I was 13 months old when my mother, my older brother, my twin sister, and I were out on our daily walk. It was an average, unassuming morning until we were struck by a negligent driver carrying a tractor trailer full of concrete. My siblings and I were left lodged upside down in a ditch, battered and bruised in our stroller. My mother was killed instantly after taking the brunt of the force to pro...  Read More

Prayer is something that can often be overly complicated and intimidating. Which method do I use? What words do I say? What if I forget something? If God already knows it all, what’s the point in praying? But “Jesus prayed constantly - if He felt the need to pray, how much more must we?” Matt Chandler explains in a sermon that there are 3 ways to pray. Through praise, acknowledging who God is and ...  Read More

A while ago, someone stole our dog, Crash. They entered the yard and unclipped him from his lead at the barn. He was a beautiful dog, friendly, cheerful, and excellent with children.  In the days and weeks after, I struggled with anger and bitterness. Every time I thought I had confessed and removed it all from my mind and heart, I’d drive past the house of the people we suspected of stealing him,...  Read More

“This changed my marriage and my life,” my future brother-in-law said, as he handed me and my fiancé, Joel, a book: The Total Money Makeover by Dave Ramsey. We had been engaged for just a few weeks and we were all so excited! Joel does not enjoy reading, so he smiled at me and I knew exactly what that meant. I would do the reading and pass the word along...so that’s what we did. A few chapters in,...  Read More

Every time I open my email lately, I am offered the opportunity to opt out of Mother's Day emails.Will it be too hard to see Mothers being celebrated? It makes me think - should I be sad on Mother's Day?I lost my mom very unexpectedly to cancer six years ago this past September. Life changed after that. I didn't know I would have to do the rest of my life this soon without her. Without her here to...  Read More

Happy Friday Everyone! I’ll be honest. One of my biggest struggles as a young Christian revolved around the issue of prayer. Specifically, I had a hard time believing that it really had much of an impact on my life or my circumstances. It seemed like the things I prayed about rarely turned out the way I wanted… or if they did, I could easily explain it away and convince myself that it wasn’t God w...  Read More

Happy Friday! America is a country that loves its stars. I’m not talking about constellations here… I’m speaking more along the lines of Julia Roberts and George Clooney. In fact, there are multiple TV shows that solely focus on the life and times of our beloved celebrities. Here’s what I learned while watching one yesterday: Blake Shelton got a new tattoo of deer tracks around his forearm (he app...  Read More

Happy Friday! Can you see what it is? (If you can’t, I’ll give the answer at the end �� ) Remember the “Magic Eye” craze of the 90’s? It seemed like all of a sudden these books were everywhere! They were so fascinating because there had never been anything quite like them before. There was a picture hidden within a picture… and not everybody could see it. If you wanted to see the hidden image, you...  Read More