I Want to Walk on the Water

"The fear of man lays a snare, but whoever trusts in the Lord is safe." — Proverbs 29:25 Whose voice has the greatest influence over your life? It's a question worth asking. Throughout Scripture we find people who knew what was right...yet chose another voice. Not because they were ignorant. Not because God hadn't spoken. But because, in a moment of fear, pride, anger, or the desire to be accepted, they valued another voice above God's. The Bible calls it the fear of man. The fear of man can look like a lot of things. Sometimes it looks like keeping the peace. Sometimes it looks like wanting to fit in. Sometimes it looks like protecting our reputation. Sometimes it looks like wanting everyone to like us. Sometimes it even disguises itself as wisdom or kindness, but at its core, the fear of man is simply valuing other voices more than God's. It's allowing the opinions, expectations, approval, or rejection of people to carry more weight than what God has alr...

Grief. Feels like a shipwreck.  One moment life is familiar. The next, you're floating in waters you never expected to navigate, surrounded by pieces of the life you once knew, reaching for whatever you can find just to stay afloat. Then the waves come. One after another. Relentless. Threatening to pull you under before you've caught your breath from the last one. If you've ever walked through deep grief, I don't have to explain those pictures. You know them. You've lived them. I know them, too. Not your story perhaps, b ut I know what it feels like to have life change in an instant. To wonder how you'll ever move forward. To question whether you'll ever feel whole again.  Somewhere along the journey—maybe not immediately, but eventually—a different question begins to surface. "Why?" Why did this happen? Why now? Why them? Why me? If we're honest, we're often searching for the purpose of our pain, but over the years  I've come to know ...

One of the most breathtaking sights in the ocean is watching a humpback whale feed. Scientists call it lunge feeding . The whale surges upward, opening its mouth nearly ninety degrees as the expandable pleats beneath its jaw stretch like an accordion. In one incredible gulp, it takes in an enormous amount of water and food. Then something remarkable happens.  The whale filters everything it has taken in.  It keeps only what will sustain it.  The rest is released back into the sea.  As I watched this magnificent creature, I couldn't help but think... "There's a lesson here." The funny thing is, this journey didn't actually begin with a whale.  It began in  Proverbs.  For thirty chapters, Proverbs repeatedly warns us about our mouths.  Guard your tongue. Don't gossip. Don't lie. Don't speak recklessly. Don't answer before listening. Then, almost unexpectedly, the final chapter changes direction.  Three times we're told to open our mouths. "...

People have asked me, "So what's your story?"  And I think to myself, well, t he highlights reel would look something like this... My father died of heart failure just before my 21st birthday and that sent me reeling. I was divorced by the age of 22, divorced again in my thirties, and spent eight years as a single mom raising two daughters. I nearly died giving birth to one of those daughters. Nearly died from a ruptured appendix. And now, decades later, I find myself navigating my own heart failure journey. I've started businesses that failed. Started over more times than I can count. Got remarried and spent the last ten years of life with my husband, navigating the beautiful and sometimes messy whatevers of a blended family and now we're building a YouTube channel. Those details are true. There were times when I nearly lost myself in the grief, the heartbreak, the disappointments, and the labels others placed on me, b ut maybe that was the whole point.  Maybe Go...

🌊 Bid Me Come Closer: Notes From the Journey  I've always loved movie soundtracks.  Not because they're pretty background music.  Because they help tell a story. Think about movies like The Patriot .  Sometimes the music feels like a battle cry!  A reminder of what's at stake and a  call to keep moving forward when the fight seems impossible. Then there's Rocky.  Remember those training scenes?  There was no better music than when Rocky started preparing for the fight. This season of my life has both.  Some days feel like a battle.  Other days feel like training.  Either way, this season has a soundtrack.  Actually, a revolving soundtrack. Some days I need encouragement. Some days I need a battle cry. Some days I need to declare victory before I can see it. Some days praise wells up from somewhere deep inside me because I'm simply grateful to be alive. And some days I need the wisdom of the Holy Spirit to guide decisions I nev...

🐳  Part 1 of the Lessons from Jonah series  So, I thought I was studying Jonah. Instead, I found myself. There is something in Jonah's story that feels painfully familiar. Not because most of us have boarded a ship bound for Tarshish, but because many of us know what it feels like to move in the opposite direction of what God is asking. The story begins with a simple command in the first verse of the first chapter: "Now the word of the Lord came unto Jonah..."  God spoke. Jonah heard. And Jonah ran. Not because he didn't know God. Not because he doubted God's existence. Not because he was unaware of God's voice. He ran because he didn't want to do what God asked. Scripture tells us that Jonah went down to Joppa, found a ship, paid the fare, and boarded it to flee "from the presence of the Lord."  The irony is impossible to miss. You cannot outrun the One who is everywhere.  Yet how often do we try? Sometimes we run through outright rebellion. So...