It’s in our stories, movies, and legends. In Shakespeare’s MacBeth, Edgar Allan Poe’s Telltale Heart, Victor Hugo’s Les Miserables. We feel it in our bones. It’s in our DNA. When we’re guilty, we desperately want to come clean. Can you relate? Maybe you have a loved one who is struggling against being honest with her sin. Maybe you’re carrying something from your past that you’ve never told...
A Simple Practice for Those in Need of Mercy
Sometimes those of us who need God’s mercy most impede its flow. So instead of an outpour, we receive just a few drops. This is sad, but sadder still is when we then believe a trickle of mercy is all God wants to give us. Years ago, after telling a spiritual mentor about how I’d viewed pornography again, he recommended we go to God together so I could confess my sin directly to Him...
Now What?
Tuesday, Maryland and Maine became the first two states in the U.S. to legalize homosexual marriage by a vote of the people. I’m among the 48% of Marylanders who voted against same-sex marriage, and today I’m grieving. Rightly so. If you feel the same sadness, you might be tempted, as many are right now, to focus on what went wrong, to blame, to complain. There’s a better response. Let the eyes...
Spin
I remember as a teenager taking a corner too fast on a snowy road in my step-dad’s car. The car spun out of control and slammed into the side of the street. My brother got out to assess the damage while I sat anxiously inside. Through the front windshield I read his lips: “You’re dead.” Sometimes life’s like this. We hit an icy stretch, we mess up, and we long to hear from a loving Father...
Bargain Hunting
If you could be anywhere in the world to see something that reminded you of God’s beauty, where would that be? The Atlantic at sunrise? The Rocky Mountains when the Aspens are golden? The edge of the Grand Canyon? The Reflection Pond in Denali National Park? Or how about the grocery store line where the woman in front of you is fumbling through an overstuffed purse to find her 50¢ off...
Pancakes . . . and Passion
We have a Saturday morning tradition in my house: pancakes. Banana-Cinnamon-and-Honey pancakes, Blueberry-Pear pancakes, Apple-Walnut-and-Brown-Sugar pancakes, and the “Kitchen Sink” pancakes that include dregs from all the previous batches and anything else dad decides to throw in. My kids love it. Well, they love the eating part. They hate the waiting part. We adults are hardly...
