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Only Strong and Courageous
I cried when I hugged my daughter goodbye on the parking lot across the street from the dorm where she now lives. I didn’t care. I knew that moment would unleash the emotions I had bottled up all summer long. So I released it right there. Up to this point, I had watched my student take charge of her college checklist. I helped her unpack and I watched her settle into her new “home.” Honestly, it all felt so wrong but I knew in my heart God wanted this. So when I hugged her one last time, God said, “Let her go.” And I did…
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Las Oraciones de Mi Madre—My Mother’s Prayers
I crawled slowly and ever so quietly towards the door of my mother’s room. Her weeping had awakened me from a deep sleep. I decided to go check up on her so I sneaked over to her room. I waited a bit and sat in the corner of the hallway where I could see her through the slightly opened door. I listened. Padre nuestro que estás en los cielos, santificado sea tú nombre. I felt relieved. My mother, kneeling down beside her bed, prayed and wept. She’s talking to God. She’s having the same conversation as the night before. I decided to stay for a while so I could hear…
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Movie Review: Moms’ Night Out: A Laugh and a Missed Opportunity
Moms' Night Out, the movie starring Sarah Drew ("Grey's Anatomy") opened over the weekend, right in time for Mother's Day. And Christians filled theaters to see it. The film is clean, it's funny…and it's also a missed opportunity. Drew’s character, Allyson, and her two friends — played with expert performances by Logan White and Patricia Heaton (Everybody Loves Raymond)— want just one thing: a peaceful night out eating food off a menu while enjoying uninterrupted adult conversation. But for that to happen the dads have to parent their kids for three hours. And they are incapable of doing so without endangering their offspring. The film is billed as a “true-to-life…
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The End of My World
All of us experience a time where we risk our well-put-together world for something we know God has called us to do. We get challenged far beyond trying to figure out what to make for dinner. And we tell ourselves, “Since it’s from God, it will play out simple, right?” My past few months have contained so much change. I started a new job and my husband began a new project in Sacramento, California. This means we get to spend more time apart than together. It also leaves me in charge here at home. I thought, “No big deal, I can do this,” and felt peace about it. Several…
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Memoir-Life with a New Baby…When You Are Near Death in a Coma
"After waking from a two-month coma after childbirth I struggled to discover what had happened, love my child, and rediscover who I was. I awoke to a baby I didn’t know and a body I didn’t recognize. I faced a life and self I didn’t know how to put back together. " So begins Lindsey O'Connor's new book, The Long Awakening, a personal memoir of near-death in the midst of giving life. Ove ten years previous, at an author’s conference in Atlanta, Ga, right in the middle of ONE BIG PAJAMA PARTY, Lindsey had begun to cramp badly. In a book on the friendships of women I wrote about what…
