Rubies

Last year my daughter Ruby was 4 years old and I took her for swimming classes. She was disinterested and would even cry at the thought of going to swim. She held on to me and would not listen to her swimming coach. One day I went by the pool and found a mother screaming at her daughter who was crying as she was being taught; that girl was probably Ruby’s age. She was telling her how she was crying for no reason and would have to keep swimming and would not get out of the pool until she stopped...

"If you could be anything, be kind." I am sure you have heard this phrase before. What does it mean to be kind? A kind person is one who is generous, helpful and considerate of the feelings of others. Kindness is one of the fruit of the Spirit, meaning it is one of the evidences that we are believers in God and that the Holy Spirit resides on the inside of us. He is the one who enables us to be kind, to show kindness in a crazy world where a lot of negativity is being thrown at us. I...

In 2015, my husband and I had been married a few months when we enrolled in a marriage class. It had been recommended by a couple that had been married over 20 years at that time and they said it had been quite remarkable for them. This was enough motivation for me to be honest because if someone who had been married that long was benefitting from it, how much more we who had not even made it to 6 months. We enrolled in the class and were grouped up with about 7 other couples. During one of the sessions,...

A week ago, someone really hurt me. I think what they did hurt me so much because it was the last thing I expected. We had made an agreement and this person bailed out at the last minute, LITERALLY. I was shocked! Stunned!!! I felt disrespected, I felt hurt and I was really confused. These emotions came afterwards though. In the moment I just brushed it off. Over the last few weeks I have come to realize that when I get angry with my kids it is because I had higher expectations of them. Say my 5-year-old eats and makes...

Over the last few weeks I have been reading the book of Nehemiah. I had probably never read it in its entirety and only read portions of it. The character of Nehemiah has really stood out for me. Nehemiah was a Jew who was serving King Artaxerxes as a cupbearer. He heard about the suffering of the Jews back home in Jerusalem and it affected him so much that he fasted and prayed, crying out to the living God for help. The king seeing sadness on Nehemiah’s face, which was unusual, asked him what the matter was. Nehemiah first prayed...