Simplifying… me

The door is on the latch tonight,
The hearth-fire is aglow,
I seem to hear soft passing feet —
The Christchild in the snow.
My heart is open wide tonight
For stranger, kith or kin;
I would not bar a single door
Where love might enter in.
Author Unknown
Isaiah prophesied that the Messiah would come.
A heavy darkness had settled upon the world, [...]

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Hot and dry. A thick orangey-red haze coated the landscape as I stepped out of the Lilongwe International Airport. I pushed the heavy cart loaded with maybe three or four suitcases and a large trunk wrapped with luggage straps to keep them from busting open. Brooklyn and Jackson, my siblings, pushed their own carts piled [...]

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For just a moment, let’s think about Joseph the Dreamer.
We find his story in the book of Genesis. Anyone who grew up going to church will be quite up to speed with this story. I can still see the flannel graph pictures of Joseph surrounded by bales of wheat bowing in his direction during those [...]

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Death and mourning. Sadness and despair.
It seemed the story was over. Christ had died and his body lay in a tomb. It was the end of an era as far as anyone could tell.
There was weeping, mourning, uncertainty, and confusion.
What next?
Mary Magdalene stood at the empty grave…certainly, there must be some explanation. Her heart gave [...]

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Self-care in a season of chaos.

When we moved to South Africa, I had come out of a very challenging season in Malawi. It was hard on all fronts – from helping our children transition, to navigating life in a foreign country, the ever-precarious visa process, the insurgence of Covid-19, to understanding a new organization [...]

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The activity of Jesus, from the location of where he was teaching to the content he was teaching, to the miracles he performed, was always intentional and multidimensional.
On the Sabbath Jesus was teaching in one of the synagogues…
Luke 13:10

Jesus was teaching on the Sabbath, which hardly seems out of the ordinary, but it is [...]

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Ordinary is highly under-rated.
It seems the sincere longing for significance has pushed past contentment in doing a job well done, to that of being a world changer…influencer…and platform-creator. It is not enough, anymore, to do the hard and consistent daily work of investing our lives into meaningful, yet oftentimes, ordinary endeavors. Today, we are driven [...]

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As I watched the clock strike midnight, its hand leaving 2021 and tick-tock-ticking its way into 2022, I felt a wave of relief. Covid and transition left me feeling kind of empty. Rather than enter the new year with a bang, I mostly coasted in on fumes.
I came down with a fever on Christmas Day [...]

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Immanuel

Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.
Matthew 11:28-30
Christmas is here, and [...]

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Love.

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.
John 3:16

For God so loved…
The word “so”, when used as an adverb, can have a few different meanings. It can express the degree or extent of something, or it [...]

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