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The Real Truth about ‘Boring’ Men — and the Women who Live with Them: Redefining Boring
So not every guy proposes with lip syncing, rolling cameras, and a choreographed entourage. Yeah — so what if your Dad didn’t? He just pulled that beat-up Volkswagon Rabbit of... Read more →
Dear Brittany: Why We Don’t Have To Be So Afraid of Dying & Suffering that We Choose Suicide
You may have read the poignant & powerful, CNN front-page story of cancer patient Brittany Maynard, 29, who has scheduled her death for Nov. 1? Come November 1, Maynard plans... Read more →
What the Church & Christians Need to Know About Suicide & Mental Health
Dear Church, Cancer can be deadly and so can depression. So can the dark and the shame and the crush of a thousand skeletons, a thousand millstones, a thousand internal... Read more →
[*UPDATE of Miracle below] Into Iraq #2: What the News isn’t telling You & Why We Can’t Afford to Pretend It’s Not Happening [Sozan’s Impossible Choice — and Our Very Possible One]
[… yeah, this really isn’t easy… but it’s infinitely harder to live. And? If you read right to the end — it gets real practical and very tangible and we... Read more →
5 Ways To Stand Up & Be The Church in The World’s Worst Refugee Crisis Since World War II
1. Be Moved Quick Facts to Understand the Crisis: –> One Stop to Understand it All The world is in the worst refugee crisis since World War II. And Syria’s civil war... Read more →
About those “20 Minutes of Action”: 20 Things We’d Better Tell Our Sons Right Now About Being Real Men
When the prevailing thinking is boys will be boys -- girls will be garbage. Read more →
After Steubenville: 25 Things Our Sons need to know about Manhood
Dear Son, When you’re the mother of four sons, Steubenville is about us. Steubenville is about having a conversation with sons about hard things and asking you to do holy... Read more →
How the Hidden Dangers of Comparison are Killing Us … {and Our Daughters} : The Measuring Stick Principle
When our Hope-girl came in and sat at the foot of our bed, I knew she was looking for a way to stand. “So what am I supposed to do... Read more →
when family breaks your heart
Absolutely no clue how we turned around and then she was ten. No clue in the least how the candles on her cake are blown out with one puff and... Read more →
Dear Kids: What You Need to Know About Duck Dynasty, Justine Sacco, and Christmas
Dear Kids, Saw one of you boys sitting here in a messy house last night, reading a book by the light of the Christmas tree. Reading words. My heart about... Read more →
A Letter to the North American Church: Because it is Time
Dear North American Church, After a Sunday morning in Africa, you don’t look the same to me. You look hungry. Hungrier than anything I’ve seen in Africa. Because after I... Read more →
The Wake-Up Call that is ISIS: Who in the Church is Answering?
A man turned to me last week when we were on plane about 30,000 feet over the earth. He sat in C18 and I sat in D18 and he turned... Read more →
Dear Kids: Why Wait till Marriage — What No One Tells You & What I Wish Someone Had Told Me
So, Son, you up & bought your own house in your last days of being 18. A century old red brick near the university campus, all set up for seven... Read more →
How Tired People [Make] Love & Have an “Anything But Boring” Weekend
Dear Husband…. so yeah, yeah—- our mattress sags in the middle. You can see it, even when the sheets are pulled up taut, how the springs at the centre have... Read more →
What Christians Need to Know about Mental Health
Dear Church, Cancer can be deadly and so can depression. So can the dark and the shame and the crush of a thousand skeletons, a thousand millstones, a thousand internal... Read more →
An Honest Conversation About Abortion that Asks Us Not to Turn Away — from anyone: The Emmaus Option
When I get the message that Alima* wants an abortion, it feels like all the air got vacuumed out of my lungs. But I get it. I once sat in... Read more →
The Most Life-Giving Thing Every Mother Can Do For Herself This Mother’s Day
Yeah — if you’re being gut honest here — you don’t really want the cards or the flowers. Or what gets wrapped up in shiny paper, or stuffed in a... Read more →
Why Mother’s Day is for the Birds
Because I ain’t no Hallmark mother — and none of us are, if we’re really truth-telling here. If we’re honest– and what else is there really — there were burnt... Read more →
the most life-changing thing any woman can do for herself this Mother’s Day
What every mother wants, her most unspoken need -- is a truckload of Grace. Read more →
Dear You…a letter for all of the hard days
Dear Self and me and you and us, really, it's all going to be okay. Read more →
How to Recover the Lost Art of Dying Well: What Kara Tippetts Taught Us
She’d said it brave into the camera, the liquid of her heart brimming like light in her eyes: “I feel like I’m a kid at a party, whose Father said... Read more →
About Not Waiting Till Marriage: What No One Tells Kids & What I Wish Someone Had Told Me
Your skin and your soul are profoundly connected and this is a profoundly beautiful thing. Read more →
How to Get Through the Dark Places [#TheJesusProject 2 ]
The old cahoot ran in his boots. Weren’t too many of anybody who believed he could. The kids and I read about the old guy one night after supper and... Read more →
Dear Women & Daughters: When You’re Tired of Media Voices Telling You What Beauty & Love Is
Dear Daughter, When we stood in the check-out and you leaned over and said, “What? I can’t hear you?” I could read it right then in your eyes. Right there... Read more →
what to look for when you’ve lost your joy
I was certain God was telling me this is where I would find joy again. Read more →
Help for Mothers Who Want to Give Up: 10 Keys to Raising This Generation of Boys into #GoodYoungMen
When I was an oblivious 16, I met this soccer mama who had it painted on her Keds: Shoe #1: These 2 feet run Shoe #2: After my 3 sons.... Read more →
what happened after we got the diagnosis: about brokenness, suffering & joining The Club
When you find yourself in the real deep end — that’s when you know He’s real. Read more →
Dear You Who Doesn’t Want to Do that Hard Thing
Dear Lovely You, who doesn’t want to play the piano, take out the recycling, study for your geometry exam, get on the treadmill, clean up the basement, or do that... Read more →
How to Get Over Cliques & Get Real Community
No one can make us quite as unsure about ourselves as another woman. Read more →
How to Really Send the Kids Back to School & Out into the World
You talk with a police officer on your last Sunday. Your last Sunday still living at home — after the Preacher had said his Amen 10 minutes before noon, you... Read more →
