When I was in the throes of my divorce, and my world was collapsing around me, my counselor suggested that I read one of the Psalms each day. She said that they would encourage me and give me hope. She was so right. My daily reading of the Psalms became my oxygen when I was […]
I remember when I was in the throes of my divorce, one of my co-workers said, “I know this is difficult. You deserve to be happy.” I thought, “Yea, she’s right. I do deserve to be happy!” Back then, I approached happiness like some kind of life achievement, like graduating from high school. I wanted to […]
When the thought to move my kids to a totally new area of town after my divorce first entered my mind, I dismissed it as nonsense. I was a single parent, and I was up to my eyeballs in the day-to-day reality of raising three kids on my own and running a business. Plus, I […]
Recently, I was on a flight to New York. I was sitting in an aisle seat. The middle seat was empty, and a young woman was sitting in the window seat. She caught my attention because she was what I would call “edgy”. She was dressed very flashy, had a purple streak dyed into her […]
“I need your help. My son is pulling out his eyebrows.” was the tearful plea from Meg, a woman in my Recovering from Divorce group. I knew that Meg and her former husband were having a very difficult time co-parenting their children. In fact, they were in a “hot war,” fighting pretty much each day. […]
There is a famous scene in the 1997 movie, Jerry Maguire, where Jerry (Tom Cruise) is trying to reconcile with his wife, Dorothy (Renee Zellweger). He is trying to convince her that his life is meaningless without her. Then he says these three words: “You complete me.” (And the audience swoons with a collective “Aww…”) […]
I remember when I was in the throes of my divorce, one of my co-workers said, “I know this is difficult. You deserve to be happy.” I thought, “Yea, she’s right. I do deserve to be happy!” I approached happiness like some kind of life achievement, like graduating from high school. I wanted to graduate from […]
If you are feeling overwhelmed by all the challenges of life, you are not alone. Even the apostles felt the same way, and they had Jesus walking and talking with them every day. In Mark’s Gospel account of the Jesus feeding the multitude (Mark 6:34-44), the apostles were totally overwhelmed with the prospect of having […]
Several years ago, I brought my then five-year-old daughter to the doctor for her annual physical. She was due for a couple of immunizations, and I was trying to find a delicate way of answering her repeated question, “Am I going to get any shots?” I managed to avoid answering the question directly with responses […]
Did you ever find it odd that so many of the Gospel stories have Jesus interacting with the outcasts of society? It seems that for most of his public life, Jesus went out of his way to interact with the lepers, tax collectors, prostitutes and social misfits of his day. These outcasts were his people […]