ALY ALLEN | THE BLOG

waiting. one of the hardest disciplines, isn't it? for me, anyway. i'm not the most patient person in the world... just ask my 2 year old. waiting comes in all forms. sometimes they're serious and life-changing things that we wait and hope and pray for, and sometimes they're just daily little things that pop up in our path. we pray and pray for God to work in our circumstances. to change them, make them go away, make them better.  but what if God had a different lesson for us to learn in the waiting? some of you are waiting for a baby. either because you're dealing with the heartache of infertility or you're navigating the difficult waters of adoption.  some of you are waiting for a wayward child to return. either to your home or to your heart. a broken relationship needs mending and you're waiting. some are waiting for your husband to rise up and fill his role as spiritual leader in your house. you're waiting for his repentance or h...

maybe someone needed to read this today?  i know i needed it. i have a bunch of "mixed CDs" just laying around in the car. i stuck in this particular CD and this was the first song that played. and it was exactly what i needed to be reminded of. please take the three minutes and listen to it i included the lyrics below (emphasis mine, of course). i mean, they're just Truth, with some pretty music added to it. and hopefully they'll give you strength for whatever your circumstances might be if you don't know who Ginny Owens is, she's a singer/songwriter. and she's blind.  i won't write out her full bio, but i think that fact alone gives her some solid "street-credit" when writing about trials, doesn't it? the pathway is broken and the signs are unclear and i don't know the reason  why You brought me here but just because You love me the way that You do i'm gonna walk through the valley if You...

being a parent is a heavy responsibility.  and that's the biggest understatement of the century, right?  it requires all of you: your heart, your mind, your physical body.  it evokes every emotion: heartache, frustration, intense love, desperation, sheer joy.  it takes planning, creativity, wisdom, supernatural strength, and mostly a lot of prayer.  sometimes i feel like i can't give my daughter everything she needs. and i can't. but the beautiful thing is that i was never meant to. that's not how any of us were designed. Jesus is the only one who can give us everything we need. over and over again. if He's the answer for me, then He's the answer for my daughter even though it may look differently at her age. as she's getting older, i'm realizing that i can't protect her from every little thing like i could when she was a baby. she's interacting with other kids, other adults, she's away from me frequently. i can...

right now i'm carrying around a burden of knowledge that i wish i didn't have. there are so many crazy things going on in so many lives around me and i wish that i had some answers. i wish i could just make it all go away, and if i'm being really honest, i just flat out wish they'd never told me. knowing is not always good . but alas, i know their secrets and i'm desperate for answers, some way to ease their burden without feeling like i'm being taken under myself. you just feel so helpless when lives are crumbling around you and you're powerless to do anything. have you ever been there? maybe your own life is crumbling and you're feeling hopeless? the following is a guest post that i wrote for jami a few weeks ago.  but oh, how i need it now: if you're like me, when trouble comes, you immediately scramble to find a solution. you try to solve problems using logical, earthly wisdom, gleaned from your vast pool of experience and knowledge....