What We’re Reading: 2018 edition

It’s been a while since we shared our favorite titles! Some of these are books we read quite a while ago and I never got around to recommending, and some are still fresh in my mind. I will try keep my words to a minimum, and in some cases I might just include a favorite quote from a book and cross my fingers in hope that you will be inspired to read it.

Over the past year, I’ve felt especially compelled to learn more about the lives of people who are marginalized, to listen to a new set of stories.… Continue Reading

Living in Weakness: My Story of Anxiety

“Live leaning in when the pain is fierce

Oh, the bow, it will break at his coming

Stand who can understand the design

The refining holy fire.

Oh, gracious light. Oh, gracious light

I have been walking, walking so long, in darkness.”

(Sandra McCracken, Oh, Gracious Light)

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There is an episode of Call the Midwife, where an elderly woman with a gynecological malady (I can’t remember what) comes in to the clinic asking for help. The midwife calls a doctor to assist, and the doctor diagnoses an ongoing disorder.… Continue Reading

Eden and My Girls

Elise is wide eyed at everything, from the start of each day. Her wide eyes search me out in the morning hours, and she is keen to touch my face as she greets me. In fact, she touches every face she can reach, no matter how unfamiliar the face. To her, every person is attractive, a potential friendship.

She zealously crawls about the house, hungry to see and touch everything within reach; when she finds an item of interest, she stops to taste it and forgets all else.… Continue Reading

Lingering in Happiness

It has been rainy season here since late May/early June. The appearance of the rains is always a source of refreshment, as there has been no precipitation since November, and March-May tend to be difficult months, relentlessly sunny, in the 100s most days, and hardly any cooler in the evening. We sweat through several changes of clothes each day. The dust and the pollution increase and it gets really tough to go out with kids on public transportation. Toward the end of April I start haunting the long-term forecast websites for any sign of rain, and I tend to get a bit too hopeful if I catch a breath of a breeze or see a darker-than-usual cloud.… Continue Reading

Assimilate or Go Home | Book Recommendation

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“I had found people as different from me as the night is from the day. What I didn’t know then was that the seeds of my own blindness were orchestrating my thoughts. For, of course, in viewing our differences, I thought I was the sun and they were the darkness.”

– from Assimilate or Go Home: Notes from a Failed Missionary on Rediscovering Faith

I wanted to take a moment to praise a book I recently read, in hopes that some of you who are looking for a good read might check it out.… Continue Reading