🐙Lil Treasures #166: A Blessing and Monster Soup
We're talking male feminists and getting mauled by a cheetah
Hello! We’re going to begin this week’s newsletter with a blessing from the wise and wonderful Kate Bowler and Jessica Richie, written specifically just for you Lil Swipes! 🫶
A blessing for realizing you were wrong (and are really not happy about it)
Blessed are we, the ones who have just discovered
that others might not look at things the way we do…
and maybe they have a point.
Just maybe.
Blessed are we, attached to our hostilities
and self-righteousness and unpopular opinions
(even if we still stand by our taste in reality TV).
We who believe our ideas for how to fix the world
—especially our kids or spouse or friends—
are the best and only ways.
Blessed are we, the newly-wrong,
who feel the bruises form around our humility,
realizing that our fixes for others
might actually be mirrors to hold up first for ourselves.
As we learn to put others over our pride,
may our hearts stay soft
and ears stay open.
May we remember that our rightness
is not the basis for understanding
what is most important.
Love is.
* by Kate Bowler and Jessica Richie
For more blessings like this one, check out Kate and Jessica’s new book—The Lives We Actually Have: 100 Blessings for Imperfect Days (Convergent). I am only a few pages in to my copy of the book so far but it is just so lovely, and a great reading companion to add to your collection.
Also, if you want to save or print a copy of this blessing, you can click here or here to download!
Time for treasures!
📱Shout out to all of us out here trying to make a point in the comments on Instagram..
🧩Pete Enns and Jared Byas are doing a one-night class called “Putting the Pieces Together After Deconstruction” over at the Bible for Normal People this Monday (Feb 20) from 7-8:30pm CT. The class is pay-what-you-can! You can sign up here if you want to be a part.
😰If you have a teen who struggles with high-stress or anxiety, this post is especially helpful and contains lots of great tips to save for later.
✈️We all know and love an airport dad. What would we do without them?
💍This week on The Bible Binge, we’re talking about if marriage is favored or forsaken. Listen here to join in on the matrimonial bliss!
👕 My kiddo is raising money for a school trip next year and created a sustainable clothing brand to help reach her goal. She helped design, researched pricing, took product images, and even assisted with making the website. Check it out and support a lil baby entrepreneur!
🐆This piece by Bess Kalb that talks about gentle parenting and getting mauled by a cheetah is such an excellent read.
➕T-minus 5 days until Lent begins! We’re getting prepped over in The Swipe Up+ and the door is still open if you want to come on in and be a part. You’ll only pay $12 for the 2 months of Lent within the community, or you can do your own thang and walk through the study independently by purchasing it from my online store.
One of the coolest parts of the entire Lil Swipes community is just how kind and generous all of you are with your wisdom, time and even your dollars. One of the delights for me this week has been seeing notifications of those of you who have sent donations so that others (friends or even strangers) can take part in the study too. Without fail, every year this happens and every year it makes me emotional.
Thank you for your amazing kindness! If you’d like to give a few dollars towards a study for someone else, you can Venmo me at @erin-moon-2 (any money given goes directly to Lent sponsorships).
We also have studies ready to be donated because of these benevolent angels, so if your budget is a little tight right now, just send me an email and we’ll get you added before Lent begins!
This week’s good Tweets:
I’m so thankful you’re reading this and can’t wait to hear about your treasures from the week in the comments! Love you, mean it.
I'm so excited and relieved because my sweet dog passed her Therapy Dog International test last night! It has been a year of training and growth for me. Turns out training an animal is really about training the human. 🤷🏼♀️ Anyway, she will be able to come with me to my high school classroom and it is exactly what we need.
🌊 I live in the land of monster soup and I can confirm this to be true. Alligators. Sharks. Flesh eating bacteria. It is truly a miracle how we can survive in Florida.
🏡 My pastor knows the weirdest (read: connected in the indie Christian world) people and one of his friends got him in touch with Andy Squyres, who then did a house show at his house in Orlando. If you’ve ever listened to his music, he just gets it when it comes to God. Plus, pretty much all my local friends were there and 80% of the audience was people from church, wow so blessed. 😭
🙏🏻 Things in my little community have gotten a little better, but there’s still some hard news coming our way and ugh, life is unfair. I was shocked to see one of my friends at the Andy show because in my words, it was either the best place for her to be or the worst place for reasons I can’t share here, but yeah, what a rollercoaster of emotions!
🐜 I’m seeing the new Ant-Man movie tonight and it’s always a fun communal experience. Super stoked to see Jonathan Majors as Kang the Conqueror specifically!