November 2011
15 posts
You are NOT my God.
For the past few weeks Justin’s been preaching on idolatry. Ask anybody at Round Rock and he or she will quickly admit that the series has been a royal pain in the rump. We are all experiencing growing pains. Who knew we were idolaters?
I know now, and you’d better believe I’m making changes.
I found this gem last night as I was reading Galatians. Paul writes:
“Formerly,...
Why I Don't Want to Be a Person Who Reads Her...
I bought a new Bible last night, one of those note-takers ones with the blank page across from the text. I’ve taken quite a fancy to those. They help me read by letting me write. It’s the way I’m wired.
On the ride home from the bookstore I was fantasizing about my new, more disciplined Bible study life and I thought, “I want to be a person who reads through her Bible...
The heart is a dark, sometimes warm, sometimes cold, always mysterious place in which God works unexplainable wonders. I can feel Him in there bumping up against the hard places, wading into the soft spots, tilling, watering, whispering over tiny seeds—Grow!—creating somethings from the nothing dirt of my once-overgrown garden.
Zombies
I have this feeling that The Walking Dead is more real than The Bachelorette or one of those housewife shows on Bravo. It feels real—like news on CNN but less clinical, more devastating, and more accurate.
Am I crazy or do zombies just feel… true?
I watched just one episode of that show. It’s likely all I’ll watch. I’m squeamish and terrified of spiritless flesh.
Still, I feel like that...
Why I Make My Kids Play at the McDonald's...
I make no attempt to defend McDonald’s to its critics. Truth be told, I am a critic. The way they make that weirdly addictive food should be illegal. However, I am a fan of the McDonald’s playplace. Here’s why:
The McDonald’s playground is a microcosm of the world, a place where children from all socioeconomic, religious and racial backgrounds meet. On the McDonald’s playplace my girls encounter...
A Separate Peace
*SPOILER--I will reveal the ending of this book and it is wonderful so don’t do yourself the injustice of reading the post without having read the book. Pinky promise.
I finally read A Separate Peace. I read it in two sittings, racing from page to page. I loved it, was devastated by it.
I sat down just now to write about it, wandering about in my mind, peeking behind doors to figure out...
“Bad clothes do not, as bad words may, slip quickly into the past. They haunt us...”
– John Harvey in Clothes
Do you have a “bad clothes” memory? Surely you do. We all do, right?
Mine, one of mine, goes down in the middle school cafeteria. I’m wearing green, high waisted stovepipe pants with a 3 and half inch black patent leather belt. I look ridiculous. But I feel...
Second Skin
I read an article recently that painted God’s act of clothing man and woman in skins as suggesting something about the relationship of clothes to the self. The author noticed that God chose to give his children not some foreign material, something woven from plants or engineered, but rather a second skin, another layer of flesh. He concluded that perhaps clothes shouldn’t only be looked at...
Maybe the nicest thing my youngest has ever said...
London: Mom, is that you?
Me: Yes, London, it's me.
London: You were stomping. We thought you were a monster.
Eve: (touching my face and smiling) But you're not. You're our Jennifer.
True Love Lasts
A few weeks ago my husband sent me this link—it’s to the story of Norma and Gordon Yeager, the couple (aged 90 and 94) who died holding hands. He also linked this song from The Civil Wars, C’est la mort. He wrote: “I want to die with you.”
I, of course, cried. I want to die with him, too.
Later that night he and I talked about the story which had quickly gone...
#peoplearemeanontwitter #benice
So, apparently Kim Kardashian got a divorce. I found out on Twitter from hundreds of people tweeting jokes and insults hashtagged #thingslongerthankimsmarriage.
I do not like to call people out in blog posts, but today I will make an exception:
I don’t think that was nice.
Making fun of the end of a marriage is a less than loving way to behave—even, perhaps especially, if you...
I'm Reading a Book by and about George W. Bush
Yes, I am reading a book by George W—a man I voted for and initially liked but then also didn’t so much like toward the end. And I’m realizing as I read this book that I still like him. He is insanely likable, even when I crazy disagree with him.
Decision Points, his memoir, is a good book about a pretty regular guy who makes some good decisions (and some bad ones) and sort of...
God's Face
I took my daughters to the nursing home (“nursery” home according to London) across the street from our house last week. I’d been wanting to do it for months, feeling guilty about not doing it. So, finally, we did it. London drew pictures of people (she’s very Tim Burton right now) and Eve drew circles which she told me were fish in the sea. We made six or seven pictures,...
If Hamlet Had To Get Dressed For Church...
To dress up or not to dress up
that is the question
whether tis nobler in the pew to put on
the dresses and slacks of outrageous fortune
Or to take arms against a sea of posers
And by opposing judge them?
Musing today on whether or not to dress up for church—not quite to be or not be, but still a question up in the air.
I’m not sure whether or not it’s important. What do...
