Home & Blog | Lynne Baab

Draw near: Praying for the ability to listen to unexpected voices

Lynne Baab • Tuesday March 21 2023

My mother has a green thumb, and her home and garden are full of thriving plants. When she shows me a new plant, she’ll often say, “This plant is happy here,” meaning that the plant is thriving in the western sunlight of this particular window or the more diffuse light in the living room. Her plants tell her where they like to be.

I’ve read about sculptors who say that the stone tells them what it wants to be. In an article about her spring quilt, Avis Collins Robinson said, "I let the fabric’s colors and textures tell me how they want...

Read full article »

Draw near: Asking God for maps

Lynne Baab • Tuesday March 14 2023

Until I was nine years old, my dad was a pilot in the U. S. air force. For those of you who love planes, he flew P-37s and P-51s in World War 2, then cargo planes (C-47s and C-54s, also known as DC3s and DC6s) in the late 1940s and 1950s. I have vivid memories of my dad coming home from a trip. He would carefully spread out maps on the dining room table and show me where he’d been. One time, he had flown somewhere tropical – the Caribbean? Hawaii? – and he saw a black sand beach. He showed...

Read full article »

Draw near: Praying to be present when people change

Lynne Baab • Tuesday March 7 2023

The week before Valentine’s Day, a friend posted a quotation on Facebook. Since then I have returned over and over to this quotation, which is increasingly relevant as I get older, and as my family members and friends are aging, too:

“To love someone long-term is to attend a thousand funerals of the people they used to be. The people they’re too exhausted to be any longer. The people they don’t recognize inside themselves anymore. The people they grew out of, the people they never ended up growing into. We so badly want the people we love to get their spark back...

Read full article »

Draw near: Praying about starting, stopping, and finishing

Lynne Baab • Tuesday February 28 2023

When my husband Dave was a child and teenager, he spent a lot of time with his dad, Hubert, in Hubert’s workshop. When Dave would help Hubert with a specific project, Hubert frequently said, “You’re a finisher, Dave.” Those words of blessing helped Dave complete his undergraduate degree in three years, persevere in the challenging years of dental school, and learn to do academic research as an associate professor in a dental school. To my great benefit, Hubert’s words helped Dave persevere in being a consistent and loving dad and husband.

There are moments, however, when those words keep Dave from stopping...

Read full article »

<< Newer | Older >>