NOTE FROM ELIZABETH: Every Heartspoken Life is unique, and it has been my honor to meet many smart, interesting, caring, generous women and men through my online activities who exemplify the Heartspoken Life in their own way. Today’s guest, Sue Painter, is one of them. She and I are among those folks who have had […]
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Book Review: The Book Of Longings
Author: Sue Monk KiddPublished 20205 stars There were so many marvelous layers to this book! First, it is a fascinating and well-researched story based on the premise that for ten years before his ministry, Jesus had a wife named Ana and she was both a writer and a feminist of her time. Viewing the life […]
8 Ways To Get Past Feeling Misunderstood
“What we have here is failure to communicate!” The famous movie line from Cool Hand Luke was spoken facetiously by the Captain, a prison warden, to Luke, the young prisoner played by Paul Newman. Perhaps one of the reasons it has stayed so deeply ingrained in our cultural lore is because the failure to communicate is […]
We’re All In This Together
My writing friend Joy Newswanger dislikes the term “social distancing,” and I agree with her. What we’re doing to protect ourselves and our communities is physical distancing, not social distancing. In some ways, we’re connecting socially more than ever before. John and I are trying to call or email or write friends and family to […]
It’s Easter Anyway
Church building doors are still closed seven months into the COVID-19 pandemic, and even after they open, there will be significant changes to the way we take communion and pass the peace. Back in April, we celebrated Easter without a real organ or the scent of lilies or the squeals of excited, squirmy children in […]
Changing Seasons Can Be Messy
Changing seasons can be messy in nature and in life. Here’s what I observed and reflected on in September 2015. Little did I know that just five years later, that messiness would take on a whole new meaning in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic. Morning walk, early September As I walk this morning in early September, I notice lots […]
Book Review: A Gentleman In Moscow
Book author: Amor TowlesPublished 2016 In 1922 at age 30, the protagonist, Russian Count Alexander Rostov, finds himself sentenced by a Bolshevik tribunal to house arrest for the crime of being an unrepentant aristocrat. His reputation and popularity allow him to escape execution, but he must move from an elegant suite in a grand hotel […]
How to Distinguish God’s Voice from Satan’s Lies
An age-old question One of my Heartspoken readers recently sent an important and challenging question: Hi, thanks for God’s work here. My question is how do you differentiate between God’s warning and Satan’s warning? And how do you feel it when it’s God’s warning or how do you feel it when it’s Satan’s threatening? Thank […]