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Searched
Every time I step into the airport security line, I feel a little sick to my stomach. There’s something so unnerving about the possibility of having my bags searched. I know these practices keep our skies safer, but they still intimidate me. Fortunately I’ve only been escorted from the line once. After a spending a week in Minnesota with a girlfriend—enjoying a reprieve from the Texas summer heat—I packed my suitcase and prepared to re-enter the hundred-degree temperatures of my home state. Before we left I picked up a wild rice pancake mix for my parents made from the famous Minnesota staple. As my bags passed through the x-ray machine…
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Evangelicals and The “Happy” Imperative
Some grow up convinced that feeling unhappy, uneasy, and uncertain is unnatural. American media promotes that being uninvited, unattractive and unintelligent is unnecessary. Even some evangelical circles will contend that feeling unwanted, unworthy, unlovable, and remaining unmarried is unacceptable. Expectations for happiness run high for many evangelicals. Some even believe a marriage that does not offer a lifetime of bliss has no purpose. Well-meaning Christians sometimes nudge unhappy spouses towards divorce in the name of, “God wants Christians to have happy marriages.” But in Sacred Marriage, Gary Thomas contests that God intended marriage to cultivate holiness more than happiness. But some…
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This is Your Brain…On Stress
Those who grew up in the 80’s can’t forget this gem of a Public Service Announcement: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dk9XY8Nrs0A While the war on drugs continues to rage on, another battle happens almost every day in traffic jams, breakrooms, and around dinner tables: the battle within the brain as it deals with stress. According to the American Psychological Association, the stress situation in America is “chronic.” That’s putting it mildly. Many would say modern-day Americans are the most collectively stressed-out population in history.
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The Tapeworm Gallery: Freedom
I see you signed up for another round of Celebrate Recovery at the church two towns over. Still angry and bruised, ha? I knew it. I think you should do CR again. It worked wonders the first time—especially for that anxiety and depression. So go ahead and rehash all your resentments, guilt, shame, anger and fear that stem from your wholesome childhood. Because I enjoy watching you run in circles. I meant to ask, how’s your narcissistic mother doing? Tell her hello for me. And that I said, “Thanks,” for leaving you emotionally emaciated. I get why you don’t feel like praying. Talking…
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GOOD GRIEF: Seven Steps to Embracing Emotions- #3 The Heart of the Matter
Being good is not the same as being godly. “They tie up heavy loads, hard to carry, and put them on men’s shoulders . . . They do all their deeds to be seen by people,” Matthew 23:4-5a In verse 15 Jesus exhorts, ““Woe to you, experts in the law and you Pharisees, hypocrites! You cross land and sea to make one convert, and when you get one, you make him twice as much a child of hell as yourselves!” Do we settle for obedience even when we know it is done with an angry belligerent heart? If we are satisfied with obedience even when attitudes are wrong we have…
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A New Normal: Finding Life amidst Chronic Illness
Four-and-a-half years ago an autoimmune condition slipped into my system. Like Troy’s Trojan horse, it unleashed a stealth attack. And the battle that ensued left me battling bouts of exhaustion and extreme fatigue. When our bodies don’t work like we want them to, we’re often left searching for a new normal. Yet as we embrace the journey, we learn to acknowledge our humanness, rest in God’s presence, and ultimately find new life. Listen Deeply: It requires attentiveness to acknowledge the changing needs within us. We may notice our need for more sleep, cravings for solitude, or longings for better health. And only as we pay attention, can we…
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Everything Centers On This One Thing
My earliest memories of Easter include new church dresses with hats and lots of yellow ribbons, intense searches for plastic eggs with the rare $2 bill stuffed inside, marshmallow peeps (which I never liked) and loads of Cadbury chocolate, complete with the resulting stomach-ache. The day came and went with a little bit of anticipation, but nominal impact on my day-to-day life. As I grew up, the cognitive recognition that Easter celebrated something important, something critical, something that all of reality hinges upon, was not lost on me. However, the disconnect between head and heart can sometimes keep the significance of an event at a distance. I would reflect on…
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Scrambled Souls and SILENCE – An Accessible Addiction
Eleven years ago this fall I was invited to go on a “silent retreat”, the kind where you literally do not speak during the time period for silence. This particular one was for 36 hours. Some of my friends were incredulous. “How can a group of women be silent for that long, for any amount of time?” One of my relatives emailed me and asked, “Just what does one do on a silent retreat, like – what’s the purpose?” One colleague even ventured to look at me as if to say, “YOU, silent?” Until this first silent retreat I had not experienced the phenomenon of stopping to enter into silence…
