The Land Between, a sermon. And a confession.

  https://youtu.be/nn5cvHhXdvk "This is too much. I can't carry it anymore." Uffda. These are words that split my heart wide open this morning. This is where I've been, in "The Land Between." I've been wandering in the desert, "The Land Between," these last almost two years as I've sought to help lead our church through...

Don’t be afraid. Just believe.

This short little verse is referring to Jesus speaking to a father who’s just been told his daughter has died. He sought out Jesus for healing, waited for Him to show up, fell begging at his feet. He made it to Jesus and Jesus began to go along with him. As Jesus and Jairus try...

The crashing waves of grief

I'm fighting the waves of grief today. I was going to say there was "no rhyme or reason," but that's not the truth. The truth is my mom died, and I am grieving. I miss her. My heart hurts, and I ache with longing. This past week was filled with some pretty incredible highs, moments...

Ask me about my children. Yes, even the one that died.

It's awkward. Trust me, I know. I realize you're uncomfortable. I realize you don't know what to say. I get it. I was there once myself. I, too, used to shake my head and whisper, "I can't imagine" as news of the unthinkable reached my ears, news of a child who had died. But now...

The Death Cry

Christian singer Toby Mac dropped a new song on Thursday. It is eerily comforting and all at once heartwrenching and sad. It is a song born of grief after the sudden loss of his 21 year old son Truett, the oldest of their five children, just two months ago, November 2019. I have had it...

My decade in review

God was faithful. God remains faithful. As we step into 2020 today, January 1st, the reality of the mundane tasks of life in a new year, like letting the dogs out to go potty, struck me. Just mere hours earlier, millions of inhabitants of planet earth looked with joyful anticipation, expectation, and hope toward a...

Christmas 2019

I posted a few thoughts on Christmas to my Grieving With Hope Facebook page. With joy and grief, Angie

Children Aren’t the Only Ones Who Cry Themselves to Sleep at Night

Why is it we who grieve seem to believe that crying oneself to sleep at night as an adult is strange or somehow abnormal? Why is it we think there's something wrong with us if we sob ourselves to sleep as grown-ups? I never pictured myself crying myself to sleep as an adult. I never...

Holding onto hope and light through tears

I’ve now lived the equivalent of half his lifetime without him. I no longer remember the intimate details of his life; the memory of his scent, his voice, his walk have faded over the eight years that have passed. Sometimes I even wonder, “Did he really exist?” because it’s been so long since I’ve seen...