Personal Faith

DISPLAY:

Echoing God’s Creative Character

I’m on a mission. It’s never-ending and I’ll not be able to complete it; but rather than feeling frustrated, I feel invigorated. It’s a mission to share God’s love through the creative arts. Of course, teaching music doesn’t have to include God. After all, music is orderly and based on the physics of our natural […]

Displaying Faith

Six years ago, a student in my FRENCH 1A started talking to me after class and unexpectedly invited me to attend a Bible study organized by Christian students on campus. I was delighted to learn that there were Christian students on campus as I did not know this. The student also gave me a flyer […]

Do You Love Me More Than These?

“Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men” (Matthew 4:19) is the first recorded sentence of Jesus to Simon Peter. It starts with the call, “Follow me,” and ends with the vocation, “fisher of men.” Jesus is the instrument of the vocational transformation. The last recorded words of Jesus before his ascension repeat […]

Living Life Crucified

Galatians 2:20 – I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. – NIV “Living life crucified” is an oxymoron, like “jumbo shrimp” or […]

Being Like Post-Resurrection Peter

I am currently reading The Final Days of Jesus, a book by Professor Andreas Kostenberger and Dr. Justin Taylor that tracks Jesus’ last week on earth. As I read, I am struck by Peter’s denial of Jesus. I have read the gospel accounts many times, but it had never struck me so hard until I […]

Risk Brings Reward

I shouldn’t have needed the push, but I did. In retrospect, I’m not surprised; I’m not always forthcoming when faith and risk are required, even though I am a former staff member with Cru.  Not that a great deal of boldness is required to speak up about being a Jesus follower at a Catholic university […]

Transparency

Professors aren’t known for their personal transparency.  It seems part of the job description to keep up a good image and look like we have it all together. God put me in a situation where that job description was challenged with another one:  be vulnerable and talk about what God has done in my life. […]

Lessons From the Pandemic

Two years ago my husband, infant daughter, two cats, and I moved from Oklahoma to Florida to begin my tenure track position at the University of Florida. A steep learning curve ensued in almost all areas of life. We were beginning to find our feet…and then 2020 hit. The world irrevocably changed with the pandemic. […]

A Table in the Wilderness

Springtime in the mountains is evident from the view out my window as I work from home. My morning routine begins, as it does with so many of us, with those first few sips of coffee.  Familiar, gratifying. Oddly, without rush, now, as the semester is taught online and a statewide shelter-in-place order. Also without […]

Living With an Eternal Perspective

Professor Kuhlman taught me a lot about economics, but the lesson I remember most was about the power of perspective. I was a freshman in his economics class, sitting with about 200 other students in a University of Missouri lecture hall in 1974, when he explained how he could tell in 30 seconds how any […]