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I readily admit – I would not choose ANY times of grief that my husband and I have experienced over the past 18 years of ministry. I also can admit that my ‘grief vision’ is flawed and retrospective. God foresees and oversees each moment of grief in a way that my heart is learning to […]
New to ministry, I remember sitting in a seminar room with other pastors’ wives when our speaker asked us to write down one ministry fear. I feared many things…but surprised myself writing, “to be too tired to serve well.” I feared burnout! Though almost two decades later my propensity is still toward burning the candle […]
As our lives change, so do the ways that we interact with our spouses. It is one thing to overcome obstacles when dating as a couple of young twenty-year-olds, but quite another thing to try to fit dating in between meeting the needs of families, congregations, and full or part time jobs. It is easy […]
The last time I was on a date was about 25 years ago. A few months ago I decided that I needed to start dating again. This time, I set my sights on dating my pastor. Of course, he’s the same man I dated 25 years ago, but he has changed and so have I. […]
Reluctance is one of my biggest joy stealers. It can sneak up on me when I least expect it. Once I start focusing on myself I can quickly lose the bigger picture of seeing sacrifices for my church family as participation in God’s kingdom work. Most of the time I can send my pastor-husband off […]
The seasoned hiker was alone on an arduous journey, enjoying the beauty of the scenery and the challenge of the venture. Then something went wrong. He sent one text. No response. He tried another–still no response. His condition worsened. The elements revealed their power. Now he was becoming desperate. He could only text one word: […]
He drew me up from the pit of destruction, out of the miry bog, and set my feet upon a rock, making my steps secure. Psalm 40:2 Have you ever felt like you are in “the miry bog” with your husband? Like he needs to be drawn up “from the pit of destruction,” and you are slipping […]
I woke up one morning with red welts on my arm. Now that in itself doesn’t seem strange; my mom always told me that our bodies did funny things sometimes. But the night before, we had been shopping for new mattresses, and call it a premonition or a leading of God’s Spirit, but I connected […]
Asking for help is not something I do easily. I can find myself circling the “shame spiral” as we lovingly call it in our house, where I have taken on too much, am not willing to ask for help, and martyr myself to get everything completed well and on time. It’s a mix of not […]
Communication is our specialty – that’s what my husband, Paul, and I often say. It’s a bit of an inside joke for us dating all the way back to our first conversation ever when he asked me if I was in band (we met at college), and I thought he asked me if I was […]
