PRN: Pause, Renew, Next

As we wrap up Season 6 about telling our stories, I want to leave you with some practical places to begin your own story work. In this reflection episode, I’m laying out four integral parts of story work: reflection, writing, telling, and listening. I hope you’ll come away from this episode with good ideas, practical tips, and inspiration to begin your own journey of storytelling.

May you be encouraged on your journey with Jesus.

Join me for this 12 minute Scripture meditation episode as we reflect on the imagery of Christ as our Good Shepherd. We’ll be spending time in both Psalm 23 as well as in John 10 if you’d like to read along.

May you be encouraged on your journey with Jesus!

Have you ever wondered what it would be like to hike the Appalachian Trail? It sounds epic, right? Well, today’s guest, Julie Long, is here to talk about her family’s Appalachian Trail adventure. Her husband and son are currently hiking it, and are nearing the end. She talks about what their experience has been like, as well as what it has been like for her to support them on their journey.

In this episode, Julie shares fun facts about the AT, things that her family is learning, challenges that they are overcoming, as well as ways that they are growing through this experience.

Julie is an old friend of the podcast! She was on a few years ago to talk about foster care. You can find that episode here: The Fostering Journey.

If you’d like to follow along with Jeff and Gavin’s adventure, I encourage you to check out their YouTube channel: Step Into Hiking. You can also find Julie’s store and blog on her website: Misty Creek Acres.

May you be encouraged on your journey with Jesus.

In today’s reflection episode, I’m exploring an existential spiritual question: Are we supposed to bear fruit in every season? This question relates to both soul care and our stories, because the truth is, we all experience different and unique seasons of life.

Join me for 11 minutes as we do a slow-down and centering exercise and then reflect together. I’ll be sharing some of what the Lord is showing me about resting this year. I am also releasing this episode in blog form, so if you’d like to read along or go reflect by reading later, you can access the transcript here: In Season and Out of Season.

May you be encouraged on your journey with Jesus!

Have you ever thought about how God’s will intersects with your story? In this reflection episode, we’ll consider specifically what we’re telling ourselves about God’s will and how that affects our thinking, our view of ourselves, and our stories.

So, in story language, we’ll be talking about three parts: the past, the story that’s already been written, the present, the life we’re now living, and the future, the parts that are left to be written.

As always, we’ll begin our time together with a slow-down exercise and end our time together with a benediction.

May you be encouraged on your journey with Jesus.

Today, we’ll be examining the characters who show up in our stories through the lens of relationship. Specifically, we’ll be talking about 3 paradigms for relationship: independence, codependence, and interdependence. Each of these relationship strategies affect the way we view relationships, and thus the way we interact with the people in our lives. I hope you’ll join me for this 15 minute reflection episode as we consider how our relationship strategies affect the way we interpret our own stories.

What are emotions and what purpose do they serve? In this episode, we’ll answer that question, as well as talk about how we can recognize, name, and learn to regulate them. It was a joy to talk in this episode with my friend and fellow counselor, Deni Huttula, about emotional regulation and about her book, The Bridges of Chara: an allegory for your brain’s emotional landscape.

Deni shares about her history of working with children who struggle with emotional and behavioral challenges, and how that experience led her to write her book. We also talk about how we experience emotions in our bodies, and ways that we can co-regulate in safe relationships.

Deni is an old friend of the podcast. In fact, she was on PRN in the 2nd season to talk about soul-care. You can listen to that episode here.

If you’re interested in journaling, I hope you’ll go check out Deni’s other book, The Author Still Speaks: 21 days of questions to ask God.

May you be encouraged on your journey with Jesus.

In today’s episode, we’re going to be meditating on one of Jesus’ parables, and gleaning what He is teaching about His kingdom through the story. If you’d like to read along, we’ll be reading from Luke 12. As always, we’ll read the passage 3 times, so that we can spend time thinking, noticing, repeating, pondering, and giving the Word space in our minds and hearts.

I’d love to hear what you noticed or thought about as we read this passage together. Feel free to share below!

May you be encouraged on your journey with Jesus.

In the second part of my conversation with Leah, she shares about the unexpected difficulties she has faced as a parent. Leah is a single parent of four adopted children, and she honestly talks about the realities of that journey. She also speaks about being a parent of children with special needs.

Leah is so honest and authentic in telling her story, and it is a story that we all need to hear. Whether or not you’re a single parent, an adoptive parent, or a special needs parent, you will come away from this episode with compassion and new understanding for some of the “invisible” needs of our communities and churches.

If something from this episode resonates with you, I’d love to hear about it. Drop a comment under today’s show notes, or comment on Facebook or Instagram.

If you missed the first part of Leah’s story, I hope you’ll go back and give it a listen as well!

May you be encouraged on your journey with Jesus.

Pull up a chair, grab a cup of coffee, and settle in for quite a conversation today, friends. It was a joy to talk with my friend, Leah Stirewalt, as she shared her story on this episode. It is no easy story, and to say the least, it has layers. Leah has experienced unexpected grief so many times, that she has felt as if she had a “target on her back.”

Whether or not you have experienced grief yourself, you will come away from this episode wiser. Leah shares the nitty gritty about making it through difficult circumstances, and wisdom about how to help others who are grieving.

In fact, Leah’s story could not adequately be captured in one episode, so her story will be continued next week as she shares about her parenting journey.

If this episode resonated with you, I’d love to hear about it. Comment below today’s show notes, or join the conversation on Facebook or Instagram.

May you be encouraged on your journey with Jesus.