But you are God, ready to pardon, gracious and merciful, slow to anger, abundant in kindness, and did not forsake them. (Nehemiah 9:17)

Jerusalem, the city meant to declare God’s name, lies in rubble on the ground. The glory of Solomon’s era has passed. Now it stands bare, lifeless, stripped, and unprotected, a shameful shadow of its former splendor. A powerhouse brought low. A chosen people scattered. A city desecrated.

Nehemiah, having heard news from afar about the beloved city, mourns over the reproach of his people. He knows that the pride and hard-heartedness of his people have caused their own destruction. Previously, God warned them of this, that if they haughtily turned away from …

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If there is one thing I want to do well, it’s rearing my children to know God's voice and love his ways. But if there is one area that I feel most inadequate in, it's rearing my children to know God's voice and love his ways, and every other little thing I’m trying to teach them under this larger umbrella, whether it’s tying shoes or polite social interactions.

I panic when I think of my children embarking into adulthood, typically because I imagine that they’ll have to call me to come tie their shoes or they’ll freeze to death because I'm not there to remind them to wear pants and coats in the winter. Or they’ll spend every waking minute in front of a video game console because I’m not the…

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When God called my husband and me to plant a church, I said yes.

My yes to church planting echoed the vow I made on my wedding day, that I would support my husband in any ministry God might give him. As he does with us all, God has not stopped asking for my yes and he has not stopped showering his faithfulness on any willingness I offer him.

Sisters, I believe this — a willing heart — is the key to our fruitfulness and joy. And yet our hearts are the very things that will be tempted and tried throughout the church planting process. Feelings of loneliness, resentment, discouragement, or exhaustion lure us to wander from Him.

The temptations are subtle but real:

• to turn to others, to…

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Unpacking in our new home in a new state far from our families, I opened a box marked Fragile in big black letters. Inside, buried under bubble wrap, I found my framed wedding vows. While I searched the master bedroom for the perfect spot where the frame could hang, I read what I had committed to Kyle on our wedding day. Just as it had when I had first written the words, my heart stopped on one line.

I vow to support the ministry that God gives you.

An Overarching Willingness

When I wrote those vows in the weeks leading up to our wedding, I read them several times, each time imagining myself speaking them on our wedding day and, each time, hesitating at the promise to support Kyle’s ca…

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Until my late twenties, I spent the majority of my Christian life striving — striving for perfection, for God’s favor, for the approval of others, and for the joy and freedom that the Bible spoke of yet completely eluded me.

In her forthcoming book, Nothing Is Impossible with God, Rose Marie Miller describes my life as she depicts her own:

The gospel was not my working theology: Mine was moralism and legalism — a religion of duty and self control through human willpower. The goal was self-justification, not the justification by faith in Christ that the gospel offers. But, as many people can tell you, moralism and legalism can “pass” for Christianity, at least outwardly, in the good ti…

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The home exists for Christ. Our marriages, our children, our physical spaces — all these are means of joyful response to Him. Through the home, we treasure Christ and show others how to treasure Him also (Titus 2:3–5; Proverbs 31:10–31).

Too often, however, we treasure the home more than we treasure Christ. As a result, what He has given as a blessing and an avenue of sanctification becomes a means of achievement or accomplishment, where our well-behaved children or our organizational abilities are an indication of our value and our righteousness. Our homes become a matter of pride, self-elevation, or comparison. And we cling to our treasure, thinking that the home is under our control, th…

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On October 16, 2006, my oldest son was diagnosed with autism. That word — autism — spoken over my son and over my life on that day sent me into a year-long spiral of grief and confusion.

One of the most difficult aspects of navigating and processing my son's autism diagnosis was being around typical kids. I noticed everything: the way they talked to other kids, the way they hugged their mothers, the way they tied their own shoes, even their interests and curiosities. In those months, I left every playdate, church event, or trip to Chick-fil-a obsessing about what I didn't have and what my son didn't do. On each car ride home, my son sat silent and staring in the back seat while I sobbed an…

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Every other week this spring, I opened my home to a group of new moms to discuss biblical motherhood. Each of them arrived with their babies and baby gear in tow, as well a palpable fear that they were getting it all wrong.

There is an inherent danger in gathering moms in a room: we immediately compare notes regarding our children’s milestones, personalities, and sleep habits. Really, though, we are comparing ourselves, wondering if we are good moms and if our children reflect that.

With the new moms, I addressed this tendency toward comparison on the first day. Until we stop comparing ourselves or telling other moms they should mother our way, I said, we will leave our time together fee…

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As a recovering perfectionist, I sometimes confuse holiness and perfection. Rather than try to reflect on God’s grace or allow its natural compelling work in my life (holiness), I try really hard to do godly things, produce spiritual fruit, and live a neatly tied-up life (perfection).

Sometimes I do this because I believe God can’t love me without my efforts, but most of the time I do this because I am trying to fulfill some arbitrary Christian standard that I think others expect of me or that I expect of myself. I feel like a walk-in freezer forever attempting to keep myself at a constant, controlled temperature.

I grow weary of myself, of maintaining my frozen image.

Sometimes, to th…

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As a mother, there is a constant, uncomfortable battle that rages inside of me. It is not the big or dramatic: Will I raise my children to love God? Will I train them to obey Him? Do my children belong to Him?

The constant battle of motherhood is more subtle, more everyday, more hideable. At the center is one question: Will I sacrifice? Or as Oswald Chambers poses in My Utmost for His Highest: "[Am I] willing to spend and be spent; not seeking to be ministered unto, but to minister?"

The Everyday Question isn't answered one time, with the birth of a child, with the planning of school, or with the decision to discipline. This question — Will I sacrifice? — is answered everyday.

It’s ans…

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