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2020: Week 10 — Remembering
Do you take the time to remember milestones in your life? How do you mark them so that you don’t forget them? Some people, like me, are journalers. For others, photos mark their milestones. Maybe it’s a collection of something else. Whatever your method, I think it’s important to reflect on where we’ve been as we look forward to the future. This week, I finished up reading Numbers and started reading Deuteronomy. Deuteronomy opens with Moses recapping the past 40 or so years to the Israelites who are preparing to enter the Promised Land. As he describes how they got to that point, I can’t help but notice God’s faithfulness…
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2020: Week 5 (sort of)
This week is a little different because we’re now officially in February! And February is Retinitis Pigmentosa (RP) Awareness Month. I think it’s been three years since I was diagnosed. The timeline is blurry in my mind because my retina specialist monitored it for about a year before RP became official. I’ve written about it before, so I won’t bore you with the details now. I don’t have any updates about my RP because it’s holding steady, praise God! I ask that you say a prayer for me, though. I’ll have my next appointment in March. I haven’t noticed any vision changes, which is a good indicator of little to…
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2020: Week 4
Is anyone else surprised that January is almost over? Where did it go?! It’s been a lovely month, even with back-and-forth weather. I like to say that the only predictable thing about Alabama weather is that it’s unpredictable. Just a few updates as we round out this month. I don’t want to be afraid to wrestle with God. I’ve always loved children’s ministry and the challenge of explaining biblical truths to them. Now that I’m teaching middle schoolers, the questions they ask are deep. Even when I don’t have the answer or the answer is difficult to understand, I encourage the kids to keep asking questions. Keep seeking God’s truths.…
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#IDontLookBlind
I recently joined a couple of retinitis pigmentosa support groups on Facebook. People with RP are sharing their stories and experiences and encouraging us to embrace this part of our lives. Nobody plans to have a disorder, and it can be difficult to cope with for many reasons, but it helps to know that we’re not alone in this. Joining groups never really occurred to me because I believed — and still believe — that God can restore my vision, or at the very least stop it from progressing beyond what I experience now. It’s what I pray for often, what I know God is capable of doing, so I…
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‘Do you know what the best smell in the world is?’
When I taught preschoolers, I never knew what questions they would ask. Ms. Elizabeth, can I get married when I’m 10? That’s old, right? Ms. Elizabeth, what does Play-Doh taste like? Ms. Elizabeth, can I have a pet whale in my bathtub? Now, I teach fifth- and sixth-graders, and most of the time their questions are easier to answer. Most of the time, the questions connect to the lesson, too. Sometimes they will answer a question before I even ask it because they know where I’m going with my train of thought. I love it. Last year, though, I was asked a question that threw me for a loop. It…
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The eyes God gave me
Growing up, I wanted blue eyes. My brown eyes were too normal for me, so I would often wish that they would change colors. It wasn’t until I learned the story of Amy Carmichael that I decided my brown eyes weren’t too bad. Amy wanted blue eyes and remembered her mother telling her that God answers prayers. So, she prayed that God would give her the blue eyes she wanted. Amy was very upset the next morning when she didn’t get what she had prayed for, and her mom explained to her that God sometimes answers “no” and that God had a reason for her brown eyes whether or not…
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When the storms come
Adversity and faith. Those topics were at the center of our young women’s Bible study discussion tonight. How do you respond to adversity? How do you keep your faith strong when you face trials? What are some situations where you find it difficult to give them to God and instead try to control them yourself? Tough questions. Questions that remind me how far God has brought me in the past three years, and questions that remind me how far I have left to go. When my family broke apart three years ago, I fought to believe that all the pain would be worth it. I told myself multiple…
