I wasn’t thinking of Lent when I scheduled our annual baking day in the old wood-fired oven. The home we meet in was originally a boarding school, built in 1830 just as the side-flue oven was invented. The 7’ deep, brick-lined oven heated by a fire in an adjoining chamber provided ample room to bake […]
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CREATE YOUR OWN DESERT FOR LENT … and seek Christ in his Word
I just spent the most boring hour of my life at Jiffy Lube, waiting for an oil change and car inspection. There were no magazines or pictures to look at, so I was stuck with my own thoughts. All around me, people were absorbed in their phones. Not even the three-year-old twins beside me offered […]
SCRIPTURE & SONGS TO THE RESCUE
“Put your hand in the hand of the man who stills the waters . . .” It’s been decades since I heard that song by Ocean, but the snatch I caught took me right back to seventh grade. I was riding the after-school bus, sitting not with the cool kids in the back; not with […]
GOD WANTS TO SPEAK TO YOU: How to Hear Him
Sometimes I think my cell phone is possessed. Little burps and chirps and whistles come from it at the oddest times, for no apparent reason. There’s no new text, no new email. Someone is trying to reach me, I think. But who? If only I was better at figuring out technology. The Bible is like […]
COME INTO THE WORD THIS SUMMER
Something about the randomness of summer, with its laid-back days and flexible schedule, makes me want something to take me through it. A Bible reading plan is just the thing to tie one day to the next and give me a feeling of accomplishment at the end. A couple summers ago I came up with […]
CHOOSE FROM 3 BIBLE READING PLANS FOR LENT
“The Word of God is alive and powerful, capable of converting hearts and leading them back to God.” (Pope Francis) Are you looking for a simple way to add Scripture to your days this Lent? Open your heart to God’s word by setting aside just 10 – 30 minutes a day. Here are three suggestions to get […]
THE RICHNESS OF GOD’S WORD: Psalm 19, 119
Newscasters called it a “bomb cyclone,” the winter storm that slammed the East Coast last week. By the time I cleared my car, did my errands and returned, I’d dealt with wispy snow that returned as quickly as I brushed it off; slick snow that sent my tires skidding sideways; blowing snow that obscured my […]
THE “JESSE TREE”: AN ADVENT TRADITION FOR THE WHOLE FAMILY
When a new star shone bright enough that grown men (wise men? kings?) saddled up, dropped everything else and set out for the tiny town of Bethlehem, it didn’t herald something unexpected. The king it announced had been expected for centuries! Jesus’s birth was not “Plan B,” some sort of last-ditch effort to save the […]
HEARING GOD’S WORD IN THE WILDERNESS
Pale brown hills of sand and rock rise on either side of the road from Jericho to Jerusalem and stretch as far as I can see. I want to call it “desert” but our guide insists on “wilderness”: this is wild, uncultivated land that needs just a few showers to spring into bloom. Every […]
GROWING UP: BECOMING “FRUITFUL SOIL FOR THE WORD”
Our 18-month-old granddaughter stands ready to run, grinning over her shoulder as if to say, “you can’t get me, Grandma … but please try!” When I start toward her she squeals and runs laughing into my arms. Bliss! Children are such a gift. When our kids were her age, though, I never imagined the deep joy […]
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