And I’ve seen the cheesy church signs that say things like: “Feeling distant from God? Who moved – you or Him?” Thanks for that extra guilt and shame, church sign.  In a time when I already feel lost and confused. The fact of the matter is, I have been marching steadily toward the purpose and the mission to which God has called me. Not away from it or Him. So…

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A Pressure-Cooked Reminder

It’s funny, in the last few weeks there have been so many things going on in our life – MAJOR life changes: my husband quit his job and now works from home, I started a professional speaking career outside my current job, my editor got back to me with all the changes I need to approve in my book, we bought a house….. It’s been overwhelming. I’ve been overwhelmed. Stressed to the max- I can feel it in my body (and so can my chiropractor!) Naturally with all that going on, tension has run high in our home. My husband and I have been bickering and even arguing a lot, which is rare…

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#56

Skydiving is was on my bucket list. It’s number 56, in fact. I kind of had it penciled in for this Summer, and then my best friend turned 40 and decided that’s what he wanted to do to celebrate. BINGO! Weeks leading up to the event I was pure bottled excitement and eager anticipation. My husband had a scheduling conflict arise so that he was not able to join us, and I remember having a strange little flutter of uneasiness. Am I going to be able to do this without him? Won’t I need him there?  Then I reminded myself, I lived a pretty routine life for 25 years before I met him,…

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The Lost Year

Driving around running last minute holiday errands, my husband says to me, “Babe! 2014 was such a great year.” “Yeah?”  I was racking my brain to think of any significant milestones or events. “Yeah. We got engaged, we got married…..” “Nope.     That all happened in 2013.”  I replied. “Ooohh. Then what happened in 2014?” “Exactly.” He paused for a minute while he tried to think of other things, “….Wow, I lost a whole year.” Today, January 1st, 2015 is the first time I ever felt completely unprepared for a new year.  I was not ready to write a 1- in the upper right hand corner of my page today.  Everything in me screamed…

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Discernment & Hearing Tim’s Voice

My friend Tim died suddenly. He was 35. I was with him two weeks prior, joking around, pushing, poking. Then his heart stopped beating and he was gone. I will never see him again on this earth. After his death, I was struggling with the decision of whether or not to attend his funeral or a Christian leadership conference that was coming up the same weekend.  We were going to be taking a friend with us to the conference who tried to commit suicide two weeks before.  As I contemplated the decision, weighing in my mind were things like being judged by other people for not going, and disappointing others if I decided…

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