2014

Sex and Sunday SchoolA Small Talk Guest Post by Megan Hill
Sex and Sunday School
Image: tamarajohnsonbelieves/flickr

In anticipation of my new book, Small Talk: Learning From My Children About What Matters Most, each week I'm featuring a different writer for a guest post. These posts dicuss the ways children's questions, comments, or actions have prompted deeper reflection for the ...

Confession Leads to Reconciliation Leads to CommunityAn interview with Mae Elise Cannon and Soong-Chan Rah about their new book, Forgive Us.
Confession Leads to Reconciliation Leads to Community
Image: quantumlars/flickr

In the midst of the national news storm that emerged following Michael Brown's death in Ferguson, Missouri, this summer, I received an early copy of Forgive Us: Confessions of a Compromised Faith. This book, written by four evangelicals from a variety of ethnic backgrounds, ...

8 Books for Parents Who Need to Know They're Not AloneFor moms, dads, single parents, and married ones.
8 Books for Parents Who Need to Know They're Not Alone
Image: Chris_Parfitt

When I was working on Small Talk:Learning From My Children About What Matters Most, my husband asked, "What's the one-minute takeaway from this book?" Without thinking too much about it, I said, "You are not alone." I later elaborated on that thought ...

Identical Twin Sisters Growing Up Thousands of Miles ApartA new PBS film premieres tonight and raises questions about family, fate, and culture.
Identical Twin Sisters Growing Up Thousands of Miles Apart

Twin Sisters, a short documentary film about twin sisters raised on different sides of the globe, premiers tonight on PBS at 10:00pm EST. (Click here for a preview.) This film tells a simple story of twin girls abandoned in China and adopted by two very different families—one ...

How Godparenting Brought Me Into the Family of GodA Small Talk guest post by Katelyn Beaty.
How Godparenting Brought Me Into the Family of God
Image: Ceyla de Wilka/wiki commons

This Friday "Small Talk" series is an opportunity to consider the ways God uses children as "vehicles of grace" in the lives of adults. The idea comes from my new book, Small Talk: Learning From My Children About What Matters Most. In the second post of the ...

"You Was a Jerk Mommy?"What to do when your two-year old convicts you. An excerpt from my new book, Small Talk.
"You Was a Jerk Mommy?"

The following excerpt comes from my new book, Small Talk: Learning From My Children About What Matters Most (Zondervan):

It snowed yesterday. The view outside the kitchen window is idyllic—trees hand-painted with delicate white strokes, sunshine glinting off the crystal ...

Three Reasons Why We Should Read Books Instead of Blog PostsBooks cost money and time, which is why they are worth it.
Three Reasons Why We Should Read Books Instead of Blog Posts
Image: spykster/flickr

I succumb to the same temptations as everyone else. I lie in bed with a novel next to me and my phone in my hand, scrolling through Facebook and Twitter to see what people have shared, clicking various articles and blog posts, flitting from one idea, one news item to the ...

I'm Celebrating by Giving You Free StuffPre-order a copy of Small Talk and receive a free subscription to Christianity Today and more.
I'm Celebrating by Giving You Free Stuff

A friend once pointed out to me that writing a memoir has three stages. First, you live it. Then you write about it. And then you send it out into the world and respond to it. As a writer, I usually don’t love the first part, the living-it part, because I’m in ...

What I Learned When My Children Fell Apart In Front of MeAdoption, brokenness, and grace. A "Small Talk" guest post by Sara Hagerty.
What I Learned When My Children Fell Apart In Front of Me

For the past two years, I've been working on a book called Small Talk: Learning From My Children About What Matters Most. I'll be sharing lots more information about the book on this blog in the next few weeks (pre-order sale starts Monday), but one of the most exciting ...

Are Faith and Science Compatible? Hanging out with Christian scientists taught me even more about the nature of God.
Are Faith and Science Compatible?
Image: c@rljones/flickr

Last week, I had the privilege of attending a conference hosted by The Biologos Foundation. In some ways, I felt like an odd duck. Biologos is an organization dedicated to demonstrating the compatibility of modern science and evangelical faith. I’m all about evangelical ...

How to Talk to Parents of Children With Down SyndromeI am much more inclined to tell the whole truth when you assume she is someone to celebrate.
How to Talk to Parents of Children With Down Syndrome

When people discover that I have a child with Down syndrome, I often receive a murmur and a sympathetic nod of the head. I almost immediately feel something tighten inside my chest, as if I am steeling myself for a fight my opponent doesn’t even know they’ve initiated. ...

Why Men Should Read Sheryl Sandberg's Lean InChange depends upon women and men working together to transform the social structures of work and family life.
Why Men Should Read Sheryl Sandberg's Lean In

When the COO of Facebook writes a book about women and leadership, the world takes notice. Sheryl Sandberg’s Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead, turned heads when it came out in March of 2013, and it sparked heavy criticism (see, for example, the Washington ...

Six Books on How Kids Learn Books to help you stay informed about the national debates surrounding character education, knowledge, and grittiness.
Six Books on How Kids Learn
Image: by www.audio-luci-store.it

My husband is the Head of School at The Gunnery, an independent boarding school in western Connecticut, so he keeps himself current on national debates surrounding education and learning. We also, of course, have kids of our own, and because our oldest daughter Penny has ...

Have Christians Made an Idol of Life?Ezekiel Emanuel says he wants to die at 75. Why we can support his reasoning.
Have Christians Made an Idol of Life?
Image: Moyen Brown/flickr

In some ways, the title of Ezekiel Emanuel’s new essay for The Atlantic says it all: "Why I Hope to Die at 75." But this already over-commented (2,500 comments and counting) and widely read article deserves some attention here because Christians have distinct ...

Why I Don't Like Being Called ReligiousAnd how I'm learning to embrace it anyway.
Why I Don't Like Being Called Religious

We moved to Connecticut two years ago. It took nearly as long for people to start telling me that I am “religious.” It usually comes as an explanation for why I won’t like something or why I wouldn’t know about some local gossip. It almost always seems ...

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