Musings
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Every Saint a Singer
While recording a podcast earlier this week, I was asked: “Are all Christians required to sing?” I replied that yes, scripture indicates as much. Not every believer is called to music ministry as a vocation, but every saint is, fundamentally, a singer. The calls to song that punctuate scripture are not only directed to all Continue reading
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The Spirit Moves in Mysterious Ways…and then other times the Spirit is VERY Clear
This title really says it all. Yesterday, I had a moment of angst. I was hard at work on my book proposal when my laptop began to act up again. I’ve been ignoring its quirks for months now and, finally, had to admit it was time for an update. My workflow was disrupted for the Continue reading
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Insignificant in Life, Glorious in Death
There’s a tree at the end of my street that is unfairly beautiful right now. It’s nice enough throughout the rest of the year, but in the early autumn it turns a vibrant red. I slow down whenever I drive past just to marvel at it. There’s something somber about this tree. It spends its Continue reading
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Joyfully, Ryanne
I sign my emails “Joyfully,” which seems ironic. I don’t tend toward cheerfulness when I open my cluttered inbox. Signing my emails this way began as a choice—much like joy. No matter my mood when I type the body of a message, I am forced to rejoice when I sign and send it. The early Continue reading
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Becoming Who Your Book Thinks You Are
When I was in grad school, I asked a fellow student to grab coffee. She was a few steps (and degrees) ahead of me, but we shared an alma mater and enough other similarities that I hoped maybe we’d become friends. At coffee, she told me about a book she was writing on happiness and Continue reading
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Spaketh the Fool
“Be true to yourself” or, to quote Shakespeare’s Hamlet, “To thine own self be true” is perhaps today’s most popular self-help advice. People who offer and adhere to this maxim, however, fail to recall that it was advice given by a babbling fool. This above all, — to thine own self be true;And it must Continue reading
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November
In Little Women, Meg March complains about November, declaring it “the most disagreeable month in the whole year.” As a November baby, this passage stuck with me. I first read it as a child living in sunny suburban Arizona, so could not understand why Meg hated November for the simple reason that I had never Continue reading
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The Quiet Art of Reading Aloud
I remember reading in St. Augustine’s Confessions how he was astounded to see a man sitting before a book, his eyes roving back and forth across the printed page, and yet without uttering a sound. Could he be…reading? The very idea was shocking. I laughed at first, struck to think that reading silently was once Continue reading
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Run Like a Girl
Run as fast and far as the menBut be sure to stay out in the open. Carry pepper spray or an alarmTo keep your health and keep from harm. Turn down the music, keep wide, clear eyes, Suspect all footsteps and passerby’s. Go only in the broad light of day;Brave the heat; it’s the safest Continue reading
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The Wages of Sin are the DMV
By far the most aggravating thing about moving cross-country is dealing with local government—the most troublesome of all being the motor vehicle department. After several mornings of battling baffling websites, decade-long hold lines, and paperwork with inexplicable spaces, I cried out in despair…and then, I had an epiphany. The DMV is a consequence of humanity’s Continue reading
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The Aisle
I have walked down the aisle many times throughout my life: when leading a children’s processional, rushing to a band practice, or walking with dignity to the choir loft. I remember, most strikingly, the first time I walked down the aisle at St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church in St. Andrew’s, Scotland. I was one of a Continue reading
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A Couplet for Couples
The sweetest submission I now know is this: To bow before his gentle forehead kiss. “Wives, submit to your husbands, as to the Lord…Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, so that he might present the church to himself in splendor…” Ephesians Continue reading
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Ryanne Molinari 