i was sitting innocently in our church, Re:Generation, evening service last nite, when suddenly a shot rang out... it wasn't fired from a gun. but it still felt like it hit me between the eyes. and there was nothing i could do about it. a woman called Andrea, from an organisation called 'Disarm the Dark' was invited to share a little about the work she is doing in anti-trafficking. one line she said really just [...]
Nothing can prepare you for that moment when your perfect world is shattered into 1000’s of little pieces. When you receive that phone call to say that a part of your heart ‘”didn’t make it”… My sister, first team swimmer had drowned in a freak accident, walking around our pool, having a seizure, falling in and waking up in the arms of Jesus. Lauren and I were more than just sisters, we were the [...]
Grief is such a huge and too often taboo topic, possibly because different people grieve in different ways and so it is often hard to know what to say or do when someone has lost someone they love. We have already looked at some powerful stories from people who have lost a baby and those who have lost a child, but what about someone who has lost a person who has been in their life [...]
When I started thinking about having children and even long before.. I would never have guessed that the word abortion would ever be part of my vocabulary. I am definitely pro-life, and have been an active advocate against abortions, even doing speeches and presentations on the matter. I always thought that it was a black and white issue, and I am sure that for most people it still might be… I kind of wish that [...]
We read the story of Jade and Sean as part of the Marriage Year 4 posts and Jade was so inspired by taking time to reflect on her marriage that she invited her folks to do the same and so we have this stunning post by her mom, Shelley. Deon and I were married on August 30 1986, which means we have been married for 28 years this year. I would love to say it [...]
The death of a baby or child is forever life changing in every way that you can imagine, or maybe you can not imagine. I must have heard this a million times, “I can not image how you handle this; I would not be able to handle it.” Who wants to imagine the death of their baby or child, No one I know and neither did I. But I found myself in that very real [...]
Married 15 years this year... "It's important to remember that there is a difference between being an awesome team and an awesome couple. Teams can work well even if the teammates don't connect on a deeper level." As time goes on, the roles and job descriptions for everyone in your family unit sets in. Who sorts out the kids lunch, who buys the milk, who pays what bills, who handles the social calendar…after a while it [...]
DAY 8 Woke up to some really bad news this morning. A close friend had suffered one of the hugest losses imaginable. Task: Weep with someone who is weeping. If you don't know someone personally that is weeping, then pick up a newspaper or go and visit a website, because there is enough corporate weeping going on that you can join - the families and friends of the missing airplanes, the people in the various [...]
When my friend Deborah's post on 'What my Single Friends would like their Married Friends to know' hit 1000 views, i figured that people were interested in what she had to say and so it would be worth seeing if she was up to writing a piece for the Taboo Topic on Singleness and turns out, she was... Stages of Singleness When I was 18 years old, I attended my very first Singles Camp. Contrary [...]
wait, what it's only day 5 and i already don't want to write another one? i realised last nite that a huge danger of coming up with 40 days of Lent observance activities is the creativity of the idea usurping the actuality of the practical nature of the observance... wait, are you actually going to do that? that's a lot of thankfulness and gratitude you're calling the people to [in day 3's Lent Observance] two days [...]