Stories of HOPE &
Nuggets of Truth

Perspective Changes Everything I recently picked up a study I started several years ago but never finished called “Changed Into His Image” by Jim Berg. Stumbling across this book was not simply a reminder of my bad habit of starting and not finishing books, but rather a timely message I needed to hear. In one of the chapters Mr. Berg, using the example of being stuck in a traffic bottle-neck,

Learning from the Past; Building Health for the Future Age has a way of blurring your vision. You need longer arms for the fine print and regulated “daytime hours” for the road. We laugh at “cheater glasses” that have become wardrobe and scramble for one of 20 pairs when it’s time to read the medicine bottle.  We can see an eye doctor and seek eye health, but often there is

Keeping God’s Word Close The other day I was putting a new license plate on my car. I had picked the most freezing day of winter and was on a mission to complete it in record time. Running into the garage I grabbed the first screwdriver I found and ran back out into the tundra to make a quick finish of the task. However, as I leaned over to remove

Sharing the Treasure of God's Word “We are hard-pressed on every side, yet not crushed; we are perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed.” 2 Corinthians 4:8-9 In the midst of trauma, your world turns upside down; you feel broken in a million pieces and steady footing seems impossible. The pain and sorrow of brokenness and loss leaves you in a place of

The Impossible, a movie about a family who survived a Tsunami, expresses the chaos of trauma. It showed how hopelessness drives into your heart, mind and soul; you can’t breathe or orient to normal anymore because it no longer exists. Sorrow overwhelms, pain penetrates and confusion plagues your mind with a sense of drowning.  All of these emotions occupy your being as you consider the searing loss of “normal,” the

How to Survive the Holidays Feeling the jolly of the holidays is excruciatingly hard? Experiencing pain even when you are around familiar people or traditions? Trauma does that. It brings a new level of awareness for the brokenness you feel, and it seeks to steal the joy of those moments. Figuring out why you celebrate, what to engage in, whom to be around or how to even begin to join

How to Help the Hurting Holidays are especially hard for people in Trauma. Even when you are around familiar people or traditions, trauma brings a new level of awareness for the brokenness you feel, and it seeks to steal the joy of those moments. Our working definition of trauma is “an emotional response to a deeply distressing or disturbing event that overwhelms a person’s ability to cope.” This can be