What is a Wedding?
So I told my dad and my sister that I was going to get married without them there. I got married in a dress I bought off the internet. I wore heels that were a little scuffed up, ones I’d worn many times before. I got dressed without my sister to zip me. I took a moment in the bathroom alone, without my best friend asking me if I needed a getaway car.
The First Five Things I Learned as a Lead Pastor
Two years ago today – I remember it so clearly. The day I became a lead pastor. I remember laying in bed the night before, unable to sleep. I remember standing in front of that room full of people, wondering if they would accept me, if I would know what to do to lead them. I had so many ideas – so many solutions to problems that seemed so easy.
The reality was going to be so much different than what I expected.
To the Father of an Independent Daughter
She was one of those girls I’m drawn to. Messy and wild. Fire in her eyes. Grit in her spirit. She’s not the first of her type that has sat across from me, dreaming and boiling over with what God is doing in her. She’s not the first of her type who has shrugged off her relationship with her dad while swallowing her water.
Teach Us to Number Our Days
I used to play that game kids play where you hold your breath when you drive past a cemetery. Then when I was in elementary school, on a trip to West Virginia, mom took me to the carved out space in the holler where my grandmother is buried. It was jarring to see her headstone, bought by my mom’s brother when he received his first-ever paycheck. I never played that breath-holding game again.
If You Didn't Have a Mom...
Some time ago I was chatting with a friend who does ministry with college students. He said to me, “I was surprised to find that the deepest issues these students have are not that they’re fatherless – it’s that they’re motherless.”
How Do I Know My Calling?
The space you are in right now – the job, the classes, the life you’re living – your current season is not an obstacle to your real calling. It is where you are called right now.
The Beatitudes
Blessed are you who doubt – who aren’t sure – who can still be surprised by grace.
Blessed are you who have nothing to offer.
Blessed are you who keep trying and nothing seems to work.
We Said It Enough
There are those families that reserve their I love you’s like expensive candy in a jar, bought overseas, limited and finite. When it’s gone, it’s gone. There’s not enough for us to eat it anytime we want. There are those parents who have a hard time saying it to their kids or to each other.
We Didn't Talk About Women
From that moment on, most of the women I met introduced themselves as pastors. Preachers. Priests. Professors at seminaries. Almost every woman I met had a life entrenched in the ministry. Pastors were referred to as ‘she’. It felt shocking.
Your Body Matters
Your body is not just a carrying case for your soul. Your body is your soul. Of course we know that our bodies can get sick and break and we wait in hope for the resurrection and the perfect bodies we will have then. But your body now is not just a shell. Your body is sacred. And it matters.
I Failed Speech Class. Twice.
I, who now speak every weekend and am minorly sought after for other events, failed speech class. Twice.
No One is Brave
Everyone is so much braver than I am. I don’t feel brave at all. I feel scared most of the time. I feel like a faker – like if people really knew me, the real me, they wouldn’t think I was capable of anything.