Forgotten Dream

Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? Yet not one of them will fall to the ground outside your Father’s care. Matthew 10:29, NIV

One of my favorite aspects of fall is watching flocks of birds dance through the sky in synchronized motion.

So I offer this from the work of a grandson and former student, Aaron Hildebrand. You or someone you know could be like the bird in this poem. Recognizing the broken-winged among us shows grace and shines the light of Christ in a darkened world.

Almost too easy to pass by,

Save for when it gives a cry,

Is the gentle presence of a bird.

Planted lightly in the ground,

It makes a faint yet shrill sound,

In hopes that it will be heard.

In the wind high above,

Sparrow, jay, quail, dove,

Soaring through the sky.

As if by chance or fate

This one bird must forever wait

Till eternity may pass by.

From the sadistic hand of nature

Has this poor bird been injured,

With wings so frail and delicate.

In vain attempt it tries to fly,

Not wanting to leave the sky

Now one bird more desolate.

To the surface it quickly returns,

So far away from what it yearns,

As close as it may seem.

Distant remain the fields of blue and white,

Henceforth destined to believe that flight

Was but a forgotten dream.

Photo Credit: Pixabay

Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Our new website milicomathersreads.com is accepting reviews for middle reader books–especially those written by middle school students. Message me at readgoodbooks@milicomathersreads.com or in the comments below.

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Showing the Better Way of Freedom

So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed. John 8:36, ESV

“The true value of a human being is determined primarily by the measure and the sense in which he has attained liberation from the self.” Einstein

The questions of our times: Do we look within and decide for ourselves who we are? Or do we look outside ourselves and rise to become more than we are?

The first question leads people to what they believe is freedom, but their lives become a new kind of bondage. The second leads to a life we could not have imagined on our own, yet a life that may at times be more challenging.

Do you decide or let God decide?

“There are two freedoms – the false, where a man is free to do what he likes; the true, where he is free to do what he ought.” Charles Kingsley

Many choose the false way. The true way is harder, at first. It is harder to do what we ought to do, but the reward comes later.

Having made the right choices makes life better.

We see the results of people choosing their own way, lives broken by irrevocable choices. You can’t restore the marred bodies of children and babies, of men and women.

Suicide and drug overdose deaths are at all-time highs.

In choosing the harder way, we can show others the better way.

By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another. John 13:35 ESV

True worship makes life better and helps us find freedom from ourselves, freedom in Christ.

Joe Carter writes for the Gospel Coalition: “Frequent churchgoers aren’t merely benefiting from a useful delusion or a sense of community. They are finding the relief—the psychological and spiritual relief—that comes from aligning oneself with the true and ultimate reality. What we find in frequent worship services is helping us fulfill the purpose of life, what we could call biblical happiness: to glorify God and enjoy him forever. “

Even so, choosing the harder way means more than loving those like ourselves.

But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven. For he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust. Matthew 5:44-45, ESV

Choose true freedom. Walk in the harder way. Show that way to others.

Reap the joy of living out truth.

Photo Credit: Pexels

Our new website milicomathersreads.com is accepting reviews for middle reader books–especially those written by middle school students. Message me at readgoodbooks@milicomathersreads.com or in the comments below.

Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

One Name for Three Persons

In Making Sense of Your World: A Biblical Worldview, W. Gary Phillips and William E. Brown discuss a point of faith that has perplexed Christians through the ages: the Trinity.

“The Bible is clear that there is only one God … yet this unity does not preclude statements that allow three persons–the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit–to be called ‘God’ or ‘Lord.'”

It’s a doctrine that’s clear from the beginning in the Hebrew words of Genesis.

“Then God said, ‘Let us make mankind in our image, in our likeness.'” Genesis 1:26a, NIV

Three persons referring to themselves as ‘us’ but called God–a singular term.

And this doctrine continues through the New Testament.

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning.” John 1:1-2, NI’V

Something I’d not considered before: Phillips and Brown explain that when Jesus issued the Great Commission, He commanded us to make disciples and “‘baptize’ new converts in the ‘name’ (singular)” of each member of the Trinity.

“Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.” Matthew 28: 19, NIV

A singular “name” for the three persons of one God.

They further state: “The respective roles and relationships within the Trinity present God as a dynamic fellowship rather than a static unity. God has exercised an eternal relationship of love and communication within His own nature.”

Singular names for one God comprised of three persons so unified they can correctly be called One.

We cannot fully appreciate the sacrifice the crucifixion caused, the division of persons who had never been separated for all of eternity past–and never will be again for all of eternity to come.

Our God, so big as to contain Three in One, so loving as to separate the indivisible–for us.

“See what great love the Father has lavished on us that we should be called the children of God.” I John 3:1a, NIV

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Our new website milicomathersreads.com is accepting reviews for middle reader books–especially those written by middle school students. Message me at readgoodbooks@milicomathersreads.com or in the comments below.

Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Milico Mathers Reads: Good Books for Kids

School libraries and classrooms used to be trusted sources of worthy reads for kids. Today, that’s not a certainty in a growing number of communities.

Parents and kids need information about safe, clean books for kids and teens.

Books that are windows to history, culture, faith, and virtue. Books that urge readers to look outward to others, not just inward to self.

Books that invite young people into adventures that call them to higher thinking and nobler living.

A soon to launch website (we’re looking at mid-September), www.milicomathersreads.com, will offer reviews of classroom and read-for-fun books. Students and parents can post short reviews or blurbs providing title, author, plot summary without giving away the end, information about the main character, and their opinion about the book including identifying an audience who would enjoy the read.  

At the beginning, we plan to focus on middle reader books (ages 8 through 13). You may offer a submission at www.readgoodbooks@milicomathersreads.com or in the comments below.

Kids, tell us about the book you just finished reading. Grown-ups, dust off that copy of your favorite youth read and offer your insights.

We reserve the right to determine the “window” (looking outward) value of reviewed books and to edit submissions for punctuation and grammar, and for conciseness and clarity.

Share a message about a book you love!

Photo Credit: Li of Milico Mathers

Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Little Strength, Big God

Little Strength, Big God: Discover a God Bigger than Your Goliaths is a little book with a big message.

It’s easy for us to feel overwhelmed in life, to feel that our struggle is unique in history, to be discouraged by the political sniping, growing violence, and shrinking dollars our times have come to.

Some of us face larger challenges of personal tragedies, illness, or other loss that convince us that there’s no coming back for us.

Our situations intimidate us.

As we look back on our childhood studies of Bible stories, the characters often seem larger than life, as though they had no fears, no questions. To us, they seem too confident to be real.

But if we step into their shoes, we might be able to see that they were much as we are. They faced difficult decisions. They knew what seemed to be impossible circumstances. But the heroes among them followed truth and faith.

We can, we must, be like them. We’re all human. We’re all the same, past and present.

The book’s author Debbie W. Wilson says:

“Loss and intimidation are not new to God’s people. What if you had to choose between―

“– Drowning your baby or letting your worst enemy raise him?
“– Bowing before an idol or being thrown into a fiery furnace?
“– Compromising your convictions or being tossed to the lions?
“– Living in fear or leading ill-equipped volunteers against an intimidating enemy?”

Midwives who risked death to save Hebrew babies, the heroes of Daniel including the prophet himself, Gideon leading a miniscule force against a seemingly invulnerable army were real people serving the able, present Lord.

Debbie Wilson leads us to understand the mountains biblical heroes climbed, to hold the stones they threw at giants, to see the risk to themselves they endured for the sake of honoring God.

She has a message for you in retelling these stories.

God was faithful to those who trusted Him in the past.

He will be faithful to you as well.

Coming from Debbie soon: a Leader’s Guide for this study. Check out Debbie’s other studies.

Photo Credit: Debbie Wilson Cover

Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Innovation that Kills Innocence

“Behold, I am sending you out as sheep in the midst of wolves, so be wise as serpents and innocent as doves.” Matthew 10:16, ESV

The world has transformed over the last century. Incrementally, gradually, with blips of notice and adjustment, we’ve navigated our busy lives. Technological change led the way.

A few go off the grid, rejecting a life of constant change and motion.

Some of us take a while to catch on to one innovation or another but don’t know enough about traps that shift shape with the wind.

Many of us roll along with the lava rush, embracing the most recent innovations.

All too often those caught up in that flow are kids who don’t have the needed skills to protect themselves.

Children and teens haven’t experienced life before the explosion of change. Those born at the onset of this century have only a foggy recollection of life without social media, without information, entertainment, and connection at their fingertips.

To them the world seems as if it’s always been this way, constantly shifting.

Mental health for youths, already in crisis pre-COVID, accelerated downward during the pandemic. Now, schools are suing social-media platforms over alleged damage to students’ psyches. Groomers lurk behind innocent-looking deceptions.

Ryan Kingensmith of shapethesky.org says younger kids don’t have the skills needed to avoid internet ills. The older they are when they engage in electronic socialization, the better. Even so, he doesn’t recommend that parents prohibit screens for younger kids altogether, but rather teach children how to handle technology responsibly as they grow.

“Kids have the knowledge to use technology, but sometimes lack the wisdom to use it responsibly. Adults have the wisdom to be responsible users, but sometimes lack the knowledge to use technology.”

Shape the Sky’s website says, “There’s a disconnect between how adults think children use social media and how they actually use it.”

The wry insight of Mark Twain tells us, “It ain’t what you don’t know that gets you into trouble. It’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so.”

To be as wise as serpents, we must understand the magnitude of the internet creature that is such a threat to minds, souls, and bodies of the innocent. We must understand the reality kids face.

We must realize the reality that our “adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.” I Peter 5: 8, ESV

He seeks us. He seeks our children.

Resources like Shape the Sky help us perceive the reality around us to help protect the naive, the ones caught in the lava flow of innovation that kills innocence.

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

A Window, not a Mirror

You shall love your neighbor as yourself. Matthew 22:39b, ESVUK

“The whole purpose of education is to turn mirrors into windows.” Sydney J. Harris

The elder leader of the group smiled with the presumed wisdom of a sage. “We can’t teach old books. The world has changed.”

The seminar for teachers had been filled with the assumption that contemporary education must include reflective books for middle/high school students. Old books no longer held relevance.

According to the new authority, teachers must give students books with characters like themselves in modern situations kids face today.

The world has changed, I thought. But how will students know how it’s changed if they only read books about kids like themselves? How will they ever be able to understand situations people faced in other times and what difference those books made?

To be fair, there’s nothing wrong with students considering how someone else might face a situation similar to one they’re experiencing.

Our minds, like our stomachs, need variety. But mirror-reflecting situations are good for occasional desserts, not as a steady diet.

Young people still need models who faced situation bigger than themselves.

Let’s consider some characters from a widely read book, banned in some places in the past, and having fallen out of favor with many educators in today’s world: To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee.

Lee’s magnum opus came at a time of disruption in America, the 1960s. It showed what life was like in the fictional community of Maycomb, Alabama, in the 1930s.

Atticus Finch looked through a window. If he’d looked into a mirror, he would have refused to defend Tom Robinson. He would not have wanted his children to suffer the abuse of schoolmates that led Scout into playground fistfights.

He would have shielded them from the issue of their day. He would have protected them from witnessing a quest for justice. He would have kept them from who they would become–better people for having gone through the trial of resisting racism around them.

Mayella Ewell looked through a mirror and saw the disdain the community would have for her for desiring the attention of a Black man. If she’d looked through a window, she might have seen Helen and the children who would have to find their way alone without the provision and love of Tom.

(Spoilers ahead.) Had Bob Ewell looked through a window, he could have avoided the revenge that cost him his life.

Scout, Jem, and Dill looked into a mirror and found a desire to make Boo Radley come out.

Perhaps Boo Radley had looked into a mirror long enough. When he looked through the window, he saw children in need of protection and saved them.

The book wasn’t set in contemporary times. It reflected the inward conflict that comes with outward injustice. Something beyond youthful angst and a quest for identity within a school setting.

Well educated people understand the past. They understand the conflicts of people who came before them. They understand life beyond the First World issues of our day.

They know the struggles of pioneering America from Laura Ingalls Wilder’s Little House books.

They know the hunger of famine and how watching the society around you can push you into bad decisions from Pearl S. Buck’s The Good Earth.

They know the pain of living through the resolve not to sell yourself short in a society that doesn’t see your value from Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre. They know the victory that resolve brings.

They know the dangers of not paying attention to the past and to truth from George Orwell’s 1984.

They understand that, in order to love our neighbors, we must first look through a window to see them.

To limit our viewpoint to the mirror is to propel ourselves into our own destruction.

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Finding a Vision

“Where there is no vision, the people perish.” Proverbs 29: 18, KJV~

“People speak with incredible contempt about–depending on their views–the rich, the poor, the educated, the foreign-born, the president, or the entire US government. It’s a level of contempt that is usually reserved for enemies in wartime, except that it’s applied to our fellow citizens. Unlike criticism, contempt is particularly toxic because it assumes a moral superiority in the speaker. . . . People who speak with contempt for one another will probably not remain united long.” (Sebastian Junger 126)

We are a divided people–a people in many ways at war with each other. Sebastian Junger examines the reasons in Tribe: On Homecoming and Belonging. I picked the book up because it was the common read one fall on the campus where I taught freshman composition. All incoming freshmen receive a copy of the chosen book each year.

I hadn’t participated in the common read before and never again did. Other books didn’t fit with my course plan. I refused even to bring one home to investigate beyond the cover, which featured a naked woman. (Really!?)

At times, students indicated great relief that I wasn’t making them read the books.

This one was different.

When I read the description of Junger’s book, I couldn’t wait to get ahold of it. It deals substantively with the division of our society and with PTSD–Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. Junger explores why PTSD is a larger problem for us today even with a military much smaller than those of the World War II, Korea, and Vietnam eras. 

The book fit well into class discussions that frequently included seasoned vets, some who confided in me that they suffered from PTSD because of their combat experiences.

When the number of vets in the room dropped, I quit using the book. Now I realize it might have been better for me to have kept it.

Now retired from the college classroom, I picked the book off my shelf this summer with an eye toward making it available for one of my high school students (with parental approval) to select for an Advanced Placement rhetoric project this year.

None of the students in my high school class will have experienced combat. Some of them have acquired, or know someone who has, PTSD.

All of us witness daily the division our society inhabits.

The compelling details of Junger’s text include discussion of factors we don’t often consider–our degree of comfort, our freedom from threat, and our lack of a shared experience. Those factors alienate us from each other.

I remember my mother telling me what it was like during World War II. Everyone knew the country was at war. Everyone’s life changed because we were at war. Everyone sacrificed.

Nearly everyone wanted to be part of the war effort–to contribute something, volunteering, donating a bicycle tire, buying a war bond.

Throughout the first two decades of the new century, most of America did not felt the pinch of war in the least. We did without nothing. Most of our lives didn’t changed–except for our awareness and fear of terrorism. We made an effort when soldiers returned, unlike the one those returning from Viet Nam sometimes suffered, that of public abuse.

But even though we are no longer officially at war, our society lives out no “shared public meaning.”

“Such public meaning is probably not generated by the kinds of formulaic phrases such as “Thank you for your service,” that many Americans now feel compelled to offer soldiers and vets [and sometimes police and firefighters]. . . . If anything, these token acts only deepen the chasm between the military and civilian populations by highlighting the fact that some people serve their country but the vast majority don’t” (97).

Veterans from our Middle East wars have settled back into life in the US. Many still deal with PTSD. Many are homeless. They seem to have vanished into the crowd.

But PTSD and its affects don’t just hit combat veterans. I know some of my students deal with situations, past and current, that cause them to feel divided from others.

Even without our young men and women going off to war, we are a divided country suffering from a lack of vision.

Junger presents our momentary unity after 9/11, but that cohesiveness was so short lived because of our lack of a common experience, a common vision. Instead Junger describes a moral superiority that replaced the unity of a nation attacked.

Now we have to ask ourselves: What kind of attack will unify us in a long lasting, significant way?

And is there no other way?

Note: Some Christians will find Junger’s continual assumption of evolution to be off-putting. But it’s not a big leap for readers of faith for readers to see sin as a contributing factor in today’s troubled society. There is rare inappropriate language in the book.


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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Breathing the Word and Feeding our Souls

Then the LORD God formed the man from the dust of the ground. He breathed the breath of life into the man’s nostrils, and the man became a living person. Genesis 2:7, NLT

Man shall not live by bread alone,
    but by every word that comes from the mouth of God. Matthew 4:4, ESV

The Bible tells us that God breathing into Adam conveyed life to him. The Bible is the Word of God. We can’t speak a word without breathing. But when we read the Bible, God breathes life into us.

The Bible is the fresh air of our reading. But to live fully we need food too.

The Bible gives us life. Other books feed our souls.

The world holds a smorgasbord of worthy literature. Some of us pick from different books at once. Some of us consume them one at a time.

The first school reading I remember enjoying was Lilies of the Field by William E. Barrett. Lilies of the Field.

Barrett melds the individuality of Homer Smith, an everyman Baptist, and the community of a convent of Catholic nuns.

Smith, an African American man, and the nuns, refugees from Eastern Europe in the 1960s, represent those society rejects and oppresses. Smith drives a station wagon with a mattress in the back, his bed for the nights he might be turned away from the hotels of the early 1960s in America.

My eighth-grade mind missed the reasoning for his innovative preparations for rest on the road. When I teach the book now, I make sure students understand that many hotels would have turned Homer away because of his race.

The nuns invite Smith to join with their community to achieve a quest–a chapel for the local community.

The community remains. Homer Smith moves on to a “settling down place.” He goes on to find his home where he can build community.

Their encounters change him and them. Us too–as all good books do.

An intelligent heart acquires knowledge, and the ear of the wise seeks knowledge. Proverbs 18:14, ESV

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. Galatians 5: 22-23, ESV

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Change the World

Before Christ, “In all of history, only one culture had prohibited [abortion and infanticide]–that of the Jews” (42)

I remember my mother telling me where she was and what she was doing when she learned that the Japanese had attacked Pearl Harbor. She was sweeping the basement floor and listening to the radio. When the news came, she shut off the radio. Denial is our first response to unfathomable news.

Eventually the event becomes memory. But if we lose our awareness of the past, we neglect the help it offers. Few people alive today remember the horror of hearing that news.

We’ve reached the point in our nation when no school age students remember the events of September 11, 2001. They have only heard about the day 19 terrorists killed more than 3,000 Americans on US soil.

Since the fall of Roe v. Wade more than a year ago, however, we realize American’s have not come to terms with legal abortion. We still argue over it. A voice still proclaims the sanctity of human life. A voice still declares the holiness of the traditional family–the community designed to welcome and nurture new sacred lives.

Before Christ, aside from the Jews, every society practiced abortion, infancticide, pedophilia, and adultery without internal controversy. In their book Seven Revolutions: How Christianity Changed the World and Can Change It Again, Mike Aquilina and James L. Papandrea explain that human rights, equality, and compassion for the needy and weak have been nonexistent throughout history except for the influence of the Judeo-Christian God.

In the Roman Empire, charity was unheard of.  “A woman had no legal existence apart from the men who controlled her.” Roman fathers could execute their children, if they “judged them guilty of a crime, even into adulthood” (69). Abortion and infanticide, especially of girls, were common. Not rare, but common.

Aquilina and Papandrea cite census reports from Delphi that show that out of 600 families, “only six raised more than one daughter” (authors’ emphasis, 48).

Jewish communities treasured their children. But nobody else in the world thought twice about throwing away girls or disabled boys, any “inconvenient” child, like trash.

Until Christ.

Christ and His messengers changed the world so that human rights and equality became norms in Western Civilization. Most families in societies the Church influenced understood the nature of their holy trust to nurture sacred lives.

Today some of us are like my mother at the moment she learned of tragedy in the South Pacific. We have turned off the radio. Voices still argue. Some children and families survive; some thrive. Many are wounded or worse.

In the decadent world–before and beyond the Roman Empire, Christians spoke.

“To affirm the universal dignity of human life requires the strong to speak up for and defend the weak, those who can’t speak for themselves” (29).

Christians are the voice to renew regard for human life. We hold the revolutionary ideas that changed the world once.

And those ideas can change it again.


 
Your eyes have seen my unformed substance;
And in Your book were all written
The days that were ordained for me,
When as yet there was not one of them.
Psalm 139:16.

Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Photo Credit: Pexels

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

The Little Circle of Us

We start by understanding that there is Truth.

We see our sin and realize God is our only hope.

We encounter him and find joy.

We find a small circle of others like us and settle into comfort.

We feel good about us.

We forget our sin and unworthiness;

We forget God wants us to wash feet,

Carry a cross,

Follow in his steps.

We feel good about us.

We see others’ sins, but not their wounds, their needs.

We look hard at their sins;

We forget our own.

Our little circle is snug.

We feel good about us.

Excerpted from Restoring the Shattered. Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

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Cultivating Community, Cultivating Life

“[T]here were times, . . . mainly during the . . . harvest, when we would all be together. The men would go early to have the benefit of the cool of the morning. The women would finish their housework and then gather, sometimes bringing dishes already cooked, to lay on a big feed at dinnertime; and then after the dishes were done, they would go out to help in the field or the barn for the rest of the day. . . . This was our membership.” (Hannah Coulter 92)

Through most of America’s history, people grew up in small towns. They knew each other and helped each other. Most people were part of a community.

Modern people have accused these forebears of sexual division, relegating women to the kitchen. But women worked in the fields too. Men and women grew food and other crops.

Often the division of labor meant he worked harder than she did growing the food. And she worked harder than he did to bring to put it on the table. Children grew up learning a good measure of hard work.

It wasn’t about who did what work. It was about making sure the work got done.  Everyone had a part to play, a contribution to make, a purpose to serve.

People worked hard, some just to survive–others, to thrive. They grew old, perhaps at a faster rate than we do. They were tired. But they were not lonely.

Today, loneliness is an American epidemic. We might expect that among the elderly–especially those who live alone–but that isn’t the case. In fact, older people have done the best job of keeping themselves from being isolated.

The loneliest among us are the young.

The situation was bad before COVID. It’s worse now.

The problem is bigger than social isolation. Loneliness is a health problem–as harmful as smoking–making some more prone to heart disease. Loneliness is costly in many ways.

And social loss happens in more than dollars. Lonely people are more prone to substance abuse. Loneliness has become a social crisis.

Author of Hannah CoulterWendell Berry sums up our problem this way: “We need drugs, apparently, because we have lost each other.”

An exodus back to the farming life doesn’t seem reasonable. Much of the available farmland has been consolidated or subdivided. But there are things we can do.

Many of these things came more easily to farm folks. Working together, eating together.

We can do those things too. But we have to be more intentional than they had to be.

We can grow some of our own food. Some of us already grow tomatoes–even in pots–even in apartments. What better way to show the young that food doesn’t originate in a store?

What better way to explain the concept of cultivation?

We cultivate plants. We cultivate purpose. We cultivate our souls.

When we as a society left the farm for the town or the suburbs, we thought we were moving to a better place, an easier life. Ease has shown itself to be a false promise for peace in our hearts.

With purpose, we find that peace. And that is something we can pass along.

“It is not good for the man to be alone.” Genesis 2:18

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

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Where to Draw the Line on Life

I am concerned with cases where fetuses that had been thus far welcomed and loved by their respective community are suddenly regarded as candidates for abortion simply because they may have been diagnosed with a disability. That is, I am worried about cases where disability is deemed sufficient grounds for dehumanizing a being who had been, up until that point, embraced.

Bertha Alvarez Manninen “self-identifies as pro-choice”. Manninen has values. She does not have a standard regarding life.

A standard is a line that doesn’t move. A mile is a mile. A cup is a cup. A foot equals 12 inches. Standards don’t change.

In contrast, a value changes. We know all too well that a dollar today doesn’t buy what it did a few years ago. It’s unlikely to buy next year what it does today.

In the United States in 1973, the Supreme Court effectively legalized abortion in all 50 states without restriction. States added limitations like waiting periods and parental consent but had little say in effectively regulating the procedures.

When states did have success in limiting abortion, there were always loopholes, ways around the rules enabling the killing of children and harm to mothers, fathers, siblings, and others.

One such loophole regarding gestational age was birth defects in the unborn.

This loophole allowed people to bestow conditional acceptance to other people. Unborn children who’ve managed to survive to a certain age, birth, sometimes have permission to continue living if they can pass a health test.

For the unacceptable ones who slip through the process intended to eliminate them, nineteen states allow a doctor to deny them care until they die.

For Manninen, refusing to accept a child you don’t want because of inconvenience is acceptable. Celebrating a child’s expected arrival and then rejecting the child based on a diagnosis of disability is not.

Surely the child with disabilities would be inconvenient also.

It rubs her the wrong way to abort the disabled baby you had previously longed to hold and raise. That child, she asserts, is dehumanized and unworthy of rejection.

Unworthy of dismemberment.

Yet the child you did not long for is already, in her view, dehumanized and worthy of suffering the worst.

For Manninen, the child’s humanization emanates from the mother’s/parents’ desire for the child early on, a value she asserts should be a standard once the parents decide their baby is wanted.

If the law makes human value a moving line, we are all subject to someone else’s judgment that we are no longer worthy of life.

Life as a value is a shifting line that can take out any of us.

Life as a standard is a truss that upholds a stable society.

We can’t point to the moment society’s rules changed from standards to values. But we can point to German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche as the one who substituted the shifting term for the constant one and asserted the shift from God’s authority to humans.

The strong individual loves the earth so much he lusts for recurrence. He can smile in the face of the most terrible thought: meaningless, aimless existence recurring eternally. The second characteristic of such a man is that he has the strength to recognize – and to live with the recognition – that the world is valueless in itself and that all values are human ones. He creates himself by fashioning his own values; he has the pride to live by the values he wills.”

All values are human ones. Questions about which people are worthy of life and which do not emanate from such a worldview.

All moral standards come from God. His commandments about how we must treat innocent life don’t come with exceptions. God’s decrees are standards.

Human beings require a standard of worth–the unchangeable precept that we all have worth that does not change. The immovable line of human worth prods us to welcomes all regardless of age or degree of ability. His standard of love shows us the worth of every human being.

I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.
Wonderful are your works;
    my soul knows it very well.
Psalm 139:14, ESV, Biblegateway.com

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

The Man, The Horse, The Wolf

“A horse having a wolf as a powerful and dangerous enemy lived in constant fear of his life. Being driven to desperation, it occurred to him to seek a strong ally. Whereupon he approached a man, and offered an alliance, pointing out that the wolf was likewise an enemy of the man. The man accepted the partnership at once and offered to kill the wolf immediately, if his new partner would only co-operate by placing his greater speed at the man’s disposal. The horse was willing, and allowed the man to place bridle and saddle upon him. The man mounted, hunted down the wolf, and killed him.

“The horse, joyful and relieved, thanked the man, and said: ‘Now that our enemy is dead, remove your bridle and saddle and restore my freedom.’ “Whereupon the man laughed loudly and replied, ‘Never!’ and applied the spurs with a will.” Isaac Asimov~

A slow process takes us from freedom to tyranny. Identifying the influence of multiple elements helps us track the descent.

In our culture that once encouraged self-control, personal morality used to be just that, personal. No more.

Behavior shifted from publicly accepted mores to license, and on to the despotism of an imposed moral code. The culture that asked restraint of young and old became one that embraced “free” sex among the unmarried, including unlimited abortion, and no-fault divorce among the previously committed. From there emerged LGB, then T, and now to an assortment of alphabetical self-identities limited only by one’s imagination.

The new moral code arising from the “freedom” era requires us to embrace and approve of any sexual choice, and apparently now the push is on for any choice at any age.

Not until Bud Light and Target aimed at the young did a significant reaction occur–as if the frog in the slowly heating pot had suddenly awakened. The end result of that reaction remains to be seen.

Do not be mistaken: the young are the goal and have always been.

Eleven states require a positive classroom presentation of “LGBTQ+ history.” Only four of those allow students to opt out. Five others prohibit such teaching, but Florida for example, limits the prohibition to the early grades.

Some call for a return to basics in the public classroom. Gillian Richards says those making such assertions miss the mark.

“For years, some conservatives have responded to morally toxic content in schools by implying that proper education should be morally neutral. The left has a campaign to “teach the whole child.” These critics counter by saying, ‘No, teach just a part.'”

Richards goes on to quote C.S. Lewis: “We make men without chests and expect of them virtue and enterprise. We laugh at honour and are shocked to find traitors in our midst. We castrate and bid the geldings be fruitful.”

Lewis would be shocked to find his geldings metaphor to have become so literal today.

Rochards continues, “It is a bitter irony that some Americans on the right now invoke the very thing Lewis critiqued as the cure to the ideologies that have replaced progressivism—critical theory, gender ideology, and the like.” 

An education without moral formation is, it seems, no education at all.

Richards looks back for the answer. “The Founders and early Americans saw a core part of education as cultivating virtues, morality, and religion—all of which sustain a free and prosperous society.”

Where do we find such virtues?

Primarily in history and books.

As a college instructor, I was astonished at what my students did not know. Too many didn’t know a simple timeline of America’s “big wars,” the War for Independence, the Civil War, World Wars I and II. They seemed unaware of which century, not to mention which decade important events occurred.

Here’s part of why that’s the case.

Last fall, I attended a teachers’ conference. I participated in this conference for English teachers twice before but had been absent for more than a decade. The transformation was astonishing.

I’ll paraphrase my main takeaway. “The world has changed. We can no longer teach old books.”

The world has changed indeed. But students in too many schools (not all) today are sentenced to a life of ignorance about its various transformations, both from a technological and a literary perspective.

They read books about the world today. Books focused on the issues they see, their depression, their sexual confusion, their lack of understanding mirrored back to them in a resolution of false wisdom.

We have a long way to go to get back to the basics. The journey to wisdom and virtue is further yet.

In order for our society to teach virtue, we must first embrace it ourselves. Selfishness was the seed that produced the fruit we live in today.

Asimov: The fall of Empire . . . is a massive thing, however, and not easily fought. It is dictated by a rising bureaucracy, a receding initiative, a freezing of caste, a damming of curiosity—a hundred other factors. It has been going on, as I have said, for centuries, and it is too majestic and massive a movement to stop.”

In order to rescue our nation, we must become the horse that can throw off its own bridle.

Difficult, yes.

Impossible?

Asimov thought so, but he did not know that only One who could stop the decline into desolation.

With God, all things are possible. Let’s look to Him.

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Remembering Those Who Gave All

“Poor is the nation that has no heroes. Poorer still is the nation that, having heroes, fails to remember and honor them.” Marcus Tullius Cicero

Today is Memorial Day in the United States. It’s a day we mark with picnics and parades. The unofficial beginning of summer, yet so much more than the chance to eat hot dogs and buy a new swimsuit.

Decoration Day, as the holiday was originally known, began after the Civil War–our bloodiest conflict. It was a time when a divided country was trying to heal–perhaps as we are today.

We mark the day on the last Monday of May–but May 30 had been the selected date before three-day weekends became a priority. May 30 reminds us of no notable battles from the Civil War. The day only reminds us of those who’ve given themselves for the cause of country–our country.

We enrich ourselves in this remembering.

Remembering those who’ve done noble things tells us we can be noble too.

Of his sailors and marines at Iwo Jima in World War II, Admiral Chester Nimitz said, “Uncommon valor was a common virtue.” Iwo Jima is famous for the flag-raising image that is now a statue.

Three of the six flag raisers died in battle.

My father was in the South Pacific as a Navy medic. He was someone who went to war to make sure others came home safely. Someone who hoped not to see battle–but was prepared in case he did,

“Courage, G.K. Chesterton said, “is almost a contradiction in terms. It means a strong desire to live taking the form of readiness to die.”

Today we remember those who wanted to live but fought anyway. Some came home. Some gave themselves instead.

Today, we honor those who gave all.

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

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Who We Were Made to Be

“Male and female created he them, and blessed them.” Genesis 5:2a, KJV

“What sort of world might it have been if Eve had refused the Serpent’s offer and had said to him instead, ‘Let me not be like God. Let me be what I was made to be–let me be a woman,'” Elisabeth Elliot.

When I was in tenth grade, I imagined what life would be if I were someone else. I imagined myself as a girl in my class who wasn’t too tall or too plump, as I saw myself. She had the cutest layered hair cut. Not in the style of Farrah Fawcett, who had yet to achieve fame, but who would seed a crop of feathered hair across our nation.

Instead of wondering who I was, who I was supposed to become, I worried more about what people, especially boys, wanted me to be. That was who I wanted to be.

Around the time I was musing within my high school mind, many of the world’s women imagined what life would be if they could only be like men. Not actually men, mind you. Just like men.

So in the ’70s women wanted to be like men. But they couldn’t be like men because men don’t have babies. Men could have sex casually and choose to avoid the consequences.

So women wanted abortion. And now men have sex with them and push them to abortion, at least some of the time. Sometimes, it’s a girl’s or woman’s parents. Sometimes, it’s her abuser, her trafficker. No matter the situation, her choice isn’t as free as abortion supporters had promised it would be.

Women wanted to be like men and still pay a big price for behaving as men sometimes do.

Now a new possibility emerges on that same front, a vaccination to prevent pregnancy. And it seems possible that such a medication is on the horizon for women.

It sounds like a great idea. No hormones.

No side effects?

Not so fast.

Immunizations get our bodies to attack cells we don’t want.

“[W]hat comes of immunizing a woman against herself? For this is precisely what a birth control vaccine would do. Where other forms of contraceptives attack the female body’s natural cycles, a vaccine would deputize the work of pregnancy prevention to her own flesh, teaching her cells to become belligerents against their own. It would bring the war on womanhood right down to the cellular level, teaching her body to strip itself of the very thing that makes it female,” Carmel Richardson.

Many men and women today who are de-transitioning from trying to become the opposite sex are learning that what we want when we are young often changes later on. Some treatments are permanent. We can’t always turn back from what we decided in our youth.

Brenda Baletti quotes Brian Hooker, PhD. PE: “The big question [about a contraceptive vaccine] that comes to mind is ‘reversibility.’ It is very difficult to turn off an immune response complete with memory B-cells after it has been turned on. My fear is that many would be left permanently sterile from this type of vaccine.”

Richardson points out that, at the least, “’People with especially enthusiastic immune responses‘ could end up infertile for several years.”

Imagine abusers and traffickers threatening, forcing the vaccine on their victims, not bothering to persuade, not concerned with consequences.

As Eve learned the hard way, trying to be who we want to be without regard to God’s intentions doesn’t produce the desired result. A deal with the devil never pays as it promises.

Women striving to be “like men” has led to today–when men want to become women and women want to become men. Social movements keep moving. They don’t stand still. From the ’70s to today, people seek new, self-created identities.

The recently departed Dr. Timothy Keller reminded us that “identity is received, not achieved.” We can never make ourselves into something better than who God intended for us to be, who he specifically gifted us to be.

Attempting to create ourselves anew is distorted pride.

Elisabeth Elliot quotes Isak Dinesen to define an undistorted God-centered pride, a good kind of pride, as “faith in the idea that God had when he made us. A proud man is conscious of the idea, and aspires to realize it. He does not strive towards a happiness, or comfort, which may be irrelevant to God’s idea of him. His success is the idea of God, successfully carried through, and he is in love with his destiny.”

Our attempts to recreate ourselves in mentally conjured images are Eve’s sin, distorted self-pride. Idolization of self.

Social movements move. They do not stand still. Nothing stays put. We will not reach an end that says, “I am content with the person I am,” unless we come to God’s view, who he had in mind when he made us.

Fulfillment lies in following his plan.

Let the Creator be the Creator.

Be the creation he made.

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A Place in the Picture

Once windblown sand without direction,
I am now glass, colored by life, faith, and love.
 
Sand heated, tinted, shaped, and planted,
Part of a larger picture.
 
Cracks and fissures healed and yet healing,
Whole glass within the framework,
 
Supported by Spirit,

Surrounded by glass like and unlike me.
 
Light shines to the world through me, through us,
A piece in the picture of the Bride,
 
Glass arranged just so to shine light and show the image,
Glass, waiting for the King’s return.
 
He waits to heat, shape, heal cracks,
And place you just right,
 
So His light and image can shine on another,
Windblown sand without direction.

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

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Your Favorite Color in the Land of Darkness

“The light shines in the darkness. But the darkness has not overcome the light.” John 1:5, NIV~

What’s your favorite color? It’s a simple question. But it’s one Yeonmi Park found impossible to answer.

When Park was 13, she and her mother decided to escape from North Korea. Her sister had gone ahead days earlier. The girls’ father planned to follow later.

Park and her mother, as Park’s sister had, paid a broker to get them across the Yalu River thinking they could get jobs in China and be free.

Free–even though the citizenry of North Korea has no word for the concept of freedom or justice. Or an understanding of the pronoun I. There is only we, Park says in her book In Order to Live.

When they got to China, Park and her mother learned they were to be sold as prostitutes or wives for Chinese farmers since the country’s one child policy had created a dearth of women through sex-selective abortion.

Park watched helplessly as a broker raped her mother. Exploitation continued until they met Christian missionaries.

You might think the gathering between grace and those seeking freedom would be one of joy. But the missionaries told Park and her mother that their work in a sex chat room, the only work they could find because of their illegal status, the only work they could do to eat, was sin. They were “dirty”. They must repent or risk their entire group being captured and repatriated to North Korea.

That possibility was no small threat since North Korea typically executes defectors.

Park felt as judged as she had in North Korea during the daily self-criticism sessions.

Park was 15 when they arrived in South Korea through Mongolia. The South welcomed defectors from the North. Yet the transition from oppression to freedom was not a simple one.

Imagine growing up in a society where you almost never have to make a decision, what to wear, where to go, what your job will be, even what to eat because famine meant you ate what you could get–even dragonflies and roaches.

Park had no way to answer questions like What do you think? or What is your favorite color? She even thought that, if not for the death sentence that would ensue, it might be better to go back to North Korea where there was no burden to make decisions.

We in America give no thought to such questions. We know what we think. We know we’re right, most often without listening to those who disagree with us.

And we know which colors we prefer for our clothing, houses, and cars.

We take so much for granted. Our abundant food, our electricity that is reliable for the most part, our freedom in matters large and small.

Such abundance and freedom impressed Park–even in China, not a country most in the West would point to as a bastion of liberty.

North Korea is a land of, not only spiritual darkness, but also physical darkness. The photo above is a satellite image of electrical light at night. One bright spot indicates the capital city where dictator Kim Jong Un resides.

Darkness comes in different forms. Park was surprised and pleased to learn that South Korea had a law forbidding men to beat their wives. Abuse in the North is common and accepted. It’s not that the law is unenforced. There is no law against abuse.

North Korea is a land of darkness, physical, spiritual, moral, and intellectual.

America is a land of artificial light with a sense of freedom that is sometimes deceptive.

What’s your favorite color? You need light to perceive color.

You need light to understand oppression and to navigate freedom.

Then Jesus again spoke to them, saying, “I am the Light of the world; the one who follows Me will not walk in the darkness, but will have the Light of life.” John 8:12, NASB~

Escape the darkness. Embrace the Light.

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

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Satan Always Lies

The painting Checkmate used to hang in the Louvre in Paris.

A man is playing chess with the devil. It looks like the devil has won.

We don’t know how much the painter Friedrich Moritz August Retszch understood about chess. Paintings don’t usually come with written explanations.

Even so, a legend has attached itself to this one.

A chess grand master visited the Louvre and studied the painting.

Although the man in the painting appeared to be losing, although an observant, forlorn angel stood by mourning another lost soul, and although Satan was congratulating himself for a win, the chess board told another story.

The man still had a move to make, and that move could lead him to victory.

When the Israelites had their backs against the Red Sea, God had another move.

When Jesus was dead, and evil appeared to have won, God had another move.

God will always have another move.

He may appear to have lost, but God has already won.

My pastor recently told this story as part of an exceptional message. Enjoy!

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

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Same War, Different Uniforms

Faithful Christians of different traditions are soldiers in the same army, but our uniforms are different colors. It’s as if we somehow believe it is not a war we are fighting but a game we are playing. And the soldiers with different colored uniforms are players on a team we oppose—a team of bitter rivals—rather than our fellow soldiers who hold to the same creed and battle the same enemy.

Imagine two nations, each warring against the same evil foe. The world is in peril as the evil enemy conquers more and more countries, stealing more and more hearts. The enemy troops are captives. The soldiers who fight the enemy are duty bound volunteers whose mission is to call the enemy’s troops to freedom.

Further imagine the general of one nation trying to discuss battle strategy with a general from the other. The generals do not speak the same language, and no one is present to translate. Some individual soldiers continue to engage in battle—some effectively, some even in concert with allies in different uniforms. Their efforts are small and uncoordinated. 

Other soldiers don’t know what to do, so they do nothing but fret about the war to the soldiers of their own units.

Both nations have the same goals, but they use different strategies. Some work well; others waste time, resources, and energy fighting the same battle here, but sending no soldiers there. The needs are great, but the work is lonely and calls for reinforcement.

Because the nations’ customs and foods are different, they misunderstand each other. These misunderstandings distract both from the crucial battle against the enemy. They imagine their fellow soldiers as the enemy.  The two forces end up fighting each other. 

Many who have not joined either are confused. The enemy succeeds in drawing them outside the battle lines, outside the reality of the war they themselves need to win. The evil enemy takes even more ground, captures even more souls.

The army that fights the enemy has a long history. When its fight began, the army was a small corps of committed fighters; most gave their lives in battle. From the army’s very inception, from its beginning with only twelve generals, the enemy had infiltrated the ranks.

A betrayer was within the ranks of the army’s greatest leaders. For the first 500 years, division happened within the army.

The forces of good were the faithful who battled forces of evil, the corrupted betrayers. Infiltration continues to this day and sparks confusion among those who might otherwise become soldiers. Some people like wearing the uniform but would never actually engage in battle. They are not true soldiers.

Aside from infiltration, the enemy has two main battle strategies. The first is persecution. His intention is to kill as many soldiers as he can—the most typical war strategy. It not only eliminates opposition, but he supposes that it deters new enlistments. This strategy is often faulty. Our army grows in the face of persecution, and our cohesiveness is at its peak when our trials are plenty. The soldiers wearing different colored uniforms work together best during times of persecution.

His second strategy is more subtle and more insidious. He lavishes our established, well-entrenched forces with wealth, comfort, and divisiveness. The divisiveness is often thinly veiled self-righteousness. We make judgments about each other based on those who wear their uniforms lightly or even deceptively, or we accept someone’s misinterpretation of another’s worship language. For Satan, this second strategy has been his most effective throughout history.

The primary battlefield of this war is within people’s hearts. Here is the battlefield we have most neglected. Here is the front where we must win.


Photo Credit: Pixabay

Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

What Can One Person Do?

“What is urgently called for is a general mobilization of consciences and a united ethical effort to activate a great campaign in support of life. All together, we must build a new culture of life”Pope St. John Paul the Great

The above quote comes from The Vulnerable People Project’s website.

The story of VPP begins with Jason Jones who got his high school girlfriend pregnant. He joined the army to prepare to support her and his child.

As the child of a teen mother, Jones grew up with the dream that he would be a father in an intact family, and his “children would be happy and safe.”

While still in training, a phone call dashed his hopes as his girlfriend’s father explained: “I know your secret, and it’s gone.” His girlfriend wept that she had not done it. Her father had forced her to have an abortion.

This mother was in her third trimester.

At the time, Jones was an atheist. But he understood that his daughter, whom the couple had already named Jessica, had become a murder victim.

He had never been to church. He’d had no interest in politics.

From that day forward, he “committed his life ‘to protecting women and children from the violence of abortion.'”

His commitment was real. It would take years before it became a commitment of faith. As Jones worked to protect the innocent, to protect the vulnerable, he rubbed elbows with people of faith. He worked with Christian organizations and studied political philosophy.

He came to know the truth of Christ, the meaning of freedom.

Jones produced the movie Bella (and other films) and used the proceeds from DVD sales to promote the film’s prolife message in pregnancy resource centers and prisons.

His accomplishments don’t end with films, and they aren’t limited to saving the unborn. His effort begin there, and now reach far and wide.

Medical treatment for girls ISIS has displaced.

Efforts to free Catholic bishops imprisoned in China.

Bringing clean water to refugees in South Sudan.

Providing water, food, medicine, and other aid in Darfur.

Rescuing those left behind in Afghanistan when the US withdrew.

Providing coal and food for Afghans during winter.

Jones is now married and the father of seven children.

You may have said to yourself at one time or another: I’m only one person. What can I do?”

Jason Jones show us that one man’s efforts, with God’s blessing, can go beyond what we could hope or ask.

Photo Credit: Vulnerable People Project

Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Abortion’s New Big Lie

There didn’t appear to be any risks or side effects…or if there were, we didn’t go over them. Surely if there were risks, they would have told me about them, right? Abby Johnson

It was supposed to fix it all–women dying from illegal abortions, child abuse, poverty.

Abortion would end dangerous, back alley procedures that killed desperate girls and women. Child abuse would end. Lessening the burden from “unwanted children” would enhance the economic stability of the poor.

Compassionate helpers would be the heroes of abortion “rights”. That’s what they told us in the 1960s and ’70s and into the ’80s. Many still make some claims, leaving out the one about child abuse rates going down.

The above quote from Abby Johnson explains what she thought before she had her chemical abortion. What she thought afterwards was very different.

She thought she was going to die. She bled for eight weeks.

I remember the slogan: “Every child should be a wanted child.” The irony is that the rates of child abuse and abortion parallel each other. When abortion rates rise, so do those of child abuse.

Perhaps some who tell these tales are misguided. We can see now that many were intentionally deceiving us.

Former atheist and “abortion doctor” Bernard Nathanson revealed the deceptions after his conversions–first to a pro-life perspective, then to a Christian one. A leading proponent of ‘legal and safe’ abortion became a vocal proponent for life–and a voice of truth.

“Repeating the big lie often enough convinces the public. The number of women dying from illegal abortions was around 200 – 250 annually [before 1973]. The figure constantly fed to the media was 10,000. These false figures took root in the consciousness of Americans convincing many that we needed to crack the abortion law.”

Cracking the abortion law caused, Nathanson said, “the annual number of abortions . . . [to increase] by 1500% since legalization.”

The reporting of abortion complications in 24 states is voluntary, so the numbers we have are guesses.  Even so, the CDC acknowledges that four-hundred and thirty-seven women died in America of legal abortion between 1972 and 2014. Legal and safe was not safe for them.

America bought the lie. And much of what abortion was supposed to fix got much worse.

Some may argue that better reporting has led to greater transparency of abuse that was going unreported before. But the rates of abuse simply do not translate into abortion access reducing child abuse. Child abuse was a problem before liberal abortion laws; today it is a bigger problem. We bought the lie that abortion would reduce, even eliminate, child abuse.

And poverty. Abortion would keep women out of poverty by ensuring that an unplanned child did not interrupt a mother’s education or require her to leave her job.

Rachel MacNair sites Thomas J. Strahan’s assertion that abortion can exacerbate poverty.

“Experience suggests abortion may instead actually be a contributing factor. Through an increase in broken relationships, psychological difficulties, and substance abuse, a practice which is done exclusively on women may put them at greater economic disadvantage.”

And as compassionate as abortionists might like to present themselves, nobody does abortions for free.

From Planned Parenthood’s website: “An in-clinic abortion can cost up to around $800 in the first trimester, but it’s often less. The average cost of a first trimester in-clinic abortion at Planned Parenthood is about $600. The cost of a second trimester abortion at Planned Parenthood varies depending on how many weeks pregnant you are. The average ranges from about $715 earlier in the second trimester to $1,500-2,000 later in the second trimester. “

And yes, third trimester abortions happen. Here are some numbers. But remember, reporting is voluntary.

US News and World Report says chemical abortion costs between $580 and $800.

Abortion “providers” don’t explain the increased risks of chemical abortion. They don’t tell you that you’re four times more likely to suffer a serious complication than you would with surgical abortion.

They make a similar amount of money for passing out pills and sending a girl or woman home to deal with the trauma herself. With new regulations allowing telemedicine or abortion by mail, there is the increased peril of women not knowing the Rh factor of the unborn child and not receiving medicine that would enable them to have more children.

There is also no way of knowing whether the baby is an ectopic pregnancy, a serious risk to the mother.

It is all gain and not much to lose for abortion “providers”.

Like the purveyors of illegal abortion, those who engage in the legal practice of ending a pregnancy through the death of a child conduct their business on a cash upfront basis.

Abortion “providers” were supposed to care deeply about women. But those who perform abortions do not provide. They sell. They earn. They prosper.

But here’s some good news:

“The Society of Family Planning, not exactly a pro-life organization, released a study earlier this week indicating that there were 32,260 fewer abortions than expected between July and December after the Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision. That means there are more than 30,000 living, breathing babies alive today who, but for Dobbs [the SCOTUS case that overturned Roe] and anti-abortion laws passed at the state level, would not have been born.”

Speak truth to the lie.

Truth saves babies’ lives. It saves women’s lives.

Truth can make the difference for families, women, babies. Truth brings protection for life and against death and trauma.

Speak truth.

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Easter Has Come

“If man had his way, the plan of redemption would be an endless and bloody conflict. In reality, salvation was bought not by Jesus’ fist, but by His nail-pierced hands; not by muscle but by love; not by vengeance but by forgiveness; not by force but by sacrifice. Jesus Christ our Lord surrendered in order that He might win; He destroyed His enemies by dying for them and conquered death by allowing death to conquer Him.” A.W. Tozer

We are the people of paradox–the apparent contradiction that is not a contradiction at all because it is truth.

We live by dying to self. His strength shows in our weakness.

We are supposed to love our enemies, turn the other cheek, and rejoice when life has us down.

We are supposed to live without fear, to live with peace in our hearts.

Sometimes, we are the people of the wrong paradox. We fear when we should hope and trust. We lack peace because we fear.

He is the God of paradox. He won by losing.

When everyone else thought He was gone for good, thought His teaching was done, He won the greatest victory ever.

He won over death.

Don’t fear. Hold to hope. Find peace.

Easter has come.

Jesus will come again.

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Awakening Time

One of my very favorite passages from the Bible comes at the end of the book of Luke.

Two men are walking down the road discussing the crucifixion of their leader. Another joins them and asks what they’re talking about. They wonder at Him not knowing.

But they don’t realize that He’s the only one who actually does know what really happened.

He talks to them about prophesy. When they reach Emmaus, He indicates that He will keep going.

It’s evening, they say. Stay with us. When He breaks the bread, they recognize Him. Then He vanishes.

Did our hearts not burn within us? They ask themselves.

Often that’s where we stop reading. But what happens next?

Once they realize Christ was the One who talked with them, opened the scriptures (the prophecies he fulfilled) to them, and broke the bread, they don’t just go to sleep planning to react to their revelation the next morning.

They immediately return to the place they’d just left–Jerusalem. Walking, tired but exhilarated, filled with the adrenalin of realization, of fulfilled understanding.

Remember, it’s evening. Perhaps it’s even dark before they begin. They already walked and are walking again.

Imagine their arrival, very late, even in the middle of the night.

“Wake up! Let us in! We’ve been with Jesus! He has risen!”

The crucifixion had destroyed any hopes they had that Jesus would lead them in victory over Roman rule. They had been confused. They had lost all hope.

His resurrection brought a better kind of hope, a hope based in the true understanding of who Christ is–a God for life and eternity–not someone who came to get us off a hook of political oppression.

He came to free us from the consequences of being us. He came to give us this life and the next one.

Like the men who traveled to Emmaus and then returned to Jerusalem in joy, our next step cannot be to go to sleep.

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

The Poison of Bitterness Within Us

Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice. Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you. Eph 4: 31-32 ESV

“So whatever you wish that others would do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets. Matthew 7: 12 ESV

There is a strange ethic today, one of disrespect. It springs from a demand for respect. It’s a tunnel vision respect–a one way street. Yet it goes in two directions.

It’s a mentality that says, “I don’t have to respect you because you don’t respect me. Or my cause. Or the ax I am grinding today. Or [fill in the blank].” It doesn’t matter if you lean left or right in your politics. If you reject faith in God or hold to it. There are two roads of discourse and only those who agree are allowed on a highway.

It’s hard to pinpoint when it all began. Perhaps it was some time after a president advised us to, “Ask not what your country could do for you.” That difficulty of finding a starting point would indicate a gradual slide into the morass of accusations, name calling, and violence.

We have to admit, we have done it to ourselves. As affluence rose, faithfulness fell. That includes faithfulness to grace and civility among those who name Christ as Savior.

Our children learned evolution, that we are just an animal species, not the image of God. Judeo-Christian principles became a foreign language.

Children of the left and right alike embraced the new freedom–sexual license and freedom from responsibility–and the wounds that come with them. Such an embrace of sin leads to a stumbling into another sin snare, obnoxious self-righteousness.

Remember the conversation on social media over the US Supreme Court Hobby Lobby decision? Christians and others of like conscience would not have to pay for abortion inducing “birth control.” The “opposition” was most unreasonable in its insistence that conscience should not determine what services women are “entitled to.”

The argument heightened when Dobbs overturned Roe.

On the other side, “our side,” David Aikman discussed the reaction of Christians to an atheist book. Believers became “self-appointed attack dogs of Christendom. They seem determined to savage not only opponents of Christianity, but also fellow believers of whose doctrinal positions they disapprove.”

“The attacks, moreover, are not reasoned or modestly couched criticism, but blasts of ire determined to discredit beyond redemption the targets of the criticism.”

We’ve forgotten we are to love our enemies. We’ve lost our ability to disagree reasonably, to engage in civil discourse.

We have more than two options. Instead of caving to unbiblical demands or responding with anger and name-calling, we can speak truth calmly and with reasoned argument.

We have the truth on our side. Using venom in our response will not win over others. It simply passes the poison down to the next generation only partly by our example.

For children on both sides, we boosted their self-esteem. We encouraged unhampered self-expression without requiring effort, accomplishment, and compassion for others.

We overspent on comfort and luxury. The government overspent. When the crash of 2008 came, many–least of all the government–did not curb spending. Personal debt is nearly as high as it was then. Our national debt has “surged” to previously unimaginable heights.

We have created monsters of entitlement. They are ourselves. There is a material sense of entitlement. But there is also a sense of entitlement to be obnoxious.

Christians are as guilty as anyone. Guiltier yet, because to be obnoxious is to be disobedient. And there is a crop to harvest from all this obnoxious, entitlement thinking.

New US Senator JD Vance correctly understands that Americans “look to the future more with frustration and fear than with hope and optimism.”

A Gallup poll supports that view. American’s have a “mostly gloomy outlook for the U.S. as majorities predict negative conditions in 12 of 13 economic, political, societal and international arenas.”

No wonder we’re cranky.

Perhaps our venom is inevitable. The economy aside, there had to be a point where more comfort and a higher quality of life, would be unattainable. There is a saturation point to luxury and pleasure. We’ve surpassed it and are reaping its results.

A primary result is that we stopped being grateful for what we have. We’ve grown to expect more. We expect to get and keep what we enjoy. And that it should never be threatened. We’ve convinced ourselves the party will never end.

As our personal kingdoms totter, we become bitter, angry, even afraid. Our sense of self-regard has toppled regard for our neighbor.

Shouting at him seems okay now.

We had so much to lose, we lost our very selves.

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Katherine Pasour’s Honoring God with My Body

“What I do, I do not understand. For I do not do what I want, but I do what I hate.” Romans 7:15~ 

That’s a verse that may come to mind when we’ve eaten too much of something that isn’t so good for us.

At this point in the year, most people’s New Year’s resolutions are long forgotten. Eleven days remain in Lent.

The closer we get to Easter, the more I dream and plan of the things I want to eat that I’ve done without for some time. As I begin to shop for our family’s traditional foods, I find myself yearning for foods I’m better off limiting or avoiding altogether.

Enter Katherine Pasour and her new book Honoring God with My Body: Journey to Wellness and a Healthy Lifestyle.

As most health and wellness books do, Katherine’s calls us to eat and exercise well, get enough sleep, and manage stress.

Even so, this book is not just another health and wellness book to collect dust on your shelf while you shame yourself for eating yet another cookie (or six).

Katherine presents a spiritual road map. This book strikes at the heart of our eating, sitting, restlessness, and worrying about things we cannot control.

We’ve spent years, perhaps decades thinking we have a food problem or a job problem. Many times, though, our problems are spiritual. We have forgotten who we are and who God is. We’re focusing on the wrong things.

“Healthful living is not just about what we eat or how active we are, although those two aspects of health are very important. Achieving good health involves recognizing the many dimensions of health: physical, mental spiritual, emotional, social, and vocational. These aspects intertwine, each one affecting the others. When all aspects of health are balanced and viewed as important, we can strive for better health.”

Honoring God with My Body is organized for daily study for an individual or group.

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!
Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Annie Yorty’s From Ignorance to Bliss: God’s Heart Revealed Through Down Syndrome

I will give thanks to You, because am awesomely and wonderfully made;
Wonderful are Your works,
And my soul knows it very well.
Psalm 139:14

In the poem “Welcome to Holland,” Emily Perl Kingsley compares her experience as a mother of a child with disabilities to someone planning a trip to Italy but ending up in Holland.

Future parents dream of going to Italy and touring the Coliseum, which translates to having a healthy child with typical challenges such as skinned knees, struggles with algebra, and a broken heart over lost adolescent love.

Prospective parents don’t dream of going to Holland, which has tulips and Rembrandt, but represents having a child with challenges parents didn’t expect.

Kristen Groseclose takes issue with Kingsley’s portrayal of “Holland” as an initial disappointment that turns into gratitude for flowers and art. She states the poem is rather “a generic spin on a painful situation.”

In From Ignorance to Bliss, Annie Yorty shows us her journey from the diagnosis of Down syndrome in her first born daughter Alyssa, through the pain of realization and struggle, to the destination of wisdom and gratitude for what is.

Annie grew up with an inherited belief that our value is in what we can achieve, especially intellectually. Having a challenged child meant rethinking human value, understanding our sacredness without regard for capability.

“If I believed her [Alyssa’s] life had value, and I instinctively did, my understanding of what gave a person significance was flawed. If she had worth superseding what she could do or give, from where did her significance originate?”

Aside from the existential question about life’s value came the overwhelming nature of the practical issues: doctors, specialists, therapists, homework from therapy, a support group dealing with rights and responsibilities, floods of information and predictions (mostly dire) about what to expect. And medical billing.

The last one especially resonates for me. Last year at this time, my husband and I lived in the aftermath of his third heart attack. Billing issues abounded. Invoices from multiple doctors and two hospitals, and documents required by a medical sharing entity had me leaping through hoops from the moment the first bill arrived, consuming uncountable and irretrievable hours. The final resolution took 363 days.

For the new mother of a handicapped newborn, such battles must have seemed as though they would stretch endlessly. It’s a special kind of purgatory that seems it will never end.

We measure children’s advancement through life by achievement and growth. We marvel when they take their first steps, ride a bicycle without training wheels, and learn to read. We mark a wall or door post with their height and a date.

Measuring spiritual growth is a bigger challenge. Milestones include decisions to resist temptation, to exercise grace instead of malice, to sacrifice desire for good–even someone else’s, and moments of rejoicing.

As children grow physically, we grow spiritually day by day through prayer, fellowship, nourishment of the Word, and wrestling with difficult circumstances. There is no physical mark that shows our progress.

Annie Yorty has brought us her wrestling. Through this book, we watch a soul developing. In reading, we grow too.

Photo Credit: From Ignorance to Bliss cover, Lana Ziegler, Derinda Babcock

Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!
Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

The Plan

Their lives were set.

They had worked at their jobs all their lives.

They thought they knew which way life would turn for the rest of their days.

There was a hope for Messiah, in their minds a political savior, to free them from the Romans. But mostly there was routine, the everydayness of work and home.

Then they met Him. Perhaps He was the one. the one who would save them from the oppression of Rome. That was their plan.

They were fishermen and a tax collector, the tax collector recruited to stop working for Rome, to find a higher cause. Surely overcoming the earthly oppression of Rome was the plan.

The disciples listened. They followed. They believed.

They still thought political freedom was the plan.

Then one betrayed Him. Another denied Him. One stayed close to the end. The rest scattered. They watched their plan end.

They watched their plan die.

The fishermen returned to their boats, back to the routine, back to the everydayness of every day.

Life would be as it had been, as if He’d never lived.

Then He arose. Rome stayed, but His followers changed.

They received fire from heaven.

They were never the same.

That was His plan.

They turned the world upside down.

His plan.

His rising, a lie?

You may say so, but who dies for a lie?

Only one disciple would not be killed for believing Him who said, “Follow Me.”

That one would suffer exile and write his encounters with Him whom he’d followed at the cost of all else–all else but eternal gain.

All else but God’s plan.

This plan remains today.

To show us how to follow Him.

To make us never the same.

His way through His plan.

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!
Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

The Way

He stopped me in the hallway at work–my former teacher, then a colleague. He’d been studying Greek, because, he said, teachers should always remember what it’s like to learn something difficult.

He asked me where in the Bible Jesus said, “I am the way, the truth, and the life.”

I directed him to John 14.

He was especially interested in the word way, uncertain whether the English translation came from methodos or hodos. The conversation sparked my own investigation. I’m glad the terms I looked up were easy to understand (always a plus when dealing with Greek).

Methodos means a way of searching–inquiry. That meaning is secondary, but it’s the one my colleague mentioned. Methodos also means scheming, craftiness, and deceit. Strong’s Concordance finds it twice in Ephesians (4:14 and 6:11). Scriptures that warn us first of the cunning craftiness of men, then to beware the wiles of the devil.

But Jesus did not use methodos in John 14:6. He used hodos. Like methodoshodos has different connotations. “It can mean not only a road, a path, but also a practice.” So it is not only the way to go, the direction we take, it is also how we walk, how we encounter God and others through our lives.

Jesus is not a means of inquiry. He is the way to God. And He gives direction for our lives.

Before His followers were called Christians (Act 11:26), they were called the people of the Way. In Acts 9:2, the people “belonging to the Way”–hodos–were those Saul hoped to persecute as he made his way along the road to Damascus. Being called a follower of the Way was descriptive. Being called a Christian was an insult.

They stood out among the crowd. Some didn’t like that.

My colleague also wondered about the root of the word Methodism. Methodism’s founder John Wesley was well versed in Greek. Had Wesley intended to associate his view of the Christian life with methodos–a way of inquiry?

We were both surprised by what he discovered.

The name Methodism came in derision–just as the name Christian had in the early Church.

John and Charles Wesley’s fellow students at Oxford called them Methodists because they were methodical in their spiritual discipline and their ministry efforts.

They stood out among the crowd.

John Wesley once said, “Do all the good you can. By all the means you can. In all the ways you can. In all the places you can. At all the times you can. To all the people you can. As long as ever you can.”

Wesley knew that to follow the Way was not the easy way.

Wesley, like Luther before him, did not set out to establish a new church. Luther wanted to reform Catholicism. Wesley wanted to reform the Church of England. In fact, Methodism did not even become its own denomination until it arrived in America.

In England and America, Methodism planted churches and encouraged moral living, literacy, and philanthropy. Wesley encouraged William Wilberforce in the fight against slavery. He advocated prison reform. He urged Christians not to simply collect and send goods to relieve the misery of the poor, but to go to the poor individually, each Christian engaging in personal ministry.
 
When He walked this earth, Jesus invited people to follow him. Wesley didn’t invite people to follow Methodism. He invited people to follow Christ, the Way, the Truth, the Life.

Strong’s Concordance renders truth (aletheia) in John 14:6 as reality. It translates life (zoe) to include both the “physical (present) and . . . spiritual (particularly future) existence.”

The Way, Truth, and Life invites us to a path that leads to reality for eternity.

And there is no other hodos.


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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!
Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

The Counterculture Is No Longer Counter

“Over the last 60 years, the countercultural left has successfully changed the norms on every topic of political concern: from family formation, to the role of religion in public life, to drug use, to sex, to criminal justice, to war, to education. In short, the culture we have now is the culture that the counterculture wanted. The leftist counterculture has become our dominant culture, and it is supported and enforced by the most powerful institutions of our society.” Adam Ellwanger

Part of what’s happening within our civilization in decline is what Christians throughout history took for granted: that they were a minority and could only influence the surrounding society through a small circle of influence.

What was unacceptable in the “Christian” culture of the US from the First and Second Great Awakenings until the sexual revolution of the 1960s is now standard fare. We have exceeded what the wildest expectations conjured six or seven decades ago.

Struggling under the thumb of Rome, early Christians dwelled in a culture where the idea that they could widely influence belief and behavior was unimaginable.

Today, we are finding its opposite unimaginable, but we are living it out.

Every year as America “progresses” down a corridor of “tolerance” of sexualizing children and redesigning ourselves into our own creations, we move further into an amoral abyss. Yet within that morass, we see a glimmer of hope.

On one issue, America is moving toward the light.

Beginning in 2009, more Americans said they were pro-life than said they were pro-choice. Numbers in 2016 supported that trend. As did the stats in 2018 and 2021.

Americans have never supported abortion until birth. Ninety percent of Democrat voters do not favor abortion without limitation.

Pro-life views among young people are becoming more prevalent.

These relatively newfound convictions obviously haven’t always played out at the ballot box. Too many people still don’t understand what abortion is and what it does.

That it is the killing of a child. That it causes terror and agony to the unborn. That it marks mothers forever. That it wounds fathers beyond understanding. That it deprives our society of the opportunity to love the defenseless and disabled. That it means fewer of us are here to find solutions to today’s troubles.

It’s up to us to spread that word. Loving the weak is part of the Gospel news. Before we can let the little children come to Christ, we must let them come to light.

We are now the counter-culture of a darkened world.

We hold light they cannot see unless we show them.

Spread the word. Shine in the darkness.

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Food for the Soul

“As Chesterton saw, it is the search for truth that keeps us sane, because it always brings us back to reality. And why is reality so important? It is what we are made for. Reality is the food of the soul.” Stratford Caldecott

In Hillbilly Elegy, J.D. Vance includes a moment from his youth when he didn’t understand the difference between intelligence and knowledge” (59). A classmate had shown off his multiplication skills. Vance had yet to realize the concept even existed.

He felt stupid. In response to his sense of failure, Vance’s grandfather devoted time once a week to drilling the youngster in mathematical concepts. Papaw showed patience when Vance got frustrated. Papaw crowned success with ice cream. The lessons stuck.

But Papaw wasn’t the only one to enrich Vance’s mind. His mother introduced him to the library and encouraged reading in the home. His father introduced him to faith.

Papaw was a rock of stability for the boy. Mom? A sea of dysfunction. Dad? Absent in his early years. But what they gave was enough. Small meals of wonder.

Growing up in a community that did not value learning, Vance “received a different message at home” (60). Today, he’s a graduate of Yale Law School, a best-selling author, and a US senator from Ohio.

Some messages are brief but resonate all our lives.

Today, kids receive a message adults convey implicitly. This message has worked its way down from parents, teachers, and other adults to the next generation and the next.

The message is that the main purpose of education, at its conclusion, is the ability to engage in a particular kind of employment. And once that employment is attained, aside from any related training, education has come to an end.

Sound education translates into more earned dollars than unsound education does. High school graduation produces more dollars than dropping out. Often but not always, a college degree produces more money than just a high school diploma.

But earning money is not the be all and end all of learning.
 
Classical education in Europe during the Renaissance was founded in the idea that learning the truth about various subjects, math, music, history, literature, and science, would lead a student to the truth about God. The subjects were the basis for the primary topic–theology.

Knowing the truth about God would lead to a purpose beyond oneself.

Such learning would not end. It certainly wouldn’t end when the student left school behind and entered the marketplace. It enriched and captivated the mind and spirit throughout life.

Education gave birth to the idea of a Renaissance man–someone who had mastered various subjects, not just six ways to make widgets. Learning wasn’t a means to a job. It was a means to a life. It showed the way to wonder. It was food for the soul.

But western culture rejected truth and modern education has shut God out. Now one’s purpose is to find one’s self. Now purpose is found within self not beyond ourselves.
 
Such an education makes the world small. It makes a life small. It reduces us to what we do and fails to recognize who we are–who God made us to be.

But small voices still carry wonder in them. Voices in a wilderness, to be sure–voices to convey big purposes beyond self.

Voices that point to flowers, treetops, stars. That teach children math and show them books. That open a world of opportunity.

Voices of sanity and reality. Voices to feed the soul.

The world is filled with soul hungry people. But small voices can speak a resonating language of bread.

If you own wonder, share your bread.

You never know how far someone might go on a small meal.

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Happily Even After: Let God Redeem Your Marriage

It’s the type of book you might read “for a friend because nothing like that would ever happen to me.”

Even so, 70 percent of men use porn. One in six women struggles with addiction to porn. Being part of the Church doesn’t exempt us when 50 percent of pastors use porn too.

Porn is everywhere. It touches all of us causing wounds, seen and unseen, but always felt even if we don’t understand their source.

Bob and Dannah Gresh have felt the hard slap of porn addiction in their marriage too.

And unlike many other Christians, they aren’t hiding their struggle. They’re showing us their journey to help us along ours.

“One book won’t fix a marriage.” That’s how Dannah opens her newly released book Happily Even After: Let God Redeem Your Marriage.

The book specifically addresses couples who struggle with his porn addiction and her response to it. Yet the advice is applicable to a variety of challenges couples may face.

Dannah writes in a tone that makes you want to pour a cup of tea for yourself and relax as if she were right across the table from you understanding your every heartache.

Her personal story, introduced with an account from her husband Bob includes sound, step-by-step counsel.

  • “stop pretending everything is okay
  • strengthen yourself in the Lord
  • fight for your husband instead of with him
  • discover 6 essential beliefs every marriage needs to survive broken places
  • participate in your husband’s redemption story”

Books like this one are important because they touch our lives right where we wrestle. Right where we feel that we can’t let anyone else know what our inner combat is all about.

Disclosure: I’ve known Bob and Dannah for more than a decade and a half. I received a free copy of this book for review as part of the launch team. That doesn’t color my conviction that years from now, because of this book, couples will be together who wouldn’t be without having heeded its message.

And if they’ve taken this book (and others Dannah recommends) to heart, their marriages just might be thriving.

Read this book. Cover to cover. Use the supplemental materials. Follow the directions. Cry. Pray. Cry. Share your burden. Cry with someone else. Heal. Forgive. Heal.

And follow God’s path on the good way forward.

Even if you’re just asking for a friend.

Photo Credit: Cover photo [of Dannah’s book] of pictures clipped to wire copyright © 2019 by martin-dm/iStock (1178573531).
Cover illustration of plant pattern copyright © 2019 by Asya_mix/iStock (1186132289)

Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Who Are We?

The woman stood in front of the congregation to tell her story. She had never spoken to such a large group before. I was in the auditorium “by chance” that day. I had come to hear my grandchildren sing. But an extended conversation in the hallway meant I missed my intended purpose that day.

I went home knowing I had been there for a reason very different from the one I had planned.

Her story drew me in. She had been pregnant for the second time. She spent weeks in bed nurturing a baby her doctors told her would never survive. And even if the child did survive, it would never walk, never be normal.

“It”. It is such an awful word when referring to a human being.

She should have an abortion now, they said. She fought the doctors. She finally found one who wanted to help her, to help her baby survive.

The weeks turned into months. The child arrived–a girl. She would not survive, the doctors said. But she did.

As this mother finished her talk, the doors at the back of the church opened and a little girl did not walk down the church aisle.

She ran. Beautiful, perfect, running. She was never an it.

She is set to graduate from college this spring. She has lived what we in America consider to be the most normal of lives.

All discussions about unborn life, life limited by illness or disability, center on one question: Who are we? Are we sacred souls made in the image of a great God who loves all, weak or strong?

Or are we just a mixture of electrical synapses and chemical reactions, a useful collection of spare parts?

One mother knows the difference.

Deep down, we all know it too.

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

When Satan Stops Lying

“[T]hat ancient serpent, who is called the devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world” (Revelation 12:9 ESV).

Satan loves to lie. He loves to help us justify our actions. He loves to convince us that his way is the only way.

Ultimately we see the truth. And that’s okay with him too. The knife of his lie is in us. Realizing the truth twists the knife.

In her forthcoming book Happily Even After: Let God Redeem Your Marriage, Dannah Gresh points out the effects of our realization of truth: shame.

“The enemy of our souls is so double-minded.
He convinces us that sin isn’t so bad before we do it.
But afterward he tortures us with our unworthiness
because our sin is so very bad.”

Some sins we can recover from. Others leave lasting consequences.

“After my abortions, I couldn’t listen to a baby cry. If I was in a store or restaurant and heard a baby’s cry, it sent a chill up my spine. Think about our nervous system and how everything that happens to us is stored there. There’s a reason that a baby crying did this to me,” Emily Rarick.

And that reason is truth–the realization that abortion, what seemed to be the apparent easy way out at the time, was no such thing. Emily realized that abortion kills babies. She knew it killed her babies.

Another big lie of our times debunked–that we can change who we are:

“I want to tell everyone what they took from us, what irreversible really means, and what that reality looks like for us [trans people].

“No one told me any of what I’m going to tell you now.”

. . . Now, now I’m trapped in the wrong body” TullipR (de-transitioned man)

The lie that TullipR followed changed his life permanently and irrevocably.

That lie states that God made a mistake.

God doesn’t make mistakes. Only we can do that. He’s trying to save us from ourselves.

Sex change surgery is supposed to be an easy (or easier) way out. You think this way, and we can adjust your body to meet the hopes of your thoughts. It would be harder work to adjust your thoughts and feelings to what your chromosomes and body chemistry and structure already are. That’s the lie.

“[T]he medical evidence suggests that sex reassignment does not adequately address the psychosocial difficulties faced by people who identify as transgender. Even when the procedures are successful technically and cosmetically, and even in cultures that are relatively “trans-friendly,” transitioners still face poor outcomes. Ryan T. Anderson, Ph.D.

Poor outcomes. And convincing the rest of us that it’s right doesn’t change the outcomes.

The lies that aborting unborn babies and changing the sex of children when they’re too young to decide and too easily manipulated eventually come to light for most.

It takes time, sometimes.

One study claims 95 percent of women have no regrets five years post-abortion. The study has a low participation rate (37.5 percent, despite paying the participants). It disregards what happens to the non-responding participants for the first five years and the responding percentage of women over the next five years.

“In 2010, at the age of 18, I had two abortions a mere six months apart. My regret was not instant, in fact, it was years before I truly realized what I had done. It crept in slowly, little by little, taking pieces of me and breaking me in ways that I never imagined possible.” Emily Rarick

Pamela Whitehead, executive director of ProLove Ministries, said it took her a decade to identify the effects of terminating her pregnancy. Just days after her abortion in 2001, the 9/11 terrorist attack happened, and she buried her grief. In the following years, she attempted suicide, became addicted to drugs, and lived in a homosexual relationship even though she wasn’t a lesbian. It wasn’t until 2011 that Whitehead realized her abortion had been the ‘precipitating factor’ of her self-destructive decisions. ‘I could trace it back to that event,’ she said.”

Regarding transition surgery, a controversial study but one quoted by the Obama Administration in 2016 says:

“We note, mortality [death, most often from suicide] from this patient population did not become apparent until after 10 years. The risk for psychiatric hospitalization was 2.8 times greater than in controls even after adjustment for prior psychiatric disease. “

The lawsuits filed by detransitioners who’ve realized the truth–that their desire to change was transitory– have begun in earnest.

Truth comes to light eventually.

Too late for many.

Desire truth. Embrace truth. Speak truth.

And so save some.

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Hope for Our Darkened Town on a Mound

“You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden,” Matthew 5:14.

“America is and always will be a shining city on a hill,” Ronald Reagan

“If destruction be our lot, we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen, we must live through all time, or die by suicide,” Abraham Lincoln.

America has been different from any other country since her inception. Now, we’re different in different ways. Only 22 or so years ago, the US “led the world in the proportion of young people who were creating new businesses and who were either working or looking for work. ”

In The Collapse of Parenting, Leonard Sax, MD, PhD, points out that in only 11 years, “the United States had dropped from first to last” among eight developed countries with entrepreneurial and working young people.

What changed?

Sax asserts that children have lost the understanding of their own culture, which encompassed basic principles of respect that come from sources such as, in earlier times, the Bible along with the Golden Rule, and more recently, Robert Fulghum’s All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten, which translates, in essence, to respect for others.

Some of Fulghum’s points include the following:

1. Share everything.
2. Play fair.
3. Don’t hit people.
4. Put things back where you found them.
5. CLEAN UP YOUR OWN MESS.
6. Don’t take things that aren’t yours.
7. Say you’re SORRY when you HURT somebody.
8. Wash your hands before you eat.
9. Flush.
10. Warm cookies and cold milk are good for you.
11. Live a balanced life – learn some and drink some and draw some and paint some and sing and dance and play and work every day some.

As I said. Basic.

Today’s American kids, Sax says, are more, much more, likely to be overweight, under-rested, and on medications to control their behavior than were their peers of a couple of decades ago.

“The proportion of obese kids more than quadrupled. . . . obese, not merely overweight. (emphasis Sax’s) . . . In every age group from 6 to 18, the average American kid is sleep deprived; and the older the child the more sleep deprived she or he is likely to be. . . . American kids are about 8.7 times more likely to be on these medications [the mind-altering kind that helps kids sit still or stay awake in school] compared with kids in Germany, 56 times more likely compared with kids in Norway . . . 93 times [more than] kids in Italy.”

What has happened to bring about such change?

Sax asserts that American society is now peer-driven, no longer parent-driven. Kids worry more about what their friends think than what their parents think.

“Without strong guidance from parents, children and teenagers turn to the marketplace for guidance about what counts. And today, the American marketplace . . . is focused narrowly and relentlessly on fame and wealth. . . . which impoverishes the soul.”

The problem largely rests in parents shifting their priorities from raising young people with character to keeping kids happy.

Sending children on a quest to attain perpetual happiness doesn’t produce disciplined, productive people who respect others.

Even though the changes Sax discusses have, for the most part, happened in the last 20 years, this transformation of our society didn’t begin recently.

Rod Dreher sites “Philip Rieff, an unbelieving Jew, [who] recognized that a massive shift happened in Western consciousness in the late 19th and early 20th century: Western man went from being ‘Religious’ (in the sense that he affirmed a set of values rooted in religion, however badly he observed them) to being ‘Psychological’ (abandoning the ideal of virtue, instead simply trying to manage the anxiety of living without ultimate meaning). But we were still Christian enough as a society back in the 1950s and 1960s such that the Civil Rights movement could use openly Christian language and concepts to shame their fellow Christians in America into repentance.”

We’ve fallen a great distance from the transition away from faith to the ’60s, and to today.

Where is the hope then?

It’s found in parents taking up their most important job, shaping their child’s character to teach humility, enjoying their children, thereby spending time leading them, and encouraging children to seek purpose and meaning. Such purpose and meaning come through the pursuit of “meaningful work,” finding (in the appropriate time) “a person to love,” and toiling on behalf of “a cause to embrace.”

Such a path toward hope begins, Sax asserts, with such a simple step as eating dinner together as a family on a regular basis and the harder step of establishing loving authority as a primary component of the role of parent.

A return to faith, the self-sacrificing sort Christianity proposes, lays the foundation for respect, discipline, and virtue through such steps. That path leads to happiness since serving others best gives our lives meaning and gives us satisfaction.

In the restoration of faith, discipline, and satisfaction through service, America can restore itself as the light of a city on a hill.

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Night and Day

“Then God said, ‘Let there be light’; and there was light.  God saw that the light was good; and God separated the light from the darkness.  God called the light day, and the darkness He called night. And there was evening and there was morning, one day.” Genesis 1: 3b-5~

Evening and morning–the first day. That was how God measured days. We flip it around. In our minds, our days begin with dawn and end with sunset.

In that change, we show our preference for daylight. And we show it in other ways as well. Our brightly lit streets are illuminated to a degree far beyond our need to have a well-lit pathway. Our cities glow and flicker as business interests compete for our attention. We are like moths, and like moths, we find artificial light more attractive than natural light. And the more light we have the more we want–as in addiction.

In The End of Night, Paul Bogard takes a secular look at our desire for more and brighter light.

“As our surroundings grow brighter, we grow used to that level of brightness, and so anything dimmer seems extraordinarily dim, even dark. This is exactly what happened as artificial lighting developed through the ages. The once glorious oil lamps became dim and disgusting with the advent of wonderful gas lighting, which then became smelly and awful and unbearably dim the moment we saw electric light. . . . [O]nce our eyes get used to seeing brighter lights, we must have brighter lights.”

We favor the daylight so much that we miss out on the night–on what God intended for us to get out of the night. Bogard asserts that our sleep problems–insomnia and other sleep disorders–are due to a lack of darkness. Artificial light on our streets and in our houses makes it impossible to achieve the level of darkness that promotes good rest.

But there’s more.

We consider a day as the time we move from light into darkness. God set up a daily system that moves us from darkness into light. There’s a metaphor for redemption in that view.

And as we see God’s glory through his complex and beautiful creation during the day, we see the same at night–if we can still see it in spite of the artificial light that conceals the lights of the sky.

Bogard writes: “[I]n the night skies under which the vast majority of us live, we can often count the stars we see on two hands (in the cities) or four (suburbs), rather than quickly losing count amid the more than twenty-five hundred stars otherwise visible on a clear night.”

Those who stand on the observatory deck of the Empire State Building see one percent of the stars those in Manhattan could see during the 1700s.

Our world is ever-brightening 24/7 with artificial light. It obscures the natural beauty God put in place to light our way and show his work.

And sometimes the light that captures us best is the small rectangle right in front of our faces.

I want to be careful to let even the light of my screens show me His way–His very self.

And I want to take care to look up and remember at least that there is much more there than what my eyes perceive.

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through Him, and apart from Him nothing came into being that has come into being. In Him was life, and the life was the Light of men. The Light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it. John 1: 1-5~

Photo Credit: Pixabay

Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

A Modern Fable

“Each of us is born an original, but we are ever so in danger of dying as mere photocopies,” Carlo Acutis.

At some point over the last century or so, school became about, as Alberto M. Piedras says, “not the communication of knowledge but the sharing of social experience.”

True education presents nobility of character and self-sacrifice. Not a shared experience but an uncommon, often difficult one, one that challenges students to go against the flow instead of with it.

Not to show students nobility risks depriving them of a life of meaning and purpose and offers the feeble substitute of self-indulgence.

Consider this allegorical example.

Once upon our current times, there’s a community school that issues supplies to its students. Young scholars receive uniforms allowing them all to look the same, and multiple, clear plastic backpacks. The backpacks are tinted red, blue, yellow, or green, so students can choose one each day to let their peers know how they’re feeling: red for angry, yellow for triggered, blue for sad, and green for happy.

No one carries the green one.

The backpacks are not called bookbags, for they carry no books.

On their school-issued devices, students read stories about children much like themselves: kids who want to hurt others, those who want to hurt themselves, and those who just want to pull a pillow and stuffed puppy out of their bags and sit in the quiet rooms reserved for students with yellow backpacks.

In defense of the stories, no one ever gets hurt. All ends well when every character gets a new stuffed puppy at the end.

At this school, everything is equal and fair. Everyone gets the same amount at lunch–macaroni and cheese or pizza on alternating days. But students can pick a cookie or an apple for dessert.

There are always lots of leftover apples.

At the end of every day, each student gets a gold star sticker to take home. And the greeters at the door say, “Please think about bringing your green backpack tomorrow. It’s good to be happy.”

Even so, no one carries a green one.

Until the day someone does.

Joe is a new kid. He doesn’t carry a pillow or a stuffed puppy in his backpack. He carries an old-fashioned book, The Horse and His Boy. He doesn’t stomp or shuffle his feet. He smiles.

He’s very weird.

Upon his arrival, more students than usual visit the quiet rooms with their pillows and stuffed puppies.

Day after day, Joe eats his lunch alone as do most of the others. He picks an empty table away from the red backpack kids, near the blue ones who spread out and don’t take much notice that he is there.

One day, he recognizes Ann, a girl who rides on the same school bus he does. She has dark hair, wears glasses with turquoise frames, and carries a blue backpack. Joe senses all eyes on him as he walks to her table and offers her his cookie.

She pauses before replying, pondering his breach of the unspoken rule that students in different emotional states don’t intermix. “Th-thank you.” She glances up at him as she accepts the cookie. Then looks away as she nibbles at its edges.

He gives her his cookie every day for a week and receives the same response in return. On Friday, he lingers.

He shifts his weight from one foot to the other. “Want to read my book?”

She nods but whispers, “Not now. On the bus.”

On the ride home, she deftly stuffs the book behind her pillow so no one can see it.

Another week passes. Every day, he gives her his cookie, and she thanks him. But on Friday, she doesn’t eat it. She puts it in her pocket.

When she leaves the cafeteria, Joe sees Ann give the cookie to another student, a younger boy carrying a blue backpack.

A red-backpack boy also notices the exchange. He maneuvers himself in front of them and shoves her and the younger boy onto the floor before moving past them and down the hallway. Before Joe can get there, she helps the fallen boy up, pulls another cookie, her own, out of her pocket, and offers it to him.

The next day, she carries her green backpack to school, sits with Joe at lunch, and thanks him for all the cookies.

“Oh, I hope you don’t mind that I gave your book to my little brother, David. He’s reading it now too.”

“I don’t mind. Would you like to read another one?”

“Yes.”

They look up wondering whether their whispered conversation has quieted the cafeteria. They see the smaller boy Ann gave her cookies to and helped before walking to the red backpack side of the room. Seeing the look on Ann’s face, Joe realizes that the boy is Ann’s brother, David.

David approaches the boy who pushed him the week before. The boy stands and looks down at David. All is still as the room waits to see what will happen next.

David looks up and extends his hand offering a cookie. “Would you like my cookie?”

“No,” barks the bully shoving David to the floor again. That side of the room explodes in laughter. The blue-backpack kids look away. Three yellow-backpack students scurry out of the cafeteria to find quiet rooms.

David, wearing more bruises each day, repeats his question at lunchtime every day for the rest of the week and receives the same response.

Except on Friday, the red-backpack boy looks down on David once more but stops short of pushing him.

The room is pin-drop silent in anticipation.

“Sure.” The boy smiles, drops his red backpack, and crosses over to the other side of the cafeteria with David.

And so change slowly comes to the community school with the use of a great many cookies.

And books passed from hand to hand.

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

The Value of Wonder

“We are perishing for want of wonder, not for want of wonders.” G.K. Chesterton~

One year between Christmas and New Year’s Day, I had the blessing of being sick. Good timing. After Christmas. When there’s time for not doing much.

One day: A granddaughter was sick along with me. Two bad cases of winter yuck: coughing and head stuff. We each claimed a couch and a blanket. Since she is the other Rod Serling fan in the family, I put in a DVD of Twilight Zone episodes. Black and white images flickered in the glow of a wood fire and a lit Christmas tree.

We found a twilight of wonder with Serling voicing over our dreams.

The next day: Still sick, but in solitude, I wanted to stitch away some time. To finish restoring a quilt. If I finished it (and applied some Lysol), two granddaughters could dream underneath it for our then-annual New Year’s overnight.

As I sewed, I searched for some background diversion. Flipping channels, I found two-inch deep television. I settled on Netflix and discovered The Little Prince.

It’s a story within a story. An eccentric neighbor relates the story of The Little Prince to a young girl. Her life is consumed with the essentials of preparing for adulthood, her mother having mapped out every waking moment. No time for dreaming. No time for wonder. Only enterprise, but without the vision of wonder.

“Where there is no vision, the people perish,” Proverbs 29:18.

The neighbor shows the girl the stars. Beyond them, she sees what is truly essential—what the neighbor himself has already learned from the little prince.

“And now here is my secret, a very simple secret: It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye.”

When we find wonder—the invisible that shapes our souls—we learn the essence of who we are. And that essence speaks in everything we do.

We learn that the world can be full of patient wonder. And patience is not found in a thirty-minute sitcom that resolves a superficial crisis.

Wonder takes us deeper than two inches. It teaches us to endure. And endurance pays off with a prize.

The prince: “Well, I must endure the presence of a few caterpillars if I wish to become acquainted with the butterflies.”

Patience is, of course, a virtue. And wonder will always teach us virtue. C.S. Lewis shows us what happens when we lack vision and thereby lack wonder: “We make men without chests and expect from them virtue and enterprise.”

Without wonder, we have only empty enterprise. We have no virtue and no vision.

On the first night of the New Year, two young girls and I settled down with a bowl of popcorn and The Little Prince. Then they dreamed under the completed quilt.

Soon enough they will be grown-ups, at times consumed with the essentials of everyday living, but the prince reminds us that,

“All grown-ups were once children… but only few of them remember it.”

May we count ourselves among the few who remember—because only those who remember that wonder comes from God can participate in it with Him.

“Then Joshua said to the people, ‘Consecrate yourselves, for tomorrow the LORD will do wonders among you.’” Joshua 3:5


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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

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Advent, Week Four: The Expected, Unexpected Baby

“Our God who breathes stars in the dark–He breathes Bethlehem’s Star, then takes on lungs and breathes in stable air. We are saved from hopelessness because God came with infant fists and opened wide His hand to take the iron-sharp edge of our sins.” Ann Voskamp (138).

First, there was the oppression of Egypt, then the captivity of Babylon, and finally the occupation of Rome.

For quite some time, Israel had been imagining a conquering Messiah. Perhaps on that silent night before the angels’ announcement, the shepherds were dreaming of the day when they would be free from Roman rule.

The magi–scholars debate where they came from–were religious. They came to worship. But they may have also had a political motive. They came seeking the new King. They brought gifts befitting a king who may someday want to conquer.

They did find the One to worship. They gave their gifts. Returned home. And we never heard from them again.

I wonder. Did they expect to meet a humble king in a humble home?

How could they know what to expect of His Kingdom?

The song asks “Mary, Did You Know?” Were there moments when she wondered when she would wake up from this strange dream? But it wasn’t a dream.

He would turn water into wine at her request. He would, as the song says, walk on water, give sight to the blind, still a storm, and raise the dead.

How could she know what to expect from His life?

Reverberating in the back of her mind through His growing up years rang the prophecy of Simeon the priest: “[A]nd a sword will pierce even your own soul.”

Simeon had a glimpse at least of what was ahead. But perhaps even he did not fully understand that Christ’s incarnation was not to be political.

From Voskamp: “The Light never comes how you expect it. It comes as the unlikely and unexpected” (139).

Ace Collins writes, “Christ was the king who came not to take, but to give” (101). In the ancient world, that concept may have been the most unexpected of all. A King who would utterly give Himself rather than extracting tribute. A King who would suffer on behalf of His servants. He takes us beyond expectation.

We bring our expectations to our daily lives. We bring them to our churches every week. Reaching beyond expectation to ministry with other Christ followers opens doors of fellowship.

Reaching beyond the expectation of the manger takes us to the love of the cross.

A kind of love we could never have expected.

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The Shepherd’s Story

And it came to pass in those days, that there went out a decree from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be taxed. (And this taxing was first made when Cyrenius was governor of Syria.) And all went to be taxed, every one into his own city.

And Joseph also went up from Galilee, out of the city of Nazareth, into Judaea, unto the city of David, which is called Bethlehem; (because he was of the house and lineage of David:) To be taxed with Mary his espoused wife, being great with child.

And so it was, that, while they were there, the days were accomplished that she should be delivered. And she brought forth her firstborn son, and wrapped him in swaddling clothes, and laid him in a manger; because there was no room for them in the inn.

And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them: and they were sore afraid.

And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord.

And this shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger.

And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.

And it came to pass, as the angels were gone away from them into heaven, the shepherds said one to another, Let us now go even unto Bethlehem, and see this thing which is come to pass, which the Lord hath made known unto us.

And they came with haste, and found Mary, and Joseph, and the babe lying in a manger.

And when they had seen it, they made known abroad the saying which was told them concerning this child.

And all they that heard it wondered at those things which were told them by the shepherds.” Luke 2:1-18, KJV.

It happened just like that. I’m a shepherd. I was there.

We aren’t just shepherds, you know. It’s true, we aren’t wealthy. Our sheep are smelly. But they aren’t just sheep either. Our sheep are sheep for the sacrifice–the means to ask God to overlook our sins, take them away, forgive them.

The sheep have to be perfect, not a blemish anywhere on them, and not older than a year. Only males qualify for sacrifice. And they have to be born within five miles of Jerusalem. That’s how far Bethlehem is from our great city of worship.

The Roman historian Josephus figures that more than 265,000 sheep go to sacrifice every Passover at the Jerusalem temple. That doesn’t count Yom Kippur, the day of atonement, or wealthier people sacrificing a lamb upon the birth of a child.

Aside from the excitement of seeing the sky light up and the angels proclaiming the message we’ve waited hundreds of years to hear, what really caught our attention was the swaddling cloths.

You see, when a perfect lamb is born, we wrap him in swaddling cloths to keep him from hurting himself, getting a scar, and barring him for use as a sacrifice.

Another part of the message that was amazing was that the baby would be lying in a manger. A food trough for animals?

That’s not a common place to put a baby.

We didn’t have to wander around Bethlehem asking where a baby had been born that night. We just went back to the sheep tower, the Migdal Eder, the place where we inspect the sheep to make sure they’re worthy of sacrifice.

His parents must have been frustrated to find no room at the inn. But His heavenly father knew where he should be born–in Migdal Eder.

That’s where we found him. And that’s when we knew WHO He is. He didn’t come as a king in Jerusalem. He didn’t come to a rich family or a famous general of the army.

He came as a lamb.

The perfect Lamb who has come to take away the sins of the world.

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Advent, Week Three: Joy

“May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope” (Romans 15:13, NASB).

In Romans 15:13, Paul references joy, peace, and hope in the reverse order of the Advent calendar. He states that joy and peace come from God and make possible His provision of hope. Advent begins with hope and progresses to peace, then joy.

We cannot produce our own joy, the exultation within us that does not depend upon our circumstances. Sam Storms says, “Joy is not necessarily the absence of suffering, it is the presence of God.”

With Him, we have joy. With Him, we have peace.

Like joy, peace also comes from God. The peace that passes understanding (Philippians 4:7) comes to us in our worst, not our best times. Peace remains only when we keep our eyes on Him and don’t focus on our circumstances.

When we look back to see His provision and care for us, we can look ahead with faith and trust that He will continue to be good even if times become harder. That’s hope.

Advent is a time to draw near to God. We ponder the hope of His coming at Christmas as we look toward His coming again. We find peace and joy even in the turmoil of a world darkened because it has turned from Him.

The world is dark now. It was dark then too.

Christ is the light shining through the darkness.

The darkness will not overcome His light.

In that knowledge, we find joy and peace and hope.

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Advent, Week Two, Peace

“For a Child will be born to us, a Son will be given to us;
And the government will rest on His shoulders;
And His name will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God,
Eternal Father, Prince of Peace,” Isaiah 9:6
.

“He, Who had made humanity, became man. He, Who created His mother, was born to her. He formed the hands that carried Him. He filled the breasts that fed Him. The Word, without eloquence[,] is rendered mute–an infant, wordless, in a manger.” Augustine, trans. S. Watts, from God Above All.

Two or three weeks before Christmas is often not a time of peace for many who celebrate a modern Christmas, especially in America.

Peace sometimes comes through pleasant circumstances when we feel like we’re in control and things are going our way.

Yet the promise of Christmas does not come from us being in control, quite the opposite. And it doesn’t come from things going our way.

The wordless infant in the manger had crafted the world He came to. Those He made would care for Him and later look to Him for help and healing. Some would seek His death; they would watch Him die.

Old and new followers would marvel at His resurrection.

Many would follow so closely as to give their lives for the One who made them and died on their behalf.

He brought inner peace to people living in outward turmoil. He still brings that peace today.

If we can be still enough to find it.

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

The First Week of Advent: Hope and Time

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.  He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it,” John 1:1-5.

“He, through Whom time was made, loved us so much He was made in time for us.” Augustine, qtd. in God Above All.

Christ came from outside time to experience its limitations–days that were too short–nights, too long. He suffered in time without relief or reprieve.

It’s hard for us to imagine being outside time. How often every day do we check the clock or wonder how to get to the next task or place on time? We vacillate between wishing for more time and hoping minutes would pass more quickly.

We understand that He placed us in time but did not intend for us to remain in it always.

“. . . He has also set eternity in the human heart . . .” Ecclesiastes 3:11.

Since eternity is in our hearts, we squirm under the pressures of time–too much or not enough during our earthly lives.

Even so, Christ calls us contemplate the true meaning of His birth, life, and death. He invites us to respond to His call and so find hope.

“He came to this poor earth of ours to carry on an exchange; to say to us, as only the Good God could say: ‘you give me your humanity, and I will give you my Divinity; you give me your time, and I will give you My eternity; you give me your broken heart, and I will give you Love; you give me your nothingness, and I will give you My all,” Fulton J. Sheen

This exchange requires our time and devotion. In our humanity, in time, with broken hearts, and in our nothingness, we find hope in Him.

This first week of Advent when we ponder hope, hush your waiting heart. Hush your hurrying heart. His all awaits. Welcome, Christmas. Welcome Christ.

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Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Faithfulness, No Matter What

“Then the king of Egypt spoke to the Hebrew midwives, . . . and he said, “When you are helping the Hebrew women to give birth and see them upon the birthstool, if it is a son, then you shall put him to death; but if it is a daughter, then she shall live.” But the midwives feared God, and did not do as the king of Egypt had commanded them, but let the boys live. So the king of Egypt called for the midwives and said to them, “Why have you done this thing, and let the boys live?” The midwives said to Pharaoh, “Because the Hebrew women are not as the Egyptian women; for they are vigorous and give birth before the midwife can get to them.” So God was good to the midwives, and the people multiplied, and became very mighty. Because the midwives feared God, He established households for them, Exodus 1:15-20, (NASB).  

It hadn’t always been like that for the Hebrews in Egypt. Joseph had risen in influence and authority. In a time of famine, he brought his father, his brothers, and their families to the land where food was available. Over time, the famine subsided, but Joseph died, and a new Pharoah ascended. Life for the Hebrews in Egypt changed.

Did they notice small changes, little limitations, and growing oppression? Or did life change all at once in one day?

Do we notice the changes around us?

Throughout our lives, era blends into era almost without our noticing. Social mores take on different hues and shades and before we know it, society has taken itself to a new place.

Jake Meador: “In a hedonistic world [during the 1990s to 2010s], hostility to Christianity . . . was mostly centered around Christians being a moral buzzkill. But in our new moralistic world [from the 2010s to today], it’s not simply that Christianity is boring or not fun, but that Christianity is actively harmful because it suggests that there are some types of authentic selves [identities] that are actually bad and should not be privately accepted or publicly expressed.”

This change from a hedonistic era to a moralistic one happened gradually yet arrived more suddenly than we imagined it could.

Our times never stand still. We move forward and backward as a culture, not in a linear fashion. We’ve moved forward, for example, by establishing fairness in workplace laws regarding ethnicity and gender, but backward in other ways, embracing sin, then celebrating it, then insisting on approval for it.

Leonard Sax, MD, PhD, and Louise Perry in their respective books agree that Americans assume societal movement is always progress and always good. As Sax says, in this viewpoint, progress “has a smooth, upward trajectory albeit with a few hiccups.” Such a viewpoint, Perry points out, “encourages us to ignore both the ways in which things may have become worse over time and the advice offered by older generations.

That so many see our faith as not only passe but also “bad” for society is not something Christians can simply ignore. The crucial question becomes: How do we maintain our faith and faith communities in such an environment?

More from Meador: “What will primarily sustain the church in this moment is plain to any student of church history, for it is what has always sustained the church: the grace of God offered to us through the preaching of the Word and the Sacraments, which equip us to live lives of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. What sustained the church then was a quiet confidence in the providence of God, a patient resilience amidst suffering, and a humble reliance on God to give what is needed, in life and death. If we would lean upon those resources, they could sustain us today as well.”

The Hebrew midwives in Egypt knew honoring God was more important than obeying a wrong decree. God blessed them by placing them within families, perhaps providing a measure of safety not otherwise available. For many Hebrews, life got harder–until God sent a rescuer.

Today we wait for our promised rescuer.

And like the midwives of long ago, we must remain faithful until the day.

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

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Taking Sex Seriously: The Case Against the Sexual Revolution by Louise Perry

Sex Must Be Taken Seriously.

Men and Women Are Different.

Some Desires Are Bad.

Loveless Sex Is Not Empowering.

Consent Is Not Enough.

Violence Is Not Love.

People Are Not Products.

Marriage Is Good.

Those are the chapter titles in Louise Perry’s book The Case Against the Sexual Revolution: A New Guide to Sex in the 21st Century. It’s the kind of information and advice a mother (one who is wise or became so the hard way) would give her daughter to help her understand how to navigate youth and early adulthood with minimal wounds of body and soul.

I write often about the consequences of abortion on all involved. Yet abortion isn’t an isolated wound. It’s one in a series of injuries that often begins with the idea that we need not take sex seriously, that sex is not about commitment, reproduction, and raising the next generation, but that it’s about amusement and recreation and can be devoid of negative consequences.

Perry asserts that women have been deceived into believing that sexual freedom benefits them even while “it so obviously serves male interests.”

Society has further convinced us that men and women are the same, which has led to the idea that women can take care of themselves without extra precautions. Such an approach. Perry argues, often places women in “the perfect environment for the would-be rapist.” There is “cultural pressure,” she says, to reject messages encouraging women to “stick together on nights out, to keep their friends safe.” Cultural pressure doesn’t end there.

Our society has fallen victim to a belief that there are no “bad desires.” This modern tenet presses us to suppress our natural and protective “moral intuition. And not just “disregarding [our inclinations against that which is unnatural] but actively resisting moral intuition” (emphasis Perry’s), such as the need to protect not only ourselves but also our children. We shouldn’t be surprised to see, she says, that after the breakdown of “sexual taboos,” all taboos would be “considered fair game.” Hence we see the assertion that children are capable of sexual desire and consent and the efforts to sexualize children and instill in them the foundational premise that “loveless sex” is harmless.

Not only is “loveless sex” not empowering, but it’s also not all that enjoyable. Perry provides solutions to help us avoid falling victim to a “sexual culture that is fundamentally not geared toward protecting your safety or wellbeing.”

Further, she does an expert job explaining inconsistencies in the jargon and results of the sexual revolution. For example, laws draw arbitrary lines between statutory rape and consensual sex because a girl has reached a particular birthday of consent.

The same girl is abused and assaulted one day and the legal prize of desire the next.

Acknowledging that there “is no other way the law could function,” Perry states that “consent has more layers to it.” That a female has said yes “may do as a legal defence, it is not a convincing moral defence” (sic) (Perry’s emphasis) because consent can be urged, manipulated, or even coerced.

Consent to sex, manipulated or otherwise, can lead to a twisted notion of consent to violence. Women who are “inexperienced or overly trusting” can “confuse jealousy for fidelity and so be drawn to” those who would have them believe that violence is love.”

Sexual manipulation extends itself to prostitution as well. When Perry explains that people are not products, she highlights contradictory, even schizophrenic, efforts in England, on one hand, to legalize prostitution, and on the other, to legally forbid sex for rent, exchanges that have emerged in college towns within the UK.

“The whole point of paid sex is that it must be paid for. It is not mutually desired by both parties — one party is there unwillingly, in exchange for money, or sometimes other goods such as drugs, food or shelter.” Perry argues, among other assertions, that sexi should be done “with” someone else, not “to” someone else (emphasis Perry’s). “Once you permit the idea that people can be products, everything is corroded.”

This book culminates in a final full chapter with a surprising chapter title considering its writer holds an evolutionary viewpoint. “Marriage Is Good” illustrates that we live in “a natural human life cycle,” either dependent on someone else or “giving away some portion of your freedom, which runs counter to what we’re all supposed to want” for the sake of someone else.

Marriage is protection for women and children, not just a ball and chain of patriarchy as many feminists have claimed for decades.

Perry’s Conclusion “Listen to Your Mother” offers advice “I would offer my own daughter” urging readers to trust their moral intuition, learn how to recognize sexually aggressive men, and protect themselves by only having “sex with a man if you think he would make a good father to your children.”

She ends with optimism that women are wising up to the harm the sexual revolution has foisted upon them.

The Case Against the Sexual Revolution is well-researched, well-documented, well-argued, and easy to read. Perry stumbles across biblical principles through study and science although not completely as she supports same-sex marriage.

She avoided any argument of abortion except to say this: “And whatever you think about the ethical status of the foetus, we should all be able to agree that an abortion is not a good thing for a woman to go through, given such medical risks as uterine damage or sepsis, not to mention the emotional consequences, which are not trivial.”

I recommend this book for the evidence she provides in support of much that Christians have argued all along with a minor caveat about a smattering of unsavory language.

The sexual revolution was a lie. Perhaps you knew that from your youth. Perhaps you, as many of us did, learned it the hard way. When an evolutionary-feminist like Louise Perry writes a scholarly book backing up that claim, liberals and conservatives alike would be wise to consult it.

The sexual revolution was a lie.

“It was a lie all along. It’s time, at last, to say so.”

And may her message be heard and heeded far and wide to the healing and wholeness of many.

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Not We Ourselves

“Know that the Lord is God.
    It is he who made us, and we are his;
    we are his people, the sheep of his pasture,”
Psalm 100: 3 (NIV).

“Know ye that the Lord he is God: it is he that hath made us, and not we ourselves; we are his people, and the sheep of his pasture,” (KJV).

Two different versions of the same verse provide different but not contradictory messages. Some scholars favor the first version; others the second.

“He . . . made us, and we are His”–or–“He . . . made us, and not we ourselves.” The Bibles I most often use for study provide these different versions, but each includes the other in a footnote.

Both provide insight and wisdom. We are His. We do not make ourselves.

A distinctive quality of our times is that people insist on creating versions of themselves, remaking their own identities in the likeness of an image they’ve conceived and propose to give life to.

Proponents of self-creation assert that sexuality is fluid, yet they argue for permanent alterations for those too young to truly know themselves or be able to separate their own desires from those of others.

The more young people hear about transgenderism, the more it grows in popularity–a previously unheard-of phenomenon before it became a topic of pop conversation.

Chantel Hoyt writes, “The cultural phenomenon of transgenderism is growing at an astonishing rate. The number of gender reassignment clinics in the United States has increased from one in 2007 to 50 today. In her book, Irreversible Damage, Abigail Shrier reports that most Western countries have seen a 1,000-5,000 percent increase in teenage females seeking treatment from gender clinics and psychologists—many of whom recommend that these girls socially and physically transition through hormones and sometimes surgery.”

The change in numbers reflects a change in sociology rather than scientific breakthrough.

Who of us would like to be held to an irrevocable decision we made in our teen years–or even earlier? Now many are stuck with the ramifications of such decisions for the rest of their lives.

Years ago, Europe leapt ahead of the US in allowing transgender treatments for the young. Now several countries have wised up and back-pedaled. We should take heed.

Mairead Elordi explains:

“The United Kingdom, Sweden, Finland, and France have all taken steps recently to pull back on transgender medical treatments for seemingly gender-dysphoric children.

“Sweden has been one of the most progressive nations on transgender health care for decades. Back in 1972, Sweden became the first country to allow transgender people to change their legal gender.

“Last year though, Swedish hospitals halted the use of puberty blockers in five of the country’s six clinics for minors with gender dysphoria. The last clinic only uses puberty blockers in clinical trials. The country now emphasizes psychotherapy for minors with gender dysphoria instead.”

America needs to push on the brakes too.

Attempting to “make ourselves” rejects God’s image within us. Making ourselves rejects the person whom He made us to be–who we authentically are.

The young will not find themselves by looking in the mirror and imaging someone else looking back.

Human beings can only truly find themselves in God–the one who made the image they see in the mirror and knows them completely.

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

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Literacy: A Hard Thing to Do

What appealed to me about his story is that he picked the hard thing to do.

It wasn’t that he had played football at the University of Georgia. Not my team.

It wasn’t that he later played for the New England Patriots. Not my team either.

It was that he found something hard and decided to work at it anyway. And then he did something to encourage others who also find it hard.

Malcolm Mitchell has a Super Bowl ring. But he told CBS News that getting to the big game isn’t his biggest accomplishment. Reading well is. He found reading hard. But he didn’t give up. He just worked harder.

And he didn’t let his image as a star athlete get in his way.

A chance meeting in a Barnes and Noble bookstore enhanced his literary journey. A woman invited him to her book club. It was a club of readers, and he had become a reader.

Nevermind that everyone else in the group was an over forty woman. Malcolm joined anyway.

Malcolm realized when he got to college that his reading skills weren’t what they needed to be for him to succeed as a student. He decided he wouldn’t rest on the laurels of his athletic prowess.

He picked up a book whenever he could.

Then he wrote one. He was still a college student when it was published. The Magician’s Hat encourages young readers to open themselves up to the magic of reading.
Magic?

Malcolm Mitchell would say, yes, reading is magical. Hard too? Yes, sometimes it is.

But maybe that’s how we find magic. We decide to do the hard thing. And the world opens up to us.

Sadly, Americans are reading fewer books, and the current numbers don’t reflect an earlier decline in the number of us who read books of literature. The downward slide in reading has been steady over decades.

Malcolm Mitchell established the Children’s Literacy Foundation to “introduce book ownership to students in households where reading is not a priority and to improve literacy in schools with below grade-level reading skills.” He still writes books.

He didn’t play on any of my football teams, but go, Malcolm. I’m on your team now. Dust may settle on his Super Bowl ring. But magic will be with him for the rest of his days.

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

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Caption My Christmas Card, Please

On a light note:

I like to get an early start on holiday preparations, and I’ve been saving these pictures of my husband Paul and our dog Bindi since last Christmas.

The above picture is for the front of the card. The one below is for the back.

Provide a caption (for both if you like) in the comments below.

Photo Credit: Nancy E. Head

Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

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The Violent Bear It Away

Flannery O’Connor published The Violent Bear It Away in 1960. I read a short story or two by her when I was in college and recently decided to give one of her two novels a try.

O’Connor provides much to ponder in this book that becomes a page-turner the closer you get to the end.

Her characters in this book are among the best devised I’ve ever read.

An old man who is a self-proclaimed prophet is raising his nephew Tarwater to follow in his footsteps.

A worldly-wise cousin wants to draw Tarwater into the “reasonable”, “modern” world of faithlessness.

Tarwater himself is torn between two worlds, wanting to be his own master but having to choose between what he believes his destiny is and a life of self-determination.

O’Connor was a one-of-a-kind author whose texts are satire filled with irony. You won’t read another like it.

This book has dark, but not graphic moments. So dark I couldn’t see how she would redeem them.

But she did.

A fascinating, faith-affirming book–but only if you read to the end.

Photo Cover: The Violent Bear It Away Cover

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The Way to Healing and Wholeness

To heal my wounds, I worshiped myself.
I found the wrong path to healing and only stumbled on my way.
Self-worship became wounds wrapped in chains.
Scars lingered.
Birthmarks for my children,
Who received their own wounds.

We seek our heading on life’s path,
To heal wounds,
To break chains.
Christ is that Way,
The Rock on which chains break,
To make us free.

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When the Sexual Revolution Meets Reality

There’s a scene in the movie When Harry Met Sally in which the curtain comes back for a moment on the ideology of the sexual revolution.

Harry and Sally met upon graduating from college and later became friends. Their challenge became maintaining their male/female relationship without letting it become sexual.

Ultimately, they faltered in that quest. The pair had come to a crossroad, and they couldn’t turn the clock back and pretend it hadn’t happened. At their best friends’ wedding, they had this exchange.

Her: “You want to act like what happened didn’t mean anything.”

Him: “I’m not saying it didn’t mean anything. I’m saying, why does it have to mean everything?”

Her; “Because it does.”

I remember being shocked at that acknowledgment the first time I viewed the movie. Here was Hollywood, the purveyors of free love, explicitly pointing out that sexual encounters are not insignificant.

In her new book The Case Against the Sexual Revolution: A New Guide to Sex in the 21st Century, Louise Perry tears away the curtain on the “sexual disenchantment” within our culture whose population largely “believes sex means nothing.”

“[We] pretend that this particular act is neither uniquely wonderful nor uniquely violating, . . . [and] there is another kind of cost. . . [which] falls disproportionately on women.”

Perry stakes the ground of her argument somewhere between that of conservatives and liberals, yet her “complaint is focused more against liberals than against conservatives for a very personal reason: I used to believe the liberal narrative.”

She asks why “so many women desire a kind of sexual freedom that so obviously serves male interests? What if our bodies and minds aren’t as malleable as we might like to thinK? What do we lose when we prioritize freedom above all else?”

I first learned about this book from a somewhat negative review. Despite the reviewer’s input, this “feminist” author intrigued me with her willingness to buck the accepted way of thinking in a culture so eager to cancel dissent.

Austin Lamb writing for The American Conservative is the not so intrigued reviewer: “Perry’s book is good as far as it goes, but it doesn’t go far enough.”

His view of her book (which I’ve not finished yet) reminds me of my reading of Aborting America by Dr. Bernard Nathanson when it was newly published in 1979. Nathanson was an atheist whose acquaintance with abortion began with him acquiring an illegal abortion for his girlfriend when he was a student on his way to becoming an OB/Gynecologist.

Nathanson went on to become part of the effort to legalize abortion via his efforts as a member of the NARAL (the National Association for the Repeal of Abortion Laws, later the National Abortion Rights Action League). He claimed to have presided over 60,000 abortions as the attending physician (one including his own child) or through his position managing abortion facilities.

He knew how abortion worked.

Aborting America is Nathanson’s account of his journey from urging abortion deregulation to advocating for the unborn. New to a movement accused of wanting to impose religious views on others, Nathanson had come to his pro-life convictions solely on humanitarian grounds. He showed that one could hold such beliefs without a reliance on faith.

A few years ago, I read Nathanson’s final book The Hand of God: A Journey from Death to Life by the Abortion Doctor Who Changed His Mind (1996).

The reference to life in the title is a bit of a play on words. Nathanson had come to the pro-life view first through the technology of ultrasound where he saw the humanity of the unborn.

He became aware that others were praying for him. He began to research Christianity and so realized he carried all the sins of his life.

Through his pro-life journey, Bernard Nathanson gave himself to Christ and thus found new life.

Louise Perry enters the discussion of “sexual freedom” from an atheist perspective with great reliance on evolutionary arguments and more reliance on Christian morality than she realizes.

Like many Christians, Perry doesn’t understand that God’s prohibitions on pre- and extra-marital sex are protective, not just prohibitive.

Perry changed her mind about the “liberal narrative” about sex by working with rape victims. Like Nathanson, she arrived at her new beliefs through humanitarian convictions.

The pro-life movement welcomed Nathanson and prayed for him.

Rather than criticize her work because it stops short of embracing our full convictions, we can congratulate her about her new realizations.

We can welcome her to the discussion and pray her journey leads her to faith.

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

To Not Live in Fear

Christianity has ebbed in flowed in America since the pilgrims landed. There was ebb; then Awakening. Another ebb, another Awakening. In that second waking time, America freed slaves, prohibited abortion, introduced mandatory education, and enacted child labor laws. We regulated medical care to protect people from untrained quacks. We required employers to take steps to protect employees, steps that often required businesses to lose money.

We weren’t perfect. But we were better than we had been.

World War I came, an ebbing, the Roaring ’20s, more ebbing. Then the Great Depression, a flat line, followed by World War II, a resurgence of faith.

Then the ’60s came with the sexual revolution. And even with the ups and downs of the economy over the years, comfort and ease increased. In the 1980s, Christianity, especially the Christian Right, enjoyed an influence unparalleled since the Second Great Awakening.

Yet another ebbing followed with continued comfort for many and a discouraged malaise for others.

Through the last few decades the sexual revolution escalated. It became the Culture War. It gained intensity, declining into a shouting match. Angry people spewed hate from both sides.

It’s a delicate balance to speak truth and show love. Shouting, name calling, and snarky social media posts are not loving. They don’t make people yearn to have what we have or to be what we are.

If we show love and speak truth and suffer persecution, then we get what Jesus promised us. “If the world hates you, you know that it has hated Me before it hated you,” John 15: 18.

If we show love and speak truth and people’s lives are transformed–if there is another awakening, where will we go from there?

Back to our comfort? Or beyond to a new mission?

In his travels to places where Christians aren’t as comfortable as America, pastor and author Francis Chan sees a contrast between the comfortable but angry Christians here and the persecuted but joyful ones in countries hostile to the Gospel.

“[I]n China, believers in the underground church told Chan about the persecution they endure from the government. But what surprised the American pastor was that they had so much joy and were laughing when they told stories of being chased by police and authorities shooting guns to scare them. They thought it was normal to be persecuted and that Christians everywhere suffered like them, explained Chan. The underground Christians in China pointed to Philippians 1:29, which states, ‘For it has been granted to you on behalf of Christ not only to believe in Him, but also to suffer for Him.’

“Chan shared that in America, Christians change churches over better worship music, service time, or daycare programs. The Chinese Christians laughed at him thinking he was telling a joke because it did not make sense.”

We cannot be a church that is fearful. Fearful that our freedom will dissolve. Fearful we will suffer persecution. Fearful that America will stop being America.

To not live in fear, we must ask ourselves this question: Do we really fear the loss of our freedom or simply the loss of our comfort?

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

The Desire to Know

“For everything that was written in the past was written to teach us, so that through the endurance taught in the Scriptures and the encouragement they provide we might have hope.” Romans 15:4

“All men by nature desire to know.” Aristotle

In the Disney Pixar short film La Luna, a grandfather and father initiate their grandson/son about their employment. The viewer realizes that the boy is “going to work” for the first time to follow in the footsteps of his forebears.

The task ahead fills the boy with wonder. The men disagree about the best way to proceed and seem to have arrived at a place of tedium in their duty.

The boy reminds them to marvel at their work.

I taught with a fellow instructor who was learning Ancient Greek. The university’s Latin teacher was fluent in Ancient Greek. The two spent time in lessons every week.

My colleague told me, “I wanted to remember what it’s like to have to learn something hard.” And Ancient Greek is hard. A character in Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar explains something he doesn’t understand by saying, “It’s Greek to me.”

Sometimes we have to work at learning. Sometimes it’s hard. Still, it’s in our nature to want to know.

In his Inferno, Dante Alighieri relegates the world’s great non-Christian thinkers to Limbo. In an endnote in Dante’s Purgatorio, Anthony Esolen points out that new knowledge is something unattainable for the souls in this first circle of hell.

Those who sought knowledge in life have no ability to find new ideas in death. In Dante’s view, all that is the wonder of eternity will be lost to those who inhabit the dark and colorless regions.

It’s a challenge to bring wonder into a classroom of young ones today. More than a century ago, education largely stopped being about who students would grow up to become and instead became about what they would grow up to do.

Wonder seeped out of the classroom. Schools became larger, more uniform. Education became about, as Alberto M. Piedras says, “not the communication of knowledge but the sharing of social experience.”

Some students overcome the tedium of colorless education. The vibrant colors of learning for its own sake, wonder, are within them. Too many shuffle through their days feeling like the walls are all gray as is the world around them.

It’s up to us to show them the colors of the real world. The desire to know is within each of us, but someone must feed it or it will die.

“Our job is not to direct the imagination but to raise it from the dead.” Anthony Esolen

True education calls students to be better people, dutiful citizens, faithful family members.

Wonder plants seeds to pursue truth and excellence. A well educated populace is the living fruit of such pursuit.

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

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Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

The Spindle Chair

When a man and woman become one in marriage, each life meld’s with the other one’s baggage, even when neither fully understands his or her own past.

Shellie Arnold’s The Spindle Chair delves into this dynamic after Pierce, a pastor taking over his father’s ministry, and his wife Laurie suffer a miscarriage.

Both of them yearn for a child. Laurie is gleeful when she learns she is pregnant again. Pierce, however, withdraws, full of fear that he will lose Laurie because of the miscarriage–and because of trauma and rejection of his past which he has yet to resolve within himself.

Throughout that journey, both characters develop well in this nicely drawn and realistic community of faith.

Arnold weaves a well-researched tale that helps us understand her characters–and perhaps ourselves as well.

Shellie Arnold is a speaker and writer dealing with family and marriage concerns.

https://www.shelliearnold.com/

Shellie Arnold’s You Tube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC5IjrabLL7FnbWV7IZt4wsA

Photo Credit: Spindle Chair cover

Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Living for this World or the Other?

“to equip his people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up.” Ephesians 4:12 (NIV)~

“For three decades, maybe more, churches have been stripping themselves of compassion, community and commitment in favour of butts in the seats, bucks in the bank and broadening their sphere of influence. Once you feel like a number on an attendance sheet, a source of revenue or just one of many in a target group you are forced to ask yourself, why attend?” J. David Peever

The Western Church faces many challenges today not the least of which is a reduced number of “butts in the seats.”

Peever provides a harsh answer–but one we’d be wise to heed.

“At some point people just get bored. The entertainment loses its luster and the desire to leave the comfortable surroundings of the house disappears. For some this marks the end of regular attendance, while others continue to show up out of some sense of duty or tradition. Entertainment can inspire us, influence us, make us laugh or make us cry, make us feel good or make us feel guilty but the one thing it cannot do is make a permanent change in who we are.”

Church leadership, Peever asserts, sees the service “as a way to connect with people and with God but . . . [don’t] value people or God.”

It’s a simple diagnosis: The Church has been trying to connect without realizing that connecting occurs in truly valuing others. We don’t value others by entertaining them. We value them by serving them and calling them to service.

An example I read long ago: When you move into a new place, don’t offer to do a favor for your new neighbors. Ask them for a favor–even if it’s just the proverbial borrowing a cup of sugar.

When you do something for people, they feel beholden to you. That makes them feel uncomfortable. When they do something for you, they feel good about themselves.

That’s not to say we don’t fill needs as we see them. But part of filling someone’s need is helping him to see his own possibility and purpose.

The “butts in the seats”–all of us–need purpose in our faith. We need to feel useful, not just encouraged that God loves us. That’s important, but it’s far from all there is to living the Christian life.

The all-wise God knew that His love for us would require great sacrifice on His part.

He invites us, not to comfort and entertainment, but to sacrifice. To service.

If we issue that same invitation to fill the seats, we do better than inviting people into a fabulous showtime that lacks true connection, meaning, or purpose.

Our invitation is for others to live beyond themselves. We take our eyes off the comforts of this world, look to eternity, and invite others to do the same.

That’s how we value them. That’s how we value God.

Sarah Orne Jewett tells a story in which a community of women serve an outsider and learn this lesson:

“You know plain enough there’s somethin’ beyond this world; the doors stand wide open. There’s somethin’ of us that must still live on; we’ve got to join both worlds together an’ live in one but for the other.” 

Living in this world for our own sake is comfortable. Living for the other world isn’t always comfortable.

But it’s the richest life possible.

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

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Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Innocence Lost: Pearls of Innocence

“He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds. Psalm 147:3~

Based on a true story, Pearls of Innocence: Shattered and Restored, by Karen Ciccarone, helps us understand the methods abusers use to capture their victims and shows us how God can heal the wounds of those who’ve suffered such abuse.

Protagonist Kiersten MacKenna’s first-person account begins with her childhood wounds as she witnesses the results of her father’s alcoholism–estrangement from the neighbors and beatings for her mother.

Abusers prey on children who endure such circumstances, often distorting scripture to add credence to the power they hold over their victims. Kiersten’s experience follows that path to a place where she believes suicide is her best option.

Yet, that’s not where her journey ends.

From the Introduction: “Tangled knots on the chain are what keep a necklace from being seen for its real beauty and purpose. A jeweler who crafts a beautiful necklace never intends for it to become tangled, yet he possesses the right tools and expertise to fix it if it ever does. Our Creator God did not intend for our priceless souls to become ensnared by the trauma of abuse, yet he can provide what’s needed for our healing.”

A companion text Restoration for the Brokenhearted: A Study Guide to Healing from Abuse is a workbook for individuals or small groups to work through over 12 weeks.

Kiersten’s story will stay with you long after you close the book. And you will be changed for having opened it.

Photo Credit: Pearls of Innocence; cover by Andy Mylin

Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Meaning and Purpose in Pain

“The Lord is close to the brokenhearted
    and saves those who are crushed in spirit.”
Psalm 34:18 (NIV)

I wanted to entertain a bored grandson when I thought of the movie. The boy was intrigued because I said the football scenes were actual footage from Penn State’s games in the early 1970s.

Before long the story grabbed him. The movie, like all sports movies, wasn’t about a game as much as it was about something much larger. Character, sacrifice, love, family, and even suffering.

The movie was Something for Joey, the story of John Cappelletti’s quest to be the first Penn State football player to win the Heisman Trophy. But, as I said, it’s more than that.

The crux of the story is an internal conflict John and Joey’s parents felt. Joey’s mom and dad had signed him up for experimental treatment for leukemia. Of course, they wanted their son to live.

But he suffered.

At one point, their mother lost hope. She decided to pray for Joey to die “because if Joey has to die, I’m going to ask God to let him die now so he won’t suffer anymore.”

But Joey didn’t die. Joey’s journey through illness continued. It had ups and downs. But every time John had a game, Joey was up. Their mother encouraged John to devote himself to playing well because it meant so much to Joey.

In his Heisman Trophy acceptance speech, John gave his trophy to Joey since “it’s more his than it is mine because he’s always been such an inspiration to me.”

It seemed like the film had reached its highest point. But when the actor portraying Archbishop Fulton Sheen stepped forward to give the benediction, it went higher yet. Sheen did something I’ve never heard of anyone else in his position ever doing. Instead of praying, he made a brief statement that is probably more memorable than a prayer would have been.

He told the audience that perhaps for the first time in their lives they had “heard a speech from the heart rather than from the lips.

“You have heard that triumph is made from sorrow. That John was made in part by Joseph. I was supposed to pronounce the blessing at this point, but you do not need a blessing tonight. God has blessed you in the person of John Cappelletti.”

I love this story partly because I remember it unfolding. I remember the hubbub when Cappelletti won the Heisman. I remember the news coverage the day after he gave his acceptance speech. A speech that brought a roomful of celebrities and big league athletes to tears. I remember the radio relaying Sheen’s statement.

And later I remember hearing that Joey had died.

His young life and his suffering had not been meaningless. He had blessed his family. And through his suffering, he helped shape their love and their souls. And now through book and film, the story lives on to inspire us.

Photo Credit: Heisman.com

Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Sangre de Cristo: A Review

Christopher S. Swan, the author of Amos–a story/dramatization of the biblical book of the minor prophet, has published a very different kind of text, an action-adventure with Christian influence.

Sangre de Cristo (translated as the Blood of Christ) presents a metaphorical “shepherd”, a marshal on the hunt for a prison escapee. What Rawlings, the marshal, doesn’t know is that a gang of anarchist “wolves” seek the same escapee intending to kill him to protect their operations.

Caught between the two sides is Clay the convict escapee who realizes he’s better off with Rawlings than he is with his former friends who are willing to pay any price to bring about his death. Rawlings relies on the Holy Spirit and shows Clay how to do the same.

The bulk of the book contains various battles as this newly formed team of Rawlings and Clay strive to fight off the anarchists.

The text is filled with compelling descriptions, vivid conflict (sometimes with explicit violence), and occasional humor. Swan narrates in the present tense giving a sense of urgency to the action.

Full disclosure, I helped Swan edit the text.

At times, I couldn’t stop reading.

If you love action-packed adventure: Sangre de Cristo just may fill the bill for you.

Photo Credit: Sangre de Cristo cover

Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Unexpected Turns in Life

“God’s ways are at times like heavy wagon tracks that cut deep into our souls, yet all of them are merciful.” ― Charles Haddon SpurgeonGrace God’s Unmerited Favor*

Sometimes life takes an unexpected turn. Something bad happens. And the landscape of our story changes completely. We have a new perspective, a new direction. A bad thing works for good that we did not foresee.

I have a friend who worked in an ice cream truck when he was 17 years old. That seems like a job that would have few challenges. But one day, he was robbed and beaten. The event changed the trajectory of his life.

He became a career prosecutor. He devotes his life’s work to pursuing justice for those who are robbed, beaten, cheated, or worse.

A neighbor’s grandchild was born with serious handicaps. He and his parents faced challenges most of us cannot imagine. But two of his aunts found inspiration and, because of him, became occupational therapists.

A former student’s younger sibling was born with a genetic disorder. This student graduated from a prestigious Ph.D. program after studying genetics for years. She may change the life trajectory of others who suffer from similar conditions.
 
We Christians love to quote Romans 8:28–“And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.” NASB

But we sometimes neglect the following verse: “For those whom He foreknew, He also predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son, so that He would be the firstborn among many brethren.” We are creations still in the shaping process–being conformed to the image of Christ.

Most of us can look back and clearly see our turning points.

We can realize now that we found our path because life changed one day. Unexpectedly. Unpredictably. Even unpleasantly and painfully.

But never without purpose.

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Habakkuk: A Bible Study by Dannah Gresh

“Look among the nations, and see;
    wonder and be astounded.
For I am doing a work in your days
    that you would not believe if told.” Hab. 1:5, ESV~

Dannah Gresh’s Habakkuk: Remembering God’s Faithfulness When He Seems Silent is a six-week study that immerses us in the minor prophet’s three chapters with side journeys to the writings of a major prophet, Daniel, and other passages, Old and New Testament. Related weekly podcast episodes enhance the study. Videos are available for group study.

Habakkuk presents questions we often ask in our time of cultural disintegration and moral decline:

“Why do you make me see iniquity,
    and why do you idly look at wrong?
“Destruction and violence are before me;
    strife and contention arise.
“So the law is paralyzed,
    and justice never goes forth.
“For the wicked surround the righteous;
    so justice goes forth perverted.” Hab 1:3-4
, ESV~

Habakkuk provides context for our own times.

Providing the means to deep study and meaningful meditation. Dannah leads us on a journey from wrestling with God when we live in unsettled times, to watching for God to work, asking questions embedded with truth, watching for God’s answers, fearing God, and singing praise to Him.

It’s discouraging to watch the news or even go to the grocery store today, yet we can trust that God is doing a work in our days that we cannot imagine.

Dannah Gresh reminds us of that truth through her study of Habakkuk. Do the study. Reap encouragement.

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

So That the World May Believe

“My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me.” John 17:20-21, NIV~

I once had a conversation with a Chinese dissident, a man who had been a leader at the Tiananmen Square protests in 1989, who was arrested and imprisoned, and who later made a dramatic escape to America.  

In the course of our conversation, he mentioned that he was a Buddhist, nominally, and that Christianity, “because there are so many kinds,” was confusing.

That’s a difficult criticism to answer.  There are real differences among our traditions.  Take, for example, communion, confession of sins, and the role of Mary and other saints in our lives. Christians from different traditions view these issues differently.  

Many of us have some view of why other traditions teach what they do.  Sometimes, these views are accurate; many times, what we think we know about each other’s beliefs is actually a distortion, an out-of-focus picture that keeps us from understanding where we might actually agree.

It’s ironic that our confusion began with actual confusion.  In 451 AD, the eastern part of Christianity in the Middle East and the western part of Europe were trying to discern where they agreed and where they disagreed.  They got stuck on a point about the nature of Christ.  Was He truly God and truly man?  Was He always both all at the same time?  

Our Eastern brothers were working hard to explain that Christ’s two natures were inseparable, that He was ALWAYS God and ALWAYS man.

The biggest obstacle in the discussion was language.  The two sides did not speak the same language.  In such a situation, comprehension is only as good as the best translator in the room at the time.

For much of the last 1,500 years, most Christians in the West have known very little about the doctrines of Eastern believers. Those who knew even a little operated largely under the misunderstanding that those in the East believed that Christ had two natures but never had them both at the same time.  We in the West thought that those in the East believed that Christ was God only sometimes and man only sometimes.

We were wrong.

The translator, perhaps tired and overworked, gave us a distorted view of Eastern faith.  This distortion led many in the West to decree that Christians in the East, with their supposed view of the dual natures of Christ, were not true believers.  Our distortion of their faith separated them from our faith communities.  We became distinct groups, not because we actually disagreed about the nature of Christ, but because of a bad translation in an area of agreement.  How creatively the evil one employs confusion.

And our misunderstanding was not the end of his creativity.  Because of our misunderstandings, we have spent these last 1,500 years splitting into smaller and smaller communities, each presuming to be more right than all the others, many of us pointing to each other with disdain rather than showing the love Christ commanded us to pour out for each other.

A unified Church can seek genuine understanding and show love within herself even in the face of real differences.  A discerning Church seeks to determine the foundation for our differences and to overcome our misunderstandings.  Let’s be that Church today.

So that the world may believe.

Photo Credit: Gethsemane, Pixabay

Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Joy, Grace, Love

“By judging others we blind ourselves to our own evil and to the grace which others are just as entitled to as we are.” ― Dietrich Bonhoeffer, The Cost of Discipleship

Paradox:

To see my own sin—my own failings and imperfections—

To overlook yours.

Joy:

To have His grace wash over me and splash onto you,

To have His grace soak us both through,

And stain us forever with His love.

Jesus stood up and said to her, “Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?” She said, “No one, Lord.” And Jesus said, “Neither do I condemn you; go, and from now on sin no more.” John 8: 10-11, ESV~

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here! “Paradox” excerpted from the book.

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonies.”

The Business of Body Parts

They say, “The Lord does not see;
    the God of Jacob takes no notice.” Psalm 94:7~

In 2016, the National Health Service (the socialized medicine bureaucracy of the UK) was accused of encouraging women whose unborn children had terminal illnesses not to abort their babies. Instead, they could carry the children to term and then donate their organs.

Later reports denied that anyone would ever encourage or pressure a mother not to abort for the sake of finding harvestable organs. Even so, 11 newborn babies between 2014 and 2016 became “organ donors.”

Formerly, British law banned the harvesting of newborns’ organs. But that prohibition came into question when someone discovered that “even for adults,” a newborn’s organs can be useful.

On North America’s side of the Atlantic, Canada has been harvesting organs from euthanasia victims for a few years now. Someone dying of a terminal illness or living with a non-terminal illness can pass their organs along by having themselves killed.

Not just people but countries can be of two minds–not realizing an inherent contradiction in their pursuits.

Currently, Canada’s government is considering bills designed to prohibit transplant tourism and protect citizens and foreign nationals from exploitation.

The primary legislative goal is to stop China from harvesting organs from oppressed people due to their status as outsiders, the Falun Gong, Uighurs, Tibetans, Christians, and political detainees. Organ harvesting is a big business in China garnering $1 billion in profits for the government.

Gingrich 360 reports:

“China’s organ transplant industry began to increase dramatically in 2000.  Hundreds of hospitals offered transplants, thousands of transplant surgeons were trained, transplant research was conducted by the military, and the immunosuppressant industry was subsidized by the state.

“While transplant patients in most western countries wait months or even years for an organ transplant, the wait times for a procedure in China have been as short as weeks, days, or even hours.”

So Canada harvests organs from the euthanized while trying to protect the oppressed of another nation from being euthanized to harvest their organs.

In the meantime, many Canadians travel to China to receive transplanted organs quickly.

Perhaps in an effort to keep these Canadians home, the nation expanded its death “service” to include the mentally ill and handicapped.

“It’s a lot cheaper for the government to offer medical aid and dying than to offer the services people with disabilities need to live full lives,” Jewelles Smith, Chairperson of the Council of Canadians with Disabilities, said in an interview from B.C.

“John Maher, a psychiatrist from Barrie, Ont., called expanding access to MAID (Medical Aid in Dying) ‘the moral scandal of the century.'”

“He told CTV National News that the upcoming rules that could allow medical assistance in dying solely because of a mental illness don’t take into account that those suffering from severe illness may not be capable of making the best decision for themselves.”

Those who assist people deciding to die would surely encourage them to donate their organs.

A minor distinction exists between encouraging “donation” and taking advantage of someone who’s finding it hard to understand other possibilities.

While the possibilities may seem limited for someone with emotional and mental challenges, the possibilities to take advantage of people are many.

Back in the UK, researchers have discovered that they can safely harvest organs from those who’ve died of COVID. Organ recipients do not contract COVID from the transplanted part if the virus is absent in that organ (as is common in organs unrelated to the illness). Donor parts qualify if the deceased patient tested positive for COVID more than 20 days earlier.

How nice that, if someone dies in a pandemic, their organs can still be useful. That’s true only if medical was uniformly good and not based on a premise that people considered limited receive limited care.

From the UK: “more than twice as many individuals with learning disabilities died during the peak of the coronavirus pandemic than in the same period last year. “

“‘Do not attempt resuscitation’ (DNAR) notices were added en masse to the medical records of elderly and disabled people in care homes, without proper consultation with either the individuals or their families:

“* At the end of March, three care facilities for adults with learning disabilities in Somerset, Derbyshire and East Sussex were contacted by General Practitioners (GPs) to inform them that all the adults they support should be deemed DNAR.”

Sadly, care rationing is not limited to the UK. Several states in the US also set up rationing plans during COVID that proposed to deny care to those with disabilities.

It’s not a giant leap from determining who doesn’t deserve good care to seeing people who have challenges as spare parts.

One UK analyst proposes that the “normalisation of health care rationing and the wholesale abandonment of the most vulnerable in society is only possible because the NHS has been systematically starved of funds for decades.”

We miss the most important point if we blame a lack of money rather than a lack of respect for human life for the deaths of the defenseless and dependent.

All discussions about unborn life and life limited by illness or disability center on one question—Who are we? Are we sacred souls made in the image of a great God who loves all, weak or strong?

Or are we just a mixture of electrical synapses and chemical reactions, a sometimes useful collection of spare parts?

Answering the last question in the affirmative means there won’t be a stopping point along the way to the continually increasing exploitation of people as human products.

More questions to lead us forward:

Does the one who shaped the ear not hear?
    The one who formed the eye not see?
Does the one who guides nations not rebuke?
    The one who teaches man not have knowledge? Psalm 94:9-10~

We will all stand before the one who shapes, forms, guides, rebukes, and teaches.

A rebuke stands at the gates. And one more question will follow.

What did you do when you knew this atrocity was happening?

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Life or Death for Nikolas Cruz?

“See that none render evil for evil unto any man; but ever follow that which is good, both among yourselves, and to all men.” I Thessalonians 5:15 KJV~

On February 14, 2018, Nikolas Cruz killed 17 people at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida. Now he awaits news of his fate: Will he will serve life in prison or receive the death penalty?

Before his murder spree, Cruz published a post about another mass killer stating, “Elliot Rodger will not be forgotten.”

On May 23, 2014, Rodger killed his two housemates and a friend—then went on a shooting spree near the UC Santa Barbara campus. At the end of the day, he had wounded 14 and killed six. He then killed himself.

In a YouTube video recorded between killings, Rodger said, “You denied me a happy life. And in return, I will deny all of you life. It’s only fair.”

Rodger and Cruz described themselves as incels–involuntarily celibate. Rodger was 22 at his death. Cruz was 19 when he committed his crimes. Cruz’s father died when Cruz was six. Rodger’s parents divorced when he was seven. Both killers had suffered the “injustice” of female rejection.

Amia Srinivasan points out that in 2017 Reddit—an online discussion forum website—shut down a 40,000-member “incel” support group (Incel means involuntarily celibate)— ”for people who lack romantic relationships and sex.” Reddit also banned a second such group for calling for, among other proposals, reduced penalties for the crime of rape.

Incels are an unexpected consequence of the sexual revolution. The marginalized. The lonely. The excluded. The Elliot Rodgers and the Nikolas Cruzes. And others.

It’s a situation Aldous Huxley avoided in his futuristic masterpiece Brave New World. Huxley’s “civilized society” encouraged sex and conditioned children to understand that “everyone belongs to everyone.”

Huxley even created an alpha male character who was less than perfect. Bernard Marx was smaller and less attractive than other men of his social rank–as was Elliot Rodger.

Yet unlike Elliot, Bernard still had his share of the action–so to speak. Conditioned to always say yes, women accommodated even Bernard. There was no rejection. Therefore in Huxley’s book, there were no Elliot Rodgers or Nikolas Cruzes feeling that they had to kill in order to even the tilted score of life.

Some say, “Just take away the guns.” But that would not have saved three of Rodger’s victims. He stabbed his housemates and friend. He could have continued to wreak havoc with a knife–but he chose to attack his other victims with a gun.

Draconian gun laws may have reduced his casualty list. But they do nothing to heal the heart that tells itself everyone else is getting something I can’t have. They do nothing to keep that heart from determining to find revenge through some kind of violence.

We’ve taught more than one generation that their desires and inclinations trump all else. We have reached a shocking place, but we cannot claim to be surprised.

We have simply reached the logical conclusion of the sexual revolution.

If sex is free–all are entitled to participate.

Perhaps it would be a simple thing to teach young children to respect others first and themselves next. To teach them that respecting yourself means not giving yourself away casually. To fill them with enough compassion and respect for others that the idea of forcing themselves on another might become unthinkable–at least less thinkable.

There is much discussion over whether schools do enough to end bullying. Some say no, those administrations look the other way. Another argument says they do all they can. Both are true depending on where you look.

Indeed, schools have to do more than put up posters and hold anti-bullying assemblies, as they avert their gaze from reality. They have to teach that social responsibility is more important than self.

They have to be willing to suffer the discomfort of a difficult public relations scenario. They have to admit that their school isn’t as safe as they pretend it is.

Moms and dads, especially those who parent bullying children, must accept responsibility also. If children hear a message at school and home (and church) as was the case in America in the past, the message has a better chance of sinking in.

We will never be able to take away enough guns and knives to stop all violence. Ending violence requires us to change hearts. It’s a simpler matter than confiscating property. A simple matter–but a harder task. It requires us to face the truth about “free” sex.

Sexual freedom is a lie. It doesn’t give. It only takes. It does not free. It only binds. And its chains forge one scar upon another.

Winston Churchill once said, “Americans can be trusted to do the right thing–once other possibilities have been exhausted.”

How many more will die before we finally admit to that right thing?

Nikolas Cruz faces judgment here and now. He will face judgment again, as we all will sooner or later, in eternity.

He alone holds responsibility for the crimes he committed. He will pay with his life–either in prison or via a lethal needle.

We can hold him accountable.

But nothing will change until we hold ourselves accountable for the culture we have cultivated that seeks to disarm the wounded but never heal their wounds.

Revised from March 26, 2018, “The Brave New World of Sexual Entitlement.”

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Not Some Rapist’s Child: Loving Loud in a Scary World

We think it can’t happen to us. It’s something that happens to other people or in the movies or on television.

Jennifer Christie was on a business trip. After a long day of work, she headed back to her hotel room, unaware that someone followed her.

She saw him after she had opened the door to her room and stepped inside. He hit her in the face. He broke her fingers. He broke her ribs. He violated her.

She told herself he could touch her body but not her soul. She awoke in below-freezing temperatures in the outdoor stairwell of her motel.

Today she suffers from a seizure disorder because of the assault. She’s endured six major surgeries to repair the damage he caused.

“I couldn’t wrap my head around the evil we can do to each other,” she told a central Pennsylvania audience gathered to hear her a couple of years ago. Her story held us spellbound.

Weeks went by after the assault. Her body healed, but sudden noises made her jump. Her husband was supportive, but she could hear him rage in the shower, shouting, sobbing, punching the wall. He would emerge and tell her: “Everything’s going to be okay,” only to rage and sob and punch again the next day.

At the end of six weeks, he suggested she go back to work–to go do what she loved as a sign language interpreter for the deaf. He stayed behind with their four children.

Work in this instance was a previously scheduled cruise. What could be a better way to find healing and restoration?

Unless you get dysentery on day two of the cruise.

When she didn’t bounce back as expected, the ship’s doctor suggested a pregnancy test.

That possibility had not occurred to her. Her youngest child was eight years old. Her husband had had a vasectomy years earlier.

“I was raped,” she told the doctor, having only used the word assaulted until that moment.

Yes, she was pregnant.

Others urged her to have an abortion–to get rid of the reminder sure to haunt the rest of her days.

Imagine the physical pain along with the realization that you lost the sense of security most of us carry within us. Imagine the sense of lost control over your life.

The argument for abortion in the case of rape is supposed to be one of compassion. How can we ask a woman so violated to carry the reminder of her attacker, to bring this reminder to life, to look him or her in the face every day (as we disregard the possibility of adoption)?

Now imagine people telling you what you have to do. What you can’t do. You have to abort. You can’t keep what came from rape. Imagine many people telling you what you MUST do. So many voices saying the same thing.

But she felt protective of the life within her.

“I couldn’t protect myself. Him I could protect. . . . The more I heard how easy it would be [to have an abortion], the more I felt protective.

Her husband’s reaction?

“This is a gift. This is something beautiful that came from something horrible.”

What a gift is such a man.

She says, “My son is a reminder that every day we can rise above our circumstances. . . . He came into our lives when we were hurting and broken and he healed our family.”

Jennifer Christie has lived that reality. She looks into her reminder’s face every day.

But years later, she does not see “some rapist’s child.” She sees “God’s child.” His name is Joshua. And he is beautiful.

The voices that would have snuffed out his life were many. And Jennifer says, “Those voices were loud.

“But little boy, we loved you louder.”

Only a loud love can drown out the voices that would tell us that an innocent life must end because of the evil of someone else.

See beauty. See that there are no rapists’ children. There are only God’s children.

Love loud.

Behold, children are a gift of the Lord,
The fruit of the womb is a reward.
Psalm 127:3, NASB

Photo Credit: Pixabay

Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

This Thursday! Best You 2022!

Nancy E. Head, is featured in the Leadership Training Track on the topic, Prep for Discomfort Zones.

Airing live on Thursday, July 14 at 1 PM ET, Nancy’s session will help women everywhere embrace unprecedented times of uncertainty while finding peace in God’s Word, God’s workings, and God’s ways. Prepare for the coming unknown as you discover:

How trials draw us close to God

How to walk with someone else going through trials

How to build a community of support to lift others

Summit Director, Marnie Swedberg, is excited to welcome Nancy to the speaker platform because she is the author of Restoring the Shattered, Nancy E. Head was a single mother of five for eleven years. Nancy now teaches, writes, and speaks about God’s providence and grace.

“Mentoring women for 20 years led up to these amazing online programs,” said Summit Director, Marnie Swedberg. “Being able to host them live, on YouTube, and 100% free for attendees, is like a dream come true.”

Swedberg will kick off the summit with a “7-Day Praise Challenge” at 11 AM ET on Thursday, July 14. 

In addition to Nancy’s session entitled Prep for Discomfort Zones, attendees are next invited to select from simultaneous sessions all afternoon, at no cost, including:

  • Supersize Your Hope with Maribeth Ditmars of Sarasota, FL
  • Self-Care Secrets with Shayla Hilton of Jamestown, NC
  • Overcoming Giants with Tammy Kennington of Colorado Springs, CO
  • Master Money Mindset with Laney Houser of Bend, OR
  • Marketing Not Mania with Hannah Conway of Clarksville, TN
  • Break Free of Anxiety with Chikeitha Owens of Dallas, TX
  • Declutter Your Soul with Carla Gasser of Hudson, OH
  • I Dare You to Jump with Georgina Verzal of Tustin, CA
  • Why God Allows Suffering with Darci Steiner of Parker, CO
  • Reframe Your Thoughts with Sara Im of Largo, FL
  • Step Out of Your Doubt with Doris Swift of Edgewater, FL

Attendees are also welcome to request any of the $1500+ of free swag gifts now available, plus listen to any previous summit sessions at your convenience. No limit.

This summit is open to the public with attendees hailing from around the world. Many international participants use the post-summit videos (also free) to host watch parties where interpreters translate the training for local women’s ministry groups.

Our esteemed panel of presenters each provide a 30-minute training session followed by 15-minutes of Q&A for live attendees. Every program is hosted on the trainer’s own YouTube Channel and is available for replay indefinitely. So, if you miss a session or want to share it, or review it, it will be there for you, at no charge.

The Best You 2022 Virtual Women’s Summit has had over 70 speakers and over 2000 attendees so far and the hosts are excited to invite you to join the Summer Summit, Thursday, July 14. After you request your free ticket, you’ll receive a downloadable session schedule in PDF file format. Use it to explore your options, then click to attend the sessions of your choice.

Request your free ticket at http://www.BestYou2022.com.

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ABOUT LOCAL SPEAKER, NANCY E. HEAD & THE BEST YOU 2022 VIRTUAL WOMEN’S SUMMIT

Local speaker, Nancy E. Head, is one of twelve featured speakers at the Best You 2022 Virtual Women’s Summit on Thursday, July 14. This international online conference is 100% online, free and open to the public with sessions on Spiritual Growth, Self-Care, Bold Living, Leadership and Expanding Your Reach. Nancy’s session is Prep for Discomfort Zones, airing live at 1 PM ET on July 14th. Learn more and grab your free tickets now at http://www.BestYou2022.com

The Rape Exception

For you formed my inward parts;
    you knitted me together in my mother’s womb. Psalm 139:13~

It was a flashpoint in the argument to legalize abortion in America during the 1970s: rape. How could anyone be so cruel as to suggest that woman who’s been raped has to carry the child of the rapist to term?

The surprising answer is that abortion is frequently pushed onto these rape victims, and abortion victimizes them further.

We are half a century removed from the complete eradication of abortion laws that Roe v Wade and Doe v. Bolton enacted and in the midst of states reacting to the overturning of those cases along with Casey v. Planned Parenthood (1992).

Surprising is the scant discussion of the compelling subject of abortion because of rape or incest aside from an emotionally charged but “dubious” account of a 10-year-old victim who allegedly had to go out of state to be relieved of the child a rapist implanted.

And there seems to be little interest in finding facts to support what was and still is assumed: That women/girls who suffer rape and girls who suffer incest are better off having abortions than they are delivering babies.

We have barely looked beneath the surface of this assumption.

One study of 37 women pregnant from rape showed that a large majority opted against abortion. “Dr. Sandra Mahkorn found that 75 to 85 percent chose against abortion.[1] This evidence alone should cause people to pause and reflect on the presumption that abortion is wanted or even best for sexual assault victims.” (Also, see here and here.)

Multiple factors play into the discussion: the woman’s view of abortion before she was assaulted and the conviction that something redeemable can result from something horrible.

It’s interesting that few have replicated such studies. As if impressions that abortion is best, even necessary, in cases of rape are universally valid, further testing is superfluous.

More likely, it seems researchers fear results that would overturn the public’s impression that abortion after rape is beneficial or even benign.

Those impressions carry the same conclusion into the discussion of incest. But in cases of incest, abortion erases the evidence of a crime and allows abuse to continue.

David C. Reardon, Ph.D.:

“Studies show that incest victims rarely ever voluntarily agree to an abortion.[4]Instead of viewing the pregnancy as unwanted, the incest victim is more likely to see the pregnancy as a way out of the incestuous relationship because the birth of her child will expose the sexual activity. She is also likely to see in her pregnancy the hope of bearing a child with whom she can establish a true, loving relationship, one far different than the exploitive relationship in which she has been trapped.”

So it isn’t the way we thought it was. No matter which study we consider, assault victims are not lining up in great majorities to abort their pregnancies. They are not claiming that abortion saved them from something more horrible.

more recent survey of sexual assault victims–one that includes a much larger sample (192 women) than the studies cited above–states that 80 percent of women who aborted children conceived from assault regretted their abortions. No woman who gave birth expressed regret.

Missing in much of this discussion is the voice of the children. Rebecca Kiessling is one such voice. Conceived as a result of rape and later adopted, she speaks for the tiniest persons involved.

“Most importantly, I’ve learned, I’ll be able to teach my children, and I teach others that your value is not based on the circumstances of your conception, your parents, your siblings, your mate, your house, your clothes, your looks, your IQ, your grades, your scores, your money, your occupation, your successes or failures, or your abilities or disabilities — these are the lies that are perpetuated in our society.”

Our worth comes from our Creator. He values the littlest ones no matter how they came to be. We can value them too by helping their mothers. Those who have suffered such abuse need not suffer more.

It’s time to tell the truth about rape and abortion. Abortion harms women. Abortion kills children–no matter how they came to be.

Speak up for mothers and children.

Photo Credit: Pexels

See also: Not Some Rapist’s Child

Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertisement.

Rules to Free Us

“Sin is the failure to live freedom excellently.” George Weigel

When we were children, we told ourselves that, when we grew up, we would do what we want. We would stay up late, drive a car, and watch whatever we want on television.

But then we grew up and wished we could go to bed earlier. We wondered how we’d pay for car repairs. And we wanted to find some time to watch TV. Or when we did have the time, we wished there’d be something on worth watching.

We didn’t realize as children that our extra sleep helped us function and learn. Our parents chauffeured us around while bearing the burdens of car ownership and maintenance. And we enjoyed an innocence about how the world worked–or failed to work well.

We still don’t realize–and often don’t like to admit–rules are good for us.

The Ten Commandments are not just a list of what not to do–the “Thou shalt not’s”–not idolizing, misusing God’s name, stealing, lying, murdering, coveting, and adultering–or something like that.

They also list what to do. The “Thou shalt’s”–honor God, the Sabbath, our parents.

Those three seem less obvious to us. They don’t seem to carry the weight of immediate consequence, at least when we’re older. But they are perhaps even more important than the others. They keep us from the others. The “Thou shalt’s” help us avoid the “Thou shalt not’s.”

Yet every day, we are free to choose. In fact, our ability to choose our actions, according to George Weigel “is what distinguishes the human person from the rest of the natural world[;] freedom is the great organizing principle of a life lived in a truly human way.”

Life is hard. But when we live our freedom excellently we are most free.

Someone pointed out to me that God gave the Ten Commandments to the Israelites after they left the bondage of Egypt.

I had never thought of that before. I had never pondered why God didn’t give a set of rules written in stone to Adam and Eve upon their departure from the Garden. Or to Noah 120 years before the flood. Or to Abraham, Isaac, or Jacob.

God waited until His own people would be setting up their own society–a newfound society of free people coming out of bondage. He gave them guideposts, like road signs. Go this way. Don’t go that way. Avoid the bondage of sin.

They aren’t rules to limit us. They’re rules to free us.

“Had your law not been my delight, I would have perished in my affliction.” Psalm 119:92.

It’s something every generation must learn on its own. I confess that I learned many life lessons the hard way. When we learn that way, we come to see the rules as protective.
God wrote those rules in stone. They serve or are disregarded by everyone throughout history.

As children, we resented our parents’ rules while they formed a hedge of protection around us.

The wise delight in the rules and in the One who gave them to us as a gift.

Only then are we truly free.

Photo Credit: Pexels

Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonies.”

HEADlines: What We Don’t Know

In the beginning was the Word,
    and the Word was with God,
    and the Word was God.
He was in the beginning with God.
All things came to be through him,
    and without him nothing came to be.
What came to be through him was life,
    and this life was the light of the human race;
the light shines in the darkness,
    and the darkness has not overcome it. John 1:1-5~

“In former times, the most thoughtful people valued the old or the new only insofar as they gave a clue to the eternal and transcendent. In seeking the transcendent, they believed that old things did have a certain dignity on their face: they have the advantage of persistence, which is one part of virtue. Things that have been thought good for a long time are worthy of attention, respect, and study. New things are harder to judge. Nonetheless, both old and new things must meet the test of permanence and transcendence.

“To the modern ear, that sounds antiquated. Today the theme is not permanence, but change; not transcendence, but presence. Change is the master key to everything. Change can be eternal only in the sense that everything changes. But if everything changes, nothing is permanent, and nothing is transcendent. Today we are trying to make a transcendent good out of the one thing that cannot transcend.” Larry P. Arnn

One of my sons was ten or eleven when I asked his teacher whether he taught sentence diagramming.

“I sneak it in whenever I can,” was his reply.

Even during my youth, teaching elementary and middle school children the structured grammar of the English language had to happen through mutiny. My son’s teacher knew diagrams would help his students better understand their own language, but he had to be sneaky to avoid the wrath of an administration that thought it knew better.

During my years as a college composition instructor, I saw the results of grammar poorly taught or not taught at all.

Many of my college students could not identify the parts of speech in a sentence. Too many did not know how to craft a sentence. They wrote in run-ons or fragments. Beyond their inability to construct a sentence, many had no idea how to craft an argument and defend it.

College students.

Why the continuing animus against teaching English in a way proven over the years to work when the lack of teaching has produced such dismal results? Why the failure to teach the pieces of language to students, no matter their major, who presumably are working to learn to communicate in professional and public settings?

I remember an article I read years ago that I’m unable to source and cite today. The writer proposed that teaching grammar had fallen by the wayside because of an evolutionary mindset.

If we had evolved, so had our ability to speak and so had our development of language. From such a view, it would seem imprudent to teach grammar. After all, evolution means change, and if language evolved, ways of constructing language would evolve too.

This new way of thinking dismissed the idea of “correct” grammar and embraced the idea of an individual, self-created “voice”. Educators could no longer interfere with a student’s voice.

Grammar, in such a view, is a social construct, and social constructs are always to be rejected without consideration of what we lose in dismissing them.

Conversely, the author of the article explained, if we are created beings, we received language. God gave words to us along with the capacity to convey complex ideas in thoughtful, developed, structured, and civil ways.

God the Word Himself, the Logos, (John 1) ordained language.

Yes, language changes over time. Old English, the language people on the British Isle spoke around 700 AD, is unrecognizable to English speakers today.

Old words fall out of favor. New ones come on the scene. Few of us would recognize crumpet as a person’s head. If we used the word nithing in writing, we’d be accused of typographical error rather than insult.

Even so, the changing of language supports rather than refutes the need for grammar. A structure of grammar helps us understand new terms through context. Grammar helps us decipher old texts and more easily navigate complex ones.

Language changes, but we don’t invent it from scratch and expect to communicate well with others. Human interaction in any language is made worse when communicators lack vocabulary and reasoning skills as well as the ability to put words in an understandable arrangement.

Today, only a few understand the grammar of, not only English, but also history (what happened where and when and why certain events matter), math (the basics without calculators), literature (revealing the events and beliefs of people in other times), and science (what is verifiable and what is not).

During the Renaissance, people who believed God had created man melded the views and ways of Judeo-Christianity with elements from pagan cultures like logic and mathematics. Learning flowed from, not only Jerusalem, but also Egypt, Athens, and Rome.

The goal of education was (and should be now) to help students discern truth. To understand the first tenet of logic: that a statement cannot be true and false at the same time. To be able to weigh and argue reasons, facts, and ideas and come to logical, supportable arguments. To be able to explain those arguments in a coherent, persuasive way and to do so in with civility.

Such an education enables students to develop a sense of morality based on objective truth and to understand which actions lead to which consequences.

A language that evolved for a people who evolved is ever-changing and never settled in meaning. Not only in meaning by definitive definition but also meaning in having a lasting purpose. There is no room to claim an objective truth. There is no purpose in trying to convey it. There is only one’s lone voice speaking a foundationless language of self.

A created and bestowed language provides the means to use ministry to convey truth. From truth flows morality, purpose, and meaning.

All that from English grammar? Well, no.

All that results from the idea that learning looks back. Learning looks for structure. It seeks meaning. Learning has meaning because life has meaning.

The ultimate outcome of learning is far more than getting a job that pays well, the best we can hope for in the atomized life in which nothing is definitive. Learning builds a citizen, a spouse, a parent for life.

Arnn refers to higher education in the following quote, but his statement resonates no matter the age of the learner:

“Students [today] are not invited to step outside themselves, to step outside their own time, and to look at things as they have been understood by the best over time. If they did that, they would find that the great books are not a parade of agreements but attempts to approximate truth that frequently differ from one another. They would see that some [books] are more successful than others, and they would then learn and grow not by invention but by discovery.”

Not by invention but by discovery.

Modernity and post-modernity have erased the past from many of today’s classrooms. They’ve removed the wonder that comes from discovering ideas that mattered in the past, that still matter today.

Every generation must write old learning on new slates.

In losing such learning, we lose ourselves.

Reposted from The Mustard Seed Sentinel, 6/25/22

Photo Credit: Unsplash, Eric Muhr

Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.

The Fall of Roe

“So comes snow after fire, and even dragons have their endings,” J.R.R. Tolkien.

After nearly 50 years, Roe has fallen. The dragon is slain.

The decision overturns the 1973 ruling of seven men who eradicated every law in America that prevented or restricted the destruction of preborn children.

Now states can decide whether and how to limit abortion. Sixteen states have already taken up the mantle of protection for the unborn.

Mississippi’s case, the one SCOTUS ruled on, limits abortion after 15 weeks–more than a third of the way through pregnancy.

Oklahoma passed a law protecting the unborn from fertilization (with exceptions, reported rape or assault, medical emergency, Plan B). Texas’s law restricts abortion after six weeks and provides no exceptions for rape or incest. (See here also)

Arkansas’s law is also quite restrictive, allowing abortion only when the mother’s life is endangered. Aside from cases like a tubal pregnancy in which the non-viable child’s death is assured, ending a pregnancy prematurely because of a mother’s health issue does not require the death of a viable child. That’s an idea pro-abortion advocates have ignored since before Roe. There’s a big difference between seeking the outcome of a dead child and ending a pregnancy early to care for both mother and child.

In anticipation of today, eight states promised legal access to abortion until birth as per Roe. At least New York expanded abortion access so as not to require a licensed physician to perform the procedure.

Efforts to pass expansive abortion laws on a nationwide basis have failed.

That’s where things stand today. What comes next?

For the other side, the battle has risen to a new level where there can be no limitations–and not just inside abortion facilities.

A prime example is the firebombing of crisis pregnancy centers recently.

These incidents rightly remind us of abortion clinic bombings in the late ’70s through the ’80s and into the ’90s. Media outlets widely publicized the bombings and arson of abortion facilities. Pro-life advocates decried the violence.

This time, the media have largely ignored attacks on pro-life pregnancy centers.

Further, legislative leaders (see here and here) have ignored or have gone so far as to support illegal protests outside the homes of SCOTUS Justices. The White House encouraged such demonstrations supporting a clear violation of the law prohibiting citizens from attempting to intimidate the judiciary to achieve a desired decision.

Not prosecuting illegal protesters may have contributed to a more serious form of protest also muted in the media.

The New York Times buried the attempt to assassinate Justice Brett Kavanaugh on page 20.

Did the media tell themselves that one “crazy” person showing up with a knife, gun and other paraphernalia didn’t deserve a prominent headline. We must ask whether there is only one or a crowd of people willing to allow (or perpetrate) assassination for the sake of a political end?

It’s a crowd, and it’s larger than we would have imagined. Forty-four percent of young Democrat males as well as 34 percent of their Republican counterparts affirm “assassinating a politician who is harming the country or our democracy” as a moral good.

The Culture War is getting hotter, more warlike.

With Roe gone, a great deal hangs in the balance.

On the side of life, there are the children, parents, and other family members who become walking wounded after the trauma of abortion.

On the other side, Planned Parenthood, America’s largest abortion entity recorded its fifth-highest profits in 2017 at $98.5 million. Profits for 2020 were a mere $69.7 million. The University of Pittsburgh garnered millions in federal tax dollars for its companion industry of fetal experimentation.

The entities who make money from the deaths of children won’t give up easily.

Radicals willing to bomb and threaten those who oppose them won’t either.

Those of us on the side of life must continue to advocate peacefully for the innocent. Aside from the Dobbs decision, we have made progress.

As with many other issues, Americans are very divided over abortion although 70 percent of us favor some limitations, and growing numbers now call themselves pro-life.

We see courage in those willing to stand their ground in crisis pregnancy ministries–especially in states where the balance is tipped in abortion’s favor.

A decision has come down. But the argument is not over. Today is a day to proclaim repentance for our nation’s sins.

It’s a day to celebrate.

It’s a day to commit to courage come what may.

“Courage comes from the deepest recesses of our soul, where belief, hope, conviction, and grounded optimism, tempered by life experience, reside. It is seldom needed; when courage is called for, we either have it or not. those who know how to rally, in heart and deed, carry the day. Those who fold to fear slide away,” Robert B. Charles.

Let us not slide away.

“Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged, for the Lord your God will be with you wherever you go.” Joshua 1:9~

Photo Credit: Pixabay

Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.

Men Healing from Abortion

You pick up the stone on a Friday. At some time over the weekend, you’re supposed to put it down.

The stone can represent many things–your sin, your bitterness toward yourself, toward someone else. It’s the burden you’ve been carrying. It’s been the rock in the pocket of your heart for years.

But over the next few days, you’ll finally be able to put it down. And you’ll finally find healing you didn’t know was possible.

Such is the experience of many men attending a retreat to heal from abortion.

A typical situation begins with two people who come together in passing or in love–but always in passion.

She becomes pregnant.

He doesn’t resist when she says she’ll have an abortion–even though she may be hoping he will take a stand on behalf of their child–that he will choose to stand by her.

Or perhaps he pushes her to abort the baby.

Or perhaps he will learn of the abortion only after it’s already happened.

He’s often the neglected one in such situations.

Since before Roe v. Wade, we’ve heard that abortion is between a woman and her doctor. It’s nobody else’s business.

Except it doesn’t work that way–even though it may take him years to understand that the wound from abortion is the stone that has been weighing him down.

In The Tears of the Fisherman, Kevin Burke writes:

“[Many men] do not associate the symptoms they are suffering [depression, addiction, inability to maintain relationships] with that abortion event in their past. Even if a man is aware that he is hurting from participating in the death of his unborn child, there is no safe place to share that burden.”

He has no place to go–either because no one else knows about the abortion or because those who do know don’t want to discuss it.

Burke explains why healing is so important:

“When you went through that abortion experience the natural need for you to grieve the loss of your child and your parental relationship with your son or daughter was also aborted. For some men and women, forgiving self and letting go of the burden of self-condemnation feels like letting go of the only real connection with their unborn child or children.”

Yet there is hope–for both men and women. Hope comes, not in forgetting, but in honoring and remembering. Healing ministries provide the opportunity to remember, to name the child, to repent, to find forgiveness.

Burke’s book lists the following:

Abortionforgiveness.com is part of the Silent No More Awareness Campaign.

Menandabortion.net helps men find healing and works to raise awareness of men’s abortion pain in counselors, pro-life workers, and society at large.

House of Esau offers weekend retreats for men seeking healing from abortion.

And Rachel’s Vineyard is a ministry for married couples, parents, and grandparents. This ministry provides the stone that symbolizes the burden of abortion.

Burke quotes an attendee of a Rachel’s Vineyard Weekend Retreat: “After I picked up my rock, I was inspired to share with the group. ‘I’ve been carrying this rock for 14 years. I’ve been emotionally dead for that long.’”

He is dead no more.

Laying down the burden of death brings new life.

Reposted from 9/26/19

Photo Credit: Pexels

Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertisement.

How Sacrifice Plants Seeds of Hope

“When my mother’s father died of a heart attack–she was sixteen at the time–it was my father, only seventeen, who stepped in and took control of the household. Although they’d been dating less than a year, he cooked breakfast for my mother’s family, did chores in the afternoons, and became a dad to her young brother. . . . He was from my earliest memories, the person others came to. . . . [H]e never complained.” Mitch Albom

Mitch Albom included this account in the book he wrote about a dying Haitian orphan he and his wife cared for during the child’s final days. Chika was a resident in the orphanage Albom sponsors and helps lead. He and his wife provided love, comfort, and care Chika would not otherwise have received.

Albom’s father’s life changed when his girlfriend’s father died. The elder Albom’s sacrifice of time and effort manifests itself today in Mitch’s love and sacrifice, emotional and financial for Chika.

As we might imagine, the emotional and financial toll would be enormous. Yet, Albom says, “Chika gave us the blessing of having a family, even late in life. Her courage was an inspiration and continues to motivate us to take care of all the other kids [at the Haitian orphanage].”

By example, Albom’s father planted the seed of sacrifice in his son. Now, Albom has visited the orphanage more than 130 times, going monthly and staying for days at a time planting seeds into many more lives.

All fathers plant seeds. Some plant loneliness and pain through abuse or absence. Some cultivate crops reaping strength of character and heart.

When I was a small child, I discovered that the house was warm because my father loaded the furnace every winter morning before I got out of bed.

When I was nearly grown, I discovered that my father was the kind of man who stuck by his wife even if she was, as he said, no longer “herself” because of the emotional challenges and trauma she had suffered in her youth.

Our world is imperfect. That makes some people question God’s existence. A perfect God, they reason, would make a perfect world.

Yet this kind of world is the only place where we can learn about strength of character and heart. It’s the only kind of world that can shape heroes.

It’s what a perfect God would realize we need. Not all heroes are dads. Not all dads are heroes.

If your dad has been a hero, thank him. If he’s gone, thank God for him.

“Whoever fears the LORD has a secure fortress, and for their children it will be a refuge.” Proverbs 14:26~

Photo Credit: Pexels

Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.

The Languages of Life and Death

 “I call heaven and earth to witness against you today, that I have placed before you life and death, the blessing and the curse. So choose life in order that you may live, you and your descendants,” Deuteronomy 30:19, ESV~

“For too many of us, freedom no longer means the ability to know, to choose, and to do what’s morally right; rather, it means what the scholar D. C. Schindler described as ‘freedom from reality. . . . As a result, we relentlessly try to reimagine the world to suit our desires, and then coerce others into believing our delusions.” Charles J. Chaput

In 1974 along with some fellow students, I toured a residential facility for the mentally disabled in a nearby county. Patients’ conditions ranged from functional to bedridden.

In those years, seeing someone with challenges was more common. Aborting those with limited capacities or physical challenges had been neither legal nor acceptable when these patients resided in the womb.

A few years later, the center made news. A male employee had raped incapacitated female patients, two of whom had become pregnant as a result.

The parents of the two women took different paths as I recall from news reports of the day.

One family decided on abortion. Their daughter had a genetic disorder they feared would damage the fetus.

The other family’s daughter had been injured in an accident. Her “disorder” couldn’t be passed on. Her baby would be born. Her baby had a mother.

The newspaper reporter further distinguished between the two children. The fetus had tissue, but the baby had blood. Medical personnel would test both to solve the crime.

There was one language for death and another for life.

The language of death is designed to disguise its subject. Fetus is a Latin word meaning young one. Tissue isn’t as graphic as blood–the substance that sustains life. Fetuses don’t have mothers. Only babies do.

Unstated in the reporter’s account, one family would be relieved of a potential new burden the state was already carrying for their daughter since her child would die. The other family claimed an unexpected grandchild. That child got to have a birthday.

Law enforcement used the acquired tissue and blood to identify the perpetrator who paid the price of a prison sentence.

Nearly five decades have passed since SCOTUS handed down Roe v. Wade and companion case Doe v. Bolton eliminating every law limiting abortion (effectively allowing abortion until birth for any reason) across the US. The language regarding the subject continues to distinguish between fetuses to be aborted and children to be born.

Think of hospitals doing late abortions while medical personnel down the hall work around the clock in the NICU to save babies of the same gestational age.

Think of those working where life and death depend on human decisions.

Think of the people making these decisions–irrevocable moments that will resound in eternity.

And think of the babies, as all whose lives hang in the balance are.

Photo Credit: Pexels

Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.

Freedom and Happiness

“Blessed are the people whose God is the Lord!” Psalm 144:15b~

I had the great privilege once to meet Harry Wu, a Chinese dissident who spent 19 years in a laogai, a “re-education camp.” Wu was eventually exiled to America. He worked nights in a doughnut shop until he could learn English to become a voice for freedom until his death in 2016.

Something he said still resonates with me. “A barefoot peasant can be happy if he is free.” Happiness and freedom go hand in hand. 

In “The Grand Inquisitor,” Fyodor Dostoevsky presents what at first seems like a different view.

Alyosha, a priest, is generous and loving. His brother Ivan is an atheist who plans to live until he is thirty, then commit suicide. The two discuss a parable Ivan has written. The conversation, a chapter in The Brothers Karamozov, is more of a political statement than a religious one. But sometimes, people substitute politics for religion.

In Ivan’s parable, a 16th-century Cardinal/inquisitor talks to a silent Christ who has returned to earth for the day. Christ sits silently while the inquisitor tells how he and others in power have replaced God, having improved upon His plan. They have convinced the populace to willingly relinquish their freedom.

Christ had brought freedom with the promise of heavenly bread. He had brought no guarantees of earthly bread or even of happiness. The inquisitor offers people earthly bread at the cost of freedom. Not having to pursue their own bread, the people will be happy, the inquisitor claims.

Speaking to Christ, the inquisitor sums up our times:

“Dost Thou know that the ages will pass, and humanity will proclaim by the lips of their sages that there is no crime, and therefore no sin; there is only hunger? ‘Feed men, and then ask of them virtue!’ that’s what they’ll write on the banner, which they will raise against Thee, and with which they will destroy Thy temple.”

Published in 1880, Dostoevsky was prophetic. Much of the world has turned to the bread of socialism. They don’t, however, seem any happier for having done so.

Satan’s promises never pay off.

In the 1960s, President Lyndon Johnson promised America freedom and happiness. He admitted he did not have the “full answer” to America’s woes. But he determined to find “the best thought and the broadest knowledge from all over the world to find those answers for America.” It’s unlikely that he realized his point mirrored the words of the inquisitor.

Johnson’s speech marks a turning in America, not the first nor the last, away from the wisdom of God to the wisdom of man.

“The purpose of protecting the life of our nation and preserving the liberty of our citizens is to pursue the happiness of our people. Our success in that pursuit is the test of our success as a nation.” The government’s new goal became to effect personal happiness in its citizens. Without it, the nation would be a failure.

Johnson’s Great Society would result in “abundance and liberty for all” and require “an end to poverty and racial injustice.”

After having spent more than $22 trillion over 50 years, rates of poverty first dropped from 17 percent to about 12 percent, rose again to hover at 15 percent, then ticked back up to almost 17 percent in 2020. 

Changes to Social Security and Medicare accounted for much of the initial poverty reduction. 

The FBI’s Uniform Crime Report shows a murder rate in 1960 of 4.6 (per 100,000). The rate soared to 10.2 in 1980 and was at 4.5 in 2013. Currently, the rate is 6.9. The War on Poverty has failed.

More than half a century since LBJ promised that programs could produce a heyday of peace and prosperity, a heaven on earth utopia has not come to pass.

It cannot be on earth.

The pursuit of happiness is not something that anyone–including the government–can chase on someone else’s behalf. Certainly, no one can pursue happiness without freedom.

In response to the inquisitor, Dostoevsky’s Christ remains silent. His only response: kissing the inquisitor before He departs.

Ivan thought he figured out how to fix the world. But Ivan still wasn’t happy. Before they part, Alyosha kisses him.

Alyosha knows happiness does not come in the form of government-provided bread. It comes in the form of love.

Love shares, provides for needs, and is generous.

That kind of love comes only through Christ.

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.

Honoring Sacrifice

Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet,

Lest we forget—lest we forget! Kipling

Monday is a day for remembering,

Heroes who fought wars for us,

And didn’t come home.

Wives and sisters and mothers,

Fathers and brothers and sons,

Families,

Children,

Friends,

Left mourning,

Missing hearts,

Purple hearts.

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.

A Community of Light and Life

And do this, understanding the present time: The hour has already come for you to wake up from your slumber, because our salvation is nearer now than when we first believed. The night is nearly over; the day is almost here. So let us put aside the deeds of darkness and put on the armor of light. Let us behave decently, as in the daytime, not in carousing and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and debauchery, not in dissension and jealousy. Rather, clothe yourselves with the Lord Jesus Christ, and do not think about how to gratify the desires of the flesh. Romans 13:11-14 (NIV)~

“Today the individual has become the highest form . . . The smallest wound or pain of the ego is examined under a microscope as if it were of eternal importance. The artist considers his isolation, his subjectivity, his individualism almost holy. Thus we finally gather in one large pen, where we stand and bleat about our loneliness without listening to each other and without realizing that we are smothering each other to death. The individualists stare into each other’s eyes and yet deny each other’s existence. We walk in circles, so limited by our own anxieties that we can no longer distinguish between true and false, between the gangster’s whim and the purest ideal.” Ingmar Bergman~

Two religions prevail in America today. Christianity provides community. Modernity imposes isolation.

I had occasion this week to peek at life in a small liturgical church whose traditions I’d not witnessed before. Beauty dwells in that place. A beauty different from the magnificence of grand cathedrals. Natural light pours through clear windows; from within, lit candles stand tall around the altar area and above on a chandelier.

The natural forms of light bring opportunity for contemplation and an appreciation for the preparation before we arrive. Someone lights all those candles. That’s not our usual way today as we expect modern amenities along with efficiency to accompany our worship.

And we expect comfort as well. At this church, while a few benches line the wall, most people stand. Families worship on their feet. Parents carry babes in backpacks or belly slings.

Older children stand, sometimes moving around to light a candle or use the bathroom. No special children’s program separates them. No clenched teeth shushes and admonitions to SIT STILL dampen their affinity for the place and the rites.

Mothers stand holding babies within themselves.

I remember an old British literary work (but I can’t remember which one) in which a character commented that Christianity was for old women and the vulgar.

Yet in this candlelit place, the ratio of men to women is pretty even. The age demographic is nowhere near old. This church is young and burgeoning with life.

As SCOTUS continues to ponder Dobbs and Roe, we see the contrast between an encouraging community and our outer society of atomized individualists walking in circles and denying each other’s existence.

Even to the point of denying each other’s right to exist.

“Abortion long ago became a natural symbol for the loss of a spiritual center. Not divine law, but individual will is the measure, and rejecting the child within the body becomes its expression. Challenging Roe v. Wade is not a matter of standing in judgment against women, but of changing a culture of death.” Glenn Arbery~

By example, the young men and women in this small community of faith challenge this culture of death. As they accept the children they bear, as they take Communion, they renounce modernity’s cry for me, myself, and I.

“Abortion is the Antichrist’s demonic parody of the Eucharist. That is why it uses the same holy words, ‘This is my body,’ with the blasphemously opposite meaning.” – Dr. Peter Kreeft~

This small church is not an ideal community. There aren’t any. God doesn’t expect any church to be perfect, just humble.

There is a way to overcome the darkness of atomization and present the light of Christ’s community to the world.

Such a way begins in small communities loving each other and shining light to the rest.

If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land. II Chronicles 7:14 (KJV)~

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.

A Smaller Church in a Fresh Blossoming

—and blessed is anyone who takes no offense at me!” Matthew 11:6 NET~

In the 1960s, Pope Benedict XVI, then Joseph Ratzinger predicted the following:

“The church will become small and will have to start afresh more or less from the beginning.”

“She will no longer be able to inhabit many of the edifices she built in prosperity. As the number of her adherents diminishes . . . she will lose many of her social privileges. . . .”–from Faith and the Future ([published online]).

Christianity is in decline in America. Fewer than half of us belong to a church now with attendance having dropped 20 percent over the past two decades.

What might be the social privileges Benedict referred to? Tax-exempt status for religious entities in America comes to mind since most churches couldn’t maintain ministries in their current state and support missions while carrying a heavy tax burden.

In our communities as well as our nation, Christian social influence is ebbing even as we see results from years of toil. On what looks like the eve of the end for Roe v Wade, some states like Texas have already passed effective limitations to protect the unborn. More than half of US states are set to restrict abortion if or when the Supreme Court overturns Roe as many expect, giving the power to regulate abortion back to the states. That would seem like a supreme victory for the Judeo-Christian ethic.

At recent March for Life events, however, we’ve seen tremendous Christian presence accompanied by a growing portion of the crowd representing a Secular Pro-Life position–the stance that all human life deserves civil rights including the right to life, even in the womb, but without the idea that human life is sacred because God created us and endowed us as His image.

If America sees a rebirth of protection for the unborn, will we be able to keep it with a shrinking Church and even with secular allies for life?

We can, but only if we become and remain the Church of old.

Mike Aquilina and James Papandrea write about “Seven Revolutions” Christianity produced causing “radical change in the way human society thought of the individual, the family, work, religion, community, attitudes toward life and death, and even government.”

“For example, in the ancient world, a person’s worth was based on what he or she might produce, or how he or she might be a burden to others.  It was Christianity that would give the world a sense of the intrinsic value of every human being.  In other words, in the worldview of ancient cultures, some people were expendable, and some people were property.  Furthermore, in the Roman Empire the enjoyment of quality of life (along with the freedoms and free time that make that possible) was a luxury afforded to the rich.  Both religion and government existed to serve the ruling classes, which created a hopelessness in the lower classes and a tendency toward selfish hedonism in the upper classes.”

Nearly 50 years of unrestricted abortion (abortion throughout pregnancy for any reason) has done much to affirm the view that some people are expendable based on their limitations, lack of abilities, or inconvenient timing.

Now, more than ever before in America’s history, we see selfish hedonism among the elite and hopelessness growing in every population sector.

With Roe gone, it will be up to the Church to reach out to minister to families, women, and children in need. If we claim victory and celebrate that the fight is over and go home to rest from the conflict, the door will be wide for Roe to be reinstated–and even expanded.

Even with shrinking churches, ministry will have to grow. Christians will have to do more to reach out to those in need of loving service rather than the exploitation abortion offers.

Ministry itself is already taking a different shape. We can expect to see fewer large churches and more pastors managing a church along with an outside job. The number of bi-vocational pastors is now at 40 percent.

Ministry will be more difficult but perhaps more accessible, more real. We may look at the coworker next to us and find he is a pastor.

That sounds harder. More work to provide effective ministry.

Harder sounds bad. But harder isn’t always bad.

More from Benedict:

“It will be hard-going for the Church, for the process of crystallization and clarification [of essential doctrine] will cost her much valuable energy. It will make her poor and cause her to become the Church of the meek.”

And the Church becoming meek will be the seed of awakening in the culture around us.

“. . . . Men in a totally planned world will find themselves unspeakably lonely. If they have completely lost sight of God, they will feel the whole horror of their poverty. Then they will discover the little flock of believers as something wholly new. They will discover it as a hope that is meant for them, an answer for which they have always been searching in secret.”

Today in the West, authentic churches of all denominations are seeing Benedict’s words come true.

Can we know and explain what it means to be Christian in a way that holds to truth and shows love and grace? Are we willing to let our churches become materially poor in order to stand in truth, love, and grace?

“The real crisis has scarcely begun,” Benedict continued. “We will have to count on terrific upheavals. But I am equally certain about what will remain at the end: not the Church of the political cult, which is dead already, but the Church of faith. She may well no longer be the dominant social power to the extent that she was until recently; but she will enjoy a fresh blossoming and be seen as man’s home, where he will find life and hope beyond death.”

We already see loneliness manifesting itself in the totally planned world Benedict spoke of.

We know the source of life and hope.

As the Church grew through the centuries, stained glass windows and beautiful artwork told the story of Christ to the literate and illiterate alike.

We must now be those story-telling windows letting light shine into lives dwelling in the darkness of their loneliness.

We can ask God to use us to bring about a fresh blossoming of His love in our world.

We can be the seed of that blossoming.

“The wilderness and the dry land shall be glad;
    the desert shall rejoice and blossom like the crocus;
it shall blossom abundantly
    and rejoice with joy and singing. Isaiah 35:1-2a~

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Celebration of Mother

It started with the ancients honoring mothers even though ancient cultures did not regard women as equal citizens. Lauding Mother has rung throughout the ages.

America’s celebration of mothers began on a dark note more than a century ago. It was a day for mothers to mourn sons lost in World War One and work toward peace. As wars came and went, the day became a time to honor all mothers. It became a happy day.

The day’s original crafters would want you to know that it’s not Mothers’ Day–in celebration of all mothers. It’s Mother’s Day–when you’re supposed to visit and thank your own.

Some still hold the babes, wipe the noses, and change the diapers. Others joust with school-borne illnesses, sibling rivalries, and picking up Legos after stepping on one in bare feet. It’s the little ones that hurt the most.

For some of us, the babes grew up and had their own–may still have more. And some of those babes have grown and had their own now too.

Life is a sacred passage. Being a child turns into becoming a parent. The seasons pass too quickly from sleepless nights to piles of laundry on college weekends. Then weddings, then children–we hope.

Over the years, we forget the exhaustion that comes with fussy babies and sick children. We remember our lack of patience and wonder whether what we gave was enough. But even our mistakes don’t have to be wasted.

“Good parents use the mistakes they did in the past when they were young to advise the children God gave to them to prevent them from repeating those mistakes again” (Israelmore Ayivor).

But the next generation will stumble also. And so the seasons unfold. Imperfect humans pass on the stamp of imperfection. Yet we stamp each other with love and understanding too–and the eventual realization that our mothers did their best–and in spite of our exhaustion or fear or life circumstance, we did too.

We have to forgive ourselves and each other for our stumblings.

The stamp of imago Dei–the image we bear–makes it all sacred.

Celebrate your mother–in life or in memory. Celebrate those you hold, those you’ve held, and, if you’re a mom, those who hold you in their hearts for all you’ve done. Celebrate your part in the seasons of bringing others through to their grown-up time.

Celebrate Mother’s Day every day you can.
 


Photo Credit: Pixabay

Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.

Born and Preborn

For you formed my inward parts; you knitted me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works; my soul knows it very well. My frame was not hidden from you, when I was being made in secret, intricately woven in the depths of the earth. Your eyes saw my unformed substance; in your book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there was none of them. Psalm 139:13-16~

“Born and preborn.” That’s how my friend ended the Pledge of Allegiance every time she said it.

In January of 1979, she answered the phone when I called to reserve my seat on the bus for my first March for Life. We’ve been dear friends ever since.

She resides in a home now. I hope she is aware of the news of the day.

It’s sad that someone leaked the decision draft for Dobbs v Jackson Women’s Health Organization. I hope SCOTUS moves quickly to officially release the decision. If it is as it appears, there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth from the other side.

Yet the abortion business will continue in states like New York, New Jersey, Illinois, and others who prepared for this day by codifying Roe and Doe (Roe‘s companion case)–enacting unlimited abortion until birth for any reason.

Other states have prepared in the opposite way for Roe‘s fall. Pro-abortion entity the Guttmacher Institute says 26 states are ready to “ban” abortion (with limitations).

Our Pennsylvania governor takes pride in his previous service as an abortion escort. He walked pregnant women from their cars and talked to them so they couldn’t hear pro-life people offering alternatives to death for their children.

He is a guaranteed veto on any pro-life bill our majority conservative legislature will pass. His successor must be pro-life if we are to provide any measure of protection for unborn children who are still suffering across our state and at the hands of experimenters at the University of Pittsburgh.

We have marched and talked and prayed and marched some more since Roe and Doe came down in 1973. We felt devastation in 1992 when Casey (a very different Pennsylvania governor) v Planned Parenthood came down too. But now this day has arrived.

Even so, the fight for life goes on. While it appears that the generation calling itself the pro-life generation may finally have succeeded, every generation must stand to protect life.

Dred Scott, Roe, Doe, and Casey were bad decisions. Justice demanded they be overturned. Justice is late for 62 million children, the inconvenient, the imperfect, the wrong gender.

Perhaps today, justice is at the door. For born and preborn.

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

HEADlines: No Other Way

Published in the Mustard Seed Sentinel, Saturday, April 23, 2022

“And he will turn the hearts of fathers to their children and the hearts of children to their fathers, lest I come and strike the land with a decree of utter destruction,” Malachi 4:6 (ESV).

“A society based on ‘agape’ [sacrificial love] alone is all very well, but it will not reproduce itself: nor will it produce the crucial relation–that between parent and child–which is the basis on which we can begin to understand our relation to God. Hence, the redemption of the erotic lies at the heart of every viable social order.” Roger Scruton~

Charles J. Chaput includes the above Scruton quote in his book Things Worth Dying For: Thoughts on a Life Worth Living. Earlier in the book, Chaput explains that the word sacrifice “derives from the Latin sacrum facere–to make sacred; to set aside as holy.”

In his chapter on the family, “The Ties that Bind,” Chaput provides four factors that work against the process of strong families forming a strong society.

The first is political: The Christian view of what a family is–mom, dad, and the kids–is “a magnet for ill will” in a society informed by a “pervasive and permissive mass media–permissive toward some causes; bigoted toward others.” Chaput asserts that the independent-mindedness that democratic government fosters ultimately leads to this ill will since the “biblical authority of the Christian family is, finally, undemocratic.”

A family that functions with father and mother, equal in status, wielding authority, and filling different roles, is anathema to today’s liberal thinkers. Even so, the institution of the family is the primary factor in societal stability.

The second factor is economic: “Globalism has served America’s wealthy top tier quite well. But as lower-skilled jobs disappear, middle- and working-class wages have stagnated–or worse, declined . . . [forcing] both parents out of the home . . . [and keeping] many families from saving even for emergencies.” In such an environment, “the liberty and power of most individuals has declined.” We are now “free to make very few significant choices.”

The shift from local production to worldwide manufacturing has made the American Dream, family-sustaining independence, a memory for many.

The third factor is technological advances: “[C]oncern for electronic diversions and their impact on the mental health and development of children is now widespread.” Addiction to screens, addiction to porn, and mental passivity result from our devotion to daily screen time.

Even more concerning are “family-related technology issues” such as “mitochondrial replacement therapy–i.e., in vitro fertilization (IVF) with genetic material from three different adults.”

Chaput quotes Brendan Fohr: “The willingness of the fertility industry to use experimental technologies like three-parent IVF to satisfy the kinship desire of prospective parents, even when it means putting the health of the child at risk, bodes ill for how they will use the even more powerful technologies of genetic engineering now on the horizon.”

We have embarked into a Brave New World in which sex and reproduction continue to lose connection. That connection is the primary tie that binds, the “crucial relation” Scruton cited as a foundation for our understanding of God. The melding agape to eros (romantic, physical love) in families is how God created us to reproduce–physically and spiritually.

Finally, the fourth factor circles back to the first and echoes the third–hostility toward the family and pursuit of increased distance between sex and reproduction. Nineteenth-century “revolutionaries, like Marx and Engels, wanted their economic policies to dissolve the need for traditional families. Where they failed, feminists like Shulasmith Firestone (1945-2012) have not.

She explains: “The end goal of feminist revolution must be, unlike that of the first feminist movement, not just the elimination of male privilege, but the sex distinction itself.” She proposes artificial reproduction–“Children born to both sexes equally, or independently of either,” eliminating “the dependence of the child on the mother,” and thereby breaking “the tyranny of the biological family.”

Over the last few decades, society has deprived innumerable children of their fathers. Firestone would remove the influence of mothers as well leaving children to an institutional parent or a set of parents distorting the family model designed to point us to God.

Chaput: “Eros produces the family. Agape sustains it.” Western culture wants to sweep married eros under the carpet, telling us that only our desires matter. Our responsibilities to each other are secondary–perhaps not even worthy of consideration.

Firestone’s radical ideas have become more deeply entrenched as we find ourselves battling public entities over sex education, especially for young children. We’re watching this battle play out as politicians and “educators” sometimes demand the power to overrule the influence of parents.

Roger Scruton tells us that “a society based on ‘agape’ alone” is not enough to turn things around. His statement implies that agape is necessary, but more is needed. Chaput provides this answer:

“Renewing family life will require a healthy skepticism toward the secular culture that surrounds us, an appropriate caution regarding its tools, and an active, convicted Christian witness of courage, intelligence, and love. And that demands a faith rooted in one thing that finally matters: a living relationship with Jesus Christ.”

That relationship often requires sacrifice–something many of us with our independent-mindedness, economic struggles or standing, technological comforts, and aversion to necessary conflict with those who hold “ill will” against our faith would prefer to avoid.

Committed marital physical love forms families. Sacrificial love builds and sustains families. Both sanctify families.

Each generation builds or destroys the foundation of society. We build by committing to pure eros and sacrificial love. We destroy with a sledgehammer of selfishness.

There is no in-between. There is no other way.

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Every Day

“Therefore, go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always to the very end of the age.” (Matthew 28: 19-20 NIV)

On Thursday, He blessed and broke the bread.
On Friday, the Bread of Life let Himself be broken for us.
On Sunday, He defied death, sin, and oppression.
He rose.
Rise and stand for Him.
Bread of Life.
Living Water.
Messiah,
Lion of Judah.
Lamb of God.
Savior.
Returning King.

The King of kings is coming again.
The King of kings is with us yet.
Remember.
Worship.
Celebrate.
Easter is here.

The tomb is empty.

Not just Sunday. Every day.

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Easter Is Coming

“Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.” 1 Peter 1:3~

“I remember too how spring came, just when I thought it might stay winter forever, at first in little touches and strokes of green lighting up the bare mud like candle flames, and then it covered the whole place with a pelt of shadowing green blades and leaves. And I remember how, as the days and the winds passed over, the foliage shifted and sang.” (Wendell Berry)

The last part of winter brings Lent, which can be a harsh season–even if you don’t choose to sacrifice something. This March brought us a medical emergency for my husband. Yesterday, not unusual for the first half of April in central Pennsylvania, it snowed.

The chill seems even worse since warm temperatures weeks ago fooled us into thinking spring was already here. Winter lingered. It seemed entrenched. We continue to feed the woodstove, but the time of piling blankets on the bed at night will soon end.

In a few days, the lavender-blue hills will reappear awaiting spring green soon to follow.

Life is a series of seasons. Some are beautiful, warm, and easy. Some are cold and trying. All hold the purpose of drawing us to God and shaping us for eternity, shaping us to live in a beautiful place outside time without sacrifice, without pain.

Shaping us for eternal spring. The Lenten season is short. Warmth and new growth lie ahead.

Easter is coming.

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

A Mother’s Miracle Touch

For you formed my inward parts;
    you knitted me together in my mother’s womb.
I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.
Wonderful are your works;
    my soul knows it very well. Psalm 139: 13-14 (ESV)~

I remember the wonderful feeling on my belly–the squirming child who was recently inside me was now wiggling on me.

That happened four out of five times. One of my babies came so quickly I didn’t have a sterile drape on me to receive the child. (I warned them, but did they listen?)

None of my five were premature. But a preemie (and sometimes a full-term baby) born today is likely to receive “Kangaroo Care”–their parents will hold them skin to skin. This practice provides warmth and connection for the babe. Mother’s (or Father’s) body heat, voice, heartbeat are all conduits to connection.

The practice began in Bogota, Columbia, when incubators were scarce and babies in distress were in great supply. After implementing the skin to skin care, the mortality rate plunged from 70 to 30 percent. Since then, Kangaroo Care has become more widespread–even when incubators are readily available.

The most interesting aspect of the ensuing research I’ve found is that, during skin to skin time with the baby on or between the mother’s breasts, the breasts change temperature to accommodate the baby’s needs–even going so far that, with preemie twins, one on each breast, the breasts achieve different temperatures to accommodate each baby’s thermal need.

How amazing!

One mother reports using Kangaroo Care with her adopted newborn daughter–allowing the baby to get used to the mother’s body rhythms–to feel and smell her new mother–to get used to the sound of this previously unheard voice.

But the benefits aren’t just for the babies.

One study discusses the effects of Kangaroo Care (KC) for adopting parents. “During KC the mother’s perception of her infant changes: She feels more competent as a care provider, more responsible for her infant, and more in control of her situation.”

Now I think back nearly 38 years to the last time I felt my youngest one on my abdomen–warm and wet through the drape.

These were the days when it was still okay to dispense aspirin even to infants and put them to sleep on their bellies. In spite of all we’ve learned, perhaps there is more yet to learn.

We may just be on our way to discovering how healthy human connections begin at the beginning.

One of those ways–Kangaroo Care–highlights the deft hand of a loving Creator. The Creator who installed a heating and cooling system in the breasts of mothers–the mother’s miracle touch.

We are indeed wonderfully made.

Know that the Lord, he is God!
    It is he who made us, and we are his –Psalm 100:3a~

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

HEADlines: The Seed, the Root, and the Poisonous Fruit of the Overpopulation Myth

Published in The Mustard Seed Sentinel March 26, 2022.

I walked through the local mall one day in 1979. I was large enough with my third child for her presence to be obvious. I wore my favorite maternity shirt, red and stating in bold letters: “Yes sir, that’s my baby!” with an arrow pointing down toward the child in utero.

I pushed a grocery cart carrying three other children, my two already born and my nephew, a few months older and larger than my son but with hair the color of my daughter’s. She was the tallest of the three.

It was conceivable for observers to assume the three children in the cart were all mine born in quick succession. The eyes of many observers told me they assumed exactly that.

And such an assumption was not a positive one.

I could almost hear them thinking: “She has too many children.”

Nineteen seventy-nine, you may recall, came eleven years after Paul (and Ann) Ehrlich published The Population Bomb assuring us that we would soon be starving because the earth would not be capable of feeding so many. Most ominously, according to the Ehrlichs, it was already too late.

“The battle to feed all of humanity is over. In the 1970’s and 1980’s (sic) hundreds of millions of people will starve to death in spite of any crash programs embarked upon now.”

By 1979 people had so embraced apocalyptic premonitions that they perceived me as immoral for seeming to have produced four children in short order.

Thomas Robert Malthus planted the seed of the fear of overpopulation in 1798. He calculated that the population would grow more quickly than food supplies. The world didn’t check his math, and didn’t seem to notice the failure of his prediction that “there would be standing room only on this earth by the Year of Our Lord, 1890.” Perhaps more than any other philosophy, Malthus’s assertions that too many babies cause disaster became assumed “truth”.

Preventing overpopulation and certain starvation became a moral imperative.

It proved to be a convenient imperative for governments wanting to blame births rather than natural disasters or government decisions for food shortages.

China was one country whose government bought into the Ehrlichs’ theories, completely, officially, and expediently. In the aftermath of a deadly famine, the government looked to shift the blame from unwise policies that caused the deaths of as many as 45 million.

The One-Child Policy China adopted in 1980 required couples to get permission to give birth. With rare exception, the government would grant permission only once.

That’s when the law of unintended consequences kicked in.

Because of the cultural preference for sons, sex-selection abortion became pervasive, and a population imbalance ensued.

Zhuang Pinghui:

“The gender gap only started to soar in 1982, when . . . [China] started to strictly implement the birth control policy that allowed families to have only one child. The preference for boys over girls – boys could perform hard labour and were favoured in inheritance of land in rural areas – encouraged selective abortions that pushed the ratio of boys from 108.47 in 1982 to above 115 since 1994. It peaked nationally in 2004 with 121.2 boys born to every 100 girls, and some provinces even recorded ratios of 130. Demographers estimate that between 20 to 34 million more boys than girls were born in the past three decades.”

The population imbalance in China ignited the exploitation of North Korean women by the tens of thousands. “Women”, by the way, includes girls as young as 12 who have endured forced marriages or a form of conscription into the prostitution or porn industries.

It would take less than 40 years for China to realize its population policy mistake. By 2015, people would be not only allowed but encouraged to have two children, and now, three.

Today, countries like Finland, Estonia, Italy, Japan, and Australia are paying couples to have children. China is considering following suit. But despite the incentives, people are choosing to have fewer children.

Throughout history, children were a blessing although, aside from Judeo-Christian and Islamic cultures, parents often rejected baby girls and the handicapped.

In mostly rural America until the late nineteenth century, children were helpers who would eventually inherit the land and work it with their own children.

During industrialization, much of America’s population transitioned from the countryside to the city.

Instead of families inhabiting tracts of land where having many children was beneficial, they occupied overcrowded tenements.

Abortion shifted from being a rare device of desperate single women who’d been abandoned to a common tool for married women.

Society also responded with laws prohibiting abortion. That effort happened because feminists and physicians lobbied for laws to protect women and children from the exploitation of abortion. By 1900, every state in the US had outlawed abortion.

A century earlier, Malthus proposed a different solution:

“Instead of recommending cleanliness to the poor, we should encourage contrary habits. In our towns we should make the streets narrower, crowd more people into the houses, and court the return of the plague. In the country, we should build our villages near stagnant pools, and particularly encourage settlements in all marshy and unwholesome situations. But above all, we should reprobate [i.e., reject] specific remedies for ravaging diseases; and restrain those benevolent, but much mistaken men, who have thought they were doing a service to mankind by projecting schemes for the total extirpation of particular disorders. 2

Malthus saw people as an affliction on the world the way Hitler described some as “useless eaters.”

A root of the fear of overpopulation assumes people don’t produce; they only consume.

Terence P. Jeffrey:

“You don’t need to be an economist to see it is a myth that man is a net consumer of material wealth. History proves the opposite. The world is brimming with physical and intellectual improvements made by successive generations of human inhabitants. Its so-called carrying capacity has been determined not by the width of its continents, but by the wit of man.”

We need young people to come up with ideas of how to produce more food more efficiently, how to develop medicines, and how to solve environmental challenges. We need what has happened since the 1970s regarding the development of food production, medicines, and environmental solutions to continue into the next generations.

The poisonous fruit of the fear of overpopulation is the abortion movement, a monster with a voracious and never-satisfied appetite for death.

In the US many states have few or no regulations on the procedure, allowing it until birth.

Legislators were planning to consider a bill in the Maryland House of Representatives that would completely dehumanize the unborn child leaving abortion survivors without protection from death by neglect and/or experimentation.

Under the original, vaguely written bill, not only abortion survivors, but also “peri-natal” children would have no protection. The American Academy of Pediatrics defines the peri-natal period as lasting through “the 28th day after birth” (emphasis mine).

In the wake of push-back for his proposal to legalize infanticide, the bill’s sponsor canceled a committee hearing so he could rewrite the proposal removing references to peri-natal children.

It’s reasonable to assume that all unborn children and abortion survivors will still be subject to a death sentence under whatever is next proposed.

Most of us don’t live on farms today. Most people limit the size of their families. Dangers reside in believing that having a certain number of children is good, and exceeding that number is bad. And that any means to prevent those children from competing for our resources is acceptable.

Fear of overpopulation causes us to excuse the inexcusable as people reject the inconvenient child, the surprise, the one less than perfect.

When modernity made it possible to control our family size, we took that control, and we didn’t look back.

It’s time to look back to where we came from. To look up to the God who creates and controls. To ask forgiveness for our blatant disregard for human life. To show love in restoring a culture of life around us.

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Never the Same

These that have turned the world upside down are come hither also (Acts 17:6b KJB).

Their lives were set. They had worked at their jobs all their lives. They thought they knew which way life would turn for the rest of their days.

There was a hope for a political savior–to free them from the Romans. But mostly there was routine, the everydayness of work and home.

Then they met Him. Perhaps He was the one–the one who would save them from the oppression of Rome.

They were fishermen, a tax collector, others with occupations we don’t know. Simple men.

Disciples.

They listened. They followed. They believed.

Then one betrayed Him. Another denied Him. One stayed close to the end. The rest scattered.

They thought it was over.

The fishermen returned to their boats.

Life would be as it was before.

Then He arose.

Rome stayed, but His followers changed.

They received fire from heaven.

And they turned the world upside down.

His rising, a lie?

You may say so, but who dies for a lie?

Only one would not be killed for believing Him who said, “Follow Me.”

That one would suffer exile and write of encounters with Him. That one followed at the cost of all else–all else but eternal gain.

This story remains today.

To inspire us.

To show us how to follow Him.

To make us never the same.

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Enough or Too Much Time?

And do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell. Matthew 10:28~

Some of us get more of it than others. None of us knows exactly when it will end for us. We complain that there is not enough of it. Or that there is too much between where we are and what we want.

Some people even say it’s an illusion. But illusory or real, it binds us all.

Time never seems to do what we want it to do. But how to use it is up to us–even in the worst of circumstances.

Natan Sharansky spent nine years in Soviet prisons and camps. He experienced many days in a punishment cell–with little food or warmth. He underwent hunger strikes that weakened his heart.

He endured.

Sharansky filled his solitary time thinking. He devised chess strategies. He filled his mind with memories of loved ones. He resisted the urge to trust those who had taken his freedom.

Consistently, doggedly, he refused to cooperate with the KGB. He did nothing that would ease or shorten his time in captivity. He understood that cooperation was a snare that would never end.

Sharansky watched others. One worked to shorten his time but worked too well. He did not receive his promised release. He had bought a lie and kept doing time.

“During these years, I have met people who have been weakened from constant disappointments. They continually created new hopes for themselves, and as a result, they betray themselves. Others live in the world of illusions . . . in order to prevent real life from ultimately destroying it.”

Sharansky came to a conclusion:

“It’s best if you are left with only one hope–the hope of remaining yourself no matter what happens” (Sharansky 370-71).

Sharansky realized early on in his experiences with the KGB that “nothing they did could humiliate me. I could only humiliate myself–by doing something I might later be ashamed of” (8).

Later on, in freedom, Sharansky realized a great irony:

“In the punishment cell, life was much simpler. Every day brought only one choice: good or evil, white or black, saying yes or no to the KGB. I had all the time I needed to think about these choices, to concentrate on the most fundamental problems of existence, to test myself in fear, in hope, in belief, in love. And now, lost in thousands of mundane choices, I suddenly realize that there’s no time to reflect on the bigger questions” (418).

Each of us today will make a thousand mundane choices.

For the most part, we have spent our lives distracted by a world filled with such choices–voices drowning out the important.

What will we choose today?

Today, ponder the big things. Test yourself in fear, hope, belief, love.

Jesus tells us not to fear those who can kill our bodies. To find our hope and belief in Him. To follow Him, loving Him and all around us.

He holds time. He knows how long our time is. He knows what is real, what is illusion.

In our allotted time, we face challenges and sacrifice. With our trust in Him, we can find purpose and peace.

Peace no one can take away.

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Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Via, Veritas, et Vita

“You walk into this room at your own risk–because it leads to the future. Not a future that will be, but one that might be. This is not a new world. It is simply an extension of what began in the old one. 

“It has patterned itself after every dictator who has ever planted the ripping imprint of a boot on the pages of history since the beginning of time. . . . It has one iron rule. Logic is an enemy and truth is a menace.” Rod Serling, The Obsolete Man

It’s one of my favorite Twilight Zone episodes.

The story centers around a librarian (Burgess Meredith) named Wordsworth. Since books and religious faith have been outlawed, the librarian faces execution. According to his society, he has become obsolete.

In this situation, he finds a way to teach the world. He shows them that humans cannot violate each other without violating themselves.

He reads his illegal Bible. He asserts that there is a God. He has peace even in the face of death. The one who condemned him dies pleading and begging. It is the second man who has become obsolete.

It’s fascinating to consider how much the world and network television have changed since that episode first aired in 1961.

The episode was a reaction to, not only the war of those days, the Cold War, but also the previous war, World War II.

The reverberations of Hitler’s institutionalized, horrific, and unjustifiable atrocity still rocked the world. They remained fresh in the minds of those who had lived through that war and its aftermath. Those who knew of the testimonies at Nuremberg.

The world was wide awake to the dangers of those who would overrule logic and truth in favor of oppression and death.

Even in the face of terrorism and today’s political rancor, we have comfort. We have little fear. We sleep.

Ministries offer cruise packages, and families can book Christian vacations. Everyone needs a break. But a vacation isn’t usually ministry minded.

Ministry looks more like sacrifice. People who sacrifice for a greater good are not asleep.

Once, Germany’s people–and the countries Germany occupied–woke up to learn that they had much to fear.

Germany came to oppression by believing the world had oppressed them. The unfair treaty from the previous war had cheated them. They would show the world. They would rise and be a great people once more.

But they trusted a liar who gave them a twisted sense of justice. He defied logic and denied truth. He seemed great, this author of great horror.

In the meantime, others would rise to greatness. Not other countries. But individuals who lay under the “ripping imprint of a boot” Serling references.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Maximillian Kolbe, Corrie ten Boom. Examples. They were awake.

Bonhoeffer and Kolbe died standing for truth. Corrie ten Boom lived to write and speak the truth of that time.

They endured great suffering and loved their enemies. In simple essence, they lived for Christ.

Meeting at the intersection of justice and truth, they pursued holiness.

And prevailed over evil.

Ego sum via veritas et vita. ~I am the way, the truth, and the life. John 14:6a~

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Christians Speak Up! Podcast

I recently had the honor of appearing on the Christians Speak Up Podcast hosted by Eddie Jones. We had a great conversation! Enjoy!

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/join-us-for-a-conversation-with-nancy-head/id1611619225?i=1000552864263

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Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

HEADlines: Washing Blood Off Our Hands

When World War II ended and the world realized all the Nazis had done, Western Civilization determined never again to go back to what happened at Auschwitz or Buchenwald. Never again would the world see mass genocide based on race or human experimentation without regard for the wellbeing of human subjects. The Nuremberg Code states in part: “The voluntary consent of the human subject is absolutely essential. This means that the person involved should have legal capacity to give consent . . . . “The experiment should be such as to yield fruitful results for the good of society, unprocurable by other methods or means of study, and not random and unnecessary in nature.” Many today have forgotten Nuremberg, or never heard of it. In our ignoring or ignorance, we have slid back to a dark day. Late-term whole manual abortion (extraction of the child without ripping or crushing) produces living subjects for experiments. It happens more often than you might realize. The CDC estimates that in 2018, 50,000 abortions happened after the baby had reached the gestational age of 14 weeks; 6,200 of those were after 21 weeks. If their mothers “donated tissue” for research, these children were subject to experimentation.  Babies are not capable of consent, and the supposed “fruitful results” of such experiments have proven to be elusive. Melanie Israel writing for The Heritage Foundation in 2019: “Proponents of fetal tissue research claim that it has led to advancements such as creating the polio vaccine, while omitting important details about the difference between historic fetal cell lines (which do not require ongoing abortions) and fresh fetal tissue (which does require ongoing abortions). “The original polio vaccines used monkey tissue and fetal cell lines. No current vaccines are made with fresh fetal tissue.” [That includes COVID vaccines.] Israel points out that fetal research is a $100 million “industry . . . with little to no oversight.” The gains are big, but they don’t land in the realm of improving public health. They land in the wallets of the perpetrators. Societies are not comprised of wallets alone. We are hearts and souls as well as stomachs. When those with deadened souls hold power, society will only increase the level of horror. Kyle Christopher McKenna writes: “Without careful oversight, the fetus could become, like fetal tissue cell lines, merely cells, cultured within the uterus for scientific exploration. All people of good conscience have the responsibility to voice opposition to the use of fetal tissue from elective abortions in order to promote development of alternatives, affirm the value of all human life, and limit scandal.” The scandal is the deadening of our souls to the kinds of practices the Nuremberg Code was supposed to prevent. In promoting alternatives that respect the humanity of the born and unborn, we can be people of good conscience. Where to begin? We follow the money. There is recently acquired government funding from the Biden Administration. Without a new Congress and a new president, it appears that will continue. And there is funding from NIH, credited with paying for a horrific “experiment” in which infants of the gestational age of five-months (23 weeks) are scalped. A mouse or rat receives the new skin with hair. We are left to wonder what “fruitful results” for humanity could possibly follow. The scalp transplant experiment happened at the University of Pittsburgh, which ranks fifth among the top recipients of federal dollars. But cutting the the skin and hair off the heads of late-term abortion victims to see what happens when you attach them to rats and mice is not an aberration. Newsweek, which does not have a conservative, pro-life leaning, published David Daleiden’s account of a “scientist who developed a nightmarish “protocol” for harvesting the freshest, most pristine livers from five-month-old aborted babies in order to isolate massive numbers of stem cells for experimental transplants [none of which has worked]. This technique calls for aborting late-term fetuses alive via labor induction, rushing them to a sterile laboratory, washing them and then cutting them open to harvest the liver.” The majority of those babies were minority children. Intentionally. That also happened at the University of Pittsburgh. Pennsylvania law makes experimentation on a living fetus and failure to provide immediate medical care to a born-alive infant third-degree felonies. Before we ask where law enforcement is, we must wonder where the outrage is from our legislators who market themselves with pro-life slogans every election year. Pennsylvania pays Pitt $151 million currently with our governor asking for a $7.7 million increase in the next fiscal year. It’s ostensibly not money that goes to the labs for fetal experimentation. Perhaps it pays for instructors, secretaries, and janitors. Withholding $151 or $158.7 million would stop the vivisection of those legislators promised to protect. Yet a majority of legislators voted to fund Pitt even after the uncovering of this illegal experimentation. Pitt is among the four state related (as opposed to state owned universities) in Pennsylvania. Legislators fund these institutions with four separate bills. Refusing to fund one, until the killing stops, will not deter the flow of cash to the others. Perhaps Pennsylvanians will convince ourselves that what the right hand does (live fetal experimentation) has no effect on what the left hand does (college classes in English, sociology, chemistry, and sadly misguided ethics). If we do, nearly three-quarters of a century after the Nuremberg Trials, we will relegate civilization’s call for “Never again!” to an unmarked grave. Instead, we can remember that right and left hands wash each other. Some hands marinate in blood. And coming clean only happens when we refuse to continue the horror and cleanse our souls in repentance. Wherever you live, find out what’s happening around you. Call your representatives. Ask how they voted. Act accordingly on Election Day.

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Canada’s Tienanmen

In 1989, Shengde Lian was a college student studying computer science when Hu Yaobang died. Yaobang had been one of China’s highest-ranking officials, having lost his power and influence for supporting reforms like free press and assembly.

After Hu died in April, Lian headed to Beijing as thousands of students gathered to memorialize Hu and ask for the reforms he’d supported.

When the tanks came in on June 4, thousands died. Eventually, Lian was arrested. He served six months before learning his charges, at least one of which was a capital offense. After 18 months, he was released only to learn later that his rearrest was imminent.

At that time there was a covert action in China called Operation Yellowbird, “an underground railroad [to get the Tiananmen dissidents to safety] run by an odd alliance of human-rights advocates, Western diplomats, businessmen, professional smugglers and the kings of the Hong Kong underworld.”

Having escaped through that railroad, Lian now lives in northern Virginia with his wife and children.

In 1998, I was a local reporter for a small town newspaper. Because President Bill Clinton was about to visit China, my editor was interested in stories about China.

Watching CSPAN one afternoon, I came across Lian speaking on behalf of an umbrella organization for Chinese dissidents in the US.

During our interview Lian explained that Tiananmen Square wasn’t the only location for protests in the wake of Hu’s death. That no one knew the fate of the man who provided the most famous image of the protests by blocking a row of tanks.

And that the government had negotiated with the protesters in Beijing–for a time–before moving the military in to take the lives of thousands.

Agree or disagree with the protesters in Ottawa, but realize that their government never talked with the protesters. They just sent in their equivalent of the tanks of June 4, 1989.

The death toll won’t reach that of Tiananmen’s proportions. Machiavellian leaders in the West know that it’s unpopular to use violence beyond its need. But the injustices of Ottawa otherwise reflect that of the Chinese Communist government.

Like the Chinese government of then, Canada will hunt down the truckers who peacefully left Ottawa. Our neighbor to the north has confiscated finances and even threatens to euthanize the pets of those who participated.

For many in the West, Canada’s response to the protests is a surprise. First, that Canadians would rise up in such numbers. Next, that the government would come down with such force.

Before Tiananmen Square, young Chinese revered their leaders as a Confuscian culture had taught them to do. When China turned its army against its own people, the young looked elsewhere for leadership causing Christianity to flourish in China. One protester explains:

“I was raised to believe in our government, but the government shot me in my legs,” [Qi Zhiyong] says. After June 4, “a lot of people lost confidence in the education, policy and ideology of the Communist Party. People no longer had any beliefs.

“As a result, they rushed to church.”

The Chinese government is powerful, but there are now more Christians in China than there are Communist Party members.

The Canadian government has exerted its own power against a people, who like the Chinese students of 1989, wanted to begin a conversation that would lead to reasonable conditions and freedoms.

It remains to be seen whether Canadians will encounter Christ as the Chinese did.

I don’t expect a covert plan to help truckers escape Canada. We can be certain, however, that many Canadians won’t trust their government the same way they did a month ago.

Canadian leadership might benefit from remembering a motto, an old Chinese saying, the leaders of Operation Yellowbird embraced:  “The mantis stalks the cicada, unaware of the yellow bird behind.”

When a predator stalks prey, another watches.

May the One who watched over Chinese dissidents and brought them to truth, prevail in Canada as well.

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Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Manhood Does, Womanhood Is

“Manhood must be demonstrated. It is largely an action. Womanhood is an essence. Manhood does. Womanhood is.” (Qtd by Stanton)

That’s a statement many would challenge today. That there is a difference–and that the difference is significant.

Some might challenge the statement as religious. After all, it is largely in the orthodox corners of Christianity that such discussion happens at all today.

But this statement comes from a secular person–one who did not advocate biblical marriage and sexual purity.

Margaret Mead was a cultural anthropologist and an advocate of “loosening social strictures on sexuality . . . [which]  could lead to more pleasure, and less pain and suffering.”
Hardly a puritanical perspective. Even so, according to Mead, the differences between men and women are innate–born into us; they matter in our daily lives, and they are universal.

“In every known human society, everywhere in the world, the young male learns that when he grows up, one of the things which he must do in order to be a full member of society is to provide food [and protection] for some female and her young. . . .

“[E]very known human society rests firmly on the learned nurturing behavior of men. . . It is the precise opposite for women. They must be ideologically and politically pressured, with great potency, to abandon and ignore their children.”

There is no lack of ideological and political pressure on women to pursue lives that contain minimal involvement with children–especially their own. Our society has few structures in place to support the essence of women and pass on the model of manliness. This passing on of manliness is not religious pablum.

More from Mead:

“[T]his behavior [manliness], being learned, is fragile and can disappear rather easily under social conditions that no longer teach it effectively.”

And no society that works as hard as ours to ignore the differences between men and women can effectively teach manhood.

Teaching manhood requires a traditional view that effectively works in various cultures. We see it in primitive cultures. In the postmodern West, the Christian perspective is a lone voice in a technological wilderness.

The orthodox corners of the Church are where manhood mentoring can and must still occur. Solid families headed by fathers and mothers can pass manhood’s tasks and womanhood’s essence to their own–and perhaps to others around them.

Neither public education nor industry has the impetus nor the freedom to launch such an effort. We in the Church can pass along the truth science now ignores.

Christ calls us to this work in every generation.


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Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Turning Bad into Good

For as Christ’s sufferings overflow to us, so through Christ does our encouragement also overflow. If we are afflicted, it is for your encouragement and salvation; if we are encouraged, it is for your encouragement, which enables you to endure the same sufferings that we suffer. II Corinthians 1: 5-6 (NABRE)

Earthquakes, wildfires, floods, mudslides, blizzards–and war, poverty, abuse, and hunger. If there were a God, atheists claim, such bad events would never happen. Because bad things happen, there cannot be a good God–they claim.

But how good would people be if no one ever had to be a hero? If everyone escaped tragedy, there would be no heroes to celebrate. Without bad things happening–how could we be good?

When bad things happen to us, they help us sympathize with other people who suffer the same fate. No one understands a mother who has lost a child better than another mother who has been through the same experience.

That doesn’t mean, of course, that only survivors of floods can help those facing the duress of rising waters. It does mean that bad events can have meaning. It means a good God can use bad things to turn us into helpers and heroes.

Take Zach Bolster, who lost his mother to cancer.

While she was battling the disease, Zach saw the hardship other patients suffered just trying to get a ride to the hospital.

“My family was shocked by how many cancer patients had difficulty getting to their chemotherapy treatments. We soon realized what a huge financial and family burden transportation during cancer treatments can be. Some patients resorted to riding the bus, others, unfortunately, missed their treatment altogether.”

So Zach and his then-fiancee (now wife) founded ChemoCars to help those in need get to the hospital for their treatment. In only eight months, they had provided 2,000 rides. The ministry continues today.

Cancer is an awful disease. And Zach would prefer his mother had never gotten sick. But his work pays tribute to her. His hardship and hers make other lives better today.
His work brings something good out of something bad.
 
God once took a bad day–Good Friday–and turned it into redemption for us. The Cross was the bad thing for Christ that became the ultimate good thing for His followers.
Heroes who walk around on earth remind us of the greatest hero–the One who gave Himself to a bad thing to bring us to the best thing–Himself.

Revised from 1/29/18


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The Power of One Life

I will give thanks to You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
Wonderful are Your works, And my soul knows it very well. Psalm 139:14.

One cell. And no one knows you are here yet. No one except God.

Eternity has shifted because you are.

All that you will be is within this one cell, you–your cocoa brown hair, your sea green eyes. Your stubborn temperament that will eventually mellow but never become too passive, too gullible.

You will love dancing, playing the piano, and writing stories you think are silly for the brothers who will come after you.

You will not like peas.

In this early part of your life, you are tuned to your mother’s heart as you never will be again.

You reside within her rhythm, the sound of her song, the silence of her musing and her sleep.

You are wonderful.

You are small.

But the world needs you.

Pieces of this life will try to convince you that you are only the dust of your form, an imbalance of chemicals. A misplaced cog in a machine that chugs, spurts, and smokes ugliness and purposelessness.

You are not ugly. You are beautiful.

And you have a purpose.

And just as God is the only one now who knows you exist, He is the only one who can see your purpose.

You are small.

But the world needs you.

In forming you, God has crafted. He has created. He formed you so you could create too. We all have the capacity to reflect that aspect of Him, even if we only teach others to see it in themselves.

You are ideas and smiles, memories yet to be made and lessons to teach. The memories and lessons are for you to carry and bestow to others as a gift.

You are part of the eternal tapestry.  Crimson, azure, and golden threads–that is what your life looks like from above. No one else can see the rich colors of your life yet.

You have power to bring balance and beauty as you live out His plan for you.

You are small.

But the world needs you.

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Revised from January 2016.

HEADlines: Carrying the Torch for Life

Published on January 22, 2022, in the Mustard Seed Sentinel.

In January of 1979, I had two children, a husband and a house, and cable television. The cable company ran scrolling public service announcements, and for the first couple of weeks of that New Year, one announcement, in particular, kept catching my eye.

The message declared that buses would be heading toward Washington, DC, to mark the sixth anniversary of Roe v. Wade and Doe v. Bolton, the US Supreme Court decisions that eradicated every abortion regulation in every state.

Two phone numbers ran along the bottom. I called one or the other at different times, finding out what was involved, what I’d need to arrange for my children for the day, what I’d need to wear and bring with me, and how much it would cost. I learned that the two numbers led me to sisters with multiple children, (They would have 14 between them, one or two not yet born).

On January 22, I got on the bus while it was still dark. I had a sandwich and most of a large bag of M&Ms in a brown paper bag. I had on my new boots and coat and thought I looked great.

When we arrived, we walked from the Ellipse to the Capitol where we heard many inspiring speakers. It was a balmy 50-something degree day. I carried one or two of the layers I’d piled on to protect me from the expected cold.

We visited our legislators and walked back to meet our bus—late, even though, or more likely because, one of the organizing sisters Anne was leading our way.

We sat down on the bus physically exhausted. Remember the new boots? I wanted to chop my own feet off.

But we were internally energized.

Over the years, Anne became a mentor to me. My own mother had passed away in 1975. This woman was a wise sage who walked with me through my adventures of young motherhood, held my hand through my years as a single mom, and celebrated with me as I married again.

Her house was a must-stop for me and my kids on trick-or-treat nights. Halloween came before Election Day, which made for enlightening conversation and the chance for me to gather poll working materials.

But Anne was not one-dimensional. She was a fully engaged mother who made amazing homemade pierogis and, with her children, designed elaborately painted (not just dyed) eggs for Easter. She was a Registered Nurse.

And she was our community’s spokeswoman for life. Despite the plates she kept spinning at all times, she was humble.

When I would ask her: How do you do it all—eight kids, a husband, a house, a job, along with volunteer work? She would say, “Sometimes, not very well.”

For anyone who knew her, she led the way by example, sponsoring refugees from Vietnam and housing unmarried pregnant girls.

On January 22, 1980, I stayed home with a new baby. Iranian radicals had invaded the US embassy in Tehran capturing the diplomatic staff. Like today, inflation was high, in double-digits. That winter brought the Miracle on Ice—the 1980 Olympic hockey victories that garnered the gold medal for the US team. I adjusted to having three children, attended the March again in 1981 with my baby, missed 1982 caring for another new baby, attended in ’83, and carried my unborn son, my youngest, there in 1984.

Most of the following years, we attended, various children and I. One year when I had to work, Anne took my younger daughter with her.

When my kids went along, they knew the trip involved a long walk followed by hot chocolate in a legislator’s office. They learned about peaceful protest. They learned about life.

As my children grew up and got busy with school, jobs, and their own families, I began to take students to Washington for the March. In 2002, that meant a few phone calls from parents wanting reassurance of safety in the wake of 9/11 the previous September. The trip came off without incident.

I write as we plan another trip to DC, this year on January 21—the Friday closest to the anniversary—a change from the vision of Nellie Gray, the March’s founder who insisted the event be held on the 22nd every year. This alteration allows for an extended program, helps those who travel from afar (and many do), and more easily facilitates visiting legislators.

Except this year.

Because of COVID, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has forbidden Marchers from entering legislative offices. We are to be allowed inside public buildings only to use the restrooms.

So be it. We go anyway.

It’s been a few years since Anne has gone. Her years of activism were a flaming torch she has passed to those of us still able to make the trip. May we carry it well.

From our private school, we’re to be a small group, my husband and me, several students, a parent, and grandparent or so.

COVID and perhaps the aftermath of January 6 cancelled the March last year.

Pro-lifers head to DC this year with renewed hope, unprecedented hope of seeing Roe and Doe turned into their own grave. Anticipating this turn of events, 15 states are said to have “codified” Roe. Three have absolutely no restrictions “throughout pregnancy.” That means a woman could be in labor, change her mind, and have her baby killed before birth. Others allow abortion until viability, a slippery definition reliant on guesswork and subject to “exceptions” that allow the killing of the allegedly less than perfect.

Further, nineteen states allow “caregivers” to refuse treatment to newborn abortion survivors. Living, breathing little ones, left to die.

Perhaps Roe and Doe will die this year.

There is still much work to be done.

We March on our feet.

We pray on our knees.

We carry the torch of life to the next generations.

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Praying the Pledge

Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord,
The people He has chosen for His own inheritance
(Psalm 33:12 NASB).

On January 7, 2021, I was leading eight 10th graders in the Pledge of Allegiance. Not only could I not finish, I had begun to weep. I felt awful for crying in front of my students and upsetting them.

“What happened?” one of them asked.

I composed myself and explained as best I could. A few of them were aware of what happened the day before, what some call insurrection and others called a large protest, a portion of which became a riot.

I’m not here to argue the terms of that day (and won’t approve argumentative comments about it). I write to propose a way to say the Pledge without hesitation in these days of division.

Over the summer, I mentioned my difficulty to a friend. I told her I was having trouble saying, among other phrases, “One nation, under God, indivisible.”

She gave a simple reply. “Say it as a prayer.”

Oh.

I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United State of America,

and to the republic for which it stands,

one nation, under God,

indivisible,

with liberty and justice for all.

I add a phrase inspired by a friend. For her, it was a statement, spoken from her heart, from conviction. For me, it’s a tribute to her, still a prayer, spoken softly, not for the ears of those around me.

Born and preborn.

As January 6, 2021, showed us, the United States has divisions that go deeper than issues like abortion. But abortion is part of our bleeding wound of strife and separation.

Say the pledge. Say it as a prayer. Silently pray about the divisions God lays on your heart.

Pray for our nation to honor God and be indivisible in that quest. Pray for the babies, their parents, their families whom we will remember this week as we mark the 49th anniversary of the 1973 Roe v. Wade and Doe v. Bolton Supreme Court decisions that legalized abortion in all 50 states until birth.

Pray those decisions will be overturned soon. Pray America will indivisibly turn to the Creator who blessed us to be here in this time.

Pray for liberty. For justice. For all. For America.

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Reading in a New Year

It’s been my New Years’ resolution for the past several rotations around the sun. Every year I build a stack of books in no particular order. Some fall by the wayside displaced by new texts that call my name.

This year’s stack seems a bit more solid. Most I waited to obtain. One was a surprise.

It may help that our television rendered itself useless last summer, and we’ve committed to adding more seating in its place for conversation, including the silent kind that moves from writer to reader.

At the top of the pile sits Dante, an ambitious–perhaps even a bit afflictive commitment. A grandson and I began last summer with his youth version and my noteless translation. In the previous school year, we had read middle school versions of Iliad, Odyssey, and Aeneid in the classroom.

Dante seemed like the next place to go for a youthful foundation in the classics, but I struggled to keep up while googling the confusing parts. So much for a noteless rendering. As the weeks of summer passed, we remained in the infernal regions. I want to climb higher this summer.

For Christmas, his mother found me versions of Inferno and Purgatorio with notes by Anthony Esolen. (His annotated but difficult-to-find Paradisio arrived yesterday. Apparently, it’s an elusive text on the more well-traveled sites of book vendors showing that everybody really does want to go to heaven.

I plan to walk further into Dante’s vision with this grandson when the school year ends. Perhaps we can find Paradise before the start of another academic year.

In the meantime, I rang in the New Year finishing A Canticle for Leibowitz. Sci-fi, post-apocalyptic–even post-post (far after) the flame deluge otherwise known as nuclear war. Dry in spots, hilarious in others, vastly profound overall, Canticle is worth your time. I punctuated my reading of Walter M. Miller Jr.’s final few pages of the text with frequent exclamations of “Wow!”

Toward the bottom of the pile sits my first foray into the works of Isaac Asimov. I’m not quite halfway through Foundation, the first in a series. Both Asimov and Miller emphasize the importance of recording and remembering history.

The men’s divergent worldviews are apparent. Miller’s text presents a secular world in which a Christian remnant champions the effort to rescue literacy and preserve the past in the hopes of preventing humanity’s self-destruction. Miller invites us to remember what the world is, and is not.

Asimov’s text makes no allusion (so far) to faith. His depiction of the political is apt, some may say accurate, others, cynical. Asimov is the easier read. Miller is worth the work.

The rest of the stack is non-fiction. Ross Douthat presents our society, The Decadent Society: America Before and After the Pandemic. He offers us two possibilities for COVID’s ultimate outcome: catastrophe or renaissance. We are truly at a crossroads.

Carl R. Trueman offers The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self: Cultural Amnesia, Expressive Individualism, and the Road to the Sexual Revolution. It’s another study of how we got where we are.

The Final Pagan Generation: Rome’s Unexpected Path to Christianity by Edward J. Watts provides insight into what the world was like as the power structure of an empire was turning upside down, from pagan to officially Christian. That seems pertinent in our world as a form of paganism, at least in the West, displaces Christianity.

Uprooted: Recovering the Legacy of the Places We’ve Left Behind by Grace Olmstead discusses the ramifications of the uprooting many (most?) Americans have experienced today.

I remember the local communities of my youth, neighborhoods within our city. The second and third generations removed from immigrants felt a connection to the motherland and to our locale. The grandparents and great-grandparents came here but kept close ties through the fellowships of the Sons of Italy social hall or the Unter Uns (German) Society.

Some of those ties still bind smaller communities together. Many have scattered. Olmstead calls them home, truly and virtually.

The cover jacket calls the book “part memoir, part journalistic investigation.” It promises Olmstead will help us cultivate “rootedness.”

In a similar vein, Sohrab Ahmari’s work The Unbroken Thread: Discovering the Wisdom of Tradition in an Age of Chaos proposes a way to find happiness, not in a self-crafted identity, but in pursuing virtue and accepting limits. Ahmari emigrated to the US from Iran and, among other job titles he holds, is a contributing editor for the Catholic Herald. He calls himself a “radically assimilated immigrant” and invites us to examine our lives to “live more humanely in a world that has lost its way.”

Ahmari’s book is the surprise in the pile, a gift from a son who often finds gems I’ve not stumbled over yet.

Finally, Christopher Hollingsworth has crafted The Poetics of the Hive: The Insect Metaphor in Literature. I don’t like bugs, but I anticipate the delight of following a thread of metaphor through literature.

As I write, I realize that, including the bugs, these books are about the importance of remembering history, understanding our own culture, and urging society toward renaissance instead of catastrophe.

Reading can be easy or hard depending on the text. The remembering, understanding, and urging are hard work. But important work, work with eternal purpose.

Therefore, my beloved brothers, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain (I Corinthians 15:58 ESV).

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The Great Relearning

“Again the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, “Speak to the children of Israel: Tell them to make tassels on the corners of their garments throughout their generations, and to put a blue thread in the tassels of the corners. And you shall have the tassel, that you may look upon it and remember all the commandments of the Lord and do them, and that you may not follow the harlotry to which your own heart and your own eyes are inclined, and that you may remember and do all My commandments, and be holy for your God.” Numbers 15:37-41~

At the end of the twentieth century, novelist Tom Wolfe recalled efforts to start at zero, to go back to a time before we knew what we now know and try again–and do better. The hippies of the sixties, he pointed out, decided to relearn rules about personal hygiene. What they learned was what non-experimenters already accepted. Wash your hands often, and don’t share someone else’s toothbrush.

It’s a defiance of the common definition of insanity–repeating an activity and expecting a different result. The result in the laboratory communes of San Francisco was a resurgence of long-dead diseases.

In the age of COVID, we wash our hands more often than ever. But we still lean toward this idea that we can begin anew without looking back. Perhaps history is a cycle of such experiments punctuated by remembering, a recurrent remembering that we are not yet in Eden.

Wolfe wrote:

“[T]he painful dawn began with the publication of the Gulag Archipelago in 1973. [Soviet dissident Alexander] Solzhenitsyn insisted that the villain behind the Soviet concentration camp network was not Stalin or Lenin (who invented the term concentration camp) or even Marxism. It was instead the Soviets’ peculiarly twentieth-century notion that they could sweep aside not only the old social order but also its religious ethic, which had been millennia in the making (‘common decency,’ Orwell called it) and reinvent morality . . . here . . . now .”

Modern society continues through a cycle of trying to recreate culture, to turn it into something new. The West won the Cold War in the late ’80s and early ’90s. But we didn’t turn back. Our train of civil movement continued on the same track.

The battle between decency and its opposite has been ongoing. We now tilt toward a social order that is not order but rather its opposite. From newscasts to our personal interactions we see a culture that lacks memory–and manners. History has returned to a day when everyone is doing “what is right in his own eyes” (Judges 17:6, 21:25).

In the 1950s, another novelist Walter M. Miller Jr. reminded us that it’s hard to get back what we once knew but now ignore. He wrote about civilization beginning again after apocalypse, starting from zero.

“In the beginning . . . it had been hoped–and even anticipated as probable–that the fourth or fifth generation would begin to want its heritage back. But the monks [preservers of history] of the earliest days had not counted on the human ability to generate a new cultural inheritance in a couple of generations if an old one is utterly destroyed, to generate it by virtue of lawmakers and prophets, geniuses or maniacs; through a Moses, or a Hitler, or an ignorant but tyrannical grandfather. . . . But the new ‘culture’ was an inheritance of darkness,” A Canticle for Leibowitz.

In urban or rural American communities, we see crime, drugs, and lagging education. Mark R. Schneider points out that American literacy rates are lower than those of our 1840s counterparts, “well before the imposition of compulsory public education.” (Note: the figures Schneider sites are pre-COVID.)

Literacy in the America of 1840 included classical and biblical texts that conveyed more than an ability to decode the letters into words and thereby discern meaning. Literacy, faith, and freedom are a three-fold cord, not easily broken. Contemporary culture has undermined all three.

Around 1900 we began education anew. The goals of learning were no longer those of John Adams for his son: “to make you a good Man and a useful Citizen.” Today, school is largely the means to a job, preparation for a career leading to personal fulfillment and material enrichment. It is no longer the formation of character.

I sat in a classroom for a parent-teacher conference not yet 20 years ago when a teacher told me the purpose of his course was that the students would know their rights. I asked if he might tell them their duties.

We will relearn what we have lost. We will learn it by choosing the wisdom of those who came before us or by continuing to reject it and experiencing the consequences of that rejection.

Alexander Solzhenitsyn:

“Over a half century ago [under communism in the USSR], while I was still a child, I recall hearing a number of old people offer the following explanation for the great disasters that had befallen Russia: “Men have forgotten God; that’s why all this has happened.” . . . [I]f I were asked today to formulate as concisely as possible the main cause of the ruinous revolution that swallowed up some 60 million of our people, I could not put it more accurately than to repeat: ‘Men have forgotten God; that’s why all this has happened.’”

From Miller’s Canticle:

“What did you do for them . . . ? Teach them to read and write? Help them rebuild, give them Christ, help them restore a culture? Did you remember to warn them that it could never be Eden?”

Solzhenitsyn, Wolfe, Miller, and we who remember hold a key to the future. We hold the wine of truth from the past. Chaos offers a sweet purple Kool-Aid reminiscent of another failed experiment.

Offer wine. Speak truth. Remember.

And remind.

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

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A Gift Prepared Ahead of Time

Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change. (I Timothy 1:17, ESV)

It was a work of Providence I might have missed. I have no idea how long the book sat on the shelf waiting for me to buy it. But I do know it was there just for me, for us, just for the moment we would need it.

That moment would be one every mother who has watched her son go to war knows. It’s an indescribable emptiness. But an almighty God can reach down to fill a heart’s void. And He can use any little nook or cranny to do so.

My daughter and I were in an antique store passing time as we waited to see my son off. He was deploying to Iraq.

While we shopped, his unit was on base packing equipment. Families would see our soldiers later that evening for a short time before they left for their departure point.

A yearlong deployment lay ahead.

But there on the shelf sat his favorite book. It cost only a couple of dollars. The Good Earth, by Pearl S. Buck. How good it would be to give him a book he loved.

But there was more.

As we were helping him pack later and preparing to say farewell, my daughter picked the book up and read the back cover flap.

“This book can be sent to a serviceman anywhere in the world for the price of a postage stamp.”

The book was copyrighted in 1942. Published for soldiers during World War II–when my father served–it landed in the hands of my soldier son decades later.

I wondered where it had traveled and who had already read it.

Buck’s masterpiece is about a man who battles hunger and injustice. Not quite war–rather wars of a different sort. He had moments of glory, times he didn’t do the right thing.

He was, in short, like all of us.

Even before my son read it, it was a book I had come to love. I’d read it because it was my husband’s favorite book. Paper ideas about important things in life. Paper becomes glue connecting those who’ve read a book and discussed its meaning.

When my son left for war, he carried a piece of home and history with him.

I still had moments of emptiness, moments of worry during that year. But a great God had put a book on a shelf for us to find that day–to remind us that He sees. He cares. He loves.

This time of year is when we celebrate His coming.

He came to give us more than “chance” literature on a shelf. He came to give Himself to us and for us.

Emmanuel—God with us.

Merry Christmas.

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Renewing Traditions

Last year, I didn’t bake cookies for Christmas. I came down with COVID just before mid-December.

Since neither my husband (He had it too.) nor I could taste our food, and other family members were concerned about contagions, I didn’t have much reason to make treats.

Paul and I found it odd that we could imagine flavors based on the texture of the foods we put in our mouths.

The buttery saltiness of creamy mashed potatoes was a mental conception, an abstraction of memory. As the New Year dawned, our sense of taste began to return.

Twelve months later, I’ve returned to cookie baking mode.

Baking cookies and I go way back.

When I was ten, my mother let me lose on my own in the kitchen. In the cooler weather of fall, I’d bake on Saturday afternoons. She watched football. I have the sense she considered cookie production a chore and was glad to have me step into the role.

When I became a mother, my own little ones took their responsibility to taste-test seriously. As they grew, they developed favorites, and traditions took shape.

What hadn’t improved much over the years was the kitchen.

After my children had grown, one of my daughters realized a local home improvement company was sponsoring an “ugly kitchen” contest. She photographed the room where she had taste tested cookies hoping we could win some free renovations. (Some other poor soul won, apparently having endured a kitchen worse than mine.)

Even so, I remember the wonderful feeling I got entering the “ugly”, poorly equipped heart-of-home to bake cookies one holiday season. I thought, “It feels good to be here.” Good memories overcame limited resources.

In years since, my husband has made significant improvements. Counter space is now sufficient. The children gifted us with a larger mixer to replace my hand-held device. The room is still a pleasant place in which to bake, now convenient and not in danger of qualifying for an “ugly” contest.

After last year without baking, I was eager to get back to it. First out of the oven were cookies to go to the troops through our local Armed Forces Mothers chapter, an event COVID cancelled last year. The Monday after Thanksgiving, packed boxes winged their way to those serving our country. Last week, my great-niece notified me that her box had arrived much to her delight.

Next, I moved to the eight cookie trays for Christmas Day. One for each family household, one for the Christmas gathering, and one for our own table.

Certain recipes are the norm, but this year I added chocolate chip oatmeal at the request of a granddaughter. Something different mixed in with our traditions.

Traditions call us to memory and wonder. The flavors and aromas of Christmas remind us of our early realization of what Christ’s birth means. I go back to the Christmas Eve service of a particular year, to the manger scene under the trees of my childhood, back to the home where I first bowed my head in prayer, when I first began to seek Him.

We wonder at this holiday, part of history now for more than 2,000 years, transformed, to be sure, from its early days to a commercialized version of gadgets and trinkets.

But only if we let it become so.

Every Christmas reminds us that our Savior came as a baby to grow into a Man who would save us from our sins. Christmas calls us to remember all Christ has done for us.

Memory. Hope. Tradition. Christmas.

Emmanuel, God with us.

Merry Christmas!

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Remembering 80 Years

My mother would often tell me the story. It was a Sunday morning. She was sweeping the basement floor and listening to the radio when the announcement came that the Japanese had bombed Pearl Harbor.

She shut the radio off as if that would make the news go away.

I’m sad to realize I never got Dad’s story–where he was when he heard.

My parents hadn’t married yet. He joined the navy. She joined the Coast Guard. Dad shipped out as a corpsman to the South Pacific. Mom, ironically, served in Oklahoma, a state that has no coast to guard.

Today, one of my great-nieces is in Texas training to become a navy corpsman.

Eighty years of history have come and gone. There are so few today alive to tell us where they were when they heard about Pearl Harbor.

And we are now at the point where students only know of 9/11 because of their elders explaining where they were when they heard.

It’s an effective way to pass history along. When the young hear our stories, those of our own or those passed down to us, they remember. History becomes real to them.

We must pass along history, for “History is a story written by the finger of God.” (Lewis)

“Lord of hosts be with us yet,

“Lest we forget–lest we forget.” (Kipling)

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HEADlines: Collateral Damage from Abortion

Published in The Mustard Seed Sentinel, 11/27/21~

“Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter!” Isaiah 5:20~

The cities of Boston, Pittsburgh, and Portland, Oregon, are now providing 12 weeks of paid parental leave for women who have abortions and for men too. It’s an interesting “perk”.

The ironies abound.

In Boston, the revised benefits plan amends one that provides paid leave for parents who will parent their children and couples who’ve suffered “loss of pregnancy” through miscarriage.

Imagine private companies trying to compete with public entities for employees. A business could enhance the benefits package by adding paid abortion leave and beefing up company IRA contributions.

Remember that supporters of “choice” marketed legal abortion as the way women would be on equal footing with men. Apparently, that’s why men get leave for abortion too.

Also remember, the choice movement promised legal abortion would be safe and not a big deal. If abortion is so safe and simple, why would anyone need 12 weeks to recover?

Planned Parenthood assures readers that surgical abortions are “safe, simple,” and “common.” Such assurances regarding chemical abortion are harder to find. Chemical abortion appears to be a do-it-yourself-in-the-privacy-of-your-home kind of procedure. Just take a few pills as directed, and after some bleeding and cramping, your “problem” is gone.

Simple, right?

Many women are learning the hard way that chemical abortion is far from simple.

For Lifenews.com, Abby Johnson describes her experience enduring and recovering from a chemical abortion.

“Ten minutes later [after taking Mifeprex, an abortion inducing chemical] I started to feel pain in my abdomen unlike anything I had ever experienced. Then the blood came. It was gushing out of me. I couldn’t wear a pad…nothing was able to absorb the amount of blood I was losing. The only thing I could do was sit on the toilet….

“After several hours on the toilet, I desperately wanted to soak in the bathtub. I was hoping that would make me feel better. Maybe the warm water would help the cramping. Certainly it would make me smell better. I had vomit all in my hair and on my legs, not to mention how sweaty I was. I filled the tub and climbed in. It actually did feel pretty good. I remember closing my eyes and leaning my head back. I felt exhausted. The cramps kept coming, but the water helped soothe them somewhat. I opened my eyes after 15 minutes and was horrified. My bathwater was bright red.”

But more and greater pain was ahead. Johnson wasn’t having just the “heavy bleeding and period like cramping” her Planned Parenthood counselor had assured her would be the case. After passing a “lemon-size blood clot” then several more clots of similar size, she believed her experience must not be normal.

She had spent 12 hours in the bathroom and decided to sleep on the tile floor rather than bleed in her bed. The next morning, she would call PP and report her extraordinary experience–if she survived the night.

She did survive to call the PP nurse who assured her that her experience was not at all uncommon.

She was astonished that what the abortion counselor had told her would happen was so different from what came about.

Mary Szoch of the Family Research Council reports: “Disturbingly, the physical trauma that happens to a woman’s body as a result of a chemical abortion is a sign that the ‘treatment is working.’ According to the Mifeprex medication guide:

‘Cramping and vaginal bleeding are expected with this treatment. Usually, these symptoms mean that the treatment is working…Bleeding or spotting can be expected for an average of 9 to 16 days and may last for up to 30 days [For Johnson, it was eight weeks.] …You may see blood clots and tissue. This is an expected part of passing the pregnancy.'” [Szoch’s text includes endnotes for this information and what follows.]

According to one study Szoch sites, in one out of 10 chemical procedures, incomplete abortion occurs, requiring surgery to finish the process and prevent infection in the mother. These numbers are bad enough until we remember that they include only statistics “voluntarily reported” to the FDA.

In 2019, Nancy Flanders reported that nearly half of US states don’t require reporting of complications. Yet complications happen for both surgical and chemical abortions.

“Lakisha Wilson, 22, died after her abortion at Preterm abortion facility in Cleveland when she suffered uterine atony and hemorrhaged. Tia Parks, 26, died after a first-trimester abortion at the same abortion facility. A 21-year-old woman in Rhode Island suffered a perforated uterus during an abortion at the Providence Health Center this year. Margaret Sanger Planned Parenthood in New York City recently hospitalized nine patients within just eight months. And the abortion pill [chemical abortion], which is hailed by the industry as the safest way to kill a preborn child, has also killed at least 24 women. The true number, however, may never be known since abortion groups advise women who suffer complications from the abortion pill to tell ER doctors that they are having a miscarriage.”

Even voluntary reporting indicates that complications from chemical abortion are “four times” higher than those of surgical abortion. And that’s what the abortion industry calls the “safest way.”

Maybe the “perk” of leave after abortion isn’t such a perk. Maybe it’s a necessity for a procedure that really isn’t so simple after all.

Remember the pro-abortion mantra of the 1990s? Abortion should be safe, legal, and rare?

Those who support abortion have thrown their motto of safe, legal, and rare out with the bathwater and, of course, the baby. The Heritage Foundation reports that the percentage of chemical abortions goes up every year, having risen 120 percent over the last ten years.

Along with the new employment perk of paid leave after an abortion, it seems the powers that be are promoting abortion as it becomes less safe for women.

Safe? Legal? Rare?

Legal is all that matters. And the casualties are just collateral damage.

About the Author

Author Nancy E. Head was a single mother with five children under the age of 14 when many in the Church came to her aid. Her story illustrates common problems in our society such as the fracturing of families and communities, reflecting a splintering Church.

Alienated families and a riven Church cannot minister as effectively to their own members or others until they find accord. Nancy is the author of Restoring the Shattered: Illustrating Christ’s Love Through the Church in One Accord. She leads a small group ministering to the needy in her community.

Photo Credit: Ewelina Karezona Karbowiak in Unsplash.com

Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Returning a Favor


CBN reposted my devotional on 11/19/21.

When I moved into my home in 1977, I salvaged an old table my father was discarding. Our family grew from four to seven around that table.

Then we shrank. When their father departed, we were six.

The years began to show on the table. One of its legs began to wobble. Without warning, it would collapse to the floor leaving all the work for the other three legs. We would laugh. But after a while, one of us found the falling leg not so funny.

When my youngest son was eight years old, he found a hammer and some very long nails and played carpenter. He reattached the errant piece, permanently joining it to the table. The repair was effective, but not pretty.

A few years later, I got a “new” dining room table—also recycled. This table was better. It expanded. And our family was expanding. I had remarried. Some of the children had grown and married and had children of their own. 

So the table could be small for everyday dinners, and it could be large for family celebrations. Plus, it was reliable–for a time. Then one of its legs turned mutinous too.

This time, my husband Paul played carpenter, and unless you peeked underneath, you didn’t know the difference.

But our family continued to expand. Eventually, even our stretched out table was too small. Our range of motion became cramped. From fork to plate, to mouth and back. We yearned for extra room for side dishes and elbows.

So last year, Paul and I bought a new table. An Amish carpenter constructed it. 

This table is even more expandable than the last one. And it’s rectangular rather than oval. Now we have room for baked corn, green bean casserole, pumpkin pie, and a host of elbows. 

The table was ready just in time for Thanksgiving. 

But in order to use your furniture, you first must get it into the house.

Paul heaved and I pushed. But even in its smallest state, the table was too wide for our front door. It would have to come in through the back door. To accomplish that, we would have to hoist the table over the back rail deck. And that seemed impossible unless we could get someone else to help.

The best candidate seemed like the young man who had just moved in next door. He seemed strong and he was home.

As Providence would have it, he is a mover by trade. God had placed the perfect workman right next to us.

Moreover, there are many workmen with you, stonecutters and masons of stone and carpenters, and all men who are skillful in every kind of work. (1 Chronicles 22:15 NASB95)

All we had to do was ask.

The old table went out the back door and the new table came in.

We had planned to put the old table on the sidewalk with a “Free” sign on it. But Paul found out that this very neighbor and his wife had no table. Now they do. We would never have known their need if we had not asked for his help.

So I’m thankful for my new table. I’m thankful for the craftsman who made a table with legs unlikely to wobble in my lifetime. I’m thankful for the help of a neighbor and that we could help him in return. 

I’m thankful for all the elbows to occupy our table this holiday and those we hope will arrive in coming years. 

Most of all, I’m thankful for the Master Carpenter who places us in each other’s lives and gives us opportunities to help each other.

Give thanks to the God of heaven,
 For His lovingkindness is everlasting. (Psalm 136:26 NASB95)

Copyright © 2017 Nancy E. Head. Used by permission. [CBN]

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A Few Steps from Normalizing Pedophilia?

You shall not give any of your children to offer them to Molech, nor shall you profane the name of your God; I am the Lord. Leviticus 18:21~

The proscription in Western Civilization against sexual activities outside God-ordained marriage goes back to the Old Testament. Leviticus, the primary book containing Jewish law, includes in chapter 18 God’s admonition against sex acts with close relatives, within homosexual relationships, and with animals.

Within the 30 verses of that chapter resides verse 21: “Do not give any of your children to be sacrificed to Molek, for you must not profane the name of your God. I am the Lord.”

A portion of scripture about sexual behavior contains this decree forbidding child sacrifice. And this admonition comes, not at the beginning or the end ,where we might relegate it to a different section. Sandwiched between proscriptions against incest and adultery in the early part of the chapter and homosexuality and bestiality at the end is this law forbidding child sacrifice.

It’s important to remember that, at this point, the Jews were the only culture with rules limiting sex to husband-wife relationships. Only Jews and later Christians held to the ideas of sexual exclusivity between husband and wife and of heterosexual marriage as God’s ideal.

For other cultures–those in the Middle East, Greece, and Rome–sex was a free for all. Women had little to say about what happened to them sexually. Children had no voice at all.

Writing for Crisis magazine, Dennis Prager explains:

“When Judaism demanded that all sexual activity be channeled into marriage, it changed the world. The Torah’s prohibition of non-marital sex quite simply made the creation of Western civilization possible. Societies that did not place boundaries around sexuality were stymied in their development. The subsequent dominance of the Western world can largely be attributed to the sexual revolution initiated by Judaism and later carried forward by Christianity.

“This revolution consisted of forcing the sexual genie into the marital bottle. It ensured that sex no longer dominated society, heightened male-female love and sexuality (and thereby almost alone created the possibility of love and eroticism within marriage), and began the arduous task of elevating the status of women.”

Along with elevating women came the protection of children.

It’s surprising to those of us who grew up during the “sexual revolution” of the 1960s, to consider this idea of an ancient “revolution” of morality.

The 1960s didn’t ring in a new way of living never before seen. The revolution marked the return to pagan idolatry–without statues and flames. The general acceptance of such practices is nearly complete. Aside from bestiality, the last moral pillar to remain standing holds proscriptions against sex with children.

How long can it stand nearly all by itself?

The American Conservative commentator Rod Dreher quotes Allyn Walker, a “non-binary assistant professor at Old Dominion University,” who writes that “there is evidence to show that attractions to minors can be considered a sexual orientation. . . . MAPs [minor attracted people] often report becoming aware of their attraction to children during adolescence, a trend that is typical of other sexual minorities.”

Notice the change of term from pedophile to MAP and the language that presents the attraction to children as something akin to an awakening rather than a disorder and the notion that pedophiles are part of a “sexual minority.”

We might be tempted to dismiss this view. But seeds planted at the university level often take fruit in our neighborhoods over time.

Dreher comments:

“Surely there must be some way to get these suffering people the help they need without moving towards considering pedophilia just one more ‘sexual orientation.’ Because if it ever should become that, we are halfway to legalizing it, following the same path that standard homosexuality took. If sexual desire is the equivalent of identity, and if to sexually desire minors is at the core of one’s identity, then how can we stigmatize or otherwise suppress pedophiles if we recognize that other kinds of sexual minorities have civil rights?”

The sexual revolution of the 1960s has been a runaway freight train tearing through the years since, leaving pain and trauma in its wake.

It’s time to ask ourselves how we can stop the train. It’s time to get the suffering people help instead of enabling them to harm others. It’s time to stop profaning the name of God by allowing children to be victimized in the name of self-idolatry.

It’s time we stopped the destruction of our very culture through acceptance of sexual sin.

It’s time.

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Prophecy of the Coming King

“To the Old Testament belongs more fear, just as to the New Testament more delight; nevertheless in the Old Testament the New lies hid, and in the New Testament the Old is exposed.” Augustine

The history of man is that God created him, formed a woman-companion from him and for him, and provided a way for the man and the woman to return to God when they rejected Him in sin.

God was clear from the beginning that He would send a Way–the Messiah–to allow rebellious people to return to Him. And the Messiah’s kingdom would last forever.

The scepter will not depart from Judah,
    nor the ruler’s staff from between his feet,
until he to whom it belongs shall come
    and the obedience of the nations shall be his. Genesis 49:10
, NIV

Israel had big ideas about what that kingdom would look like and what kind of king would garner the obedience of the nations.

Christ was born into a world of darkness and oppression. Israel’s big ideas at this time included a king who would free them from Rome. In their thinking, such a king would not be of humble birth. But prophecy said otherwise.

But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah,
    though you are small among the clans of Judah,
out of you will come for me
    one who will be ruler over Israel,
whose origins are from of old,
    from ancient times. Micah 5:2
, NIV

Seven hundred years before Christ was born, Micah prophesied that the King would be born in Bethlehem.

But which Bethlehem? There were two towns of that name in Christ’s time. The Old Testament foretold Bethlehem, Ephrathah, the Bethlehem that was King David’s home town. The smaller, more obscure town.

The Creator-God came in the most humble of ways–born, not only in a small town, but in a dwelling place for animals.

Throughout Christ’s earthly life, some would reject Him because of his modest beginning. Many wrote Him off as “just the carpenter’s son” (Matthew 13:55).

A question for us today: How often do we expect Him to be who He is not?

He is the same as He was in Micah’s day. The same since Creation. But not always what we expect.

He came through a humble birth, grew with a small-town upbringing, died on a tortuous cross, and walked with His followers outside an empty tomb. Nothing like what Israel expected.

Today, we find Him where we look for Him in spirit and in truth. We find Him when we are willing to let Him surprise us. We find Him in the New Testament and the Old.

Seek Him today.

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Nancy E. Head’s Restoring the Shattered is out in paperback! Get your copy here!

Permissions: You are permitted and encouraged to reproduce and distribute this material in any format provided that you do not alter the wording in any way, do not charge a fee beyond the cost of reproduction, and you credit the author.

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the entities I have mentioned. Restoring the Shattered is published through Morgan James Publishing with whom I do share a material connection. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Going Down the Rabbit Hole on Purpose

I remember an assignment in a graduate English class for which I purposely did not follow the directions. The teacher had called upon us to analyze a portion of Alice in Wonderland in light of Sigmund Freud’s thinking. It was to be a short paper–just a page or two–the kind of assignment that was due once a week in that class on literary theory.

Most of my graduate classes provided intriguing challenges that engaged my mind and sparked new ideas. More often than not, this work resulted in theory-driven writing assignments, presumably intelligently argued, but inevitably dry.

I wanted to exercise some creativity.

So I wrote a diary entry in Alice’s voice. Alice expressed her frustration at being too big to play in the pretty garden but then too small to reach the key to unlock the door to get to the garden. When the cake she ate made her too large, she expressed her frustration that every calorie she consumed attached itself to the wrong place on her body while her sister could freely eat all she cared to without consequence on the scale. She wondered at the white rabbit whose presence reminded her that she had to grow up.

I enjoyed completing the assignment. Throughout the writing process, I repeatedly reminded myself that I was taking a risk, but I was having too much fun to stop.

I determined not to regret my creativity even if it cost me points.

When the time came to get our graded papers back, the instructor mentioned mine. “I was going to make you do it over, but then I read it again and realized everything you needed was there.”

Life can feel like we’re tumbling down a rabbit hole. We don’t know where we’ll land or how long until we hit the bottom. And we’re often wondering why it’s hard to go back to the small places and, no matter our age, when we’ll grow enough to reach the keys to doors we want to open.

Alice’s great