He Is Good

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He Is Good

This was originally posted in my old blog in October 2014. The link came up on my Facebook memories this week, and I shared it from my personal account. Because this old painful story resonated with some precious readers, I want to be faithful to share it here, too, in case God will use it to strengthen your faith. I know I needed to be reminded of this truth. However, if stories about scary incidents with children are too triggering for you currently (I have been there!!), please don't read it. I want this story to serve you, not overwhelm you. Our God is good. 

I threw out the pink monkey pajamas. They’re cute, and she only wore them once. But they make me remember that night, and I do not want to remember.

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My Pastor Husband, Part 2

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My Pastor Husband, Part 2

So remember last week when I told you about that time when someone scream-curse-flirted with my husband, the pastor? In a world of carefully scrubbed conversations (“Oh sorry man, I forgot you were a pastor”), it was strangely centering. People tend to worry they might get their sin on him or something. There’s already sin on him because, you know, he’s a human, but people tend to forget that about people in ministry.

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My Pastor Husband

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My Pastor Husband

My family has a well-documented ice cream problem. If we feel too happy, someone will suggest ice cream, and if we feel too unhappy, someone will suggest ice cream. As the matriarch of the household, I have to keep everybody at about a seven on the happiness scale so that we will not get ice cream. The other day, though, the kids were too cute, and I magically had dinner on the table when my husband got home, and somehow when he entered the door, I did not bare my teeth at him as an expression of my Stay-At-Home-Mom Rage, which is totally a thing, and we just ended up way too happy. DANGGIT. We went to get ice cream.

Things were going as you’d expect: Adelaide wants chocolate, will be furious if anyone else gets chocolate because she doesn’t understand that there is more than one cup of chocolate ice cream in the universe at any given moment, and Greer wants “blue,” a vague request that is not always possible to obtain, but conveniently, Greer is unclear on the color blue and generally good-natured, so chocolate or vanilla will do in a pinch. We pull up to the drive thru of our favorite place to get ice cream, and it’s there that things get squirrelly.

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Existential Crisis

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Existential Crisis

Last week, while we were on vacation, I was convinced that my children were not missing their Parents’ Day Out, because the school was on Fall Break. I told multiple people this, like, “How convenient that the school Fall Break fell on the same week as our long-planned vacation!” Isn’t it nice when life is like that? Except I was talking with my friend Megan, whose daughter Ellie Kate goes to the same PDO program, and she mentioned something about taking Ellie Kate to school. “Wait, what?” I said. “I thought they were on Fall Break!” Megan was confused, but I ended up deciding Fall Break must be next week. Silly me, getting my dates switched up! Megan and I bond over this shared muddled calendar tendency. We are silly!

When I get home, I check the calendar, and you guys, there is no Fall Break. As in zero Fall Break. As in I completely invented the entire idea out of nothing, and it was never, ever on the calendar. 

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Teach What Matters

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Teach What Matters

"I think this is a true statement: Jesus is a psycho for purity. It’s not because He wants a bunch of good girls. That’s boring. It’s because He paid the ultimate price to save us. You don’t pay that kind of price for things that aren’t precious beyond description." -Knocking Over Tables by Caroline Saunders

For most of the last decade, my husband has worked with students. I, being the token student pastor's wife and a middle school teacher, have been asked many times to talk to girls about sex, purity, and marriage. And so I always have, sharing with them things I'd learned, how purity matters because of marriage and morality and whatnot, how there are so many benefits, how it's worth it.

Then one day, I felt convicted. I realized that I'd been teaching things I'd always heard rather than seeking God for fresh revelation and wrestling through scripture to fight for the wisdom myself. This is not really like me. "Fresh teaching" was one of my core values as a writing teacher, and I flat-out refused to simply pass along what had always been taught until I wrestled with it and knew it to be valuable, and I created new content whenever necessary. I have always practiced the same thing as a small group and discipleship leader, refusing to lazily lean on someone else's hard-earned wisdom. But for purity? I phoned it in. It was too icky of a topic, and I just tried to be funny as I shared what I'd always heard. Kind of like, "HAHA WE'RE TALKING ABOUT SEX AT CHURCH, SO LET'S LAUGH SO WE DON'T BARF."

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