Well, friends, this week marks one year since we left the U.S. for PNG. People told us that the first year on the field can be especially hard, and we definitely found that to be true. Months of transition, breath-stealing homesickness, feeling overwhelmed in new ministry roles, culture shock, and other unexpected difficulties came to […]
The year I was in kindergarten, I grew six inches. I started out as one of the smallest kids in my class and ended up being one of the tallest. (Impressive, especially since now I tower over even the biggest kindergartners at an enormous five feet…) I remember laying in bed awake late into the
My jeans are smoked. Not smokin’. Smoked. They hung on the line as ash fell like snow and billows of grey rolled through in post-apocalyptic waves. It’s not from wild fires or a volcano; it’s from people burning their fields. On purpose. Some of the fires are started by mischievous boys, but many of them
There’s something about the way this afternoon is spread out all grey and misty over the valley that makes me homesick. Maybe it’s the mountains sitting silent behind the fog, so different than the rolling plains of the central Carolinas. Or maybe it’s just that we’ve been in Papua New Guinea for four months now,
The thing about packing up a house is that all kinds of stuff surfaces. Long-neglected dust bunnies, dried bits of food on couch cushions, old letters and hard memories. I have to be honest here. I’m all for a good soul cleansing, but when it comes in the middle of trying to get rid
Receive all God has. This is the scariest phrase I’ve ever heard. Receive ALL God has. Opening up to all God has for us is hugely risky. God has good things for us. Big things. But to receive big things, our hands have to be open, fingers uncurled. And I am a grasper. I
This week I’ve talked with two friends whose stories rock me to the core. These friends of mine, Amber and Lyn, have not had an easy road. Lyn’s beautiful fifteen-year-old, Bethany, died two years ago of an aggressive brain cancer, and Amber’s sweet Sadie was just seventeen months old when leukemia ended her life
Something about this time of year makes me restless. I’m not sure what it is, exactly, but every autumn it’s there. This sense of not quite fitting into my skin. Maybe it’s the foreshadowing of winter months ahead, since I’ve never done well with cold and grey. Or maybe it’s just the reminder that things
I just got back from an event in Nashville, where I spent a couple of days in the presence of some truly great people, many of them musicians, songwriters, and artists. These folks have built careers on their ability to dig deep and measure life honestly, and as I heard them tell their stories,