Pastor Mike Todd’s message on racial reconciliation, re-presented, is the best out there on Christians’ role in racial healing. Watch the video, read the notes, change your life.
Author: Ellie
No one is good except God (or: how I learned to stop worrying and love Black Lives Matter)
This is not about platforms, organizations, agendas, or performance. This is about all of humanity getting free from sin. Our liberation is bound up together.
O come all ye faithful
A poem about how Jesus isn’t surprised by your failure in the face of racism–and still calls you to love.
To speak truth in love, you must speak
Although white-woman-wokeness is trendy right now and I hate bandwagons, something tectonic has shifted in me, and now I can no longer balk at the fear of imperfection and conflict that has positioned me against people I love by default. It’s time to break the seal of silence and be willing to imperfectly stand and speak the truth in love.
Holy rest: the power of sabbatical
Sabbatical (noun): from the Hebrew agricultural term “shmita,” referring to a year-long break from working the land to allow it to rest and heal in God’s care rather than man’s. I have never successfully returned from a sabbatical. Every time I’ve taken a break from writing, whether personal or self-improvement or fiction, it’s ended up …
Hum if you don’t know the words
What do you do when the words don’t come? When your heart is burdened and breaking and you close your eyes to pray but nothing comes out? What then? Anything. Scream.Cry.Babble.Laugh.Breathe. Sing.Dance.Build.Paint.Write. Prayer isn’t about the words you say just like worship isn’t about carrying a tune. Your entire life can be worship; your entire …
I need an adult
As the news escalates, a previously-rare thought is surfacing more: I don’t want to be the grownup. I don’t know what I’m doing! I don’t know if it’s time to wear masks to the store or for my husband to shower when he gets home. I don’t know how to explain that the mall, …
Kingdom good isn’t the same as our good
If you must weep today, make it for joy. For this day that marks the end of death and sin.
The double ache of Jesus
Yesterday on our walk, my daughter casually mentioned she’d been praying the night before. “That’s great, baby. What did you say?” “I prayed that I don’t want to go to Heaven yet.” Every parent just got the same icicle in their heart that I did. I asked why she thought she might go to Heaven …
Known knowns, known unknowns, and unknown unknowns
There are known knowns and there are known unknowns. But there are also unknown unknowns―things we don’t know that we don’t know. When people greeted Jesus on Palm Sunday, joyfully crying “Hosanna!” they had all three kinds of facts. They knew they needed a savior.They knew they didn’t know how he’d do it.They couldn’t imagine …