Dearest Daughters

Finding Your Voice

Sun, 21 Dec 2025 05:00:00 -0600

A New Song in the Wind

“From whom the whole body, joined and knit together by what every joint supplies, according to the effective working by which every part does its share, causes growth of the body for the edifying of itself in love.” (Eph. 4:16)

Dearest Daughters,

Today I’m going to take a little different route with my letter.

It’s nearly Christmas time, and during this season we remember all kinds of stories that have made it special for us, not just stories of this season, but the relationships that have made us who we are. Those relationships often come together again at Christmas, like a tapestry—threads returning, crossing over and under, making the fabric of our lives complete.

Today I’m thinking of one that shaped me, and I want to share one with you.

The fair was over, and a blasting cold front charged through Texas with the zeal and strength of a soldier. The last pecan leaves shook free from the limbs shading our yard, leaving us exposed to the low winter sun and the strong northern wind. You older children tumbled and played in the yard.

This fair had been different than some of the previous ones. Some of you came down with the flu during the fair, and I rushed back and forth between music, my booth, and tending to you over at Grandma’s house next door to the fairgrounds, where you lay shivering and feverish.

One of you cried, “Mommy, I can’t be here. I’ve got to be at the fair!”

I cried with you. After months of waiting, of sanding wooden spoons and preparing, you were missing your favorite time of year—and worse, you weren’t getting to sing in the choir.

Music was the highlight of our family life. Singing together, especially with Daddy, was a joy. Daddy and I first got to know each other through music, singing together on my parents’ front porch or gathered around his parents’ living room piano. Josiah, Uncle Philip, Daddy, and I began singing together when I was sixteen. We never knew where that journey would take us, but I loved to sing.

I had never been more honored than the day Josiah asked me to join his little band. It had been him, Daddy, and Philip, and he wanted Philip to play the piano and me to be part of the vocal group. We sang in various places—first just for fun, then for relatives, friends, nursing homes, senior groups. It grew and grew.

We all ended up getting married. More joined the group. Life moved on. I married your dad, and that common ground of music grew into a shared life of love, relationships, and children.

As the years went by, Regina joined our music group. I knew right away that she was more gifted than I was. I marveled at her voice, but clung fiercely to my own place as well. She was an alto; I was a soprano. That should have worked. I didn’t need to be jealous.

But voices aren’t that neatly divided. There was overlap.

I loved Regina, so it was hard to feel anything but admiration for her. When she sang, it melted my heart. Still, over time, some of the songs I sang became songs Regina sang. No one could deny it—she did them better. And yet, in my heart, I always thought, With a little more practice, a little more time, I could have gotten it right. It wouldn’t have sounded like her, but it would have had its own touch.

Those silent battles went on in my mind more often than I like to admit.

You see, while I had a nice voice, I had a problem: I did not have natural rhythm. While Regina could throw herself into the feeling of a song, I was counting measures. Tapping my toe. Watching for cues. I did fine in orchestra and choir where there was direction, but solos often filled me with tension.

So I worked harder. Practiced more. Labored over music, trying to overcome what didn’t come naturally, hoping there wouldn’t be a need for someone else to take my place.

But the one place music was always free was with my children. I sang to you every night. We sang at bedtime, during family devotion, when Daddy played guitar, and later when some of you played the piano. Music there was joy, not striving.

The fair ended. You recovered. And then the sickness hit me.

I lay tossing and turning with fever, headache, and that wretched winter cough. It was just three weeks until our Christmas concert. Part of my responsibility was helping plan the songs. I lay in the recliner scratching titles onto paper, wondering if I would even be able to sing Go Tell It on the Mountain or O Come, O Come, Emmanuel as planned.

That night, the house was quiet. Daddy slept. The baby rested in his cradle. Outside, the wind howled, and I could hear sheep bleating in the distance.

Suddenly words formed in my mind—stronger than thought, weightier than effort.

You shepherds, be still. You sheep on the hill…how the wind blows—

From where; no one knows. Like a long captive dream, a faint melody

I felt as if I were standing on a hill the night angels announced Christ’s birth. I lowered the footrest, stepped into the living room, and looked out at the wind whipping leaves through the darkness. I grabbed a pen and paper and began to write.

There’s a new song in the wind tonight,

Oh Jerusalem, rise up and sing…

Line after line poured out, and I scrawled them out as fast as I could. At last, I crawled back into bed and waited for morning.

Daddy felt something in the words, too. When my fever broke, I called Uncle Philip. He played, I listened, and suddenly there was a song. More than that, he worked with me to sing it. And for once, my rhythm wasn’t too bad.

I was proud. I couldn’t wait to share it.

But when I sang it for Daddy and Josiah, the power I had felt in the night wasn’t there. When I finished, they looked at each other. They didn’t say anything, but I knew that look.

I practiced more. I prayed more. I adjusted. I tried again the next night.

Still the same look.

“Maybe next year,” Josiah said doubtfully.

On the way home, Daddy asked, “What would you think about Regina trying it?”

The question landed hard. I had written the song. I wanted my voice in it. But I went home and prayed, and God was there. I knew those words were His, not mine. And if Regina could express them better, love required that I step aside.

I called her. “Would you try my song?” I asked.

When I heard her sing, I knew. This was right. More than right—it was God. I didn’t feel jealous. I almost wept with gratitude. I felt as though my voice had expanded, as though her lungs had become mine. I was singing through her mouth, or rather, God was singing through us both, together. What I had tried to give expression to, she released.

When Daddy and Josiah heard it, they loved it.

And on the night of the concert, as the hall filled and Regina stepped forward to sing—

There’s a new song in the wind tonight…

Her head thrown back with abandon, her arm outstretched.

—we rose to sing with her.

And not only that, but the audience rose to cheer—not just for the voice they heard, but for the voice in the wind, for a new song, a song of unity, of God’s voice singing through His people.

So bid the violence to cease, now dawns the kingdom of peace.

Earth and heaven rejoice at the sound of a mighty rushing wind, because there was a new song in the wind that night—

A song of peace, unity, and harmony. A song where no one quite knew where one gift ended and another began among the people called to be Zion.

And this, my dearest daughters, is what I want you to understand about finding your voice. We do not find it by competing. We do not find it by guarding our gifts. We do not find it by insisting that our sound be heard above others.

We find our voice through love—through relationship—through yielding ourselves to something larger than our own expression.

Sometimes your voice will come through your own mouth.

And sometimes it will come through the voice of another.

When love is present, there is no loss—only multiplication. What is given is not diminished; it is enlarged.

That night, as Regina sang, I did not disappear. I was gathered in. My voice had found its place—not by being louder, but by being joined.

This is how the body grows, joined and knit together by what every part supplies. This is how love builds itself up.

This is how Zion sings.

And this is how you will find your voice. So let us give voice to the Child born in a manger, Who gave up His throne to give us a place in His song.

With all my love,

Mom

Sing It into Their Bones

Mon, 15 Dec 2025 00:00:00 -0600

That they should set their hope in God, and not forget the works of God… (Psalm 78:7)

My Dearest Daughters,

As we rolled out the tubs, trunks, and boxes of holiday decorations this year, my thoughts returned, as they usually do, to the days when all of my children were little. The day fell, as it always does, on the Monday after our Homestead Fair. We come home tired and happy, the children all a little disappointed that the fair is over, yet filled with great anticipation—because now it is time to set up Christmas.

This year, a real cold front blew in on that very day, and suddenly it all felt wonderfully authentic. Four-year-old Ari warmed the softest places in my heart with his jubilation as we opened each box. Out came the nativity set, the manger, the wise men, a simple bell, a box full of pinecones—and with every piece he squealed with delight, leaped up and down, and recounted an entire story connected to that object from the year before, a story I had long forgotten.

But I remembered, too—only my memories traveled much farther back than last year.

I remembered you, Helen, setting up the tiny people in the Christmas village. I remembered Blair helping me untangle the cords of lights. With every decoration in my hands, I felt so close to each of you, held together by a day that has stayed nearly the same, year after year (except for one Christmas lost to the flu—but that was a memory, too). Each piece stitched us back together again.

I have been thinking a great deal about memory these past months, and I feel as though the Lord has been speaking to me about it. I want to share these thoughts with you, because I believe they matter—not only for this holiday season, but for every season of life.

Making memories with your children is not an insignificant thing. It is a shaping force—of their development, their identity, the trajectory of their lives, and the soul of your family as a whole. I have come to see this more clearly with every year I mother.

Our friend and psychotherapist, Rita Jreijiri, once said that memory is not a camera—it is an editor. Memory is fed by emotion. If our emotions are bitter, we will carry bitter memories, edited and replayed through those same lenses. But if our emotions are loving, joyful, and steady, those memories will expand and multiply, like the loaves and fishes in Jesus’ hands.

That realization is both humbling and weighty. Our children will carry what we build.

A shared experience becomes a memory because it is bound to meaning and relationship, and what is bound that way tends to endure.

I have not done this perfectly, but I have tried, intentionally, to anchor our lives in shared rhythms. Daily story time from the very beginning. Scripture memory. Prayer. Always family meals. And the longer I have mothered, the more intentional I have become. I even laugh sometimes and say reading aloud has become my near-religion—morning school reading, toddler reading, and nightly story reading. Again and again and again.

Family dinner has always been paramount. We gather around the table for shared food and shared joy: fresh warm bread, a set table, napkins and silverware, sometimes a candle or a sprig from the garden. A meal served as a gift of love, prepared with intention, offered with a prayer that this, too, will become a memory that shapes my child’s future.

As your father and I have grown older, our appetites have grown smaller, and for a season I let breakfast, for myself, fade. But after hearing Ruth Ann Zimmerman speak about the sacredness of family meals, I felt called to bring family breakfast back as a regular feature that included me. And so we did. The children now wake to warm smells, to a set table, to music in the kitchen, and I see again how deeply these simple things matter.

Another memory-anchor you know well is family devotion time—gathered in the schoolroom, singing, prayer, reciting Scripture, reading aloud, each in turn sharing a thanksgiving to God or someone. These are not just moments; they are the threads that bind hearts.

Fashion your lives around things that happen daily, weekly, yearly. This is why Christmas has remained powerful in a fragmented world; it is still one of the great collective memory-makers. But why leave this sacred experience only to Christmas?

Family walks. One-on-one time. Gardening together. Playing games. Years ago, when you older children began attending Wednesday night youth meetings and the younger ones were sad to stay behind, I told them, “Every Wednesday is Mommy Day.” We folded laundry together, worked in the garden, rode bikes, took walks, went swimming, played games—something every single Wednesday. I tried to make it feel like a really special evening just for them.

Just a few months ago, as I walked with Nicolas, now thirteen, he told me that year was his favorite of his whole life—the anticipation of Wednesday, waiting to see what surprise I would “cook up.” I teared up as he told me. And I resolved again: memory matters.

You probably remember the true story of I Am Regina—about the two little girls captured in the Penn Massacre and carried off into captivity among the Native Americans. Nearly nine years later, after a mass release and treaty, the children were brought back. But many of them no longer remembered their families. They could not even remember their own language. Even their own parents couldn’t recognize them.

Yet one mother walked along the line of released children singing a hymn in German—the song she had sung every night over her little girl before she was taken. And suddenly, one girl broke from the crowd and began to sing along—in German. She couldn’t speak a word of English or German, but memory and music led her toward home and her mother.

I sang “Jesus Loves Me” to each of you every night when you were little. And as you know, your autistic brother began to sing that song three years before he could ever speak a full sentence. Long before language came, music and memory were alive in him.

So create these memories knowing this: even if a child ever becomes lost, confused, wounded, wandering—those shared memories may be the very thing God uses to lead them home.

The word re-member means to be made a member again. And that is exactly what memory does. It ties us back into our family, our relationships, our church, our God.

That’s what I feel every time I open the Christmas boxes. With every decoration, every pinecone, every tiny wooden figure—I am “re-membered” back into you.

So, create memories for your children that will always tie them to you, to their Lord, to their church, and to the land. Let them be re-membered into God’s people, God’s creation, and God Himself for their whole lives.

Be intentional.

Be inspired.

Be faithful.

And be, always, a memory-making mother.

With all my love,

Mom

Owned by Love

Sun, 07 Dec 2025 05:00:00 -0600

You are not your own… therefore glorify God. (1 Corinthians 6:19–20)

My Dearest Daughters,

There is a kind of weariness that comes not from work, but from striving. Striving is what a soul does when she’s not yet sure who she is or where she belongs. A woman who knows she’s loved and placed—rooted, named, and claimed—can work very hard without becoming overwhelmed. But the woman who has not yet accepted her God-given identity keeps grasping for it, trying to prove her worth through achievement, performance, or admiration. Striving is often the sign of a heart that doesn’t feel at rest in fully embracing the definitions and parameters of her place.

Where do we belong? In our culture, people are proud to say,

“I’m a doctor, and I belong to Ascension Medical Group,” or,

“I’m an attorney, and I belong to this law firm.”

And there is nothing wrong with that. God calls men and women into many vocations—to heal, to teach, to build. These callings can be holy when they are received as a service and stewardship of the kingdom of God.

But to say with the same confidence,

“I am a wife, and I belong to my family”—that often feels improper. Too simple. Too dependent. Too unaccomplished.

Why?

I believe it is because the human heart, broken by the Fall, has a tendency to seek identity in what it can achieve rather than who it belongs to and the gifts it has been given. We are much more comfortable belonging to institutions we choose than to relationships that choose us. We are tempted to anchor our worth in titles we earn instead of in covenants we keep.

And that is where the deeper danger lies—not in vocation itself, but in locating our identity outside of relationships ordered according to God’s transcendent design.

The ancient temptation is not merely to work—it is to self-define. The quest to define oneself apart from God-given belonging is, at its root, a quest for godhood. It is the same sin that caused Lucifer to fall. He was created with perfect beauty and wisdom—yet the place he was given was not large enough for him. Coveting the place of God, he fell, and became the driving force behind every human attempt to author identity apart from submission to God’s design.

Without me realizing it, that same impulse once lived in me.

The moment I came to see it, years ago, was perhaps the most liberating experience of my life, a moment that freed me from aimless striving and frustration. After the birth of my third child, I felt I had reached the breaking point. Three children three and under—and two hands. Before that, I prided myself in being put-together, punctual, scheduled, and organized. Suddenly there was chaos everywhere, and I was embarrassed. I tried to hide from your daddy that things were falling apart.

One evening he left the house to take care of something. All three babies ended up screaming in my lap, and I was crying with them. And then Dad walked back in; he’d forgotten something. He took one look and asked, “What’s wrong?”

I blurted out, “I’m failing in everything, and everybody is unhappy about it!”

He was in a hurry. He grabbed what he came for and opened the door to leave. But then he paused, turned around, and said:

“Honey, there’s a big difference between doing ‘the mothering thing’ and being a mother.”

And he left.

But God stayed, and in that moment, I felt Him speak to my heart:

“There’s a big difference between doing ‘the Christian thing’ and being a Christian. You have to be owned by this—possessed by it. You cannot live in a capsule of self, full of your own ambitions, and serve from there with joy. This is where I test how much the kingdom matters to you: right here with these little ones who are yours but really Mine.”

I looked at my children crying in my arms and suddenly felt that Helen, Blair, and Andrew owned me. And God owned me. And instead of suffocating, it was comforting—clarifying. I felt that I belonged to them and to the purpose of God—completely.

And then came an even more astonishing realization:

If God possessed me, then I possessed His purpose. The destiny He intended to bring about through our family was mine. And if it failed, I would feel it in the deepest part of me, because it mattered more than my own ambitions ever could. I had been honored to participate in what God was doing. I didn’t need to survive it. I needed to seize it with passion.

That sudden conviction that I belonged entirely to this calling was the most liberating moment of my life. I felt power. Not escape, not independence—power to change identities. I could stop doing some mothering on the side while quietly seeking another identity for myself. Instead, I thought:

This is what I was born to do— to bring these children into the kingdom of God, to help them find their place in the temple of God, and to be part of building that temple. I am owned by this. I belong to it. I will never try to opt out of it. And I will give it everything I have.

I knew that if any of you—now eight instead of three—were to find your purpose in God, if even one became a Moses or an Esther, then by loving you with my whole heart, I would have changed the world.

Your Granddaddy Blair discussed in his book Knowing God by Name that when God purposed to change the world, He chose one man and taught him what it meant to be a father and a family. Coming out of pagan Ur, Abraham didn’t know how. Sarah didn’t either. But God taught them.

And Scripture reinforces identity through relationship:

Sarah, the wife of Abraham
Eliezer, the servant of Abraham
Isaac, the son of Abraham

Each one surrendered personal identity into God’s purpose, and in doing so, found identity.

And then there is Hagar the Egyptian. She never laid down her own Egyptian identity. She never surrendered her place into God’s household. And so she mothered the work of the flesh—a “wild donkey of a man” who persecuted the promise.

This is the secret—the one that set me free:

Motherhood works when identity is surrendered into God’s purpose.

Family becomes joy when belonging becomes calling.

The kingdom of God begins to come into a home when every competing identity bows.

And when it does, you will find both the joy and the power to do it.

With all my love,

Mom

The First Image of God They Ever See

Mon, 01 Dec 2025 05:00:00 -0600

He tends His flock like a shepherd. He gathers the lambs in His arms and carries them close to His heart; He gently leads those that have young. — Isaiah 40:11

Dearest Daughters,

Especially in the early years, we teach our children not just by what we say, but by who we are. Children are mirrors. But they do not simply imitate—they absorb. Their earliest sense of safety, identity, and worth comes from reflection—how we reflect love, how we carry ourselves, how we live. Your child will reflect your love, imitate your surrender, and mirror your nurture. He will be joyful if you are joyful. She will be secure if you are grounded. They will be strong if you are strong—or fearful if you are anxious.

And they will not only mirror our strengths—they will mirror our weaknesses. A cynical tone toward your husband will become the tone they later use toward you. A sigh of overwhelm at the duties of life will teach them that life is “too much,” instead of a privilege to be embraced with gratitude. A distracted heart—always half-present, half-elsewhere—will teach them to disconnect from you, from their father, and from God.

Children do not only copy what we hope they’ll remember; they absorb what we never intended to teach. But take heart—because the power of repentance, tenderness, and beginning again shapes them just as deeply as our failures do. Even our imperfections can become teachers when grace finishes the lesson.

Just as we are made in the image of God, our children pour themselves into the mold of our example.

If your child is to understand the church—the Bride of Christ—let them first see it in you. When you demonstrate what it means to be a bride to your husband, your children begin to understand what it means for the church to belong to Christ. The attentiveness with which you listen to your spouse becomes the attentiveness they’ll learn to offer others—and to God.

The beauty with which you prepare a meal shows them how to prepare their hearts for the Lord.

The surrender with which you lay down your own agenda to come under your husband’s mission teaches them what it means to yield to Christ.

The transparency with which you speak in love shows them how we relate to God—with honesty, reverence, and trust.

Your willingness to offer yourself as a living sacrifice—holding nothing back, without reluctance—makes Christ’s sacrifice real to them.

I saw this growing up.

At night, I would lie in bed and hear my father pray. He would walk the floor, whispering, rejoicing, at times groaning or weeping—words I couldn’t always understand, but a presence I could feel. The Spirit of God passed through the wall and into my room, and I knew—without anyone explaining—that God was real. He was near.

And I learned how to listen by watching my mother, in the way she paused. The way she answered. The way she touched the hearts of those who reached out. She didn’t dismiss or rush. She leaned in. And because she listened, I learned how to reach out.

Then came a time in my own mothering when I had to learn all this again.

Your brother, still small, had already been diagnosed with autism. For many years, it felt nearly impossible to find even a square inch of common ground—to understand how he thought, what frightened him, or how he made sense of the world. His responses baffled me. His silence sometimes broke me. But through that long, humbling journey, I began to learn a deeper dimension of love.

In our efforts to connect with him, I began looking for even the smallest thread that could bind us together. I had once read that mirroring your child—literally copying their actions—might draw their attention. So when he sorted blocks, I sorted blocks. When he crawled on the floor, I crawled too, hoping for even a glance.

One of the few things that brought him comfort was crawling inside a pillow sham—pillow and all—and rolling under the bed. It didn’t make sense to me. But it made sense to him. He needed that pressure, that cocooned stillness, that control over space and sensation. It was how he created a world that felt safe.

And so one day, when he was upset and began to disappear into that familiar cocoon, I grabbed a second pillow, climbed into another sham, and crawled under the bed beside him. I didn’t say anything. But he looked at me with big, brown eyes, and then . . . he laughed! And in that laughter, something opened. A bridge was built. A gap was closed.

In that moment, I understood just a little of what it meant to be a mother after Christ’s heart. To lay aside dignity, comprehension, and ease. To clothe myself in my child’s world. To meet him where he was, because that’s what Christ did for us.

He came to where we were—when we were far off. He clothed Himself in our weakness, our grief, our limits. He didn’t wait for us to rise to Him. He stooped down and lifted us.

These small acts of empathy, of laying down control to gain connection, are not peripheral to motherhood. They are its sacred center.

And yet, this calling is too great to carry alone. That’s the point. You were never meant to mother without God. He doesn’t ask you to be divine. He asks you to be surrendered. Dependent on Him. Rooted in His Spirit. Anchored in His Word.

Let your children watch you pause. Let them feel you draw near. Let them hear you weep and see you worship. Let your hands be holy in the mundane places of the day, because you are not just raising children. You are raising worshipers. Image-bearers. Heirs to a promise older than time.

So let them look through you—and see the face of God.

“And we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory.” — 2 Corinthians 3:18

Love,

Mom

When Love Becomes a Life

Sun, 23 Nov 2025 05:00:00 -0600

He tends His flock like a shepherd. He gathers the lambs in His arms and carries them close to His heart; He gently leads those that have young. — Isaiah 40:11

Dearest Daughters,

If we are called to be our children’s first windows to God, reflections of His love, then how do we mother in a way that shows them His face?

If God is love, and we are made in His image, then we, too, must become love. Not a vague feeling, but a living, breathing presence in our children’s daily lives. They must not only be loved by us; they must see that love radiating through us in how we speak, how we serve, how we forgive, and how we endure.

If they are to understand the comfort of God, they must first feel it rocking in our arms.

In Isaiah 66, the Lord says, “As a mother comforts her child, so will I comfort you.” God Himself compares His tenderness to the way a mother carries her baby on her hip and bounces him on her knees (Isa. 66:12-13).

If our children are to experience God’s attentiveness, they must see it in how we listen. The Psalms say the Lord bends low to hear our cries (Ps. 116:2). Do they see us do the same?

We must be His hands—clothing, feeding, holding, comforting.

If God is holy, then holiness must be more than rules or rituals. It must shape how we live: how we carry ourselves in unnoticed places, how we speak when no one is listening, how we repent when God deals with us, how we show reverence in the hidden parts of the day.

If God is powerful, let our children see His strength most clearly in our weakness. In how we keep showing up. In how we rise with joy even when we’re tired. In how we lift our heads after He reproves us. A mother who leans on God allows His strength to become visible. Anointing takes the place of exhaustion. Faith steadies fear. Grace rises again after failure.

If God is mighty to save, then we reflect that might when we stand firm, when we go to war against every thought, every attitude, every distraction that seeks to harm our children’s hearts. This is how they begin to know that God is a rescuer.

Even science confirms what Scripture has always said: a mother’s presence in the early years is not sentimental, it is essential. God created the brain as surely as He created the soul, and everything in its design echoes what we know in our spirit—that children need closeness, stability, and responsiveness in order to thrive.

During the first three years of life, the brain forms more than a million neural connections per second. Those early interactions shape not just emotion, but learning, language, resilience, even identity. A mother’s presence is not a luxury. It is how God made the human soul to grow.

This calling is sacred. It is not only spiritual, but physiological. And it begins with you.

I want to tell you a story I can’t forget.

Years ago, your dad and I were driving home late one night down Halbert Lane. Just ahead of us, the car in front hit a raccoon cub, one of three trailing behind their mother. It didn’t yet die, but it was wounded and immobilized, crying on the pavement.

We slammed the brakes, trying not to hit the others, and watched as the scene unfolded in our headlights.

The mother had already crossed the road with her two surviving babies. But when she saw our headlights, she paused.

Then she did something that moved me to tears.

She ran back into the oncoming traffic.

She darted into the road, grabbed the injured cub, still crying, still writhing, and dragged it to the side of the road where she huddled with all three little ones.

I lay awake that night thinking about her. Not because I’m sentimental about raccoons (they’ve raided our eggs enough times, as you well know), but because I couldn’t stop thinking about that mothering instinct, that single-minded, God-given drive to preserve life no matter the cost.

If an animal can stare into the face of danger and still run out to save her young, what must God have placed inside the heart of a human mother? What strength? What courage? What zealous fire did He entrust to us?

I want that fire. I want to be the kind of woman who sees the onslaught of the world and still steps out into the road, believing God will help me carry my children to safety.

You may ask yourself, Why do I want to be a mother?

I believe there are three reasons why women choose this path.

The first is the challenge. A primal knowing that your body was made to bear life. A deep curiosity: Can I do it? Do I have what it takes?

The second is purpose—a sense that motherhood is not incidental but eternal. As Christians, we believe God continues His work through families. When we raise children, we don’t just build homes; we build the Kingdom. Passing on belief and conviction becomes an act of faith.

And then there is the third reason—love.

I’m not talking about love in theory, but love that reshapes you, a love that stretches, grows, humbles, and transfigures you.

When I was newly engaged, I believe it was primarily the first two reasons that drew me to motherhood. I wanted children—maybe a few—and I felt both the challenge and the purpose.

Could I really do it?

But once I held my first child—you, Helen—everything changed.

That third reason—love—took over, consuming me. It transformed me.

I realized I had never known the full capacity of my heart until I became a mother. Something in me awakened. I wanted to go to the farthest edges of love, to discover how far it could stretch and how deep it could reach. I wanted to increase love—in myself, in others, in the world around me.

I wanted to show my children what love looks like when it is lived, when it grows from the soil of surrender and sends down deep roots into the soul of a mother. I know I haven’t done this perfectly, but I have been utterly changed by trying my best.

After twenty-seven years of mothering, I can tell you this: Motherhood will ask more of you than you ever expected. But it will give you back more than you ever knew you could hold.

Now it’s your turn. Let the holy fire of godly motherhood burn bright in you.

With all my love,

Mom

Through the Window of a Mother’s Love

Sun, 16 Nov 2025 05:00:00 -0600

“Can a woman forget her nursing child, that she should have no compassion on the son of her womb? Even these may forget, yet I will not forget you.” — Isaiah 49:15

Dearest Daughters,

For most people, their first experience of God comes through their mother. If He is love, then a child’s first taste of that love comes through her arms.

God arranged the world with windows into eternity—prototypes and shadows scattered like signposts, drawing our eyes and hearts toward Him. We glimpse His majesty in creation, in mountains and oceans, stars and storms, but we encounter His nature in relationship.

Every bond on earth was designed to show us something of His shape, His form, His essence. And the very first of those bonds—the very first place a person comes to know His warmth, His nourishment, His comfort—is through a mother. Though not the only stage in a child’s journey, it is the first. And if they are ever to come to know the strength of fatherhood, and the love of the Father above, it begins with the embrace of a mother.

Helen, when I think of that truth, my heart returns to the day you were born. I wrote about that moment years later in my book, A Time to Be Born, because it marked the beginning of my understanding of what motherhood truly meant.

Excerpts from A Time to Be Born:

Before I’d become a mother, my dreams for myself had been lofty. I’d envisioned bustling foreign cities, the music of other languages, the spicy scents of exotic markets as I served in mission work. These “important” things dominated my thoughts. Motherhood? That was simply life’s background music, peripheral to the “important” things—that is, until Helen. But now, holding my first baby in my arms, her milky scent sweet and her chubby warm body’s weight pressed against mine made me feel as if I’d been let in on a profound secret.

My first birth proportioned my world differently than ever before, shifting the weight of my thoughts and dreams from inside to outside of myself. My memories drifted to that life-changing day of March 30, 1998 . . .

When, at last, our little wet baby Helen slipped from my body and passed from my mother’s hands into my own trembling ones, I clutched her to myself in gratitude and disbelief. She opened one eye, gazing at me as if seeing me from another world. Her tiny red fingers clutched mine, and in that moment, a light seemed to ignite in my life that cast the whole of my world in a new glow.

The reduction and triumph of birth had conveyed something to me I’d never seen before. Every time I looked into her deep, black eyes or touched her velvet skin, I thought, What could be more wonderful than holding in my hands the precious, moldable clay of a human soul? What could be more important than nurturing the seeds of eternal love in a human life? What if God gave me this child to raise to become a Sarah or an Esther?

I knew my dream had come true all in that one night; I had become a missionary, and my mission field began right there in my own bedroom. In that moment I had also become a teacher, a nurse: a mother. Something unfurled like the wet wings of a butterfly inside of me, the beginning of a transformation that would affect my view of the world, of those I loved and would come to love. In this birth, I had been reborn—as a mother.

That night was the first time I realized that a mother is not merely raising children—she is shaping souls. She is building God’s kingdom.

Scripture tells us in 1 John 4:8, “God is love.” And if our children are to learn who God is, then they must experience that love—not only in word, but in form. In our hands. In our voices. In our presence. In our being present.

Until you have taken on the full identity of what it means to be a Christian mother, you cannot fully train your children to be godly children.

If motherhood is meant to be a first window into the heart of God, then what happens when that window is left empty?

Our children become disconnected from love, God, and purpose.

We are witnessing a generational crisis of disconnection. Today’s children are more digitally connected and emotionally untethered than ever before. Screens glow brighter while love grows colder. I won’t bore you with the statistics, but they are staggering. In fact, the U.S. Surgeon General says that the instability and loneliness in children of this era has caused “unprecedented challenges” threatening not just the well-being of children, but their development.

Psychologists and educators alike are sounding the alarm:

“Children today are suffering from a lack of real presence—from emotionally attuned, physically available adults who are engaged with them in daily life.” — Erica Komisar, psychoanalyst

“The number one predictor of a child’s well-being is the presence of a loving, consistent, and emotionally responsive caregiver.” — Harvard Center on the Developing Child

Our children are not simply lonely. They are aching for connection—for someone to know them. God put that deep desire to know and be known in each of us, and a child cannot survive without it.

But this isn’t just a social issue. It is a spiritual one.

When the reflection of God’s love is dimmed in the earliest years of life, children struggle not only with who they are—but with whether they have a purpose, whether they are safe, and whether they are truly loved.

It is no small thing to be the first place a child encounters the reality of God.

And it is no small cost when that encounter is missed. I plead with you to be that window to our Heavenly Father, and let His love shine through you.

“And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise.” — Deuteronomy 6:6–7

So, may God strengthen you to never let your children fall prey to the tsunami of loneliness, anxiety, depression, and disconnectedness among the youth of their generation. Tie them into God’s purpose with the cords of a mother’s love. Polish the mirror of your life—yes, the window of your life—so that they may clearly see the reflection of our Lord’s face through you.

And remember: every moment you give, every gentle word, every sacrifice unseen by the world but known to heaven, is forming the first image of God your children will ever know. Guard that calling with joy and with trembling, for through your love, eternity touches earth.

With all my heart,

Mom

Covetousness—The Thief of Contentment

Sun, 09 Nov 2025 09:00:00 -0600

“I have learned in whatever situation I am to be content. . . . In any and every circumstance, I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and need.” —Philippians 4:11–12

Dearest Daughters,

There is a lurking danger that sometimes tiptoes into a woman’s heart, so subtle we may not notice it at first. Suspicion and coveting were the first sins to enter the world. After conversing with the serpent, Eve allowed suspicion toward God to take root, and then she began to covet what did not belong to her. Suspicion always brings us into conversation with the accuser, and covetousness leads us away from trust in God and into idolatry, for “covetousness . . . is idolatry” (Eph. 5:5).

The tenth commandment tells us we must not covet anything belonging to our neighbor. Wherever coveting begins, Christ’s lordship in the heart begins to fade, and something else takes His place. Many don’t seem to recognize that for a woman to covet the place God has given to a man (or vice versa) is sin. But this coveting of another’s place puts us in the same posture as Eve—choosing for ourselves rather than trusting God, and therefore stepping away from His covering and His peace.

This same coveting can seep into other relationships as well, particularly between women. The thoughts sound harmless at first:

She only gets to sing a solo because she knows the right people.

She gets to function in that capacity because of family connections.

They were invited because of their wealth.

Everyone thinks she’s so intelligent—but if they knew . . .

These whisperings of the accuser tear down love, strain relationships, and weaken the witness of Christ’s body. But Scripture reminds us, “in Christ we, though many, form one body, and each member belongs to all the others” (Rom. 12:5, NIV). We belong to each other, and we honor Christ by honoring His design and His placement.

In an orchestra, it would be foolish for the first-chair violinist to covet the drummer’s place, saying, “I could keep the rhythm better!” Or for the drummer to demand the delicate melodies of the violin. We would say, “Your part is beautiful. It was given to you for a reason.” Each instrument has its own role, and the harmony depends on differences working together, not competing.

And yet in family life, in church life, and in friendship, we sometimes lose sight of the larger “orchestra.” A narrow, individualistic view focuses on what we lack, while overlooking the privilege of being called into something larger than ourselves. To take our place is not confinement—it is belonging. It is stewardship. And it is peace.

Paul said, “I have learned in whatever situation I am to be content” (Phil. 4:11). Contentment is not passive—it is a practiced trust. It sees that God, in His wisdom, has assigned each of us a part to play, and that His purposes for us are good.

Let us always guard our hearts from suspicion, refuse the quiet invitations to compare, and take joy in the place God has given each of His children. Rejoice also in the gifts and callings of others, knowing we are members of one body, each needed, each cherished, each placed by God’s own hand.

With all my love,

Mom

Exposing Excuses

Sun, 02 Nov 2025 09:00:00 -0600

“It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery.” — Galatians 5:1 (NIV)

Dearest Daughters,

Making excuses padlocks the gate to true repentance and overcoming.

In the Bible, Aaron created a golden calf for the Israelites when they became impatient while waiting for Moses to come down from the mountain where he was speaking with God. But when Aaron saw how indignant Moses became upon seeing the idolatry, fear crept into his heart. Instead of owning his part in the sin that had just desecrated Israel’s covenant with God, he grasped for the nearest defense: “You know the people—that they are set on evil.” And then, almost absurdly, he claimed the golden calf had simply “come out” of the fire.

It’s uncomfortable to look at Aaron in this light, but it’s also familiar. That same instinct to defend ourselves, to shift blame, to soften guilt with an excuse, still whispers to each of us when the light of truth begins to pierce the shadows.

Blame shifting and excuse making are two of the most common ways that our sinful nature tries to preserve itself when God’s light begins to shine. Whenever His light reaches into the corners of our hearts, we face a question that determines everything:

Will I take full responsibility for my choices, for my sin, for the outcomes of my actions, in order to be free?

There are always reasons and rationalizations waiting at hand. We all have them. But even the faintest trace of an excuse blocks the door to repentance. And when repentance stops short, so does transformation. We remain trapped in the same habits, circling the same mountains, wondering why we can’t move forward.

Our modern world even encourages this bondage. “Don’t be too hard on yourself,” it says. “You’re only human.” “It’s not your fault—you were wounded.” “You’re just reacting.” Of course, compassion has its place. But self-pity disguised as compassion can become the soft cushion that keeps us from the bedrock of truth—the only place where real freedom begins.

And because we live in an age that prizes comfort over correction, excuse-making often slips in unnoticed, wearing a sympathetic face. It doesn’t usually shout—it whispers. You’ve done enough. You deserve a break.

So what does this excuse-making look like? Where does it pop up? Its subtle influence and temptation are hiding around every corner and slinking behind each curtain.

Perhaps we haven’t spent adequate time tending to the needs—whether character or physical—in our children, and we excuse ourselves first in our own minds: Well, I’ve been so busy, and my husband has a demanding job, which also makes requirements of me, so I haven’t gotten to that.

Our schooling is falling behind, and we excuse it because of the garden. Our garden is weedy, and we excuse it because of the schooling. Our spouse comes home and questions us about the lateness of dinner, and we blame it on the children’s needs in school. A grandmother offers insight about a demanding toddler, and we excuse the toddler by saying they’ve been sick or missed a nap.

All these excuses keep us forever chained to our own habitual problems. We go round and round the same mountain, wondering why we can’t seem to move forward, when the truth is that every excuse we make becomes a link in the chain that binds us.

When we decide to face the whole truth about ourselves, without dilution, without justification, the power of God meets us there. His grace isn’t found in the self-protective shadows; it waits in the light, where we stand bare before Him.

Israel had lived as slaves for generations. Slaves do not take responsibility for the course of their actions; they simply obey commands. God wanted His people not just freed from Egypt, but freed from the slave mindset—the bondage of excuses. As Paul wrote, “It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery” (Gal. 5:1). And that liberty, as Jesus said, comes only when “you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free” (John 8:32).

He wanted sons and daughters who could walk in responsibility and freedom, not slaves walking in fear and deflection.

As soon as we offer excuses, we chain ourselves to the very habits, the very sin we’re trying to escape. But when we acknowledge our faults completely and without defense or evasion, grace rushes in like water to the lowest place.

Aaron tried to convince himself, Moses, and even God that he wasn’t really to blame. But freedom never comes through explanation. It comes through repentance.

So, whenever the urge to excuse or justify arises, pause. Ask yourself:

What am I trying to protect—my pride, or my freedom?

Because you can keep one, but never both.

Let us be women who speak the truth—even the hard truth—until it becomes the song of our freedom.

With all my love,

Mom

A Place to Belong

Sun, 26 Oct 2025 09:00:00 -0600

“For just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not all have the same function, so in Christ we, though many, form one body, and each member belongs to all the others.” —Romans 12:4–5

Dearest Daughters,

When one ceases to belong, she drifts like a planet with no orbit, like a note without a song.

A single note blown through a clarinet or played on the piano is absolutely meaningless. You cannot tell if it’s in tune or out of tune, if it’s in rhythm or out of sync—because it has no context. It takes the presence of other notes to form a song. Any note will do as long as there is no song being played. But when the song begins, suddenly intonation and rhythm matter. The placement of that one note within the song becomes the difference between harmony and chaos.

So it is with belonging.

In this generation of loneliness and depression, radical individualism has robbed people of the context of relationship that gives life its meaning and purpose. They drift. They feel lost. They seek to define themselves by their careers or accomplishments, yet these are fragile identities that crumble without love and belonging.

I’ve often met people who imagine that life was peaceful and untroubled until they entered a marriage, a family, or the fellowship of Christ’s body. They think that only after these relationships began did life suddenly become difficult—as though they were now being “picked on” or singled out for hardship. But this is not so at all. Before belonging, they were simply that wandering note, alone and ignorant that they were untuned. It is only in relationship that God begins to bring their note into the harmony of His song. When the melody begins, tuning becomes necessary; rhythm must be learned.

So do not fall into self-pity when God corrects or refines you. Recognize that He is fitting you into His song—and that you were only “right” before inasmuch as you stood all alone.

“So then you are no longer strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God… in whom the whole structure, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord.” —Ephesians 2:19–22

Belonging to God has always marked a distinction between His people and the world around them. From the beginning, those who bear His name have lived by a different rhythm, a different song, than the culture surrounding them.

When God heard the groaning of His people in bondage in Egypt, He purposed to set them free. Pharaoh, the ruler of the greatest empire on earth, feared their fruitfulness. So he struck at the heart of the family, commanding the death of every baby boy. But the midwives feared God more than Pharaoh. When questioned, they replied, “Hebrew women are not like Egyptian women. They are vigorous and give birth before the midwives arrive” (Exod. 1:19).

Hebrew women—women of God’s kingdom—have never been like the women of Egypt. Our vitality, our strength, our very DNA are meant to be different. We are quick to perceive the purpose of God and to bring it forth with vigor.

Yet the identity of the Hebrew woman still comes under attack. The world calls the life of a wife and mother small. It says our world is narrow, our calling restrictive. It teaches that to serve, to nurture, to cultivate life is to be in bondage. And tragically, even the church has sometimes echoed the world’s voice, forgetting the dignity and power in the unapplauded places of faithfulness.

But God does not see it this way.

He made the woman not a lesser being, but a vital facilitator of His purpose. He entrusted the deliverer of Israel into the arms of Jochebed, knowing she would guard and guide the seed of His promise. And when He sent His own Son into the world, He entrusted Him to a young woman named Mary—one who did not despise the seeming smallness of her task, but rejoiced that she was chosen to bear the salvation of the world.

“Strength and dignity are her clothing, and she laughs at the time to come. She looks well to the ways of her household and does not eat the bread of idleness.” —Proverbs 31:25–27

So, remember this:

Belonging to God means belonging within His song. Your place in that song is not small—it is sacred. The world may call your rhythm ordinary or insignificant, but in His melody, every note resounds with eternal purpose.

With all my love,

Mom

The Yielded Heart

Sat, 18 Oct 2025 09:00:00 -0600

“Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus: who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God, but made Himself of no reputation, and took upon Him the form of a servant.” — Philippians 2:5–7

Dearest Daughters,

Jesus showed us what true submission looks like. He laid aside His godhood, stepped into our weakness, and served us from within our human frailty. He didn’t remain above our suffering—He entered it. He took on our limitations, felt our temptations, and loved us from that place of shared humanity. In the end, He submitted to the greatest reduction of all: death itself. And yet, in that surrender, He revealed the deepest power of love.

There is, however, yet another counterfeit version of this kind of true submission. It’s not rebellion in the obvious sense; it’s subtler and more deceptive. It is the flurry of “good works” we choose for ourselves. We fill our days with “this for the Lord” and “that thing for the Lord,” but underneath, we are driven by our own will rather than obedience. These are works of the flesh rather than the fruit of the Spirit. On the surface, they may look admirable—busy hands, charitable deeds, impressive devotion—but God is not looking for the appearance of labor. He’s looking for the surrender of love.

Every person is given a place to experience His lordship, a setting in which to lay down her own works and receive His. That place is always love. It’s not about doing everything; it’s about yielding everything—our time, our work, our thoughts, our dreams, our homes, even our identity—back to Him so that He might reign again over what is already His. That is the beauty of the Body: each one of us, a member under the same Head, offering up our small part of creation to be made holy through obedience.

Jesus Himself modeled this perfectly. He laid down all His rights as God, clothed Himself in our weakness, and served us from the inside of our limitations. That is the path He set before us. Those are the steps we are asked to walk in, the cross we are called to carry. True submission begins when we can say, “I will get inside this situation and love the way God would love. I will do here what the Lord Himself would do.” When we live that way, submission becomes a mission.

Yet when we resist that design—when we decide that what God has given us to do is too small, too hidden, or too demanding—we often begin to see Him as harsh, distant, or unreasonable. We may not say it outright, but we begin to feel as though God is an austere master, reaping where He has not sown and asking more than we can give. This feeling usually comes when we have not invested where He asked us to invest.

Jesus told a story about a master who entrusted his servants with talents—sums of money to care for in his absence. Two of them invested and multiplied what they were given. But one servant refused. To him, the task seemed too small and unworthy of his energy. He buried it, waiting to hand it back, and when the master returned, he said, “I knew you were an austere man.” But the truth was, his view of the master had become twisted because he hadn’t entered into the joy of the work.

This happens to us, too. When our work, in our small-mindedness, feels invisible—raising children, tending a home, serving a husband, encouraging a weary friend—it seems insignificant in the world’s eyes. But when we neglect those sacred callings, they become heavy burdens rather than holy gifts. When we fully invest our love, however, those same tasks become joy. What once felt like bondage becomes abundance. The small things we thought didn’t matter become treasures when done in obedience and faith.

If you want to know what really matters, think of someone who’s just learned she has a short time to live. If she’s a dental hygienist, she doesn’t suddenly wish she’d cleaned more teeth. The accountant doesn’t regret not balancing a few more ledgers. The doctor doesn’t lie awake wishing he’d performed a few more surgeries. No, the heart immediately turns to love—to family, to relationships, to the moments that were real and eternal. We all know this deep down. It’s written into us. Even those who live distractedly will often see clearly when death draws near.

This is why God calls us to invest in the places of love now, not later. Every small act of service, every unseen task done with faith, becomes a way of washing the feet of Christ’s Body. Each is an altar where something in us is offered up so that His life might flow through ours.

But submission, does not mean bowing your head in defeat. It does not mean tucking your tail or silencing your thoughts. Submission means yielding—yielding to a higher purpose, to the flow of God’s design. When I think of yielding, I often think of the expressway that runs through our town. There’s a ramp that enters it, and at its end, a single sign: Yield. You can’t stop completely there, or the cars behind will crash into you. But you can’t rush forward blindly either, or you’ll collide with the traffic already in motion. You have to watch and listen—to those ahead, those beside you, those following close behind—and find your rhythm, your speed.

That’s how submission works in the Spirit. You don’t freeze, and you don’t force. You stay attuned to God’s timing, to the movement of others in His plan, and you merge. You move forward at His pace, fitting yourself into the larger current of His will. Yielding is not stopping; it’s not crashing. It’s finding that holy balance where your life flows in harmony with His purpose.

When you live this way, even the smallest act becomes sacred. Every humble moment becomes a place of worship. And slowly, your heart will find that peace that comes only when love and obedience are one and the same.

With all my love,

Mom

At the Gate of Trust

Sun, 12 Oct 2025 09:00:00 -0600

“Blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, whose confidence is in Him. He will be like a tree planted by the water… It does not fear when heat comes; its leaves are always green.” (Jeremiah 17:7–8)

Dearest Daughters,

The cynic never tastes the fruit of God’s goodness, but withers in a desert of unbelief.

When Israel was starving during a great famine, and the king went to kill Elisha for not intervening, the prophet gave him a startling prophecy: “By this time tomorrow,” he said, “food will be flowing freely through the gates of the city.” But the officer on whom the king leaned scoffed: “Even if the windows of heaven were opened, could this thing really be?”

Elisha replied, “You will see it with your eyes, but you will not eat of it.”

And that’s exactly what happened. The next day, the miracle came. The siege was broken. The famine ended. Food poured into the city in abundance. But that man—the one who had scoffed—was trampled in the gate by the crowd and died. He saw what God could do . . . but he did not partake of the blessing.

His cynicism cost him everything.

The Scripture says, “Cursed is the one who trusts in man, who draws strength from mere flesh and whose heart turns away from the LORD. That person will be like a bush in the wastelands; they will not see prosperity when it comes. They will dwell in the parched places of the desert, in a salt land where no one lives. But blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, whose confidence is in Him. He will be like a tree planted by the water. . . . It does not fear when heat comes; its leaves are always green” (Jer. 17:5–8).

Trust, not suspicion, is the soil in which life and love grow.

When we draw strength only from our own flesh, we begin to wither inside. Suspicion drains the life from our relationships; self-reliance hardens the heart until it can no longer feel the gentle rain of grace. But the one who lifts their eyes in hope, who leans on the Lord and believes that He will bring goodness in His time, becomes like that tree by the water: steadfast, fruitful, and unafraid when the heat of testing comes. Their roots sink deep into the soil of God’s goodness.

Trust is a core element in a godly marriage. And yes—it takes risk to trust. We risk ourselves again and again if we are truly going to live. It was a risk to fall in love. A risk to marry. It’s a risk to have a child. To start a new job. To open our hearts. Something could always go wrong. But life without risk is no life at all.

What matters is not avoiding risk, but choosing the right people to risk with. Because when one falls, the other can lift him up. So you must have trust. And I don’t mean trust in the fallibility of human flesh—I mean trust in the design—the design God created for relationships. For marriage. For family. For church. For community.

It is not the perfection of people that gives us confidence, but the perfect wisdom of God’s structure. We trust that He designed a net to catch us when we fall, if we will stay in it. And as much as the individuals within that design cling to it, and to Christ, we can trust them, too, fallible as they are. We can trust that they are being changed from day to day, from faith to faith, from glory to glory, just as we are.

The world does everything it can to destroy this trust. It feeds us cynicism. Suspicion. Irony. As an adult encountering so much of the world’s literature, entertainment, and media, I’ve often marveled at how steeped it all is in mistrust. It constantly follows the same storyline: the protective father is revealed as the abuser. The noble pastor turns out to be a hypocrite. The sanctuary of church ends up as a cover for crime. The nurturing mother is really just a cold machine. Becoming a traditional wife is a gateway to dangerous alt right cults. And on and on.

Why? Because Satan is the accuser of the brethren. He wants to prove that love can’t be trusted, that human failure will triumph over the power of God. And the world plays along, not just telling true stories of failure, but reinforcing the lie that this is always how it goes. That no one is trustworthy. That no one truly changes.

But I have seen otherwise.

I once met a woman visiting our church. She spoke of the struggles in her marriage—her husband’s weaknesses—and then said, with a shrug, “But we’ll stick with it. All men have skeletons in their closets.”

I found her words deeply saddening.

Because I knew it wasn’t true.

My husband didn’t have a skeleton in his closet. My father didn’t. Many men I love and admire do not. And even among those who once did (including women, by the way), I have seen the old man put to death and a new man rise—transformed by Christ. The past buried. A new life born.

But cynicism is like a film over the eyes. It keeps us from seeing the truth of what God is doing—or what He can do. That woman’s marriage could never flourish while she lived under the lie that trust was impossible. She had no vision for transformation. No faith in redemption. Her cynicism had closed the windows of heaven.

The Lord said through Malachi, “Test Me in this, and see if I will not open the windows of heaven and pour out so much blessing that there will not be room enough to store it” (Mal. 3:10).

But unbelief, like the king’s servant, will always stand outside the gate, missing out on the blessing that could have been.

So I urge you: keep those windows open.

If your husband loves God and is committed to His ways, then believe in God’s work in him. Honor and trust not only the man he is today, but the man you believe God is shaping him to be. See with the eyes of faith.

I had to learn this while raising teenage sons as well. I remember thinking during hard seasons, How do I speak respectfully to him when he’s acting like this? How do I show honor when I feel frustration? And the Lord showed me: respect the man you believe he is becoming. Speak to that future. Call it forth. Treat him as if it’s already becoming real—because it is.

We must do this with our children, our spouses—anyone we love. See what God is doing. Speak to it. Believe in it. Respect it. That kind of trust opens the door wide for transformation.

But cynicism—just like the officer whom the king leaned on —stands at the gate and scoffs. And in the end, it may see the miracle . . . but will not taste it. “Take care, brothers,” the scripture warns, “lest there be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart, leading you to fall away from the living God” (Heb. 3:12).

The cynic will always lie trampled in the gates of victory.

But I hope for more for you. I want you to taste it. I want you to feast on the goodness of God in your marriage, in your children, in your church, and in your life. Shut the door to suspicion, and open the door to trust.

Believe in God. Believe in His design. Believe that the love He plants can grow, even in the parched soil of our human weakness—if we keep watering it with trust.

With all my love,

Mom

Capitulation—The Counterfeit of True Submission

Sun, 05 Oct 2025 09:00:00 -0600

“Do you not know that if you present yourselves to anyone as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one whom you obey—either of sin, which leads to death, or of obedience, which leads to righteousness?” — Romans 6:16

Dearest Daughters,

There is a counterfeit of submission that’s important to see clearly, because it often disguises itself as obedience. It’s called capitulation.

In the military, capitulation refers to what happens in a battle when the weaker side admits that a particular skirmish has been lost. The enemy was stronger or smarter in that moment, and so the fight is conceded. But the war itself is not over. Capitulation is not surrender of the heart—it is only a reluctant nod to the immediate outcome, while still holding on to one’s own lordship. This will ultimately lead to guerrilla warfare.

True surrender is different. In surrender, a nation lays down its arms and confesses that it has been conquered. No longer fighting under its own banner, it comes under the government and authority of a new king. That’s what real submission looks like—not just losing arguments or conceding battles, but acknowledging that Jesus Christ is Lord over your whole life, and that His kingdom is now your country.

Capitulation in the relationships of God’s design, however, is an insidious form of rebellion. It looks harmless, but it hides self-rule. Think of a nation that signs a peace treaty but secretly hides weapons in barns and cellars, ready to rise up again when the moment is right. On the outside, they look like they’ve submitted. In reality, they are only waiting for their chance to resist again.

Or imagine a child or wife who avoids doing the one thing their parent or husband asks by filling the day with ten other “good” tasks. Outwardly she looks busy and devoted, but in truth she has resisted the one obedience that mattered in that moment. That is capitulation disguised as diligence or sacrifice. And the nature of this type of “guerrilla warfare” is that it nibbles away at God’s purpose and every relationship He would build.

The Lord has already spoken about this kind of heart: “Hypocrites! Well did Isaiah prophesy about you, saying: ‘These people draw near to Me with their mouth, and honor Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me’” (Matt. 15:7-8). He does not want mere outward compliance, but a heart bowed to Him in sincere love.

Jesus showed us the opposite. He did not merely concede a skirmish. He laid aside His glory, stepped into our weakness and mortality, and surrendered Himself fully to the Father’s will—even to the point of the cross. His submission was not begrudging; it was the ultimate expression of love.

You will have opportunities every day to decide whether you are merely conceding a moment or truly surrendering to the King. Capitulation clings to self and wears the mask of obedience. True submission bows the heart, lays down every hidden weapon, and says, “Not my will, but Yours be done.”

With all my love,

Mom

Submission: The Channel to Divine Power

Sun, 28 Sep 2025 09:00:00 -0600

“In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus: who, being in very nature God… made Himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant.” (Phil. 2:5–7 )

Dearest Daughters,

When it comes to women’s roles, especially in marriage, few words carry more discomfort in today’s world than the word, submission (Eph. 5:22; Col. 3:18; 1 Pet. 3:1). I understand why. The fear is that submission means giving up your dignity, your voice, or perhaps even your safety. But in the kingdom of God, submission is none of the above. It’s not oppression—it is liberation. It is not weakness; it is strength channeled into God’s purposes.

Submission, as God designed it, is death only to the flesh, but it is life to the Spirit. Imagine the flow of water through a hose: narrowing the aperture doesn’t diminish the power—it concentrates it. In the same way, submission doesn’t silence who we are in God; it focuses the flow of His Spirit through us. It places us under the mission of Christ.

Throughout history, and especially in the modern era, this word has been twisted into something sinister. The world has crafted counterfeits, versions of submission rooted in fear, domination, or force. But that is not the way of Jesus. His authority flows only through love, never coercion. Jesus said, “If you love Me, you will keep My commandments” (John 14:15). Even in His greatest act of submission—laying down His life—He did so not because He was forced, but because He loved.

True submission is always born out of love. It is choosing to come under the same mission as another: first Christ, and then those we walk beside in family and community. In the kingdom, every person has a place of submission. God wasn’t singling out women; He was building a body where no flesh could glory, where egos and agendas dissolve into the love of Christ.

I know the question that lingers in many hearts: “But what if I submit, and the one I submit to misuses their authority?” This is why God created a design in which all are accountable in submission. Individuals are placed in families, families in the church of which Christ is the head. Each relationship of submission is orchestrated to connect all to that head—that lordship of Jesus. So as long as we stay connected to the whole, God can reach us and those we are submitted to with His love and guidance.

I’m often asked, “If Scripture tells me to obey and submit to my husband, does that mean I must trust that everything he says is God’s perfect will—even when I don’t feel it is?”

No. Your husband is human, just as you are, and not every word he speaks will always perfectly reflect God’s will. Submission is not about assuming who is most accurate; it is about whether both of you are seeking to fit into God’s design.

There will be times when mistakes are made. Yet as long as you’re not being asked to sin against the Lord or another person, you can submit in faith, trusting that in the larger picture God sees and guides all things.

What we ultimately trust is not a man, but God and God’s design. We trust our husbands insofar as they too are submitted to that design, but we submit to them because it aligns us in obedience to God. Ultimately our full surrender and obedience belong to God, who knows all things. And trust between husband and wife deepens as both grow in their own submission to Him and to those He sends to each.

Jesus said, “The greatest among you must be the servant of all.” (Mark 10:43–45) In God’s order, the one entrusted with authority also bears the greatest responsibility to serve, to lay down their life in love. And each, in His design, must have a place to submit, to be guided.

So when we ask, “Are men and women equal?”—we must be careful which measuring stick we use. The world measures greatness by control. The kingdom measures greatness by love and the service it produces. Paul reminds us: “There is neither Jew nor Gentile, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.” (Gal. 3:28)

Do you remember the story of the Roman centurion in Luke 7? He told Jesus, “I myself am a man under authority, with soldiers under me.” He recognized something profound: his strength to lead came from his willingness to be not inauthority, but under authority. And he saw that same truth in Jesus, authority flowing out of His submission to the Father.

So, submission in God’s kingdom is not weakness. It is the conduit of divine strength. When you choose biblical submission—whether in marriage or in the church—you are not stepping beneath an oppressive shadow. You are stepping into the divine order of the kingdom, saying with trust, “I believe in God’s design.” And in His design, no one carries the burden of submission alone. We are all submitted—to Christ, and to one another. Your submission positions you as a direct channel of God’s divine power. You come under His mission, as He reigns in dominion over one more sphere of life.

With all my love,

Mom

Transformed by the Renewing of the Mind

Sun, 21 Sep 2025 09:00:00 -0600

“Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God” (Matt. 5:9)

“Dear children, let us not love with words or speech but with actions and in truth. This is how we know that we belong to the truth and how we set our hearts at rest in his presence: If our hearts condemn us, we know that God is greater than our hearts, and he knows everything.” (1 John 3:18–20)

Dearest Daughters,

How do we calm our anxious, restless hearts and enter into the peace that makes us children of God? How does one climb out of the downward spiral of worthlessness, depression, anxiety, and loneliness that so many fall into during seasons of life? Scripture points the way:

“And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.” (Romans 12:2)

So learning how to renew our minds is a key.

Our society is experiencing an unprecedented rise in depression, anxiety, loneliness, and fear. And sadly, the church has not been spared. These battles seem to press particularly hard on women. If the renewal of our how minds is the answer, how do we truly do that?

Did you know that our minds are connected to every cell in our bodies? Because of the brain’s incredible plasticity, we actually have the capacity to redirect our physical, emotional, and spiritual wellbeing through our thoughts and attitudes. The mindset with which we meet any circumstance sends signals that tell our very cells how to respond—what hormones to release, what proteins to create. In short, our thoughts and perspectives literally become a physical part of who we are!

Dr. Caroline Leaf, a neuroscientist, has studied this extensively, and I have enjoyed reading some of her work. She explains that as much as 85% of disease is stress-related, and that negative emotions can actually twist and constrict DNA, shutting down healthy cell function. But she also found that joy, gratitude, love, and appreciation reverse the effect, restoring health—even increasing resistance to disease by hundreds of thousands of times! Science has simply proven what Scripture has declared all along: “Perfect love casts out fear.” (1 John 4:18)

Some of you remember when your autistic brother Christopher was small and so easily overwhelmed. The smallest thing could send him into a storm of tears and fear. There were days when nothing seemed to reach him. But slowly we learned to notice early on the little signs that told us when a storm was coming. And when we saw them, we’d gently gather him up and carry him into a new space. Because he loved water, we gave him little missions: filling glasses at the table, watering the plants, splashing the ducks, filling the dog bowls, turning on the garden sprinkler. Something about those small acts calmed him. What began as panic slowly turned into peace, even delight.

In time, he began to do it himself. When fear rose, he would pour water for the family or go outside to the animals. The meltdowns faded, and the good habit remained. That is the essence of taking thoughts captive—not arguing endlessly with fear, but redirecting it into gratitude, into prayer, into love, into service.

None of us can do this alone. God has placed us in relationship so that our weaknesses can be filled by the strengths of others. If we were able to perfect ourselves alone, would we not be gods?

Your Uncle Asi once gave this picture: when a diabetic suffers an insulin crash, their perception of the world is distorted; they feel panic and despair. But the solution is not to debate those feelings. It is to give insulin. In the same way, when depression or fear clouds our mind, we must not endlessly argue with the dark narrative it presents. Instead, we must receive the equivalent of an “insulin shot”—a word of truth, a perspective outside ourselves, a reminder from someone who sees clearly when we cannot.

So don’t be ashamed of weakness. Weakness is the very place where grace is meant to enter. The hollow spaces in you are designed to be filled with God Himself, and with the love and strength of His people. When you are joined to Him and to His body, your weakness becomes a channel for love to flow like a river, a place for His strength to be made perfect.

“Dear children, let us not love with words or speech but with actions and in truth. This is how we know that we belong to the truth and how we set our hearts at rest in his presence: If our hearts condemn us, we know that God is greater than our hearts, and he knows everything.” (1 John 3:18–20)

So when fear or condemnation try to define you, remember: God is greater than your heart. You are not left alone to battle your thoughts. His Spirit renews your mind, His people strengthen your soul, and His love transforms even your weakness into glory. Turn aside from those nibbling, chewing thoughts, and enter into serving and loving others! Embrace relationships that bring different perspectives than yours, and the big picture of Jesus will come back into view!

With all my love,

Mom

Blessed Are The Peacemakers

Sun, 14 Sep 2025 09:00:00 -0600

“Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God” (Matt. 5:9)

Dearest Daughters

Peace is not merely the absence of noise or conflict. It is the deep tranquility that comes when design is at work—as it is in art or music. Think of a choir where every voice blends, or a symphony where each instrument plays the same piece in tune. In this kind of design, no one is in one corner plunking out “Yankee Doodle” while someone else is singing a heartfelt “How Great Thou Art.” The notes, the rhythm, the harmonies—they come together as one. Design is peace.

Jesus said, “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God” (Matt. 5:9). This is not a small thing. To be called His children, to truly belong in His house forever, we must learn to make peace. We must walk into every circumstance asking ourselves, how can I bring peace?

I remember a time not long after I married your dad. He was working long hours and pouring himself into a music project for the community fair. I was home with two little ones, feeling weary, and sometimes anxious about how much he was gone. My frustration came out in little questions:

“What’s going on, honey?”

“Did you realize dinner’s getting cold?”

“Did it really take that long?”

Finally, I burst out, “This schedule isn’t sustainable. What’s going to happen when our kids are teenagers?”

Your dad just smiled at our toddlers and said, “Thankfully, that’s a long way off.” I didn’t yet understand times and seasons.

Later, I confided in my friend Angie. I expected commiseration, but she gave me wisdom instead. She said she used to feel the same way when her husband came home tired and distracted. She would pepper him with questions, hoping to draw him out, but it only pushed him further away. Then she said God showed her: “Make an environment of peace when he comes home. Don’t add to the anxiety.”

So she started with small things—quieting the house, preparing a favorite snack, settling the children so they could have story time with Daddy, offering a shoulder rub. She said, “When peace came in, everything I longed for in the relationship began to grow. My own anxiety had been excluding me. Peace drew me in.”

That conversation changed me. I began to make every effort to create a home where peace could rest—not because I wanted to pretend everything was always fine, but because I wanted to be a blessed peacemaker, a true daughter of God. I wanted Daddy to long to come home, because it was home. A haven. A sanctuary.

That made all the difference. And guess what? In the seasons that followed, including your teenage years, there has always been time and grace for the right balance of relationships and tasks in our home. And through it all, I also learned something else: wherever there is strife and anxiety, God does not speak. His voice is heard in the stillness of peace.

The apostle Paul writes, “The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control . . . . If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit. Let us not become conceited, provoking one another, envying one another” (Gal. 5:22–26).

Recognizing the times and seasons, honoring the order of relationships—this brings peace. And peace brings the Father into the home.

So I ask you: let His peace first settle deep within your own hearts, and then let it spill outward into your homes and relationships. Remember, the Father’s song is always being played; our part is to find the rhythm, to fit into the notes, and to live in tune with Him. In this harmony, you will be true peacemakers, and you will know the blessing of being called His beloved children.

With all my love,

Mom

The Complainer Will Be A Wanderer

Sun, 07 Sep 2025 09:00:00 -0600

“Enter His gates with thanksgiving and His courts with praise; give thanks to Him and bless His name” (Psalm 100:4).

Dearest Daughters,

Don’t ever let your spirit degenerate into grumbling and complaining. Grumblers are destined to wander, going in circles, repeating the same failures again and again. They may try again, appear to succeed for a while, but soon enough find themselves back where they started. This was the story of the children of Israel.

God had delivered them with mighty works: the Red Sea parted before them, their enemies drowned behind them. He fed them manna from heaven, water from a rock, quail when they hungered for meat. He sheltered them by a cloud in the day and lit their way with fire by night. Yet they chose to murmur. The manna was boring. The water was bitter. The journey was too long. Their leader took too much time.

These are not unfamiliar complaints. Have you heard them in your own heart? My husband can’t make up his mind. Our finances are low. The house renovation drags on year after year. These things are common. But one truth remains: grumbling cannot coexist with gratitude.

The psalmist reminds us: “Enter His gates with thanksgiving and His courts with praise; give thanks to Him and bless Him name” (Psalm 100:4). Every time we yield to a complaining spirit, we step outside His presence and away from His blessings.

Complaining also blinds us. Our eyes fix on what we dislike, what has gone wrong, what feels hard. Meanwhile, the miracles pass us by unseen. We miss the water gushing from the rock, the fire separating us from our enemies, the cloud of glory leading us forward, because our gaze is fixed on moldy manna, clutched one day too soon.

Your father sometimes tells a story about a study conducted: people were asked to count the number of times a ball was passed back and forth in a video. In the middle of the scene, a man dressed as a gorilla wandered in, waved, made faces, and walked out again. Almost no one ever noticed him, because they were so intent on the ball. This is what happens when our eyes are glued to our complaints—we miss the very presence of God moving right in front of us.

Worse still, complaining drains the joy, peace, and laughter from a home. If you complain to your husband, your children will complain to you. They will mirror your attitude, until the whole household is weighed down under the same gray cloud. Even the husband you long to draw near may not feel urgency to return to a house of complaint. God Himself withdrew from Israel when their spirit was one of murmuring.

A friend of mine, whom I greatly respect, once told me a story. She and her husband had a little habit of making the bed together every morning. Standing on either side, snapping the sheets and smoothing the wrinkles, they would talk about the day. She confessed that she realized one morning how she always began by complaining: how little sleep she had gotten, how many times the baby had woken, who wet the bed. But in one of these moments, she felt the Lord convict her: Why don’t you start your day with gratitude instead of complaint?

The next morning she tried. As they tucked the corners and fluffed the pillows, she shared funny things the children had said the day before, progress in the garden, small joys. She told me it utterly changed the atmosphere—not only their relationship, but the whole day that followed. Her gratitude sparked inspiration in her husband, gave him ideas for their children, direction for their family plans. Just that simple choice—to begin the day without complaint, but with thanksgiving—opened the door for guidance, for creativity, for blessing.

Gratitude changes everything. Scripture exhorts us: “Do all things without grumbling or complaining, that you may become blameless and pure, children of God without fault in a crooked and depraved generation, in which you shine like stars in the universe” (Phil. 2:14-15).

So, my dearest daughters, banish grumbling from your lips and hearts. Do not exile yourselves to a lifetime of wandering in circles. Instead, “Rejoice always, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus” (1 Thess. 5:16-18). Step up onto the Rock, and with gratitude and praise, climb the mountain into His presence.

With all my love,

Mom

He Brought Me into A Spacious Place

Mon, 01 Sep 2025 00:15:00 -0600

“He brought me out into a spacious place; He rescued me because He delighted in me.” —Psalm 18:19

Dearest Daughters,

Some people look at the traditional role of a woman, mother, wife, homemaker, and see something small. They feel it must be narrow, like a hallway without windows or a life with too few options. I understand that fear. The world has painted a narrow one-dimensional picture of womanhood. But I want to share something with you that has stayed with me since I was a child, something that returns to me again and again in my sleep.

I’ve had a repeating dream during my adult life of a little house, a house I once lived in as a girl. In the dream, I walk back through its rooms, and they are as tiny as I remember. I trace the walls with my eyes, remembering where the table stood, how the light came through the curtains, what it felt like to belong there. And then, always the same: I open a closet door. At the back of the closet is another door—one I had never noticed before.

When I open that second door, it’s like stepping into a miracle. There is a whole section of the house I didn’t know existed: broad, beautiful, welcoming spaces—well-furnished, full of light. Room after room, stretch far beyond what I lived in as a child. And in the dream, I say, again and again, “How did we not know this was here? Why did we live in only that tiny part of the house when all of this was ours?”

The life of a woman, the life in God’s design, is not narrow. But it can feel narrow if we never open the hidden or locked doors. The door of deep relationship. The door of true sacrificial love. The door of wisdom and shared sorrows and the kind of selfless care that makes space for others to grow. The door of prayer, where heaven bends low to meet us in our kitchens and bedrooms and laundry rooms.

When we live disconnected, when we don’t truly invest all into those roles that tie us to others, that demand vulnerability, we live only in the smallest corner of the house. But when we throw ourselves fully into the life God gives, investing everything in those relationships and responsibilities, the house opens up. We find that service is not drudgery but abundance, that giving our lives away enlarges them, and that the narrow hallway opens into a great hall where generations may gather and feast at His table.

We find that what looked small was only the entryway. The temple is just beyond.

“He brought me out into a spacious place; He rescued me because He delighted in me.” —Psalm 18:19

With all my heart,

Mom

Whoever Practices Righteousness…

Sun, 24 Aug 2025 09:00:00 -0600

“And the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace by those who make peace.” — James 3:18

Dearest Daughters,

Something my dad once told me has stayed with me for years. He said righteousness is when your thoughts, your words, your actions, and your relationships all line up—with each other, and with God’s purposes. It’s not just about doing the right thing; it’s about being whole.

Righteousness brings peace. It draws the fragmented pieces of our lives together, weaving integrity where there was once inconsistency. It pulls us into integration instead of disintegration—into connection, not conflict. As James wrote, “The fruit of righteousness is sown in peace by those who make peace” (James 3:18).

But this kind of righteousness isn’t automatic. The apostle John said, “He who practices righteousness is righteous, just as He is righteous” (1 John 3:7). Did you catch that? It must be practiced. That means it takes effort. Intention. Deliberate choices, day after day.

It’s easy for a Christian woman to say with her mouth, “I submit to my husband.” But what about her tone? Her timing? Her inner posture? What if her words say yes, but her actions whisper no? That’s not righteousness; that’s pretense. Scripture says, “Let love be without hypocrisy” (Rom. 12:9). So it’s possible to appear loving while withholding true love in the heart.

This dissonance—when our behavior and our inner attitude are out of sync—drains the life from our faith. It may look like submission, but it’s really a subtle rebellion, a kind of guerrilla warfare that plays out in sarcasm, cold silence, or thinly veiled criticism. And over time, it erodes the trust that marriage needs to flourish.

The kingdom of God is not built with bricks and mortar; it’s built with relationships. That means righteousness isn’t just about moral decisions. It’s about being rightly related to others. John says plainly, “Whoever does not practice righteousness is not of God, nor is he who does not love his brother” (1 John 3:10). In the end, we won’t be judged on how many arguments we won, how many facts we got right, or how clever our reasoning was, but on how we loved.

When you stand before the Lord at the end of your life, do you really think He will check whether your scheduling was better than your husband’s? Was this meal more tasty than that? Was this vacation more suited than that? Should we have used this curriculum over that, or even chosen this vocation rather than that? No. He will ask whether your heart was consumed by His love, your mind tempered by His Spirit, your actions guided by His sacrifice. The attitude of the heart is what God is looking at.

Paul says, “The only thing that counts is faith working through love” (Gal. 5:6). So yes, the small things matter—vacation plans, daily routines, parenting decisions—but what matters more is the spirit and attitude we carry into those discussions. Are we building peace? Or are we bulldozing our house to make a point?

“The wise woman builds her house, but the foolish tears it down with her own hands” (Prov. 14:1). I often think about that verse when I feel the urge to “set something straight.” There are ways to speak truth that don’t fracture unity. There are ways to be strong without being hard. And there are ways to suggest adjustments that aren’t manipulative.

Remember, dearest daughters, we’re not just tending our own households—we’re part of something much larger. Scripture says we together are God’s temple, and His Spirit dwells among us. And it gives this sobering warning: “If anyone destroys God’s temple, God will destroy that person” (1 Cor. 3:16-17; Eph. 2:21-22).

That means the way we treat one another—especially those closest to us—is sacred ground. Do not destroy that temple.

Does righteousness mean you can never speak up, never ask questions, never express concern? Of course not. But it does mean asking this: Am I building or am I breaking?

Let me offer a picture. If your cabinet door is crooked, you don’t burn the whole kitchen down. But how many times have we let a minor frustration spiral into something truly destructive? How often has ego demanded the final word when love would’ve chosen meek understanding?

I remember a story about a young couple who lived this out in a beautiful way. They had planned a short trip to visit relatives. The husband chose the timing, but the wife felt uneasy about leaving then because of important community activities at home. She gently suggested waiting, but he was convinced his plan worked best for both family and work. After wrestling in prayer, she felt the Lord whisper, “Let it go. In the bigger scheme, this doesn’t matter. Trust Me.” So she chose to submit cheerfully, planning the trip and enjoying it—though she still suspected they might have chosen the wrong time.

Sure enough, while they were away, some circumstances made him restless and wishing he were home. She noticed, but she kept silent, trusting God’s order. When they returned, to her surprise, he went to speak with her father about the trip. It was the first time he had ever initiated such a conversation, and it opened the door to a mentoring relationship she had long prayed for.

Had she insisted on her own way, they might have been home for those events and the trip might have been “better timed,” but that deeper bond between her father and her husband may never have formed. What looked like a misstep was, in God’s hands, a step toward something far greater. Only He sees the whole picture. I should know, for I was the wife in this story.

Righteousness never glorifies the self. It seeks peace. It sows gently, waits patiently, and honors God’s design even in the small, hidden moments. This is the gentle, radiant strength of a godly woman.

Let’s keep practicing, my daughters. It won’t always come easily, but it will always be worth it.

With all my love,

Mom

Your Kingdom Come in the Home

Mon, 18 Aug 2025 00:00:00 -0600

“You also, like living stones, are being built into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.” 1 Peter 2:5 (NIV)

Dearest Daughters,

I’ve often been asked what the purpose of marriage is, and my heart longs to answer in a way that reaches deeper than duty or romance or even companionship. To truly understand marriage, we must begin not with ourselves, but with God and with the purpose for every relationship He has designed.

You see, from the beginning, God was building a house. Not one of stone and timber, but of human souls. His plan was always to dwell with His people. Not just among us, but inside of us. And so, every Christian relationship is meant to become part of that spiritual structure. We are, as Scripture says, “living stones,” carefully placed and shaped, growing together into a temple where God’s presence rests (1 Peter 2:5).

Through this holy dwelling—His Church—God reveals His wisdom not only to the world, but even to principalities of the heavens. Imagine that! Your faithfulness in friendship, in family, and especially in marriage becomes part of an eternal testimony to angels and powers, a declaration that love always wins over fear, over death, over pride, and over every decay that sin has sown into human relationships (Ephesians 3:10–11).

So marriage was never just about finding “the one” who makes only you feel complete. It was never meant to be only about our self-fulfillment or comfort. Marriage was created for God’s glory. It is a sacred context in which we learn to lay down our lives, to submit not merely to one another, but to Christ. It is a place to unlearn self-centeredness and relearn how to love like Jesus does—with humility, grace, and transparency.

The world tells you to ask: What will this relationship do for me?

But the better question is: What is this relationship asking of me? What is God forming through it?

If we want to be part of the spiritual house that He’s building, we must allow Him to dismantle the selfish scaffolding we’ve built around ourselves. That can be uncomfortable. But to the one who longs for Christ to be formed in her, it is holy ground.

Scripture speaks clearly: “Wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands as you do to the Lord. . . . As the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything” (Ephesians 5:22-24). But hear me: this is not about inferiority or blind obedience. It is about coming under God’s mission (submission) and reflecting a transcendent picture: the church responding in love to Christ.

And submission is not reserved for women. All who follow Jesus are called to mutual submission—to live in such a way that Christ is seen in how we yield, how we serve, how we forgive, how we listen.

So ask yourself often: If marriage is a prototype of Christ and His church:

How would I want my church to relate to Christ, and do I exemplify that in my marriage?
What does my marriage say about Christ and His church?Does it reflect honor? Loyalty? Trust?
Does it show how deeply the church loves her Lord?
Does it echo the unity Christ prayed for when He said, “that they may be one . . . so that the world may know You sent Me”? (John 17:21)

The enemy of your soul will go after that unity. His oldest trick is accusation and suspicion (Revelation 12:10). He knows that if he can divide what God meant to be one, he can distort the very picture of God’s covenant love.

But a marriage that is ordered by God becomes a living parable—a testimony to what real, sacrificial, enduring love looks like, to what Christ looks like. A little piece of heaven on earth. Not because it is perfect, but because it has been surrendered.

That’s why Jesus taught us to pray, “Your kingdom come, Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.” That’s not just a morning prayer; it’s a daily posture. In your home. In your heart. In your marriage.

Paul said the kingdom of God is “righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit” (Romans 14:17). This is not supposed to just be a theory. It’s the blueprint. It’s what the kingdom looks like when it puts on flesh and lives in your home.

So let’s start here:

What does righteousness look like between husband and wife?
What does peace look like—not just a “ceasefire,” but a true atmosphere of grace and order?
What does joy look like—even when the laundry’s piled up, the baby’s crying, and you’re tired to the bone?

The world has at times abused the role of women; sometimes even the “church” has. I’ve seen it with my own eyes. When I was nineteen, I traveled to the Middle East and watched in stunned silence as a woman, strapped to the boom of a rotating irrigation pump, trudged in endless circles to draw water for the family fields. Her husband relaxed in the shade, and nearby, the family donkey rested under a tree. The image never left me.

There will always be people who use their own power to trample others. But that’s not God’s design. Just because there will always be those who caricature God’s order, don’t reject the treasure of godly design and submission just because you’ve seen counterfeits. Submission, rightly understood, does not degrade; it dignifies. It is not a lowering of value; it is a demonstration of trust in the One who laid down His own rights, even His own life.

God’s order is not about showcasing our brilliance. It’s about reflecting His. His kingdom is not a platform for pride but a mirror for glory. And marriage is one of its clearest mirrors.

Submission, when yielded in the Spirit, is offensive only to the flesh. But to the woman who has tasted the sweetness of surrender, it becomes a doorway to peace.

“The wise woman builds her house,” Proverbs says. “But the foolish one tears it down with her own hands” (Prov. 14:1). So ask yourself—what kind of woman am I becoming?

The kingdom will rise or fall in our homes before it ever shows up in our churches or communities. If righteousness, peace, and joy are the fruit of the Spirit, then let them begin in you. Let them take root in the secret places: in your tone, your thoughts, your willingness to forgive. Let them blossom in your daily choices. Let them spread to the children and the man beside you at your table.

Because if His kingdom is ever to come in the earth . . .

It must come first in the heart.

And then, my daughters, in the home.

With all my love,

Mom

A Radiant Home

Sun, 10 Aug 2025 09:00:00 -0600

“She looks well to the ways of her household and does not eat the bread of idleness. Her children rise up and call her blessed.” — Proverbs 31:27-28 (ESV)

Dearest Daughters,

When you hear the word “home,” what rises in your heart?

For me, it’s not just a word; it’s a feeling. A deep, almost painful tug, like something written into our very bones. After a long trip, a hard day, or even a hospital stay, all I can think about is home. There’s something magnetic about it, so powerful that the word “homesick” has been invented just to describe the ache we feel when we’re away from it too long.

We remember the laughter around the dinner table, the comfort of familiar routines, the scent of dinner on the stove, the way the walls hold our stories. Home is where we feel safe. It’s where we belong. It’s where we are most ourselves.

So, my daughters, there is another ache in my heart that I want to describe: If home is such a sacred and vital place, why is the word “homemaker” spoken with so much discomfort, even disdain, in this world around us? This truly grieves to me.

If you say you spend 2,000 hours a year in an office cubicle, staring at spreadsheets, people will nod approvingly. Say you wear a paper cap and rubber gloves to press buttons on an x-ray machine, or clean the teeth of strangers all day, and they’ll commend your discipline and your contribution to society.

But if you say you are a full-time wife and mother? Say you are a keeper of the home? An awkward hush falls. A shadow of pity or confusion flickers across faces. Just a housewife? Only a homemaker?

As if you’ve given up.

Daughters, never forget: you haven’t given up anything! You have taken up something holy.

I don’t say this because I’m bitter that homemaking has been demeaned. I say it because I love being a woman! I love being your mother. I love creating a beautiful space for peace and welcome. I love the behind-the-scenes steady work of nurturing life and light in our home. And I believe, with all my heart, that this work, done in faith and love, is a sacred calling.

Recovering the dignity and mission of womanhood is not drudgery to me. It’s delight.

I truly believe that in the beautiful symphony of life, family, community, and faith, we women have been entrusted with a powerful anthem. We are privileged to bring the Kingdom of Heaven into kitchens, into laundry rooms, into bedtime prayers and warm plates passed around the table. We are honored to keep the flame burning day after faithful day.

You see, the problem is not the calling itself. It’s the caricature. The distortion. The counterfeit that turns biblical submission into subjugation or paints homemaking as small, dull, or regressive. These lies shrink something beautiful into something bitter—and that, my dear ones, is what we must resist.

I pray you will see the home for what it really is: a sanctuary. A garden. A training ground. A holy outpost of heaven in a weary world. And I want you to know that to tend that space with love, wisdom, and joy is no small thing.

It is legacy. It is strength. It is purpose.

Let’s redeem the word “homemaker,” not merely with nostalgia, but with vision! Let’s lift it up where it belongs, not in pride, but in peace. Let’s show the world that a woman who loves her home, who creates beauty, who serves with laughter and tears and open arms is not less. She is more.

More than the world can measure. More than earthly culture will ever understand.

And her joy? Her purpose? It is waiting to be rediscovered. Let that joy shine through you, and let everything you do in and for your home and family be radiant with God’s purpose.

With all my love,

Mom

Let Love Be Sincere

Sun, 03 Aug 2025 09:00:00 -0600

Let love be without hypocrisy. Abhor what is evil. Cling to what is good. Be devoted to one another in love. Honor one another above yourselves. —Romans 12:9–10 (NASB / NIV)

Dearest Daughters,

There’s an old story about the word “sincere.” It is said that it comes from the Latin sine cera—“without wax”—and was used to describe a marble sculpture. A piece was considered sincere if it had no cracks filled in with wax to disguise its flaws. Sculptors sometimes used wax to cover broken places or fill tiny fissures, but when those statues were brought into the light of the sun, the wax became visible. The cracks were exposed. The sculpture was not whole. It lacked integrity.

And so it is with our lives, and especially with our marriages.

Sincerity means purity, clearness, and truth. It is honesty and transparency woven together like strands of a single cord, or like facets of the same precious stone. And that stone—truth—is what we must build our marriages upon.

If you can’t be transparent with your husband, then you’re not truly being honest. And if you’re not honest, your relationship will always have hidden cracks.

I want to tell you a story, one I’m not proud of. It was just before I married your dad. One night, I was thinking about my old journals. I had filled them for years with stories, prayers, questions, confessions, and raw places of my heart—my teenage longings and failures, my weaknesses and fears. And suddenly, I panicked. What if he ever read them? What if he saw all my brokenness and loved me less?

So, I got out of bed, found a black Sharpie marker, and went through my journals, striking out every line that made me look immature, foolish, or weak.

Then I forgot about that night... until a few years into our marriage. I was telling your dad a story and couldn’t recall all the details, so I went and found one of those journals. We lay in bed flipping through its pages when he stopped.

“What’s this?” he laughed, pointing to the thick black lines.

It felt so silly in that moment, because by then, I had already let him see all of me. The truth was, my weaknesses had never made me less in his eyes. They only became shameful when I tried to cover them.

Over time, I realized something amazing: the places where I am cracked and broken are the very places where God pours Himself in. In marriage, that often happens through the one He’s given to walk beside you. Your dad became the one who filled the broken places, not with the wax of dishonesty to cover, but with love, strength, and grace. And somehow, in those joints, those places of fusion, we became stronger. We became one.

So don’t ever hide from your husband. Be honest. Be transparent. Say what you mean and show who you are. Let him see your weaknesses, and trust God to meet you both there.

And if you ever stumble, if you hold something back, or let something small grow into something false, step into the light and make it right.

I remember a situation that had something to do with ice cream (though I forget the details now). Your dad asked me a question, and I answered in a way that wasn’t originally dishonest... but I could tell by his response that he had misunderstood me. The version he’d understood made me look better. And, conveniently, I said nothing.

But that night, I couldn’t sleep.

I realized I had let a shadow settle between us. So I woke him with tears and told him the truth. It felt small, and yet so big. Because I knew I couldn’t bear anything standing between us.

As humbling as the moment felt, it strengthened us. It set a precedent. And that precedent shaped our future. And that future has been good. So allow the blaze of God’s love and truth to expose any flaws in the sculpture He’s shaping of your life. Let Him make your love sincere.

With all my love,

Mom

Cultivating Love

Sun, 27 Jul 2025 09:00:00 -0600

Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. Bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity.” — Colossians 3:12–14 (NIV)

Dearest Daughters,

Love is the most important thing in a marriage. In fact, we might even say that love is the marriage.

Scripture tells us that marriage is the way God chooses to demonstrate His love—between Himself and His bride, the church (Eph. 5:22-33). And so, our own marriages must reflect that holy design if they are to be true marriages, Christian marriages. But love is not static. Love is a living and growing thing. It must be tended.

If, after a year of marriage, you look back and see that your love has not grown—or worse, that it has shrunk—then something is wrong. Love should not merely survive; it should thrive.

Look at your garden. If you plant peppers in April and come back in May and they look exactly the same, you immediately know something is wrong. If you’re a good gardener, you don’t just sigh and let them wither. You dig around the roots. You check the soil. You compost. You weed. You adjust the sunlight, add water—whatever it takes to help them grow and bear fruit.

This is how we must approach the love in our marriages.

The very first feelings accompanying love are strong—so strong you may think it will grow all by itself. But it will not. The burst of life that makes a seed sprout is powerful, yes—but that young plant is fragile. And so is new love. It must be nurtured, guarded, fed.

So how do we do that? How do we tend the plant of love?

We feed it. We water it. We weed around it. We check the soil.

Let’s talk about the soil first. The soil of your marriage is the environment you build around it—what you fill your heart and mind with, who you spend your time with, what your home absorbs. Do you spend time with each other? Do you spend time with people whose love you admire, whose marriages you’d be glad to imitate? If not, your love may be rooted in nutrient-poor ground.

Look for relationships that are further down the road than yours. Let your time and conversations be seasoned with things that edify—books, scripture, stories that make your heart ache with longing to become more than you are. Let them move you to prayer. Spend time in homes where this longing is shared. This is the compost. This is the mulch. This is how you nourish the soil.

And what about water?

Words are water. Express your love often. Your dad and I speak words of love to one another almost hourly. Every goodbye is sealed with a kiss. Every return is met with warmth. When he works long hours, I never let him leave without sending him off with care—and I never let him come home without a welcome.

These may seem like small things, but they are not. They are the daily watering that keeps the plant alive.

And the weeding? That’s just as important.

Weeds are little things—grumblings, irritations, sharp words, withheld kindness. Of course, there will be frustrations in any marriage. Dirty socks. The cap off the toothpaste. The clatter of dishes at the wrong time of day. But do these things matter enough to choke out love?

If the plant matters, you pull the weed.

You say: “This is an imperfection—but this is why God puts us together. Because only together can we be made whole.”

Even the annoyances can become opportunities. When we serve each other in the things we do not enjoy, we are truly loving. And in time, that service becomes joy.

So let your every thought, your every action, your every word be a cultivator of love. Feed it. Water it. Weed it. And place your marriage in a garden rich with light, air, and holy company. Let the people around you, the pages you read, and the prayers you pray feed your love.

As it is written:

“Let all that you do be done in love.” —1 Corinthians 16:14

With all my heart,

Mom

Do Not Despise the Places Where You Lack

Mon, 21 Jul 2025 00:15:00 -0600

“God has chosen the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God has chosen the weak things of the world to shame the strong." (1 Corinthians 1:27)

My Dearest Daughters,

Marriage is not a place for us as human beings to shine—it’s a place for God to shine. Scripture tells us, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my strength is made perfect in weakness” (2 Cor. 12:9). This means that the very places where we feel insufficient are the places where His glory is most able to be revealed.

Though in today’s world, it’s an unpopular concept, we should consider that, according to scripture, the woman is the “weaker vessel” (1 Pet. 3:7). She was created after the man (1 Tim. 2:13), to be a helpmeet and support. She, like every creature in God’s design, was given a role of submission (Eph. 5:22-24). Taken through the lens of the world’s thinking—where greatness is defined by power, strength, wealth, or dominance—these passages may seem demeaning to some. But the kingdom of God has been called the “upside-down” kingdom (or better said, the “right-side-up” kingdom). It operates by a different design: “Whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first must be your slave” (Matt. 20:26-27). “The greatest among you shall be your servant” (Matt. 23:11).

And so, from that viewpoint, the woman has been entrusted with one of the greatest and most treasured roles. To walk happily and contentedly in this calling, we must first change our thinking.

Consider a puzzle piece. Too many people long to be the entire picture God is painting. But in truth, each of us is only one small part. (1 Cor. 12:27). We all have jagged edges—missing corners where the image seems incomplete. We can look at those gaps and mourn over our lacks . . . or we can say, “This is the exact spot where God will fit me into His design. This is where He will demonstrate His beauty through unity” (1 Cor. 12:18). It is in the joint that His strength shines through.

We only need to be ashamed of our weakness when we refuse to let His strength fill it. But when we are willing, our weakness becomes the very place where His grace enters. (2 Cor. 12:10). Where I end, He begins.

Scripture also tells us that it was the woman who was deceived in the Garden (1 Tim. 2:14). And yes, women are often more easily deceived. But this, too, is not without purpose. The same softness that allows us to be more easily swayed also allows us to be intuitive, sympathetic, emotionally attuned—gifts vital to nurturing children, building relationships, and supporting our husbands. Our vulnerabilities and our strengths are interwoven. Were we not sensitive, we would not so easily sense the needs of others.

So rather than despise the ways in which you feel lacking—whether in strength, intellect, eloquence, or certainty—recognize that even these can be a gift when surrendered. “God has chosen the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God has chosen the weak things of the world to shame the strong” (1 Cor. 1:27). God designed us to be fitted together with others, not to be complete on our own. We were made to reflect His image, not our own (Gen. 1:27).

The entire creation testifies to the reality of structure and order—of roles that shine and roles that support. The moon doesn’t resent the sun. The roots don’t envy the blossoms. The violin doesn’t wish to be the drum or the trumpet. Each fulfills its role in harmony with the others, submitted to the direction of the Great Conductor.

Submission only becomes demeaning when we’re longing to display ourselves. But when we long for Christ to be made visible, then submission becomes a joy. (Col. 3:3). We’re not ashamed to be hidden in Him—we cherish it. Because we carry a part of His image, we’re fitted into His design to show the world who He truly is.

So don’t despise the complementarity between you and your husband. Don’t be jealous of his strengths or mournful over your differences. Let him be strong where you are weak. Let yourself be strong in the strengths given to a woman. Let the Spirit of God flow through both of you, knitting your puzzle pieces into a picture greater than either could reflect alone.

With all my love,

Mom

Motherhood—An Art of Balance and Proprioception

Sun, 13 Jul 2025 09:00:00 -0600

“He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together.” Colossians 1:17

Dearest Daughters,

As I shared in my previous letter, the role of a wife and mother is meant to be a dance—a dance to the rhythm and music of our Maker. But to dance well, a woman must have extraordinary balance and proprioception.

A trained dancer can hold an arabesque on one leg, complete multiple turns with control, or freeze mid-motion with grace. Her balance is both static and dynamic—she is steady in stillness and fluid in movement. But these abilities don’t come naturally.

Dancers cultivate proprioception: the body’s internal awareness of position in space. It’s the sense of where we are in relation to everything around us. This awareness is developed through years of focused training—barre work, turning drills, slow-control exercises. Her core becomes stable, her feet and ankles refined, and she becomes less dependent on visual cues. She moves with an inner compass.

With eyes closed, a dancer can maintain balance on one leg for more than 15 seconds. Most non-dancers lose their footing in under five. With eyes open, dancers average 30 to 60 seconds of poised stillness; others only 15 to 30. These skills become vital—especially when dancing under pressure, with lights flashing and choreography shifting. But they require discipline, repetition, and grace.

Motherhood, too, is an art of balance and proprioception.

But in the dance of womanhood, the balance is not just physical. It’s spiritual. It’s the awareness of our place in God’s design—our smallness and our significance. Proprioception in motherhood is knowing where we stand in relationship to our children, our husbands, our neighbors—and to God. It’s knowing how to take our place, not at the center, but in harmony with the whole. We’re small enough to keep our problems and our egos small, but significant enough to be called, chosen, and placed here by God.

This inner balance allows us to stand—even when the world spins wildly. When the lights go out. When children scatter and voices rise. We’re not thrown off course. We know with whom we stand. We know where we stand. And so, we do not fall.

But dancers don’t merely balance. They don’t just hear the beat—they embody it. Timing, phrasing, and emotion become synchronized with motion. A dancer may gesture with one arm while rising en pointe and tracking a turn with her eyes. Every movement is purposeful. Every part participates in the rhythm.

So it is with us. If we are to live as dancers in the great choreography of God’s creation, we must first learn to hear the music. But not only to hear it—to embody it. This music—this divine harmony—is the design God set into motion when He spoke the world into being. The stars, the tides, the seasons, the breath in our lungs—all of it moves according to the song He composed.

Scripture tells us: “He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together” (Colossians 1:17). The whole universe is upheld by His voice. And if we learn to listen—really listen—we’ll find that same rhythm flowing through our homes, our relationships, our work, and our rest.

To be a mother is to take our place in the music. To listen. To learn. To practice. And then, to move. In grace. In balance. In holy awareness.

And in Him, to hold all things together.

With love always,

Mom

To Bow and to Bend, We Shan’t Be Ashamed

Sun, 06 Jul 2025 09:00:00 -0600

Teach me to do Your will, for You are my God; May Your good Spirit lead me on level ground. Psalm 143:10

Dearest Daughters,

I often think of the calling of womanhood—of being a wife, a mother, a servant of Christ—as being something like the role of a dancer.

Motherhood, for one, quite literally keeps you on your toes. But beyond that, there’s a kind of sacred choreography to this life we’ve been given.

A few months ago, I found myself singing the old Shaker hymn:

’Tis a gift to be simple, ’tis a gift to be free, ’Tis a gift to come down where we ought to be, And when we find ourselves in the place just right, ’Twill be in the valley of love and delight. When true simplicity is gained, To bow and to bend we shan’t be ashamed; To turn, turn will be our delight, Till by turning, turning we come ’round right.

That line—to bow and to bend we shan’t be ashamed—settled in my soul. I pictured a dancer: fluid, strong, bending with grace and purpose. And I said in my heart, This is what it means to be a woman in submission. This is what it means to live under a mission.

But before I explain that fully, let me tell you something about dancers.

A dancer’s flexibility is out of the ordinary. Her limbs move with extended range—high leg lifts, deep back bends, open hip rotations. Where the average person may lift their straight leg to 70 or 90 degrees, a trained dancer can often reach 120 to 150 degrees. In back extension, she may show 30 to 40 degrees more mobility than most. But this isn’t natural—it’s practiced. It’s built by daily stretching, by targeting not only passive flexibility (how far a joint can go), but active flexibility—how well the body holds and controls those movements with grace.

Over time, the dancer’s muscles and fascia actually lengthen. Her nervous system adapts to the new capabilities. Movements that once felt impossible become second nature. This isn’t occasional effort. Dancers invest hours each day training their bodies to move in obedience to music, to choreography, to story.

Yet no dancer would say of their trainer, “He’s demeaning me,” or “He makes my life a drudgery.” They would believe that their potential had increased, their capacities expanded.

So what does that mean for us, daughters?

It means that we, too, must be willing to stretch—to bend in the service of something beyond ourselves. Ultimately, that “something” is the mission of God. And within His design, for those of us who are married, it includes the mission of our husbands, who themselves should be submitted to the mission of Christ.

In the beautiful order of family and church, everyone is under a mission. Submission isn’t about inferiority—it’s about choreography. It’s about alignment.

But here’s the truth: our natural selves are stiff. We are not born spiritually limber. Our hearts are rigid in self-interest. Our ambitions resist bending. Our habits are slow to yield. But if we want to move in step with God’s dance—if we want to be graceful in His design—we cannot just stretch when we feel like it. We must stretch with intention.

We stretch ourselves to love more than we thought we could.

We stretch our wills to yield when it feels unnatural.

We stretch our hearts to serve when we feel empty.

We bend our ambitions, our comforts, our time, again and again.

Like dancers, we must train. The connective tissue of our souls must lengthen. The muscles of humility, patience, and compassion must be worked daily.

Then, when the music of life swells and shifts, we will not break—we will move.

To bow and to bend we shan’t be ashamed;

To turn, turn will be our delight,

Till by turning, turning we come ’round right.

And in that movement, we will reflect the beauty of our Maker.

With love always,

Mom

That You May Dance

Sun, 29 Jun 2025 09:00:00 -0600

Dearest Daughters,

I want to write to you now—before some of you set out on the journey of marriage, and as others grow in the grace of motherhood. I want to share with you the lessons I’ve learned in the years God has given me. Lessons hard-won in the juggling of a very full life: as a mother, a minister’s wife, a teacher, a midwife, a friend. Through it all, I’ve sought to remain close to our Lord Jesus—to feel His love, to love Him back, to live in His peace, and to bear the fruits of His Spirit.

I’m not writing because I’ve done all this perfectly. I’m writing because I’ve been an overcomer. And I hope to keep being one, all my days. My failures have been faithful teachers, and I pray that some of what I’ve learned through them can become your foundation—so that you can build upon the stones I stumbled over. Like rocks in a river, these obstacles have shaped the flow of my life, made it stronger and deeper. And I trust they will do the same for you.

You will still have your own faltering steps. That is part of the journey. But I believe you’ll walk further down the road than I have, and in doing so, you’ll become part of that ancient journey of faith that began with Abraham and Sarah and, I pray, will continue through your children and grandchildren.

If there is one thing I could urge you never to neglect, it is this: cultivate the presence of God.

You know—you remember—that I was always the first to rise in the morning. In the quiet dark, I made space for peace and prayer. I stepped outside beneath the stars. I listened to music. I read my Bible. I wrote down my thoughts and prayers, my hopes and my repentances. I sought Him early, not just out of duty, but because I knew I needed to, because His presence became my inspiration, my strength, my source of love.

And then, throughout the day, I tried to stay there—to walk in that presence.

You’ve known it yourselves, haven’t you? That feeling in worship, when the music carries your spirit upward. That moment by the ocean, watching the waves stretch into eternity. That hush at the foot of a mountain. That radiant sunset that stops you in your tracks. The awe in your soul that whispers, God is big, and I am small, and still He loves me. That’s the place you must learn to stay.

From that place, every conversation—with your husband, with your children, with others—can become a dance. A quiet, holy dance within the circle of His arms. Sometimes it looks like laughing over a spelling test triumph and buying ice cream to celebrate. Sometimes it looks like calling a neighbor at just the right moment with just the right word. Sometimes it looks like making a beautiful meal and offering it with joy.

This dance isn’t only for Sunday mornings. It’s for the kitchen, the laundry room, the doctor’s visit, the backyard, the grocery aisle. We must learn the rhythm. We must learn the steps. We must listen for the music.

And so this letter—which has already grown into a series of letters I’ll be sending you—is really about that dance.

My prayer for each of you is simple:

That you may dance.

With all my love, until next time,

Mom