One Quiet Life

“Piglet sidled up to Pooh from behind. "Pooh?" he whispered. "Yes, Piglet?" "Nothing," said Piglet, taking Pooh's hand. "I just wanted to be sure of you.”   ~A.A. Milne I've known him exactly half of my life. Soon, life with him will overtake life without him. Truth be told, it's hard to remember when he wasn't here. Those years are dim images dusty with cobwebs and time. The older I become, the further they fade away. Today marks 21 years of cleaving to each other, of adhering firmly and closely or loyally and unwaveringly ( source ).  Our marriage is marked by God's indelible grace and His unending goodness. As I contemplate these decades together, I'm thankful for: ~laughing together ~crying together ~worshipping together ~loving together ~grieving together ~working together ~traveling together ~cooking together ~eating together ~walking together ~parenting together ~growing older together ~praying toge...

It's been a long while since I've written a Thankful Thursday post. I'm hoping this will spark my blogging creativity and that I'll start posting with some sort of regularity again. This month, I've been especially thankful for: ~fresh strawberries, picked from a local patch ~celebrating my dad's birthday ~Mother's Day with some of my favorite people, on a baseball diamond in one of my favorite places ~some particularly good books, among them Made for More: An Invitation to Live in God's Image and True Beauty . More to come on both. ~my pastor and his wife ~days of sunshine after what seemed like a constant deluge of rain ~the unconditional love of my husband and my daughter ~the gospel Blessings all mine, with 10,000 beside!

I strive to lead a quiet life.  I've set a few more guidelines that I don't always follow. I continually struggle with spending too much time looking at a screen - be it computer or phone. When I have a few minutes on my hands, I instinctively reach out to the social media world. Sometimes I fear I have as little control over my impulses as Pavlov's dog.  All my best intentions are no match for the lure of tweets and status updates. The more I wrestle, the harder it becomes to turn away. This knowledge of my sin - this coming face to face with its ugliness - is making the idea of living my life as a public display less appealing. Even the wrestling is part of my sanctification. I'm seeing that the time I've devoted to social media has impacted my life in ways I hadn't recognized before. I've been nicked by this double-edged sword. My online friendships have been a source of exhortation and blessing, yet my attention to t...

When our Women's Ministry Team began talking about having a monthly discussion of Housewife Theologian: How the Gospel Interrupts the Ordinary , we were unsure of what to call it. Bible study was obviously out, even though we use the book as a guide for a systematic study on the issues confronting women today; Bible study is just that, studying the Bible . (Jen Wilkin recently wrote a fantastic post about Bible study and Bible literacy). Book club was also a misnomer. We wanted our time together, and the time spent reading between meetings, to be so much more than that. I think we landed on book study because it was somewhere in the middle. (And it was late and we were tired.) Then I read Eric Bancroft's post entitled "The Joy of Theology Reading Groups" . Bancroft's words struck a chord in my heart, perfectly outlined my hopes for our group. I wanted to see the people entrusted to my care know their God better and live lives reflecting joyful devo...

Under the Old Testament law more than 1,200,000 lambs were sacrificed every day. 6,000,000 animals were sacrificed on the first day of the month (see Numbers 26:2, 51; Numbers 28:1-3, 11).  The priests must have been covered in blood. Did their hands ever come clean? Yet the carnage wasn't sufficient; it wasn't meant to be. The animal sacrifice merely pointed to the ultimate sacrifice that would come. John the Baptist recognized it. The next day he saw Jesus coming toward him, and said, “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world! (John 1:29) The Jewish leaders, Jesus' followers and His disciples did not. They didn't understand that redemption would require a far greater sacrifice. Therefore he is the mediator of a new covenant, so that those who are called may receive the promised eternal inheritance, since a death has occurred that redeems them from the transgressions committed under the first covenant.For where a will is involved, the de...

The long winter has finally loosened its grasp. Spirits climb with the temperatures. New life bursts forth in a bright rainbow of colors, yellowed by a heavy dusting of pollen. In these early days of Spring, I am Reading some fantastic books, none of which were on my original list for 2014 . Our Theology Reading Group didn't start until last week. While I'm waiting for the group to catch up with the topics I've already focused on in my extra-curricular reading, I'm enjoying some other titles: Authority by Martyn Lloyd-Jones (because I've never been disappointed by his writing) and Exodus: Saved for God's Glory by Philip Graham Ryken (because my pastor is preaching through Exodus).  In this season, I'm closing the day with Nancy Guthrie's Jesus, Keep Me Near the Cross: Experiencing the Passion and Power of Easter . I'll soon go back to Women of the New Testament: 30 Devotional Messages for Women's Groups by Abraham Kuyper. Realizing ...

I avoided getting a smart phone for years, but I finally gave in last month. It didn't take long for me to get sucked into the world of apps and games, not to mention constant access to Facebook, Twitter, and email. With just a couple of taps, I could be "up to the minute" on everything. And that became a problem. My self-centered, worldly heart soon became enraptured with this bit of technology in my palm. I quickly lost my resolve to  reduce the noise . I found that I had little time or attention to give to books. Shamefully, I didn't find the Word as appealing as the latest happening in the cyberworld. The Lord, in His infinite grace, has convicted me - again - about the amount of time I give to social media, its monologues and diatribes. The truth is, nearly everyone has an opinion on nearly every event and conceivable topic out there. That's not necessarily a bad thing. But placing a priority on others' opinions isn't always to my ultim...