The gift of listening
I had just moved to a new country with my husband and family. That meant new schools for the children and a new job for my husband. It was a difficult time of adjustment... »
Articles
Pausing to care
I don’t know how she did it, but the cashier's eyes peered right into mine. I’d been discovered. I had tried to avoid eye contact as I was finishing the grocery shopping.... »
Net worth and breeding patterns of the common hug
The signs were nothing but rectangles of white-painted plywood adorned with bright red words proclaiming, “ABRAZOS GRATIS” (“FREE HUGS”), along with flowers, hearts, and... »
Change the world
Question: I’d like to do more to improve things around me, but I don’t feel there’s a lot I can do. Changing the world seems like such a huge task—how to know where to st... »
The unsung hero
The story of the boy who gave his lunch to the disciples to share with the multitude is well known.[See John 4:1–3.] Jesus took the two small loaves and five fishes, bles... »
Love at work
There is a special happiness and contentment that comes from putting others and their needs above your own. When you’re doing something kind for someone, it doesn’t just... »
Grace to keep on loving
In one of the most powerful and poetic chapters of the Bible, 1 Corinthians 13, the apostle Paul describes the sort of love Christians are meant to embody: “Love suffers... »
Plucking feathers
In my childhood farmyard in Pleasant Hill, New York, we always had an abundance of chickens roaming around looking for worms and bugs, scratching the ground for seeds, an... »
Long-tempered
I used to have my own definitions of longsuffering and patience. Longsuffering was putting up with something, and patience was putting up with nothing. The one was expres... »
Life happens
Sometimes, at the most unexpected times, we get little revelations that clarify perspective, give insight, and recharge our faith. I got one of those the other day. It ha... »
Creating space
I decided “better late than never” and ventured into something new and long overdue: at age 50-plus, I registered for lessons at a local driving school. To my horror, dur... »
Longsuffering—the conciliatory fruit
“The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law.”[Galatians 5:22–23]... »