My cat Gizmo was deathly ill one summer, so he hid inside the ginormous juniper bush we had in our backyard. He nearly died of dehydration because I couldn’t find him for a couple of days. When I was finally able to coax him out and get water down his throat with a dropper, he got well. In Psalm 139, and in Hebrews 3 and 4, a comparison is made between how well God knows our ways (infinitely and perfectly) and how well we know His (maybe not so much). David lists this eloquent description of all the stuff God knows about us, like when we sit down, when we get up, what we think, where we Continue Reading
Why You Can’t Skip the Prep
Have you done any house painting lately? We tackled our living room and dining room this spring. The finished product looks fantastic, but I learned something in the process. Eighty percent of a job well done is in the prep work. I was really eager to start rolling “Nutty Beige” onto the walls, but before we could do that, we had to purchase supplies, move furniture, clean off walls, tape edges, spackle holes, and lay down drop clothes. This took the better part of a day. Once we started cutting in and rolling, the job didn’t take very long. Consider how that’s what parenting is like. Continue Reading
Why You Need an Extreme Makeover
Every time I drive by the house on a certain corner in town, I feel sad. A couple of years ago, it got a complete face lift, transforming it from an unkempt place with a yard full of random furniture and appliances to an attractive little property. A few months later, the place looked as bad as ever. Contrast that to another house in my neighborhood which was neglected for years, paint peeling and lawn shriveled to just weeds. Under new ownership, it now looks tidy, clean, and pleasantly inviting. The condition of these homes seems directly related to the inner condition of the Continue Reading
How Wonder is Better than Getting Stuff Done
It sat there on the dining room floor, floating when we walked by and begging to be swept up. For some reason, I ignored the soft gray feather that had blown in from outside for two days. That turned out to be a good thing. Have you ever gotten out of the normal routine and seen things from a different perspective? On the morning of the day I had planned to clean, my one-year-old grandson and his mommy stopped by. Reuel was a bit grumpy and out of sorts – until his grandfather picked up the feather and blew it toward the ceiling. The feather floated down. Reu stood wide-eyed, watching Continue Reading