I really appreciate the texts and emails and comments you have left for me letting me know you’re praying for me and for my family as we are facing some hard conversations (and eventually some hard decisions) about home healthcare, assisted care, etc. etc. The honeymoon phase (hah!) of the immediate medical crisis week has passed and we’re all trying to just get as much accomplished as we can, while staying patient and kind toward one another too. You know family stuff! Parts are great. Parts are hard. Nothing like family to bring out the best and the worst in us. Happily, I’ve had HOURS AND HOURS of organizing and…

It’s been so good to be here in Michigan with my mom (Kathy) and stepdad (Charlie). I’ve been able to hear first-hand from her medical team what is going on and that, coupled with my copious note taking, is freeing them up from having to keep track of all sorts of numbers and details and report back to other family members. In addition, while Charlie could head home and catch up on some much-needed sleep, I had the privilege of helping my mom through a shower, getting her tucked into clean clothes and linens, do her hair, etc. etc. So that’s great. Overall, the immediate crisis seems to have passed.…

If you are a friend of mine on FaceBook, then you already know the news that my mother is hospitalized in Michigan today and facing heart surgeries/procedures this afternoon. Here is the update I gave yesterday: Thank you SO very much for the prayers for my mom. She is scheduled for a transesophageal echocardiogram to check for blood clots on her heart and if the risks are OK, she will have an electrical cardioversion to disrupt the abnormal electrical circuits in her heart and (hopefully) restore a normal heart beat. My sister and I offered to fly out to be with her, but she asked us to wait. I am…

From Elyse Fitzpatrick and Dennis Johnson’s Counsel from the Cross: Connecting Broken People to the Love of Christ:  “The gospel of Jesus Christ—that we are all more sinful and flawed than we ever dared believe but more loved and welcomed than we ever dared  hope—is meant to be lived out in relationship: each of us assuring, reminding, confronting, counseling, and listening to one another, praying or one another, and bearing one another’s burdens. It’s here, within gospel-centered relationships, that the Spirit will reveal the Son to us.”  

Did you know that you can purchase the Kindle edition of Sinclair Ferguson’s In Christ Alone for only $.99? What a deal! Here is just one nugget from it that I’ve been meditating on for the last few days … “In his Distinguishing Marks of a Work of the Spirit of God, Jonathan Edwards draws on 1 John 4 to show that all true works of God share several features: 1. A high esteem for Christ. 2. The overthrow of Satan’s kingdom in our hearts.   3. A reverent view of, and close attention to, God’s Word in Scripture. 4. The presence of the Spirit of truth convincing us of the reality…

One of the best things about living near Chicago during my teen years was getting to enjoy the Arts—especially musicals. I loved them all, but Les Miserables was a particular favorite. Can you believe it’s been in production for over 25 years? And that there is a film version coming out this year? I just learned that from Justin Taylor’s recent post.  Can’t wait until our girls are old enough for us to read this out loud as a family! Maybe the girls can read my old abridged version in French … Mme. Henson would be so happy at that. 

It’s been awhile since we’ve had a family photo with my hair in its (normal, chaotic) au natural curly state. But this was taken on a day when I got everyone else ready and then  ran out of time to get myself ready … so here’s a fairly accurate likeness of what we look like on a normal day:  

When I met my now-husband, Fred, he was one semester into his Master’s degree in Mechanical Engineering with a secondary focus of rehabilitation engineering. The title of his thesis was Dynamic Analysis of Handrim Wheelchair Propulsion: Verification and Analysis of System and Pilot Testing. (And how fun is this? I just found his thesis online on Google books–he even has his very own QR code. Pretty snazzy!) Anyway … When we were falling in love and getting engaged and RIGHT up to our wedding (he published his thesis the week before our wedding), I spent a lot of time in his research lab, which was located in the same building…

Of course there are many important points regarding the heart, functional idolatry/wrong worship, and gospel change that this pastor does not cover in his “eight things” list.  But it’s still a great list and definitely worth the read: Eight Things to Keep in Mind in Regards to Conflict at Work/Church (HT: Z)