I don’t mean to start this blog off with a fight but I’m very opposed to tattoos… on me. It isn’t a religious concern, I’ve just had this issue since I was a kid where I really dislike pain. Somehow, for me, it hurts. So, I avoid it. But if there were some way to get a tattoo with no pain, I know what mine would be. The first bit of Romans 12:11 in some fancy font: “Be Not Slothful in Zeal.” Zeal means …
Let’s talk about fasting. Fasting as a spiritual discipline so often connotes not eating some or all food for an extended period of time. While fasting certainly can, and often does, involve reduced food intake that is not always the case, nor is that the reason for fasting. So, let’s talk about fasting: why we do it, not what it often involves. Fasting, as a spiritual discipline, is about sel…
Where could I go to get away from your spirit? Where could I go to escape your presence? God, your plans are incomprehensible to me! Their total number is countless! If I tried to count them—they outnumber grains of sand! If I came to the very end—I'd still be with you. Psalm 139:7, 17-18 (CEB) Have you ever been anxious or frustrated about something and without realizing it your body became tense…
“Not mine, but thine.” I remember using this phrase in one of the most nervous conditions of my life. I was interviewing at my dream college and desperately wanted to make not only a good impression, but a godly impression. (Seeing as it was an Evangelical Liberal Arts school. That advice might not work everywhere else.) When asked what book I had read most recently I quipped, “Is it nerdy to sa…
Writing about reading the scripture, Benedictine Sister, Macrina Wiederkehr said: “Read with a vulnerable heart. Expect to be blessed in the reading. Read as one awake, one waiting for the beloved. Read with reverence.” When you open the bible and begin to read, what do you expect to happen? Do you expect to be blessed by the words? Do you expect to hear God’s voice guiding you, comforting you, chall…
