Our Lord Come

This year, I’ve been immersed in the season of Advent for twice the normal length. In October, I began rehearsals for a set of Advent plays. In November, we finished the work of rehearsal and displayed it for an audience. And then finally, as the literal season began, we brought our work to local churches, spending the majority of our Sundays full of the work of the season.

As you can well imagine, I learned a lot about Advent through the process. I wouldn’t say that I have a ton of intimidating head knowledge or anything like that. Rather, it was a building of awareness or perhaps a revival of what had already been growing in me since childhood. Like everything, Advent had grown old and familiar after twenty years of church services and candle lighting.

I learned the names of the candles—Prophecy, Bethlehem, Shepherds, Angels, and of course, the Christ Candle. I learned to light them in order, and it made sense. First comes prophecy, then came Bethlehem etc. It was all very logical. I learned to snuff a candle with the tips of my wetted fingers, something which came after many attempts, ouches, and much flinching.

A visual of the type of Advent wreath we used, shown courtesy of The Sunday School Network.

One of the three characters entrusted to me was Helen. In my understanding of the script, she was smart, loyal, loving, and highly theological. Having struggled with depression in the past, she was very eager to help her dear friend, Peg, who had suddenly withdrawn from social activities. The course of the play was her retelling, through the use of the advent wreath, the story of Peg’s last Christmas—as it turns out that Peg is secretly suffering from a terminal illness.

In my understanding of the script, Helen was also a lot like me. In acting this is a good realization. Connecting with your character, no matter how different they are from you, is always important in making the portrayal as real as possible. Thus, it’s very nice when these connections are automatic, as they were with Helen.

My connections with Helen were subtle but deep. Her way of talking was not unlike mine, and she was close to my age. I could easily connect to her love of God and theology, and desire to help her best friend. And like Helen, I have also spent time in the depths of clinical depression. In fact, the weeks and months leading up to Advent, the time I spent embodying her, I was in those depths.

At the end of the play, I had the privilege of speaking the last lines to the audience:

Father, Thank you for my life. Our Lord come.

However, I didn’t always “feel” those words because frankly, I wasn’t always thankful for my life. I struggled to desire to address God as Father, or ask Him to come. Of course, acting isn’t entirely based upon “feeling it” or we’d never get anything done in theatre! But good acting must be truthful. I endeavour to be honest in my work, and thus, I made a pact with myself. I wouldn’t say those words unless I truly believed them.

That’s not to say I would skip the lines if I was in a bad mood. I always had to say them, but I wasn’t allowed to fake it. I gave myself as much time as I needed to pause, and find the part of me, no matter how intensely buried beneath the weights, that was thankful for life. Despite all the pain I was often in, I always said the lines. I always found some part of me that was at least somewhat honestly thankful for what I had.

I’m not one to say that serious problems can be erased or that mental health can improve with a simple change of attitude. We all have deep problems and pains that must be worked through in the process of life. Depression, anxiety, and other mental health issues are not unlike this. But if there is one thing that the embodiment of Advent taught me about the season, it’s that Christmas is about life and the revival of everything good we were meant for. Everything that we lost in the Fall. It is a renewal of sorts. And while we can develop a deep head knowledge of all things theological, our relationship with God may only be deepened with the work of the heart.

God works in living, breathing, heart-beating, weeping, laughing, human person ways, too.

So today, December 26th, in the aftermath of Advent 2015, I will say, Father thank you for my life. Our Lord come. And everyday after that, Lord willing.

Meet Me at the Tomb

I grew up hearing the Bible stories surrounding the resurrection of Jesus. Of doubting Thomas, and the Emmaus road encounter. Of the final ascension. I remember the women—Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome—who discovered the empty tomb while delivering spices to Jesus’ grave (Mark 16:1-8). And the fact that Jesus first revealed himself to Mary, a woman, was constantly emphasized my wonderful mom.

It showed that Jesus was different. And it meant something to our treatment of women in leadership.

I remember those thoughts being ingrained in my head from the age of nine. I had years of Bible stories behind me at this point. But that wasn’t all—my family, along with a few others, had recently separated from our church over the issue that women were not allowed to use their gifts in all capacities. Within this confusing situation, my young brain most resonated with Jesus’ first reappearance to Mary. I could go back to this, and reimagine, stepping into Mary’s shoes and seeing Jesus myself. She was a woman, and I would be one in time. Somehow, this story helped me understand the hard and confusing decision about church that my mom had to make.

Years of further Bible stories, now in the form of youth group settings, books, and church services, went by. Although the general idea of Jesus’ treatment of Mary and others persisted, it grew vague. I didn’t know how to read my Bible very well in my high school years. I also continued to be confused about many concepts, most especially in regards to Biblical gender roles. While my friends, some authors, and a few leaders interpreted scripture mostly to exclude women in leadership, a select few (including my mom) consistently advocated for egalitarianism in church.

And for those in the first group, Mary’s visit with Jesus was never significant enough.

I have the pleasure of writing over at The Scroll Blog today. Read the rest of the story here

The Processing

“I can’t wait till exams are over so that I can process this semester,” I repeated over and over again just a few weeks ago, when the flash cards still piled high.

Exams finally came to an end one Monday afternoon, and I threw myself into a lump for twelve straight hours. I couldn’t think, cry, or dream–just sleep.

I packed, and journeyed home, still just as tired. I packed my journal with plans to write out the feelings from these hard, long, but learning months.

The weeks of holiday time have nearly come and gone now. I’ve had more energy than expected and I’ve barely touched the journal. The time to process came, but I didn’t take it. Instead I baked cookies and volunteered, wrapped Christmas presents, and saw friends. There was hardly time to write.

But I’ve been sharing bits and pieces of my story, here and there, for those who wish to hear. Because “how was your semester?” cannot be answered completely in one or two words. Neither can, ” how was your year?”

A year, twelve months, 365 days. That is a long time. The changes one experiences in that space may not be summed up in a one sentence response. And so here I am, with no words to contain my 2014 recap. Because it’s not a recap and there are not enough words.

~~~

I took a long walk today, the first of many, I expect. I thought about someone else–a character in a new play, the character I’m playing. I thought her thoughts and about her dreams. Failed or beginning. But they were mine as much as they were hers.

It took me a long time to get around to this walk. I was supposed to do it, but I procrastinated day after day, hour after hour. I guess deep down I knew it would be me processing about me and I wasn’t ready for that. I keep saying, “I’m not ready.” Making up excuses. But I have to start somewhere.

But if I begin, will there be an ending?

You see, we don’t want to remember, and we don’t want to forget.

~~~

I’m not going to recap because there aren’t enough words, but if I were to summarize 2014, this is what I’d say:

It began quietly for me, wrapped in warm blackents on someone else’s couch. I’d spent the night with my friend, Sarah and her family, watching a bunch of movies–North Anger Abbey, August Rush, and My Fair Lady. The New Year came and we acknowledged it. On our sixth cup of tea, and too much chocolate.

I came home, and began a new semester. Classes, and two great parts in a Shakespeare play. And that was the semester I wrote my own play about a girl and a garden and a man who became her mentor.

Summer. I got my first car and a new job. Then, with a few stories piled behind me, I went back to my old job, and learned more heartbreak and more joy, from other people and myself. I turned twenty, and moved into my first apartment. I took more classes, and stage managed a show, even though I didn’t want to. My favourite classes became New Testament Studies and Directing–the two I didn’t want to take.

Now the year is ending, cuddled up in a warm sweater, and writing on my laptop. Festivities are coming shortly to ring this old year out, but for now I’m making an attempt to process it all.

As I write about last year, I’m reminded of all the things I didn’t know. All the discoveries. The joys and the griefs. I’m only learning now that I got really scared for that Shakespeare play and that fear was what held me back in rehearsals. In these past few months, I’ve learned that I’m that girl in that garden I wrote about, though I naively fought it in the writing process. This summer I learned to have more grace as I saw people as people, more and more. And while I never asked to be a stage manager, it was exactly what I needed when I needed it.

This year, there was so much growth. So much grace. So much love.

I still can’t recap it all.

I visited my old Facebook profile picture from a few hours after midnight on January 1st, 2014. It was a picture my friend, Sarah had taken last year, this time, as we were ringing in the new year together then.

“Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known.” – Carl Sagan… 

was the quote beside it because I thought it sounded nice and fit with the whole “new years theme.” Little did I know how true it was.

Something–many somethings and many someones, too–was were waiting to be known. And I got to know them only on the adventures of 2014. But the processing isn’t over yet.

Tonight, I say good-bye to 2014, but the reaping from it’s harvest, I’ll continue to remember, to cherish, and process.

Somewhere near, something beautiful is almost ready to be known.

Are You Ready?

It first occurred to me one evening in church. Exams and craziness had begun, and more were looming. And I was certainly not feeling ready.

I hadn’t been to church in a while. Two weeks, actually. And all semester I’d been pretty lacking, with good spurts here and there and many stagnant weeks. I don’t believe we’re penalized for the weeks we spend out of church. In fact, I wouldn’t even say that not attending church is a sin.  Yet there’s something about missing that makes me feel sad, and something about going that makes me feel right. More than right. Peaceful, a little bit joyous, and a lot more hopeful.

My soul was ready to be back.

But as we stood side by side, singing Christmas carols within the festive sanctuary, my heart began to ponder a question: Are you ready? It came suddenly, fleeting, and mostly unintelligible at first.

On the second round, the question was clear. The same words, seemingly created in my brain, inspired this time by the pastor’s message. Are you ready? Are you ready for Him? 

For Jesus? 

For once, I wasn’t defensive or quick to say yes. Because I wasn’t certain that I was ready and I knew that.

A year ago, if you’d ask me, “Are you ready for Christmas?” I would have replied with a persistent and quick “yes!” Are you ready for Jesus wouldn’t have even been a thought, however. If someone had tracked me down and held me into place over the matter, I wouldn’t have known what he meant.

Ready? Of course. I already did all that “heart asking” and “inviting” so many years ago.

But that Sunday night, after the hardest three months of my life, I suddenly had the knowledge to know that I did not really know. I have never known, and I will never know a lot of what I like to think that I do know. And one of those facts, these pieces of knowledge, which is really not a fact at all, but which goes like this–it’s a question, actually–are you ready for Jesus? 

I tell you, my friends, about this now because it had intrinsic meaning for me. December is the time for Christmas, for a hustle and bustle and a busy season. But as Christians, are you ready isn’t just a matter of having the turkey prepared and the presents wrapped. Are you ready is a spiritual question, and a deeper layer.

Are you ready for the Christ child, the spirit in human flesh, the incarnate deity? 

Are you ready for a miracle that will knock you off your feet? A child born of a virgin, and conceived by the Holy Spirit? A child that is both God and man? 

And are you ready for that child to possess a love so deep that it will save you? 

Are you ready to bow down? 

Are you ready to let God, Jesus, the Holy Spirit–the three in one–in to your entire being, your heart and soul and life and everything? 

Are you ready for that? I knew I wasn’t, as we sang about Angels on High, sipped coffee, and took communion.

It didn’t make me sad. Just a little thoughtful.

Christmas is overwhelming, but not just because of the elaborate turkey dinner that’s to be made or the 27 guests that are coming. The height of this overwhelmingness doesn’t have anything to do with the gift buying budget or the list of festivities to attend. It is much, much deeper than anything material. Anything we can see with our eyes.

Christmas is an invitation that began with a young girl, who was no doubt inexperienced, uncertain, and downright scared. She was invited into a very special relationship with God, unlike any other before her. It would transcend her body, her soul, heart, and mind. It was a relationship meant for everything, and an intimacy reaching to the very depths. With her acceptance, the whole world was invited into this crazy, exuberant, uncontrollable, saving love. 

Are you ready? I didn’t know why I wasn’t. I still don’t know why I’m not.

What is holding you back? I don’t pretend to know even an ounce of it all. But I know there is a fear–of knowing and of being truly known. Vulnerability is desirable, but fearsome, too. The thought of being naked sickens me, but the vision of being known and loved in spite of everything and anything, and in all the nothingness I am, is immeasurable. 

He says come in. He whispers, Let me near. I love you, and I want to be part of you. 

What is holding you back?

The 25th is coming. We remember the story and the life birthed to us for eternity. The gift to know, and be known through and through.

Will you take it?

Note: THANK YOU for all of the positive feedback to my return to the blogging world. I really appreciate all of the warmth and encouragement. I realized something from it all, and I thought I’d share it with you. Your comments are very important! I’ve actually known this for a while, but I never wanted to admit it because I thought it made me shallow. I’m seeing things in a different light now, and I’m not afraid to admit that I love hearing from you! Feedback, in any shape or form, is very welcome and actually really helpful. It keeps me going with the writing, if I know people want to read more… disagreements and queries are also welcomed as I love to go deeper with thoughts. Thank you!

Time To Write Again

I used to write a lot.

It started with yellow and black journals, filled for writing practice in my two student home school.  However, I didn’t always enjoy writing there, where the latest grammatical concept or spelling word didn’t necessarily come easily.

But then there were the ‘side notebooks,’ created for pleasure during quiet time. Filled with pictures of stick figures and scribbles, history facts gathered from Liberty’s Kids, and ideas that could not be forgotten. My deepest, darkest secrets. The feelings that I didn’t necessarily want out, but which needed to find a place in. Writing was their way of doing that, my why of figuring, of learning when I didn’t know how.

Notebooks graduated to documents on a laptop when I was twelve and Mom trusted my typing skills. I was absolutely thrilled. Now it wouldn’t take so long to get my thoughts out, and maybe I’d actually finish something. You see, my childhood scrawling never really developed in the notebook and I was quite disappointed, since I was supposed to become an author as soon as possible.

Now when I look back, my memories are filled with words, in addition to the photographs and pictures that most people have. And sometimes, those words are what create the pictures and the videos inside my head. I am grateful for writing, and I love the words I have.

~~~

I’ve been staring at documents–empty, full, partially filled–for the past three and a half months. Two papers, weeks of journals, a dozen show responses, half a million emails (and I’m not kidding!), four write-an-essay-exams, some devised and revised theatre, and one script analysis later, and I leave semester five with lots of written proof that I was there. It’s maybe more akin to the yellow and black journal I once held in grade school, yet it’s still writing. Writing still helps me in the same ways it always did, and through it, I am able to help.

But it’s time to really write again. Here. And in the notebooks and Word Documents, waiting to be filled. I like to think of schoolwork as just a practice for the real things yet to come.

It’s time to unload the stories, which have been stored up in this tired brain for the last three months. It’s time to reflect and process and remember. It’s time to write again.

It’s time to write again. I think it every morning when my “wake up reminder” rings for the tenth time, and I climb out of the covers reluctantly.

It’s time to write again, I say, crossing off one more thing from the ever growing list, and leaving an empty space for it.

It’s time to write again, I dream in rehearsal, in class, and while writing those papers.

But when I do, the words feel stiff. I press backspace much more than enter. I am tentative, shy, and utterly unsure. But why?

Was the child with her scrawling and facts and feelings? Was the young girl who could type for the first time?

Nope. If I remember correctly, there was very little hesitation, or none at best, in those writers’ hands. And that’s how the stories came to be, rough and awkward as they once were, but still they were there.

And with time, the words sweetened. But only with time spent making more words.

So it’s time to write again. For better or for worse.

~~~

This post is in commemoration of my four year blog anniversary! That’s right–I first started writing in this corner of the internet on December 18th, 2010. I used to write a lot more back then, but I like to think of this as my writing space, nonetheless. This post is also my re-inaugeration back into the blogging and writing world, after my accidental hiatus over the last three and a half months. Expect to hear more from me over the coming weeks! 

A Dance Worth Learning: Of Swing Dancing & Faith

 Photo Credit

The lights go down and the music begins, loud, quick, and perky. I stand on the side in my pretty dress, waiting, hoping for someone — anyone, mostly, though hopefully one who can lead me well and make good conversation — to ask me to dance with him.

Soon enough, he sweeps me up with his expected request, “Would you like to dance?” He reaches out one arm for me to take and we find a spot on the crowded dance floor. His hand goes to my waist, mine to his shoulder, our other hands intertwined.

“I’m Elizabeth,” I say and he introduces himself, too. We talk a bit, but mostly we just dance. He leads me beautifully, giving me grace I never knew I had.

“Ugh, sorry, I’m not very good at this,” I explain, embarrassed, when I falter.

“It’s OK. Don’t apologize.” He smiles to assure me it’s alright.

Feel don’t think. Release don’t control. Give don’t hold back.

I remember and begin again, feeling, releasing, giving, and suddenly I’m floating on musical air, moving in ways I never thought possible for any person, let alone graceless, awkward, and uncoordinated old me.

The song ends and he dips me. I let my body fall to the side he leads it, resting in the sole control of his strength. It is scary and exhilarating. That dance is finished. We thank each other and part ways, the smiles still living on both our faces as we look for new partners.

 

To tell you the truth, dancing scares me more than a lot of things. It’s something I’ve been around my whole life, and because of that, I have this built-in shame from all the memories of getting it wrong. It’s like I don’t remember a time when I ever got it right in the realm of moving my limbs to music.

And so it’s hard for me now, at twenty even, past the childhood years and teenage awkwardness. My memories haunt me in the church halls, the classrooms, and the theatre floor, as if they were happening all over again. Sometimes I can’t take it anymore. I can only move to the music for so long before I have to go relax or even cry.

I was never able to explain it till this April, when these fears really began to meet in conflict with the need to dance and the need to be. In tears, I began to explain to others and to myself. But it still felt like it was too late. The dance call had come and I’d done as poorly as ever, yet I knew it wasn’t just that. Beneath it all, there was a river of tears and I let them out, agonizing forever over the strange pain I felt. The movement I’d been forced to distribute had caused this unquenchable pain, I was sure. From then on, I vowed never to do what I couldn’t, never to move to the music and ignite this pain again.

Because this shame and pain and utter exhaustion would always be there, whether in the church halls, the classrooms, or the theatre floor. And the pain, I decided was just not worth it. 

 

I don’t remember how it started — probably with a text from my friend, Holly. She asked do you want to go swing dancing and I thought about it for a while and decided Sure, I’ll go make a fool of myself because it was sort of fun when I went before. I took a risk and gave up my vow in part. “This is different,” I decided.

I wasn’t good right away, but I found that I wasn’t entirely bad either. I still had trouble with the same old things — coordination, rhythm, remembering what to do, and getting so nervous I forgot the steps.

But I began to find comfort in the fact that I was a follow, and if I could depend on my lead, everything would be alright. Some leads swept me off my feet and I felt as if I were flying through galaxies and worlds of jeweled sunsets, and flowing waterfalls.

I began to feel more than I thought. A slow release occurred as I let go of bits and pieces of my beloved control. And I started to give openly and with courage.

 

Some days, I feel like I’m losing hard battles. My head becomes a maze, and beyond the joys and beauty of life, I feel tight and hard.

I’ve realized that I have this mountain size need for control. I don’t know where it came from, yet I’ve come to see where it is leading me and it is a place of more restlessness and battles and discomfort.

It is not worth the shame and pain, I’ve learned.

 

“You dance gracefully,” he said before bowing and departing after our song had finished.

I almost laughed in his face. Instead, I stuffed my laughter with a smile and a gracious, “Thank you.” Another boy asked me to dance and as we did, I pondered the last leader’s words and my heart soared.

When you hear something, whether good or bad, you begin to believe at least part of it. And this was the summer I began to believe that peaceful living is a dance that I can learn, a beat that I can swing to, a rhythm that I can find. Because even though my heart filled with shame in every church hall, classroom, and theatre when the music began and the dancing started, when the lights went down in the dance hall, I could only feel a very peaceful kind of joy that held room for more.

And faith is a dance, too. One I’d like to fall more and more in step with everyday.

 

This summer, I’ve realized that I like to lead way too much. And I’m really not very good at it. Well, not at the kind of leading I try to do. The control I try to take. The unnecessary worries, and big, unneeded plans.

“If you want to lead, that’s fine but go to the other side,” a dance instructor said to the follows at the last lesson.

I’ve been trying to lead from my follow’s place, but this leader’s position is not one I can take. Life and faith are dances, too. Dances in which I must follow and surrender and most of all dance without abandon. 

 

I went swing dancing for my twentieth birthday. To most, that would merely seem fun, cool, or interesting. Only I and a few others know the true significance of choosing to do that activity on my special day. It was something I wanted to do, and chose firmly and freely. That makes me laugh and almost want to cry at the same time.

On my birthday in particular, my limbs loosened and my heart felt truly light. I began to really dance without abandon, follow without leading, and fall in love with something worth caring for.

I’ve found dance to be a great analogy for faith. God leads; we follow. He creates and we create out of His creations.

God invites; we accept. We enter in to a covenant of many, many dances. Some are tricky, messy, and odd. All are beautiful.

His hand’s at my waist, mine’s at his shoulder, and our other hands are intertwined. Locked together in an unbreakable embrace. His breath’s in the music, in the movement, in my tangled steps, my graceful ones too, in every spin and dip and jump.

The pain and the shame weren’t worth it, but the dance was one worth learning with the Father of dance to lead. 

On Becoming Hard

She’s tangled her lips into a burrowed frown again, staring at the morning’s news, clearly unimpressed. Nearing ninety, the elderly lady still has her opinions, strong and bold as ever. 

“Always has to be newer and better,” she grunts before stalking off with the newspaper crumpled in a roll underneath her worn and wrinkled hands. 

She is petite and aged, worn around the edges as some would say, garnered with a consistently furrowed brow and rough, weathered smirk. Lined and hard–hard to know and hard to be known. 

 

I hear them criticize — the new ways, mostly and the new people. The “kids” who are really adults and should be acting like “adults” even though they are “kids”. I sip my coffee, trying to choke back laughs and text inconspicuously, a book hidden in my purse for later.

But sure enough, they catch my phone with their watchful eyes and criticize me now, citing the evils of technology and of course, the utter ridiculousness of updating your friends on what you are doing at every single minute of the day.

They laugh at their jokes and complain some more — about the hard chairs they’re sitting on, the hard days of work, the hard block of frozen spaghetti for lunch, currently de-frosting on the table. Sipping more coffee, they continue to talk in their hard, foreign ways, as I slip out the door. 

 

I notice him smile as I say good morning. It’s just a slight smile yet it brims to the corners of his mouth. I never remember noticing it before — I always figured he was just a grumpy, no nonsense type of older gentleman. 

But I notice the smile, soft at first, again and again and again, growing warmer just like the sun on these hot summer days. Soon he’s returning my good mornings and hellos. I wonder if I was wrong about him back then when I proclaimed him ‘no-nonsense and grumpy.’ 

His features are still weathered and hard and I bet he could tell me a lot of stories of a long life of labour and toil. But he smiles at me through the lines of an aging face and I see the life that’s in him still, that’s in us all until we die. 

 

They probably married young–those ladies sipping coffee on hard chairs. Eighteen, nineteen, twenty, or maybe twenty-one. My age, they were all blooming young brides, basking in the light of their bride grooms’ gentle smiles. All white, beautiful, beloved. Love softens us, they say. 

But before that date, they were even softer, waiting for love. They must have grown from soft, pink baby to bright eyed little girl, pig tails flying, to a fresh and beautiful young woman, long hair clipped up. They must have picked flowers, memorized words for spelling bees, baked birthday cakes for younger siblings. Went to church in their best dresses, and blushed when the handsomest boy winked in their direction. 

And then when the handsome boy met her at the alter, she likely smiled more than ever. The babies came soon after–soft, pink, and fresh, with the life we’re all created with, the life we hold till we die. The life that was meant for eternity. 

I realize that this is not all there is and was. The complaining and criticism of youth, and hardened smiles. At one time, they were as youthful as I — probably smirking at their own parents’ and grandparents’ harsh commands and comments. 

We are all born soft and pink, fresh and young. And so I wonder, what makes us become hard? 

 

Months pass into a year. I’ve matured a bit — hardened even, myself. But I have more patience, endurance, and even, love. Does that come with being hardened? 

I become privy to different, harder conversations. About walking an hour to town, houses falling at the bombs of the enemy, little legs flying to bomb shelters, and loved ones dropping dead. I suddenly see so much within the lines of their hardened faces, and wonder how I once missed what is now so evident. 

Hardship. Pain. Utter devastation. 

That is how we harden. 

Experience. Endless toil. Death and desperation. 

That is how we harden. 

Long suffering. Tears left unwiped. No conclusions for our grief. 

That is how we harden. 

Yet within the lines, I now see a surprising beauty and a long hidden joy. It’s mixed with a new found courage and bravery and I develop respect and admiration, the more I notice. I see the softness within, still there after all these years — they’re still the babies, the flower picking girls, and the June brides, little boys longing for adventure, and winking young rowdies as well as the hardened women and men, living a midst the pain and continual tread of life. 

 

The softness lies within. You will find it if you look hard enough. 

The hardness has become a shell to protect, in many cases. A relief, a disguise. But behind the hardness, there is a garnered wisdom. A learnt renewal, and a cloudy resurrection to come. 

How do we become hard? The tread of years, the changes, the griefs, and unanswered prayers. 

But do we ever really become hard? We are all children in God’s sight, and His softness and mercy can be enough for us. 

Friday Favourites: # Round 2

Only three links this week–there’s lots of good stuff out there, but I just haven’t had enough time to read, sadly.

In Which Depression Is NOT Your Fault — In the wake of Robin Williams’ sudden and tragic death, which rocked the world this week, there have been a lot of Facebook statuses, tweets, blog posts, articles–you name it–on suicide, depression, and mental illness. I’ve been sorely disappointed at the ignorance and mercilessness expressed by many Christians. However, this article by aspiring author of the recent book Jesus Feminist and blogger, Sarah Bessey captures the compassion and Christ-likeness those who are suffering need from us.

Why Courtship is Fundamentally Flawed — Most of you probably already know I’m not the biggest fan of courtship. Some of you, my readers, are, and some of you aren’t. Whatever side of the fence you stand on, I encourage you to read this (long) but informative and insightful article by Thomas Umstattd Jr., professional speaker and former courtship advocate. He takes us back to the picture of our grandparents time when “going on a date” literally meant going to a movie or having ice cream with someone of the opposite gender. Umstattd graciously points out the weaknesses of the courtship model we have righteously idealized in the Evangelical home school community for the past few decades, and sheds some light on other options.

3 Reasons You Need To Stop ‘Saving Your Heart’ — Along the same lines as the former post, I thoroughly enjoyed Taylor Turner’s article over at Inside Magazine. With, wit, humour, and insight, Taylor reveals three reasons why you may just want to stop saving your heart for that knight in shining armour (or princess with a white veil).

Happy reading!