"I long to accomplish a great and noble task, but it is my chief duty to accomplish small tasks as if they were great and noble." – Helen Keller
Confession isn’t the end of the story. Here’s why repentance matters—and what it means.
Here’s a little story about how you can teach a new word to five-year-olds so that they remember what it means. I guarantee that after you read and visualize this scene, you will also remember what it means.
continue reading
Nikki Giovanni—famous poet and winner of dozens of awards—died last month at age 81. We never met in person, so she’ll never know that one particularly interesting thing she did while eating lunch at a Kentucky Fried Chicken more than 25 years ago greatly touched my life.
By the time she was in her late fifties and eating that lunch at KFC, Nikki Giovanni was hugely famous, as poets go. In addition to her numerous literary awards, she was also a longtime professor of English literature at Virginia Tech, and by the time she reached old age, she had received 31 honorary doctorates. Despite having grown up in poverty in the 1940s and ’50s, she had risen to a high station in life due to her own tenacity and literary talents.
I have it on good authority that she was also a really nice, down-to-earth person. When she came to our city in the late 1990s as part of the library’s literary speakers series, my husband, who worked in the library’s marketing department, had the privilege of accompanying her where she needed or wanted to go. And where she wanted to go, after she was done speaking and on her way back to the airport, was Kentucky Fried Chicken.
continue reading
Here’s everything I use for Scripture writing, all in one place—plus a new Scripture Writing Tracker you can download for free.
It gives me great joy that so many people have tried Scripture writing as a result of reading about it here on my blog. Whether they’ve chosen the three-year, topical approach (monthly themes and very short passages) or whether they’ve gone directly to writing out entire books of the Bible, many readers are doing this for the first time, and it’s made a difference in the quality of their time with the Word.
continue reading
All it takes is one little picture. One little comment. One fleeting glimpse of another person’s:
appearance
home
car
vacation
purchases
accomplishments
income
position
giftings
spouse
children
family
—any aspect of their life that appears to be better than yours. That knotted-up, burning feeling of envy might begin in your heart, your stomach, or your head … along with a familiar mantra of: look what they have that I don’t. Look what they have that I never will. Look at the multiple blessings they get from God when I do without so many.
I could pretend that this post came about because I observed envy in another person, or that someone came to me asking for counsel about it, or that I had been reading a book on it and wanted to share some new insight. But none of that is true. This post was written because I’ve fallen into the trap of envy many times in my life. I’m intimately familiar with what triggers it, what it feels like, how to wallow in it, and (thank you, God) the best ways to overcome it.
Can you relate?
continue reading
Strange but true: I have a personal earworm tradition that’s tied to the U.S. election cycle. This earworm took up residence in my head in October of 2016 and lasted about a month; it repeated this exact time frame in 2020, and is back again in 2024. Thankfully, it’s a hymn I love and don’t mind it being on constant repeat inside my head. It’s also the hymn that gets me through a difficult and contentious election cycle—in one piece, spiritually, mentally, and emotionally—with friendships and family relationships intact, with neighbors and communities that I still love, and with hope and peace instead of anger and despair.
continue reading
Recently I had an eye-opening experience as a result of a Facebook marketing error. I learned a few things from this glitch … about the worst parts of social media, about some people’s hatred for the Bible, and about the Christian bubble that I apparently live in, at least online.
I’ve written a couple of times about my practice of daily Scripture writing, and my first article on how to begin Scripture writing is still the most popular post on my blog. This brings me great joy, that many people have found a new way to interact with and respond to the Word of God by writing it out.
Last year, my first Scripture writing article went out on Facebook as a “sponsored post,” meaning that it was boosted to reach an entirely new audience beyond just the people who follow my page. It had such a positive outcome that I decided to boost my second post on Scripture writing, as well. I loved the idea of more people being exposed to the idea of this daily spiritual discipline that they might want to try.
And that’s when something went wrong. This time around, Meta (Facebook) seemed to have lost its ability to determine who might actually want to see Christian content in their newsfeed.
continue reading
Six years this month. That’s how long I’ve been doing daily Scripture writing: copying out the Word of God by hand, passage by passage, book by book.
I began slowly, with just a few verses a day, following an easy, three-year plan that was organized by theme. When I finished that, I wanted more, so I started copying out entire books of the Bible—and I’m still at it. You can read how all of this developed (not only for me but for two of my friends) in Ready to Try Scripture Writing?, which is still the most-read post on this blog.
Even after six years of daily copying, one thing remains the same for me: Scripture writing has transformed my time with God’s Word more than anything else I’ve ever done.
continue reading
Statistically, my life ought to be a serious mess right about now.
It’s true that much of my ’70s and ’80s childhood was a fairly typical American suburban experience. But there was a lot going on behind the scenes, and before I was ten years old, I had learned two survival skills used by many children living in a highly unstable environment: how to lie about my family situation and how to hide things from others.
continue reading
This fall, I get to teach again.
That’s been the case every year for the past thirty or so, but the hopeful anticipation never wears off. I’ve taught preschoolers through adults … in public school, homeschool, Sunday school, and Bible study … with countless lessons of my own as well as other teachers’ lessons as a sub. Like writing and theatre, teaching is in my blood.
For the past several years, I taught women’s Bible study—I had been terrified to teach adults, but now I’m so glad I had the opportunity. For many years before that I taught high schoolers, both in public school and in Sunday school. I absolutely loved their honest opinions and insights, their sense of humor, and their natural curiosity for all they needed to know before heading into adulthood. Both the high schoolers and the adults kept me on my toes intellectually and pedagogically, and that’s something I’ve really enjoyed.
And now very soon, I’ll be back in the classroom with much younger students—two classrooms, actually. One preschool Sunday school class and one class I’m teaching in a local Christian elementary school. I know without a doubt that over the next year I’ll have moments of joy and laughter, moments of disappointment and worry, moments of shared excitement and success, and moments of what might look on the surface like utter failure. If you’re a teacher, you’ll also have those moments.
continue reading
I didn’t like turning fifty.
Turning thirty didn’t bother me at all. Turning forty I barely remember because I was so busy with young children, work, homeschooling, and church. But turning fifty was a little worrisome because it was the first decade that sounded even remotely “old” to me. It was hard to believe that I had been alive for half a century.
And now soon, very soon, I’ll be turning fifty-nine, which, if you’re counting, gives me just one more year before I turn sixty. When my husband turned sixty a few years ago, I remember saying breezily to him, “Aww, it’s fine! Sixty is the new forty!” But now the shoe is on the other foot and I’m finding myself clinging fondly to my fifties because they’re actually looking pretty good to me right now, and that decade sounds quite young, especially when it’s mostly in the rearview mirror.
Probably my sixties will eventually feel as comfortable as my fifties do now—and I’m sure a few encouraging minutes of conversation with a woman who is older than I am would confirm that fact—but right here, right now, knocking at the door of almost-sixty, it’s a little hard to swallow.
continue reading
Great and Noble Tasks 