Words incarnate ideas. I hope mine help you love Jesus more.
The Balm of Humility
It happened while we were playing Wolves and Sheep at Bible Club. The “wolves” were tagging the “sheep,” freezing them in place. My oldest son was the “Good Shepherd” who was able to unfreeze the sheep by tagging them, and the wolves did not have the power to freeze him. Bea, a spindly seven year…
Keep readingNeedy
Runty pigs are needy. Besides food and water, they need warmth, protection, and extra medical care. Two of our sows farrowed last week, and out of nineteen piglets, one was a runt. In a Charlotte’s Web scenario, I brought the little pig into the garage. It was unresponsive, with mud plugging its nose and mouth.…
Keep readingSitting at the Feet of Jesus
This week’s article details abuse and sensitive subject matter. It is my aim to uphold the healing and comfort of Christ instead of controversy or hurt. I recommend the Association of Certified Biblical Counselors if you or a loved one would like to seek counseling on any of these topics. After her mother died, a…
Keep readingDirt Under the Table
Whenever I sweep under my dining room table, I wonder, “How could this much dirt accumulate so quickly?” I actually took the time to ponder the answer today, and the answer is that our family sits there a lot. We eat there. We worship there. We learn there. We craft there. We cry and laugh…
Keep readingAnd the Word was Rare
Summer is coming, and I recently got the calendar out to note the camps, swimming lessons, mission teams, and church events. The busy-ness of Spring gave me pause before I loaded the day squares with pink, purple, and green ink. Do I really need to be doing all these things? In my mind’s eye, I…
Keep readingReading the World
When I was twelve, I would pray the same prayer every night: Lord, send me adventure. Following Him has been the greatest adventure of all, and seeing how He weaves plot, character, and conflict has proved to me that He is indeed the “Author and Perfecter” of my faith. Perhaps that’s why I love books…
Keep readingPerspective
“What do you want to be when you grow up?” I ask the ten-year-old in my Sunday school class. “A teacher.” There’s a short pause after my slightly distracted, “Oh, that’s nice.” Then, she says, “But really, I just want God to come back.” This gets my attention. I know she’s talking about Jesus. “How…
Keep readingThe Lamb
We took a field trip to Myrvik Farms in Edmore, ND last week. Their Katahdin Hair sheep were lambing. My children held the lambs and learned about their care and routines. The gentle faces, soft hair, and wobbly legs brought the startling horror of sacrifice into stark contrast. Why did it have to be the…
Keep readingSinking Prayers
Sinking prayers twist our gut. We listened in unblinking suspense as sportscaster Dan Orlovsky prayed live for football player Damar Hamlin after he collapsed on the field. We watched in growing horror as meteorologist Matt Laubhan prayed during his weather forecast as he realized that a devastating tornado would rip across a small Mississippi town. …
Keep readingTake a Stab at Doubt
The Gospel writers all take a stab at doubt. As they write about life, they put doubt to death. A policeman in my community once told me, “You know its Spring when the first stabbing of the year happens.” I would rather think about chicks and bunnies, but his point was that people who can…
Keep readingButterfly Rules
We studied the book of Galatians in Sunday School last week. I asked the children, “Do Christians have rules?” Well, of course they do. They shouldn’t steal or lie or hit their sisters. Then I asked the children, “Does keeping the rules make them Christians?” This one was more difficult, and they scratched their heads…
Keep reading“The Winning of Lady Wisdom” #1 New Release in its Category
Adam sought wisdom in a forbidden way. When he accepted the fruit from Eve’s hand, the false promise from the enemy was still ringing in his ears: Your eyessss will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil…. We all inherited the desire to define our own good and our own…
Keep readingThe Burden of Justice
My social media feed was filled with cries for justice this week. A man was killed, and the suspect eluded authorities for several days. The community would not rest until it had justice. When I first moved to my community, I gave a young woman a ride. She was in foster care and had suffered…
Keep readingBeginning and End
“Nothing could ever matter again but the things that were eternal,” missionary Amy Carmichael’s words floated over the heads of the little girls gathered together in the church. I was telling Amy’s story of leaving her family and home to travel to India to share the Good News of Jesus. The girls from my neighborhood…
Keep readingSustaining Power
My oldest daughter has her driver’s permit. Though I use winter as an excuse to avoid letting her drive, my husband decided it was a fine time to let her drive to the city two hours away. High speeds, passing lanes, interstate on ramps, and semi trucks were included. Let me tell you, friends, my…
Keep readingBurdens the Lord Carries
At a funeral, the pallbearers carry the heavy burden of the casket, but the family and friends have the greater burden of the loss. Watching a child mourn the loss of her mother, I contemplated that burden this week. It is too heavy. It made me think of my own five year old, who fiercely…
Keep readingNew Book Coming Soon!
I am so excited to announce the upcoming release of my new novel, “The Winning of Lady Wisdom.” This book has been in the works for more than ten years, and it has been fun to watch it come to life over the past few months. Have you ever wondered what it would look like…
Keep readingDevils Lake March for Life
You might have had trouble navigating through the streets of downtown Devils Lake last Wednesday night. Perhaps you had to wait as the approximately 100 advocates for life marched together holding candles, saying prayers, and remembering all of those who have been affected by abortion. A little girl walked out of one of the downtown…
Keep readingThe Orange Peel Gospel
While we were visiting family in Florida, we had an orange peeling contest. My mother-in-law laid butcher paper across the length of the room, and our children, nieces, and nephews lined up on either side of the paper. Each child was given five oranges. They have often seen their fathers, native Floridians, peel an orange…
Keep readingPower Walkers: North Dakota Sisters Practice Resilience on the John Muir Trail
From top to bottom, the state of North Dakota spans 211 miles, the same distance as the John Muir Trail across the Sierra Nevada Mountain range. After moving to the city of Salem, Oregon, North Dakota natives Molly and Carrie Nienhuis began to miss the beauty and wildness of home. “I think…
Keep readingOut of Time
Over the holidays, aging grandparents and growing children reminded me that time never stands still. As the New Year dawns, we stuff calendars with dates and times, trying to find room for every event and appointment. A valuable measuring tool becomes an enemy on a daily basis as we race against time, fight against…
Keep reading30 Days of Peace in Christ
When driving across the country, I often push the brakes. I push them so often that my leg gets sore. The funny thing about this is that I am sitting in the passenger seat. How often do we try to take over even when something is out of our control? For me, it is too…
Keep readingChrist’s Gift
An old ornament hangs on my tree. It says, “Baby’s First Christmas 1983.”My first Christmas happened a long time ago, and I don’t remember any gift or event from that day. However, Christ’s Gift only grows more poignant and memorable with time. “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us,” John wrote. Christmas Day has…
Keep readingThe Three R’s of Peace
An Excerpt from “Receive Him: A Disciple’s Advent” Philippians 4:4-6; Luke 2:22-40 Anna had many reasons to grumble, complain, and lament. She had been married young, but after only seven years, her husband died leaving her alone and childless. In her day and time, there was no way she could provide for herself. How would…
Keep readingPaul’s Peace
When my grandmother passed away, I inherited a unique Kurdish kilim. It is a woven hall runner with intricately made designs. When I turn it over to clean, I am always amazed at the tangles of knots and thread on the back. The artisans who weave kilims have an amazing skill.Psalm 139 tells us that…
Keep readingJames’s Joy
One of the last things Jesus told His disciples before His crucifixion was, “When a woman is giving birth, she has sorrow that her hour has come, but when she has delivered the baby, she no longer remembers the anguish, for joy that a human being has been born into the world. So also you…
Keep readingJohn’s Love
The disciple John chose a nickname for himself: the disciple whom Jesus loved. He defined himself by the love of Jesus. He knew what love was because He had known Jesus. When a woman finds out that she is expecting a baby, she often starts eating differently, exercising differently, and planning differently. You can tell…
Keep readingPeter’s Hope
1 Pet. 1:3, Mark 14:66-72, Lamentations 3:16-26 Believe it or not, a lot of people disagree on when an unborn baby is alive. Even with all our technology that shows fetal development and heartbeat, society still wrestles with the question of when a baby is a living person. In his book Discovering Design with Biology,…
Keep readingAwaiting the Birth
The wonder of birth is wrapped up in waiting. As we wait for a baby to be born, he or she is growing inside of mother’s womb. There’s a lot that happens in that time of waiting. By day 22, the baby has a heartbeat. On day 42, you might find the baby hiccuping and…
Keep readingContraire
My youngest son named our guinea rooster “Contraire.” The bird has earned it. He came as one of ten guinea chicks, and remained as one of three that escaped a mink. Sickness and a raccoon whittled down the flock until Contraire was the sole survivor. He keeps meticulous watch over the regular chickens, sounding like…
Keep readingDaily Bread
Highschool biology has opened up a new world to our family through the microscope. Recently, my daughter had to examine active yeast cells, and we all took turns ooohing and ahhhing over their beauty. When I make bread or pizza dough, I never take the time to gaze in wonder at the yeast doing its…
Keep readingThe Prison of Pot
It was 11:30 one night when my dogs started barking. A group of five boys was walking up the driveway.They called out to me, and I recognized them. I called the dogs, and the boys walked up to the house. They often came to play basketball or eat a meal. My mind raced to explain…
Keep readingThe Curator
“I acquired this piece after a lengthy court battle,” the Curator said, motioning to his left. I gazed intently at the ornate sarcophagus housed in a dimly lit display case. The golden skin and ruby eyes of the case no longer looked like the face of the dried and shrunken mummy inside it. “I really…
Keep readingThe Curator, Part 2
Goliath’s severed head, Nebuchadnezzar’s fingernails, Belshazzar’s golden goblet, and the worm-eaten corpse of Herod featured prominently in the Curator’s collection. I grew tired of hearing his gloating long before he was tired of detailing it. Finally, we had toured the entire museum. Only one exhibit remained. “Perhaps you are pressed for time. Would you like…
Keep readingThe Curator, Part 1
“I acquired this piece after a lengthy court battle,” the Curator said, motioning to his left. I gazed intently at the ornate sarcophagus housed in a dimly lit display case. The golden skin and ruby eyes of the case no longer looked like the face of the dried and shrunken mummy inside it. “I really…
Keep readingSomething out of Nothing
This week, my kindergartener and I studied Elisha and the Widow’s jars. Our Bible study routine is always the same. I get out the flannel board, and he gets out the Bible. I tell the same Bible story every morning for the whole week, and he never gets tired of it. Actually, if I miss…
Keep readingIdling
Once upon a time, there was a little boy who attended Sunday school. He grew up and died. That’s the end of the story, and there is no happily ever after. The rows and rows of faces, who were once happy little children in my Sunday school class, but grew up to be lost to…
Keep readingMade Visible
When Dr. Ian Donald was drafted into the Royal Air Force as a medical officer in 1942, he had no idea how the Lord would use the knowledge he gained using sonar and radar. In 1946, he was discharged from military service and awarded for his bravery during the war. He returned to practicing medicine.…
Keep readingThis is the Work
Last week, my kids got vaccinations. As the nurse set out the band-aids and calmly talked us through the process, I appreciated her efficiency and adeptness. Later that same day, my son had football practice. It was raining. The coach, who arrived before anyone else, put on his rain gear and got ready for the…
Keep readingCultivating Meaning
As soon as I make a cup of tea, it cools and I drink it. It isn’t static. It doesn’t grow warmer nor does my cup refill itself. The modern mind suffers under the delusion that everything is improving all the time even when we have hard evidence to the contrary. I have been enjoying…
Keep readingCatalytic Converter
Yesterday, someone asked me if I was a teacher or a student. As a home educator, I can proudly answer, “Both!” The kids and I did a science experiment this week that still has the wheels of my brain turning. In Jay Wile’s Science in the Industrial Age, he details the life and work of…
Keep readingThe River Road
If we hurried in the morning, we would have a few extra minutes to take the river road to school. Of the two routes, it was preferable. U.S. 1, flanked by used car dealerships and run down gas stations, was cluttered with cars and offered no enticing scenery. However, Indian River Drive wove alongside the…
Keep readingIn Deep Water
Swimming lessons had us at the pool more often this summer, and the most common phrase I heard there was “Don’t go so deep!” Why are children allured by deep water? They splash and play happily, all while edging closer and closer to that moment when the level of the water will be above their…
Keep readingPressed
These are the flowers I picked with my grandmother when I was 3 years old. It was 1987. We picked some wildflowers from beside the road as we walked and chose cultivated varieties from her garden. Then, she showed me how to press them between pages of newsprint in her flower press. If she hadn’t,…
Keep readingSurrounded by God’s Shouts of Deliverance
My children and I recently visited the On-A-Slant Mandan Village at Fort Abraham Lincoln in Mandan, ND. We had fun exploring the round houses and marveling at their construction. In the models of the village as it was in the early 1700’s, there is a long palisade along one side. As I looked at the…
Keep readingSwallowed Up
If Fairy Tales are any indication, one of mankind’s worst fears is being swallowed up. Little Red Riding Hood, The Three Little Pigs, Hansel and Gretel, and The Gingerbread Man all include antagonists who will swallow you in one gulp, one bite, or one meal. To be swallowed is to be consumed, to cease to…
Keep readingBigger Pots
My kids recently helped replant an aloe. They took shoots of all sizes and transplanted each one into a different sized pot. Small shoots went in the tiniest pots. Larger ones needed more room. Some of the larger ones have already sent up shoots of their own and are large enough to need new pots. …
Keep readingFor the Birds
We’ve been delighted with the flurry of Baltimore Orioles visiting our bird feeders this year. My oldest son laughed when he learned that they like to eat orange slices and grape jelly. When we noticed them drinking out of the hummingbird feeders, we wondered why they had such a sweet tooth. Orioles, Grosbeaks, and Hummingbirds…
Keep readingCleansed or Consumed?
Many men work hard for spiritual cleansing. Some stoke the fire. Some bring large stones to place in the fire. Once the stones are hot, still other men remove them from the fire and pour water over them to create a great storehouse of steam. They bathe in the steam they have created, hoping their…
Keep readingSeed Potential
A seed almost gets lost in the palm of my hand. It is so small, but its potential and purpose are great. If the seed never germinates, it will never fulfil the purpose for which it was created. It will always stay the small, seemingly insignifcant piece of organic matter. However, if the seed is…
Keep readingLife, Death, and Charlotte’s Web
When author E.B. White recorded the audiobook version of his classic children’s story Charlotte’s Web, it took him seventeen tries to record the scene where Charlotte, the spider, dies. He would begin weeping. The producer would stop the recording. They would take a walk outside and then come back and try it again. Seventeen tries.…
Keep readingWhen Empty Gets Full
The time I encountered a bear while hiking, empty space mattered. I froze, calculating the distance between the bear and me, the space I judged I could throw a peanut butter cracker, and the speed at which bears can cross empty space. When the good samaritans who rescued me drove me further down the mountain…
Keep readingSteamed Clean
Last week, a young man in a black hoodie steam cleaned all the chairs at church. I’m embarrassed to tell you how filthy the chairs were. Five years of spaghetti dinners and Vacation Bible Schools accumulated in real time. The cleaner’s hoodie reads, “Left it in the Waters.” His sister gave it to him when…
Keep readingSour, Like Milk
The kids and I celebrated the end of our school year with a trip to the local dairy. The folks there transform delicious, creamy milk into many flavors of gelato and cheese. Milk, when it is good, is very good, and when it is bad, it is, well, sour. When milk goes sour at our…
Keep readingWhat can we do?
I have a nine year old. It’s been an emotional week as we’ve watched the smiling faces of other nine year olds, lost in a horrific murder, roll across our screens. What can we do to protect our children? What can we give them to prepare for such a world? We need to give our…
Keep readingOvercoming Evil One Note at a Time
A friend came to tune our piano. It was a lengthy process, as our piano has not been tuned for the entire time we’ve owned it. Each key had to be tuned to the tone it was designed to play, in addition to being tuned to its fellow keys. The tuner worked meticulously with a…
Keep readingKindness Came Looking
Prodigals break our hearts. One day, they grin toothlessly at the camera as they hold up the cake celebrating their 10th birthday, and it seems like the next when they peer at you confusedly with blue lips and skin as their body tries to process the poison of fentanyl. When you care about the prodigal,…
Keep readingYour Gentleness has made me Great
The snow has melted enough this week to be able to see the seesaw in our neighborhood playground. Soon, children will be back at play, laughing as they go up, crying when they pinch their heels or hit their chins on the way down. Yet, they all persist in loving the seesaw. It’s funny to…
Keep readingDeath in the Pot
There are some pictures too ugly to paint with words. I recently visited a friend who is homeless and suicidal. While speaking with my friend, I remembered times past when I sat beside the ICU bed of first her father and then her mother whose organs shut down after lifetimes of habitual drug…
Keep readingStar Stuff is Still Dust
American Astronomer Carl Sagan narrated Cosmos: A Personal Voyage, an award winning television series that became the most widely watched series in the history of television. In public elementary school, many students like me were shown clips of Sagan’s series, where he told us, “The nitrogen in our DNA, the calcium in our…
Keep readingParable of Grace
Soiling Your hands with my formationmuddy rivulets stained Your arms of creation,and lifeless mud I would’ve remainedbut You breathed new life and called my name.*You knew the cost when this mud would say,“I’ll be the master, though I am but clay.”You knew even then how Your words would burn,“For dust you are- to dust return.”*But…
Keep readingKeep Watching
Jesus was dead. All was darkness. The greatest surprise I ever experienced happened in the dark. My father and I were sitting on a boat in the ocean. We were far enough from land that we couldn’t see any light, and both of us were gazing toward the eastern horizon. Thousands of miles away lay…
Keep readingAll my Strength
“You just need to be strong.” In a Bible study with incarcerated women, I often heard this exhortation from one to another. It was a vague admonishment to resist emotion and put up a block wall to seal out the tragic, terrible things they had seen. It didn’t work. Each day’s physical strength drops like…
Keep readingAll my Mind
Dementia is a frightening prospect. We watch elderly relatives struggle with how to make a sandwich, what day it is, how to get dressed, or even who we are, and fear wells up within us. We mourn the loss of who they used to be as we also dread the possibility of…
Keep readingAll My Soul
In pre-marriage counseling, I told our Pastor, “I really hate folding socks.” It’s still true today. Socks are annoying. You have to locate both of them, and then, more often than not, you have to turn them inside out. Maybe it’s my innate laziness, or maybe it’s that I don’t really care if…
Keep readingAll My Heart
“Why does God want my heart?” It was a simple question from a young child in Sunday School. But it stumped me. I had to hunt for the answer. The Greatest Commandment begins with, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart,” and it is a recurring theme throughout Scripture. But why…
Keep readingWhere the Lord is at Home
So many children’s books have to do with home. From Little House on the Prairie to A House is a House for Me and from Sweet Home Alaska to The Hobbit, the search for a place of comfort and belonging is universal. So many of the children I have discipled have no…
Keep readingThe Verbs of Sin
Verbs stick out. They help your mind connect with what you are reading or listening to. Have you ever noticed the verbs of sin? Crouch, ensnare, separate, consume, harden, heap, and bring forth death make me want to run the other way. However, when sin is still only a temptation, I often…
Keep readingBringing Holiness to Completion
Between Russia invading Ukraine and covid issues, problems fracture us. There are plenty of opinions but very few solutions. What if we could find all the solutions and be made whole? Isn’t that what the Ancient Greeks were looking for when they visited the Oracle of Delphi? Columbus searched for answers on every…
Keep readingThe Big Game
Tomorrow is the big game. The Bengals square off against the Rams in Super Bowl LVI. What do you think quarterbacks Joe Burrow and Matthew Stafford will be doing in the morning? Stafford, quarterback for the Rams, recently told the press, “I think you treat it just like every other game when it gets to…
Keep readingObstacles or Clear Paths
I love to snowshoe. We have had a lot of snow this year, and I have been laughing as I watch our two dogs- Baxter and Ranger- trudge through the snow. When they fall in over their heads, they whine and bark for help. I often haul them up out of their…
Keep readingRacial Reconciliation and Me
Some of my ancestors were slaveholders. Do I need to confess the sin of their active participation in the system of American slavery? My immediate reaction to this question has always been, “No!” because I don’t confess all the times they lied or cheated; however, reading John Perkins’s book One Blood: Parting Words to the…
Keep readingA Conduit for the Lord
When the Lord works in the lives of His people, He includes His people in doing the work. Pastor Steve Osage has served as a conduit of the Lord’s blessings to ministries across the Dakotas for the past twenty years, exemplifying Philippians 2:13: “For it is God who works in you, both to will…
Keep readingFlowers in the Desert, Part 2
In the Atacama Desert, three plant species can give us a tutorial on blooming in drought. Llareta, an evergreen perennial, cannot grow in shade. It only grows about 1.5 cm per year, but lives to be about 3,000 years old. The plant’s leaves grow into a dense mat close to the ground, where the…
Keep readingFlowers in the Desert
Thousands of tourists flocked to the driest desert in the world last year to see its rare bloom. The Atacama Desert on the western coast of South America boasts 500 species of flora, even though some weather stations in the desert have never recieved rain. It is known as the driest place in the…
Keep readingKnown by their Fruit
Your identity feeds your actions. I am a mom, therefore, I do laundry and cook meals. I am a writer, therefore, I sit down with my notebook and pencil everyday. I am a teacher, therefore, I plan lessons and grade papers. You get the idea. How we identify ourselves plays out in our…
Keep readingMemorize the Word
My brother-in-Christ, James, memorized Psalm 91 before he became a Christian. He was struggling with opposition, and his mom encouraged him to memorize Psalm 91 and say it whenever he was afraid. One day, he recited the whole Psalm for his neighbor, who invited James to come to church. James went. He heard…
Keep readingAuld Lang Syne
When Robbie Burns wrote down the lyrics to “Auld Lang Syne” in 1788, he captured one of Scotland’s national treasures. Scots had been singing versions of the song for two hundred years, but once it was written down, they could carry it with them anywhere. And they did. They immigrated in large…
Keep readingThe Fruit of Light
As I write this, it is the shortest day of the year. Where I live in North Dakota, that means that it will be dark for 15 hours and 44 minutes of the day. It makes the Christmas lights twinkle all the more bravely. In winter, it is also difficult to come by good fruit.…
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Sarah Dixon Young 