It is positively cold, the Advent night glittering, but we have come out anyway, following the light, looking for a glimpse of glory. Our dear friends and their tiny family huddle in a plywood sleigh, all pink cheeked and swathed in blankets and pom-pom hats, and only because the Lord is within me and everything […]

I am on my way out for a walk, pausing in the doorway to listen, one hand on the brassy knob, as Riley begins to read to her class online a thank you letter she has written to me. And this is where I am today, standing not in the place of grace, because from […]

There’s something about sitting barefaced in the morning flanked by friends, the table strewn with gifts and paper and ribbon, steam curling over our mugs, the conversation like rivers meandering, that has me mulling a repeated snatch of scripture, stacked like ancient memorial stones, down deep below the surface of the living water. The Lord […]

“Hey, are you still praying about that stuff on our prayer board?” I hear Josh ask this of Riley as we ease in at a stoplight, on our way home from their classes.  Filtered through the fiery trees, late afternoon sunlight bathes the world in warm pinks and golds.  In the rearview mirror, I can […]

Caught up, as usual, in a morning flurry, I pause to hug Adam on my way out the door, to tell him I hope he enjoys his overnight field trip.  Most years, the staff at the school Adam attends arranges a stay in the lodge at a nearby park, where the school community does both […]

“This is where your shoulders are actually supposed to rest,” my physical therapist says.  She has taken muscle and bone in capable hands and has literally rotated my shoulders back and down, holding them carefully in place as I lay, yielded, on her therapy table. “I’m sure it feels weird, though, because your muscles have […]

Here we sit, Josh’s mom–my friend Camille–and me, two sisters, on a velvet sofa in a coffee shop called Lucky Tree, twisting cups in our open hands, talking, as mothers do, of life-giving. Oddly, it strikes me that when we get up and leave this place, an impression of our bodies will remain, lightening the […]

Dear friend, our work is worship. My sister-friend, who forever speaks God’s words back to me, sends this text in the early morning, while the daylight is still new, as I rub my eyes and contemplate the day, the work, that I know God has planned well ahead of me. They are burnt offerings. By […]

How much pain do you feel right now?” On the intake forms at the doctor’s office, Riley assesses her pain level at a ten, on a scale from one to ten, and watching her click hard on the notebook-sized computer provided by the office staff, I lean over and repeat my explanation. “So, one means […]

“I really owe Jack a thank you,” Josh is saying, talking love like he does more and more all the time, his hand gently patting Riley’s knee, his eyes alight with old, otherworldly affection.  “Because had it not been for Jack, I might not have ever found you.” Humans talk, our chins around the table […]