My teen son asked for the latest video gaming system recently. He asks every year. I don’t feel it’s a good fit for our family, so I’ve worked hard to create boundaries around...
It’s the most miraculous truths that I am the most likely to forget. Things about a Jesus who comes and dwells in the midst of us, makes holy mortal bodies, and announces the...
After Jesus died on the cross, a man named Joseph came forward to bury his body. The Romans often left crucified corpses...
While the Christmas story has through the ages delivered untold comfort, hope, and joy to the world, I have occasionally wondered why the men and women who first received the news weren’t...
Psalm 130 begins with a desperate cry for help. The psalmist calls out to God “from the depths of despair” (130:1). We...
Many of us aren’t so sure how to answer this question. It’s common these days for people, including Christians, to rail on...
In a classic scene from C. S. Lewis’s book The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, Susan and Lucy are talking with...
There’s just the first touch of frost in the air. Around here, it sets in a little late. The old primordial chill stretches limbs up from the earth, and you can feel it...
At the hospital where I work as a counselor, the days are long. Between those walls, I share in God’s work—I am his hands, his words, his presence. And most days I don’t...
I have a confession to make. It won’t impress you with my godliness but perhaps with my cultural saturation. Here it goes: when I hear the word mercy, I sometimes think of the...
At the beach this past summer I saw people of all ages, from toddlers to seasoned adults, standing and running and laughing...
This Advent I am pregnant. This is my third child, my fourth pregnancy. I enter this season after having lost a pregnancy...
Thanksgiving dinner is one of my favorite meals. I suppose it has something to do with nostalgia, happy memories, and a chance...
Ephesians 5:20 urges us to give thanks to God the Father for everything. For everything? Really? ...
When Mark was 13, his mom let him bake the crowning moment of their family's Thanksgiving meal—the pumpkin pie. She figured he couldn't mess it up.
On Thursday of this week, citizens of the United States will celebrate Thanksgiving, a national holiday dedicated to thanking God for his...
He had the nurses turn his bed to face the window. “I like to watch the sun come through,” he says. I move over and slat the blinds, look down onto the street—onto...
It’s a humble sort of word, goodness. Perhaps that’s why we often overlook it or underestimate its creative power as a prophetic witness of the Kingdom of God.
This section of Ephesians 5 is based on a commonsensical observation: people nourish and take care of their own bodies. Of course...
Christ, as head of the church, loved the church and gave himself up for her. But his sacrifice was not merely a demonstration of ultimate love. It also had a purpose: to make...
