By U.S. State
By Country
Riding a Bike in Vienna
by Andrew Knot | Jan 16, 2014 | Austria
I can bike down each of Vienna’s alleys. I can scrape my elbow on any number of her streets. Still, the city will never be completely mine.
Janus
by Sarah (VanderMolen) Sundt | Jan 15, 2014 | Pennsylvania
Every year, the Romans made promises to the god, Janus (hence January), who was often depicted as two-faced: one facing front and one facing back.
Fear of Orthodoxy
by Will Montei | Jan 14, 2014 | Placeless
I wrote a piece earlier called “Mere Atheism,” and if you read between the lines of the opening paragraphs, you will find lurking within them an ugly fear—the mystery of why I am faithful was pinpointed on my family rather than the Holy Spirit; the mystical nature of...
I Will Not Go To Calvin
by Melissa Dykhuis | Jan 13, 2014 | Grand Rapids
I decided to be an astronomer at age ten. I am an astronomer now because God is gracious and I am stubborn. It is because of the former, and in spite of the latter, that I am also a Calvin alum.
Rereader
by Abby Zwart | Jan 12, 2014 | Placeless
The chord sounds a little different—less jaded and sweeter but less sappy—and I’m really glad. Glad to know I’ve changed and glad that a book has changed with me.
Play the Gloria
by Elaine Schnabel | Jan 11, 2014 | Placeless
I don’t like resolutions because they are either so small as to be accomplished in a couple months or so general as to be forgotten within the same amount of time.
From the Polar Vortex
by David Greendonner | Jan 10, 2014 | Placeless
I gunned it up what looked to me like an incline about as threatening as what you might find on, say, the eighth hole of a miniature golf course, though it may as well have been a mountainside.
A Time to Clean
by Bart Tocci | Jan 9, 2014 | Placeless
While I was home we hosted gatherings, which means we cleaned. As it turns out, my mom’s idea of clean and my idea of clean are not the same, and have not been the same for some time.
Retaining
by Caroline (Higgins) Nyczak | Jan 7, 2014 | Hungary
My roommate wears a retainer as well, and this is comforting as it lessens the embarrassment of the dreaded “retainer lisp.”
Messy Resolutions
by Josh deLacy | Jan 6, 2014 | Washington
My resolutions are bricoleur. They are messy and vibrant and ambitious and mundane. It is a dirty, wrinkled list held together with Scotch tape, because this is the time for it.
Eating Pig Face
by Alissa Anderson | Jan 5, 2014 | Placeless
So, in one sense, I broke my New Year’s resolution before I even made it to February. But I still did a lot. So if that’s failing, I’ll be happy to fail again this year.
News of No One
by Andrew Steiner | Jan 4, 2014 | Grand Rapids
On the bench, cradling the bottle, he folds over on himself and sits with the permanence of a doll on the top shelf of a woman’s girlhood closet. From the window above, the guard calls the dispatcher.
A New Christmas
by Sabrina Lee | Jan 3, 2014 | France
Yet, during the past three years, it had been always winter and never Christmas for Jeanne and her family: they didn’t see the point, nor could they muster the strength to celebrate without wife and mother.
Post for the Turn of the Year
by Jacob Schepers | Jan 2, 2014 | Placeless
December 31 certainly seems more festive than January 1. And by January 2, life resumes its normal course. Folks return to work, winter break ends, the Christmas tree comes down. Poor, poor January 2.
A Recipe from 2013
by Amy (Allen) Frieson | Jan 1, 2014 | Placeless
Begin a conversation with Person 2 about New Year’s Resolutions. (Optional: Person 2 snorts quietly.) Persist in having the conversation.
In Tenebris
by Abby Zwart | Dec 31, 2013 | Placeless
May you find a moment’s space tonight. May you draw the curtain, open the window, and climb outside to wait. May the light fall where you need it most.
Abide With Me
by Debra Rienstra | Dec 30, 2013 | Placeless
The year turns, the afternoon lingers in light a few moments more. In a week, all the holiday trimmings will be packed away, and the rooms will seem clean and empty. What will the new year bring?
We Can Dance: Everything’s Not Under Control
by Sarina Moore | Dec 29, 2013 | Placeless
When I was sixteen, I went with my youth group to a talk on the evils of dancing. No dancing, he said. Dancing is of the devil, he said.
On The Last of Us
by Stephen Mulder | Dec 28, 2013 | Placeless
The Last of Us was gripping and unpredictable, it was emotionally draining, and it ended not with a happy victory or a heroic sacrifice, but with cowardly decisions made by broken characters.
The Darkness and the Light
by Brad Zwiers | Dec 27, 2013 | Placeless
If you’ve paid attention to end-of-the-year album lists, you’ve probably noticed a soft pink album with nine capitalized letters on its cover sitting somewhere near the top.
I’m Going to Let You Down
by Griffin Jackson | Dec 26, 2013 | Placeless
Because there are so many little issues involved that tunnel-vision just ignores, and very few minds are changed, and nobody looks good in the end.
No Place Like Home
by Bethany Tap | Dec 25, 2013 | Grand Rapids, North Carolina
That Perry Como song comes on the radio, and I’m a wreck because there really is no place like home, whether it’s for the holidays or any time of year.
Spontaneous Idealism
by Lauren (Boersma) Harris | Dec 24, 2013 | Placeless
Why shop for Christmas presents when I can scrounge through the basement for spray paint and paper clips at 3 am on Christmas morning to fashion handmade Precious Moments iHomes?!!
Room
by Jenn Langefeld | Dec 23, 2013 | Placeless
The more I think about it, the more a purge seems like acceptable Advent behavior. Wasn’t God’s son plunked into a feeding trough because there wasn’t room in the right place?
Person of the Year
by Robert Zandstra | Dec 22, 2013 | Placeless
Around this time every year, I fill out a “year in review” as a way of remembering significant things in the previous year. One category is the public figure who most captured my imagination.
Favorite and Least Favorite
by Libby Stille | Dec 21, 2013 | Placeless
I’ll play favorite vs. least favorite, a completely subjective game and thus the dolt cousin of favorite vs. best. Today’s topic: Christmas carols.
On Why I Hate Church
by Calah Schlabach | Dec 20, 2013 | Placeless
“You’ll have to excuse Calah. All these people are giving her information overload right now. Please join her in the ladies’ room for a deep conversation about this week’s scripture reading.”
Roadtrip
by Mary Margaret Healy | Dec 19, 2013 | Chicago, Colorado
Somewhere around 5:00 a.m. on Saturday, mom will go into Noah’s Ark mode, creating piles two at a time and designating where they will go in the car.
Traditions (cont’d)
by Matt & Laura Hubers | Dec 18, 2013 | Placeless
It’s almost our second Christmas as a married couple. Our tree is full of bare, ornament-less spots. We have different holiday movie requests, opposing music preferences, and conflicting decorating techniques.
A Ship-Shape Church
by Geneva Langeland | Dec 17, 2013 | Placeless
We come to church expecting to be fed—physically with coffee and cookies, spiritually with a rousing sermon. We come expecting to be entertained by talented musicians and a skillful preacher.
