if we will remember to return often to our Instructor . . . our Creator . . . we will discover His loving hands still pulse to continue making us. Tweaking us. Molding us. Filling us. And daily completing the good work He began in us.

And yet what we call mundane is, in some very important ways, significant in God's school of preparation.

am a Jesus girl who can step on the scale and see the numbers as an indication of how much my body weighs and not as an indication of my worth.

Alarmed, I resolve to remember who I am. Jesus, Jesus, Jesus. Stay in the flow—my job is obedience; God's job is results. Shift from an attitude to gratitude. My reactions determine my reach.

And I keep on marching as if this is the way a Christian woman is supposed to live, as if this is the call on my life, as if this is all there is.

So, here's the short version of my predetermined biblical procedure manual all in one place: Alarmed, I resolve to remember who I am. Jesus, Jesus, Jesus. Stay in the flow—my job is obedience; God's job is results. Shift from an attitude to gratitude. My reactions determine my reach.

I have allowed myself to believe that to be stripped of all the props and pretensions and accolades and approvals is to be stripped of the best parts of me. When in reality what's best about me comes to the forefront when I'm closest to the way God created me, naked and unashamed. To stand naked and unashamed is the way of the garden life.

Anytime we feel not good enough we deny the powerful truth that we are a glorious work of God in progress. We are imperfect because we are unfinished.

When I was hired, I was urged] not to seek a clear definition of what I'd be doing because that would also make it clear what I was not supposed to do. Be careful not to define yourself out of an interesting job.

We can't take any credit for our talents. It's how we use them that counts.

We are created for adventure, and if we cannot find one, we start blowing things out of proportion so it feels like we have one.

Because she bears the image of God. She doesn't have to conjure it, go get it from a salon, have plastic surgery or breast implants. No, beauty is an essence that is given to every woman at her creation.