Swedenborg talks about how every person is a church. Within every individual there is a marriage of good and truth that creates the church within them. This doesn’t mean denomination or the building where congregations hold service, or even the group of people that call themselves a church. It is everyone’s personal spiritual identity.

Finding one’s individual and unique spiritual identity is a lifelong journey that I am only just beginning and already struggling with. I have often felt the need to conform and I can feel anxious or stressed when my church might be different from someone else’s. This might manifest as a need to make those around me believe what I do, but it might also make me feel that I must change what I believe to fit what someone else says is true.

But like most things in life, the trick is to find the balance between the two options. To listen to those around me in a way that allows me to find what I can accept as true or what I feel I need to change about my beliefs. If what someone is telling me feels uncomfortable or out of sync with what I believe it could be because what I’m being told is not true or maybe what I believe needs some refinement. We have to not only follow the Lord’s Word and bend our will to His, but also not let ourselves get trapped by what others say is true.

This past year I took an english class in which we read Jane Eyre. This is my favorite novel and I have read it many times but it wasn’t until this most recent reading that I really appreciated the spiritual journey that Jane goes on through the course of the novel. She goes through a significant transition from a dependent and downtrodden orphan, to an independent and self-confident woman all the time finding confidence in her own spiritual identity.
Continue reading Why I Love Jane Eyre: Spiritual Identity →

Did you have an imaginary playmate when you were a child? Did you know children who did?

Our 3-year-old grandson, Jack, just introduced his friend, “Masten” to our family. Last week his sister celebrated her birthday. “It’s Masten’s birthday today, too!” Jack shouted. So we sang Happy Birthday to Masten’s empty chair, to Jack’s delight … and to the delight of us all.

I was quick to tell my daughter, Jack’s mom, to welcome and respect Jack’s unseen friend, Masten. I have come to believe that these unseen playmates could be one of the many angels that surround us. And this young child can see one! A guardian angel? Who knows?.

My son, Joe, had an unseen friend, John Cooper. John was very real to Joe. Joe acknowledged John’s presence at our dinner table by pulling out a chair for him, and when we travelled away from home, Joe asked me to stop so he could call John to tell him where we were.
Continue reading Imaginary Playmates →

“Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself.” Matthew 6:34

I had negative ideas about what meditation is. It seemed too self-focused for me. I used to think of meditation as emptying the mind, or focusing more on oneself or something like that.  I don’t need to think about me more. I need to think about the Lord more. How is meditation going to help with that?

Well, one day I decided I needed to just breathe and not let my thoughts get the better of me. I sat and focused on my breath and would chant “Thy will be done” over and over, or “Trust the Lord. Trust the Lord.” again and again to try to drown out the thoughts that were pounding on my mind. But it didn’t help much. It didn’t help because I was still trying to control the situation. That’s not trust.

I tried several times with this method. I would start with reading the Word and then “meditate.” Or I would try to meditate for a bit and then read the Word. I didn’t notice a change in how I read the Word or a change in how I felt. I still couldn’t focus, and I still felt overwhelmed. I mentioned to a few friends that I wanted to try meditating and one friend recommended a particular app for meditation, so I decided to give it a try.

It worked. Continue reading Focus on the Lord →

Being a minister’s kid means that my family has lived all over. In my life time, we lived in Pennsylvania, Florida and Ohio. The place I have always considered to be my childhood home was our house in Darrtown, Ohio. I spent six years there between ages 5 to 11. That’s the house where I learned how to read and discovered all my favorite childhood movies and books. That’s the house where I played imaginary games and got my first bike. That’s the house where I made most of my memories of my mom and it’s where she died. Moving out of the house was slow and so there was never really a time when I made a point of saying goodbye. The house I knew and loved just sort of slipped out of my life until it finally got sold and other people got to fill it with memories. We called that house Hopehaven and I will probably always regret that I didn’t get to say goodbye to it.

After leaving Ohio, I moved in with my sister in Bryn Athyn and have called it my home for the past ten years. But even in that little town I have lived in four different houses during that time. Since my freshman year of high school I have lived with my sister Tirah in a house technically in Huntingdon Valley but within half a mile of Bryn Athyn. But, despite it being my physical home, I was always subconsciously careful to keep it emotionally distant. Instead of inviting friends to my house I would invite them to my sister’s house. Somehow I was both living with my sister and just staying with my sister. It was almost like I had to think of it as temporary for the sake of my emotions. Continue reading Home →