I was told recently and randomly that I’m a hard nut to crack.
The same week I marveled at how the pecans fall from opened wooden flowers high in the trees surrounding my house leaving nuts with yet more layers to be broken into by squirrels for nourishment.
The same week I grabbed a handful of those nuts and set them in a glass dish next to the kitchen sink where I’d be sure to see them clearly quite often and then took this picture.
The same week I happened to read…
I walked into my husband’s office to look through every single shelf seeking a book title that might touch my heart. My husband has two offices, each with walls covered with books. To be married to a man who loves books as much as I do is a dream come true. His books are organized neatly in rows according to subjects. It’s a far cry from my office with books scattered, piled high, and teetering about to fall over. I don’t always know exactly what I’m looking for…
With the recent ice storm in the midwest, I was reminded of these amazing images I was able to capture a couple of years ago and the thoughts that they triggered. Join me this week on a post from my past?
“Those ice cakes may have traveled all the way from South Dakota,” my dad said as he clicked away on his camera.
The Missouri River runs through my town carrying ice cakes with it toward the gulf. My dad, the kids and I explored it. We watched the cakes quickly race…
A friend approached me in tears recently wondering how to go forward after a major loss in ministry due to someone else’s heartbreaking moral failing. This loss tempted my friend to despair and even consider leaving her ministry. Because I’ve experienced my own losses in ministry, my heart remembered the deep-rooted truths that got me through. My heart surprisingly leaped with joy and moved me to say, “RUN…RUN TO JESUS!!!”
“RUN…RUN TO JESUS!!!”
Because we are fully capable of turning inward toward doubt and despair, run to Jesus!
Because we…
“You will keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on you, because he trusts in you. Trust in the Lord forever, for the Lord God is an everlasting rock.” -Isaiah 26:3-4
This is a call to be centered on the Lord in the midst of life’s hardness. When it’s hard, He is harder. I mean that in an encouraging way. He is a rock. A steady, unmoving place to place our feet. A rock that doesn’t cause us to stumble, but keeps us from stumbling. I want to…
I know a true warrior and her name is Kelly Balarie. She wars against fear and she also wars for encouragement in faith, hope, and love. I don’t know about you, but I need people like that on my side! That is why I want to introduce her and her new book, Fear Fighting, to you as she guest posts here this week:
I woke up in the middle of the night, my mind tossing and turning worse than my body had been ten minutes ago.
Everything hit me at once: I‘m…
A Christmas word problem for you:
There is a busy woman who has 1,000 anxious thoughts about the upcoming Holiday season.
She entrusts herself to the Lord and casts all of her anxieties on the Lord as she prays and gives thanks.
What does that equal?
Mathematically we would obviously say that she then has zero anxious thoughts. We all know that is just too good to be true. In the real world, the anxious thoughts will replenish themselves quickly or new ones will appear. As in The Gremlins, a movie I watched years ago;…
I’m revisiting my dream of writing and reminding myself of the truths in this old post from last year…
Do you have a dream?
God has made you and molded you in your life circumstances for certain gifts, longings, desires and passions. Often times, these stir in our hearts and minds for years and months before we take real steps toward living them out.
I’ve had a longing to write and create pictures since I was a little girl. I remember at about age four or five I would trace the pictures…
It’s that time of year when I begin to sense a shift. Even though it’s not officially fall, pumpkin latte selfies are on the verge of being the rage. Back to school pictures on Facebook pop up in my feed, I find it really is the time to stock up on school supplies, and I see, once again, that I really do get the drive to homeschool again. I’m willing to bet that most of us are ready for a new season with pantries filled with pumpkin pie filling…
Long walks and bike rides have been P.E. at the Jung Homeschool this week. Warm days and new spring life sprouting up and down the sidewalks from our house to the downtown riverfront call us outdoors. We respond with a passion, a camera, bikes and a scooter.
I remember why spring is my favorite season. Warm air, sunshine and flowers deliver joy and hope.
New life all around me. It calls me to step, more easily, into joy.
Do I realize, though, that…
