Tag: love

  • Fire and Smoke

    Fire and Smoke

    There is an icebreaker question used in small groups: “If your house was on fire, what three things would you rescue?“ The sunlight began creeping down our broken blinds, making  its way into the late Sunday afternoon.  I laid on the sofa exhausted, eyelids dragging.  There was a pile of dirty laundry upstairs in my room, waiting…

  • An Exhortation from Pastor Fred

    The late Pastor Fred once counseled a younger pastor who was deeply frustrated with his people in our community who could never seem to “get it together”. “Why don’t you just love them like the father they never had?!” The love of the Father gives us an identity, a calling, and a reason not to…

  • Wait for Love Himself

    Wait for Love Himself

    [Part 4…] Lest I veer towards an overly rosy view of my growth in Christ over the past couple years of journeying towards healthcare in an inner city context, I have visual reminders of my wilderness experience, including this picture. It was early April 2012, and I was down to five part-time jobs—two counseling-related and…

  • Beyond Figuring Out

    Beyond Figuring Out

    [Part 3 in Liz’s story…] Elucidating the pieces to my calling left me feeling like someone had dumped three or four puzzles together, shaken the box, and removed pieces, leaving 500 unrelated pieces with no picture to guide me. I puzzled over the infinite combinations and variations until, like the Grinch, my “puzzler was sore.”…

  • If I Have Not Love

    If I Have Not Love

    Not going to lie, I get jealous, and what I tend to get jealous of the most is the happiness of others.  A lot of it is inspired by Facebook; as someone with a lot of Asian friends, there are plenty of pictures of food in my feed, but there is also no shortage of…

  • Can You Drink the Cup?

    Can You Drink the Cup?

    She said, “Grant that one of these two sons of mine may sit at your right and the other at your left in your kingdom.” “You don’t know what you are asking,” Jesus said to them. “Can you drink the cup I am going to drink?” October 2005 found me bewildered, tearful, and dyspneic in a hospital bed.…