This is the fourth article in The Gathering 2017 Summer Devotional Series. The entire series can be viewed here.
“I keep my eyes always on the Lord. With him at my right hand, I will not be shaken. Therefore my heart is glad and my tongue rejoices; my body also will rest secure. You make known to me the path of life; you fill me with joy in your presence, with eternal pleasures at your right hand.” —Psalm 16:8-9, 11
It’s always about what we’re seeing, isn’t it? Read More
This is the third article in The Gathering 2017 Summer Devotional Series. The entire series can be viewed here.
I have no idea when it happened, because I thought I had been paying closer attention. But when I looked over at my oldest daughter, with her legs crossed, her hair tucked, and her cheeks thinner than they used to be, I could almost feel the wind blow across my face from the years that have somehow flown by.
I can look into a mirror and count the lines on my forehead, and recount the years that put them there. How can faces change like that? How can the years evaporate just. like. that? Read More
This is the second article in The Gathering 2017 Summer Devotional Series. The entire series can be viewed here.
I cried out to God for help; I cried out to God to hear me. When I was in distress, I sought the Lord; at night I stretched out untiring hands, and I would not be comforted. I remembered you, God, and I groaned; I meditated, and my spirit grew faint, you kept my eyes from closing; I was too troubled to speak. I thought about the former days, the years of my past; I remembered my songs in the night. My heart meditated and my spirit asked you:
“Will you reject me forever? Will you never show your favor again? Has your unfailing love vanished forever? Has your promise failed for all time? Have you forgotten to be merciful? Have you, in anger, withheld your compassion?”
Then I thought, “I will make myself remember the years when you stretched out your hand. I will remember what you’ve done, I will remember how you’ve helped me. I will remember all your works and meditate on all your mighty ways.”
Because your ways, God, are holy. What god is as great as our God? (Psalm 77:1-13, NIV, author’s paraphrase)
There are lines of demarcation in every life—before and after something happened—that mark and divide our years, making a life feel split in two. Read More
This is the first article in The Gathering 2017 Summer Devotional Series. The entire series can be viewed here.
C.S. Lewis wrote:
“Relying on God has to begin all over again every day as if nothing had yet been done.”
As if nothing had yet been done.
As if we didn’t feel like we’ve failed at this whole thing.
As if we hadn’t ripped a soul apart with what we said.
As if we weren’t carrying the pain that has made us heavy and tired. Read More
I stood there in white, and made a promise in red.
I promised that I would be patient and kind, that I would bear all things, always trust, always hope, always persevere.
I promised that I would stay for better or for worse.
Until death. Read More
You can feel it coming. Always this coming, this darkness, this weight.
Like this rain rolling in, you hear it, ignore it, push it away, fight it, dread it.
But it comes and sweeps low, this darkness. This cloud whose shadow casts and looms.
Nothing is wrong, and everything is wrong. Things that aren’t hard, are so hard.
It’s hard to remember this darkness when it’s not there, and its hard to remember without it when it is. Read More
Every night before bed, my three year-old and I snuggle up on the couch together and read. It usually ends up being the same books we’ve read a million times, and her quoting them to me, because she just can’t seem to part with these old stories for new ones.
I’ve been reading to her from her Jesus Storybook Bible that was a gift to her on the day she was born. I finally got her to move away from reading about Noah and on to Adam and Eve. Read More
