Sanctified not Sanctimonious

Social Media is this generation's technology tool that many struggle with how best to use. To provide context, in my generation, it was the TV. Social media has brought down leaders, rebuked citizens, notified us of prominent deaths prior to regular news outlets, shared the gospel, and highlighted areas that warranted our attention. But one of the things it has also done is made us all more self-focused to the point that reality is blurred. We see most people boasting - about their families, their accomplishments and their good deeds online. Sometimes I feel like a voyeur because so much of what is posted is not for public consumption. A lot of it feels like bragging, even humble bragging which is just a

Making Your Marriage Last Through Hard Times

I have a friend that I chat with regularly who has been married for 43 years. That’s a lifetime! I always enjoy our times together because whenever the conversation turns to anything marriage-related she smiles because she’s been through it all, and then she always reassures me. The things that come up are not earth-shattering, just things that are par for the course but that can become burdensome if our perspective is skewed. Things like dealing with adult children, or the empty nest phase, or just day-to-day stuff.

The Sound of New Beginnings

As a little girl in the Caribbean, I never experienced the distinctive beauty of four seasons. So in my fertile imagination as an avid reader, I imagined what each season was like and how I would experience it if given a chance. When my family moved to New York in the spring of 1978, with its promise of new beginnings came my opportunity to confirm my thoughts about the seasons.

When we emigrated, there was nothing spring-like about that time of year except the calendar, since New York had recently experienced one of the worst snowstorms in its history. I distinctly remember the cold, being woefully underdressed and ultimately frostbitten. I saw other kids playing outside at recess though there were piles of melting snow around the playground and instantly decided that spring was not what I envisioned and therefore it was not for me.

10 Most Popular Christian Hymns (and Why We Love Them)

I love hymns. The lyrics usually minister to my soul, the melodies are moving, and the repetition – verse chorus, verse chorus, verse, chorus or a slight variation of this theme are soothing. There’s a solemnity and dedication that underlies most hymns that makes me pause as they usually bring me to a place of introspection and reflection on life and what it means to serve a big God no matter what life throws at me. In this day and age, you might be made to feel that hymns are for old folks, but that’s not true.