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Category Archives: Nonfiction
The Lost Art of Reading
David Ulin’s Lost Art of Reading has been a thought-provoking little book. Described as a “ruminative essay,” this compact reflection on the distinctiveness of reading, and its role in an increasingly networked information age, doesn’t really make an argument against technology or predict the death of reading. But it does acknowledge some ways books and … Continue reading
Bursting with God-news
Upon entering, Gabriel greeted her: “Good morning! You’re beautiful with God’s beauty, Beautiful inside and out! God be with you.” (Luke 1:28, The Message) This afternoon I heard the song “Breath of Heaven” on the way home from the grocery store. It’s a song I’ve always assumed I liked, but today I realized: I don’t, … Continue reading
Becoming Native to This Place
I was introduced to Wes Jackson’s work through reading Wendell Berry. The two men have a longstanding friendship and have similar views of what Berry has called “culture and agriculture.” In Becoming Native to This Place, Jackson explores the ways our assumptions about the earth as an inert repository of resources for us to extract … Continue reading
Seed speculations
It seems like an odd time of year to be thinking about seeds. It began over the weekend, when my husband got to thinking about God’s provision of seed-bearing plants very early in the creation story. He’s been thinking about the investment of time and resources as seeds, a metaphor Jesus uses often in his … Continue reading
If Jesus Were a Parent
We’ve been reading Hal Perkins’ If Jesus Were a Parent: Coaching Your Child to Follow Jesus in a Sunday school class for a couple of months. It’s a book that has stimulated some very lively discussion and strong feelings of all kinds. I wasn’t going to try to write about it here, yet I find … Continue reading
Thanksgiving
5 By awesome deeds in righteousness You will answer us, O God of our salvation, You who are the confidence of all the ends of the earth, And of the far-off seas; 6 Who established the mountains by His strength, Being clothed with power; 7 You who still the noise of the seas, The noise … Continue reading
As little children
A few weeks ago, we finished Egermeier’s Bible Storybook. It ends with a description of John on Patmos, writing Revelation. It doesn’t summarize Revelation — just tells the story of its writing. My older daughter remembered once hearing the Bible description of the four horsemen of the Apocalypse in Revelation 6, and she asked, “Could … Continue reading
The Wilder Life
I picked up The Wilder Life: My Adventures in the Lost World of Little House on the Prairie at a publisher’s book sale that comes to our area once a year. It has one of the most attractive covers ever, in my opinion, and as someone who has read and reread the Little House books, I … Continue reading
Reflections on Marilynne Robinson’s essays
By the standards of my generation, all my life I have gone to church with a kind of persistence, as I do to this day. Once recently I found myself traveling all night to be home in time for church, and it occurred to me to consider in what spirit or out of what need … Continue reading
Posted in Christianity, Essays
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Battle wounds
The Enemy will always try to get you to do to someone what he is doing to that person… There is a gravitational field the Enemy creates around a person that pulls everyone in her life to do to her what he is doing to her. Heads up — it’s not you, and being aware … Continue reading
Posted in Nonfiction, Parenting
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