A Guiding Principle for the Modesty Conversation: You Are Not Merely a Body

A Guiding Principle for the Modesty Conversation: You Are Not Merely a Body

Modesty is about as tricky of a topic as it gets. There are many of us who grew up in the church and can easily recall the deep shame we felt when someone told us that we crossed a line. Maybe we didn’t mean to cross the line. Maybe we had no idea where the line was. Maybe we disagreed about the line. Maybe we meant to cross it, but we were still horrified to be brought so low so quickly. Whatever the heart condition, the shame was the same, and we walked away confused that our bodies could be a weapon in so many ways. It attacked us when we looked at it in the mirror, and it attacked others when we did not clothe it properly. We were confused because the world implied our body was how we earned favor, but the church implied favor was earned by how we covered it. We were frustrated because we got two opposing messages: it doesn’t matter how you look on the outside, but also it really, really does.

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Social Media and the Path to Life

Social Media and the Path to Life

Today we went to a pumpkin patch, and it made me think about how social media has weaponized things like pumpkin patches. Those last eight words sound like the punchline to a joke, but everyone with an @ before their name knows social media can put sharp edges on even the most innocuous fun.

Nothing is safe from the incessant nudging to curate our lives and present them for others, right? Not the pumpkins, not the cup of coffee and open Bible, not the cute outfit. The nudges make it harder to enjoy the coffee, the Bible, the date night, the playground.

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Your Best Beach Brain

Your Best Beach Brain

Who cares about their brain when they’re prepping for the beach? Maybe no one. But I think we should. Because love handles and thunder thighs and muffin tops and stretch marks are not the true enemies of beach bliss. The true enemies are the thoughts that wage war in our minds.

I’ve created a seven-day guide to Your Best Beach Brain. It may not be what you think, or it may be exactly what you think, but either way, it’s my prayer that God would use this to draw you nearer to him and to equip you to marvel over him and have fun—even when you’re in a swimsuit.

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The Dress Didn't Fit

The Dress Didn't Fit

The dress wouldn’t zip. It didn’t matter what I did. It was the bridesmaid dress for my sister's wedding, and I had to be in it, standing by my sister's side in front of 200 guests within 72 hours.

Sweaty and stuck, I willed the panic away and called my mom for a game plan. We decided I’d head to her house, where she and my grandmother could help me get into the dress. Maybe I just needed another set of hands to get the zipper going. If we couldn’t make it work, Mom said, we’d create a gusset ourselves with extra fabric or find a seamstress. 

I touched base with a few friends on the way to Mom’s house, joking that I was willing to go Middle Ages on this problem and remove a rib if necessary. I told Adelaide, “Pray for Mommy’s dress,” and she did. “Dear God, help Mommy’s dress. Amen.”

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Knowing Your Name When the World Tries to Name You

Knowing Your Name When the World Tries to Name You

"But now thus says the LORD, he who created you, O Jacob, he who formed you, O Israel: 'Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name, you are mine.'" Isaiah 43:1

Names matter. My parents named me “Caroline,” and somehow that particular string of letters feels eternally linked to who I am, as if they line my DNA like biological alphabet soup. (It’s weird because they could have named me something else, like Karen or Bubbalicious or Raisin Bran, and I’m sure I’d feel just as connected to those series of letters if they had.) Praise the Lord, even though Dad actually loves Raisin Bran, my folks thought carefully and chose Caroline, just for me.

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