Gwendolyn Harmon's Blog: Learning Ladyhood, page 11

Rejoicing in the Savior

The day after Christmas is an interesting dilemma. You wake up surrounded by all the Christmas decorations, you go to the kitchen for some leftover Christmas food, but then what? Christmas is over, but there’s a week between Christmas and New Years, so what do you do? It seems too soon to give up the Christmas music and food and the general idea of festivity, but the actual day of Christmas is over…

This year, as I looked out the kitchen window at the bare sticks and soggy ground of my summer gar...

Responding in Faith

The Christmas account is full of examples of people responding in faith to that which God tells them. The wise men choosing to travel for months in faith that they would find the newborn King at journey’s end; the shepherds leaving their flocks to go to Bethlehem, in faith that the angel’s proclamation of the Messiah’s birth was indeed true; Joseph, choosing in faith to take Mary as his wife, choosing to please God, though it meant suffering the disapproval and shame of friends and family.

But t...

The Fullness of Christ

We all probably know someone who likes to go above and beyond when it comes to Christmas presents. In my family, it was my grandma. I am told she used to give us grandkids so many Christmas gifts each year, my parents finally had to tell her to just give one gift per child. I am the youngest in my family, so my recollections of this era are dim and fuzzy, perhaps even nonexistent, but I do remember what happened next: my grandma discovered gift bags.

Now, we’re not talking normal sized gift bags...

The Word Made Flesh

The account in Luke 1 about Zacharias’ encounter with the angel is another one of those very familiar passages it’s easy to skim through without really thinking about what I’m reading. But as I read it aloud to my students at school this week, something stood out I had never noticed before.

Imagine the surprise, wonder, awe, and fear that filled Zacharias as the angel Gabriel appeared to him in the temple. Then the angel spoke:

 

“Fear not, Zacharias: for thy prayer is heard; and thy wife Elisabet...

And His Name Shall Be Called

I’ve been reading a chapter in Proverbs each night for a couple months now, and the other day this verse stood out to me:

“The name of the Lord is a strong tower: the righteous runneth into it, and is safe.” Proverbs 18:10

The study of the names of God used in the Bible could be a lifelong pursuit, because there are so many and each has such depth of meaning. It is not simply that God has many names, it is that each and every one tells us something about God’s character, about who He is.

These nam...

Surely Goodness and Mercy

Sometimes, it takes a trial to make us truly grateful for the blessings of God. Thanksgiving week at my house began with an early morning call to 911 and a trip to the emergency room with one parent, while the other was at home, quite ill himself.

Up to that point, my vision of the week had been rushing through three very full schooldays and waking Thursday morning to help my mom prepare the Thanksgiving feast for a houseful. As I sat in the emergency room with my mom,  and heard the doctor tell...

A Season of Gratitude

There’s a beautiful verse in Ecclesiastes 3, of which verse 1 is perhaps the most often quoted:

“To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven:”

What follows this verse is a series of contrasts which illustrate this truth. But as we enter the week of our American holiday of Thanksgiving, I am reminded how blessed I am to live in a nation that has set aside a day simply for the purpose of giving thanks to God.

Nowadays, that purpose has largely been forgotten, and ...

When You Have No Might

Judges 6

You stand, breathing in quick, heaving bursts of air as sweat trickles down your neck form the oppressive heat. Wheat harvest used to be such a festive time—hard work, yes, but joyous. And now—you look at the pile of grain and feel the feebleness of your efforts.

Anger wells up as you remember how the Midianites swept through the land each harvest, snatching up all the grain, like locusts swarming through, leaving nothing left to live on. The only way your family would have food to eat w...

Drawing With Joy from the Wells of Salvation

 We live in a largely joy-less society. Depression, exhaustion, anxiety, and “burnout” are rampant, even within Christianity. Now, I’m no doctor, and I do recognize that there are genuine physical causes which could cause each of those things I just mentioned above.

But for those of us without chemical imbalances or physical maladies, I think a big part of our struggles with depression, exhaustion, anxiety and burnout is the simple fact that we are living without joy.

We go through our day-to-da...

The Power of a Soft Answer

“A soft answer turneth away wrath: but grievous words stir up anger.” Proverbs 15:1

This is among the more frequently quoted verses in the Bible, but as I read it the other night, I was struck afresh by the truth of the statement. As a teacher of young children, I am daily witness to the power of a soft answer to diffuse a tense situation—and the power of harsh, angry words to escalate emotions.

Think about it. If you’re walking through a store, minding your own business, and someone starts speak...