• suffering
    Abundant Life - Calvary road - Dark Night of the Soul - Redemption - Setback - Suffering

    How to Get the Most out of Your Suffering

    - By 

    Suffering in some capacity is inevitable. My shoulder aches from a car accident three months ago. I am a little down from lack of sunlight in the three and a half hour Alaskan winter days.  I could go on, but you get the point. You have your list too, I am sure. But so much of the time, our suffering is a hamster wheel. We can get worn out trying to run from it, only to end up at the same place. Only now we are exhausted from running without purpose. “Dear friends, do not be surprised at the fiery…

  • core values
    Communication - connection - family - Marriage

    Five Important Core Values in Marriage

    - By 

    When my husband and I first sat down to construct our core values, we struggled a bit. Our ideas about what made a marriage really great differed somewhat. My core values were more emotionally derived while his were more concrete and very detailed. In the end, we had around eleven, but of those, five have proven to be a source of real satisfaction in our relationship. In order to really hone a core values list, you and your spouse have to take some time to figure out what is really important to you. It is really easy to fall into…

  • Mary
    Bible Characters - Christmas - obedience - obeying God - Shame & Guilt - Spiritual Maturity

    What’s So Extraordinary about Mary?

    - By 

    I have often heard it said in church circles that the Catholic church makes too much of Mary while the Protestant arm of the body makes too little. Not until I really looked into the life and decisions of Mary did I begin to realize how subversive, brave, and significant Mary is to the church, particularly women. She contributes some incredibly important and often overlooked encouragement to the role of women within the church. 1: Mary accepts God’s call on her life without consulting the men in her life. Mary doesn’t ask Gabriel to wait while she consults Joseph on…