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Strengthened by Grace
Counselors Reflect on Dangerous Calling by Paul Tripp A Series to Care for the Care Takers of God’s People “You are most loving patient, kind and gracious when you are aware that there is no truth that you could give to another that you don’t desperately need...
Healthy Ways to Capture Memories
In the end, grief is about how we remember. Memory is powerful. It shapes our lives in many ways. Memory impacts our emotions. Memory shapes the significance we give to current events. Memory influences what we expect from the future. So the effort to grieve well...
The Impact of Misdirected Identity
Counselors Reflect on Dangerous Calling by Paul Tripp A Series to Care for the Care Takers of God’s People "Ministry had become my identity. No I didn't think of myself as a child of God, in daily need of grace, in the middle of my own sanctification, still in a...
Applying the Grief Seminar to Losses Not Caused by Death
Often it can be hard to recognize grief as grief, because of the absence of a death. Major losses can be caused by many other life changes than someone dying. But this difficulty goes well beyond the challenge of rightly labeling an experience. When we do not...
Are You Identity Shopping?
Counselors Reflect on Dangerous Calling by Paul Tripp A Series to Care for the Care Takers of God's People “Human beings are always assigning themselves some kind of identity. There are only two places to look. Either you will be getting your identity vertically, from...
Thoughts on “Shame Interrupted: How God Lifts the Pain of Worthlessness and Rejection”
Your dad says he’ll pick you up Friday afternoon and the two of you will go camping for the weekend. You don’t see him much because your parents are divorced and you live with your mom. The thought of your dad taking you camping feels so great. In fact, it makes...
Memorial Ceremony for an Unborn Child
Grieving the loss of an unborn child can be particularly difficult. No one else had the privilege of knowing your baby and, therefore, many of the rituals of grief (i.e., sharing pictures or stories of how the lost loved one touched other’s lives) cannot be engaged....
Small Group Care Plan for the Whole Journey of Grief
Caring for a friend facing a significant loss is something that we (as friends and church members) often start well. We bring meals and try to make sure the mundane burdens (like mowing the grass) are handled. But too often this ends after a couple of weeks, and when...
The Absence of Providence
Bill & Connie were devastated by the miscarriage on their first pregnancy. It was especially hard sense their closest friends were pregnant at the same time. In fact, the loss was devastating to both of them. But now that Connie was pregnant again the painful...