This spring I read three of the best books I’ve ever read. One in particular I couldn’t stop talking about for weeks – but it wasn’t the sex book! I had to start with that word, though, because I knew it would grab your attention.
When Christine Paterson of FieldPartner recommended the book and mentioned that it was only $3.99 on Kindle, I figured I’d give it a try. I intuitively knew that American culture held more than just a guilt/innocence worldview and that shame/honor and fear/power comes into our thinking as well, and I was eager to learn the specifics of each worldview.
What I didn’t expect was for the book to so thoroughly rewrite my understanding of culture. I underlined nearly the entire book. At only 80 pages in paperback, there’s no fluff here. Every word seems essential, and every sentence sheds light on world cultures and their differing assumptions and thinking processes. I began to understand shame/honor and fear/power cultures more fully, and I began to see how the Bible beautifully addresses all three cultural concerns (guilt, shame, and fear).
Once my eyes were opened to this, I even began to see these three concerns addressed in most of our worship songs. In Western cultures we tend to tell the gospel story only through a guilt-innocence lens, and while that’s not wrong, it is incomplete. We look to God for help with our problems regarding fear and shame, but we don’t tend to bring these perspectives into our telling of the Gospel story, and this hinders our spiritual growth.
Thankfully, we can offer people a more three-dimensional gospel, one that has the power to redeem their day-to-day struggles with fear and shame, whether in our passport culture or a host culture. God knows the human heart and has offered a solution for all our problems in Jesus Christ.
This book made me fall in love with God all over again.
I remember resonating so deeply with Emily’s podcast episode, “How to Walk Out of a Room,” a couple years ago. The episode was mercifully devoid of details so that her principles could apply to all sorts of situations. When I heard she was writing a book based on that episode, I knew I would want to read it.
Emily is a spiritual director and has a master’s degree in spiritual formation, and she has a way of walking with people in discernment that is quiet and calm. She offers a “non-anxious presence,” as they say in spiritual direction circles. (Full disclosure: I’ve been meeting monthly with a spiritual director for about the past year, and it’s been a huge part of drawing my heart back into conversation with God after some dry, lonely years.)
I had a feeling this book would be important, and so I decided not to mark it up but to leave it empty and, in a way, sacred. Instead, I would rewrite meaningful sections in my journal. This helped slow me down and really savor Emily’s words. It helped me process the past, it helped me learn how to make better decisions, and it gave me peace in the decisions I was making. Then one day I looked around and realized I was making decisions much more easily than I had in the past, even small daily decisions, and I had to wonder if this book had something to do with it.
The thing I love about this book – and that sets it apart from other books purporting to help people recover from restrictive religious environments and explore a more expansive relationship with Christ – is that Emily gives tangible steps people can take to process the past and discern their present and their future. To walk with Emily is to learn together how to listen to God.
This is the book every woman needs to read before she gets married – or after, if things in the bedroom aren’t working, whether she got married a year ago or 30 years ago. Sheila co-wrote The Great Sex Rescue with two other authors, and it’s a great research-based book that helps people untangle their unhealthy and unbiblical beliefs about sex, but The Good Girl’s Guide really gets into practicalities.
I heard it recommended by a Bible college professor who teaches classes about sexuality, and I wanted to check it out myself. There was an earlier version of the book, but just this year it was revised and expanded, so I read the revised version. This is the book I will give to my daughters when they are engaged or newly married. I still recommend Aanna Greer’s Darling: A Woman’s Guide to Godly Sexuality for those who are quite innocent or naive about sex and their bodies, but Sheila’s book is a necessary follow-up.
Sheila, along with her pediatrician husband, also wrote The Good Guy’s Guide to Great Sex: Because Good Guys Make the Best Lovers. I haven’t read that one, but I’m assuming it’s good because that same Bible college professor recommended it and because it’s from an author I trust.
I hope these books will help you or someone you love.
The old conversation about women and work has been circulating again. People are quick to take sides. They’re for women working. They’re for women staying home. (Never mind the fact that this is a false binary, and that women who stay at home work, regardless of whether they work for pay.)
To me this conversation seemed like a lot of wasted cortisol and adrenaline. Why would I torture my body with extra stress hormones just to justify my life choices to strangers?
But it did make me think about the past 20 years of my mothering. For the first several years I stayed at home full-time and cared for our four children. I loved it. I always wanted to have a lot of kids. I didn’t always want to homeschool them, but I fell in love with that path too.
At the time I knew in my head how hard my husband was working to allow me to stay home and also pay the bills, but I don’t think I fully grasped his sacrifices. Only now, having learned what it’s like to earn income while trying to remain an engaged parent, can I more fully appreciate all that he did during those years. And I am impossibly grateful.
Because amid the exhaustion, I loved those years. I loved playing with my kids and reading aloud to them and being free to just traipse all over whichever city on whichever continent we lived for playdates and errands and homeschool activities.
I felt a unique sense of purpose in those years, contributing to society by contributing to my family in (obviously) non-monetary ways. Along the way, we created our own family culture. Sometimes I didn’t realize what an incredible gift that really was.
Fast forward to today, when I still stay at home and homeschool my younger children, but I also work from home part-time. Now I understand more fully the financial pressures facing my husband these last 20 years.
Working from home also makes me appreciate the years I had with my kids as my main focus. As fulfilling as my freelance work is, it can be hard to live with a divided psyche, to have my heart in more than one place.
And yet I am impossibly grateful. Grateful that I’ve been given work that is meaningful to both me and the people I serve. Grateful that I’m able to bring in extra income and help pay the bills while still mostly staying home. The economy is different now than when we left America in 2012. It’s even harder to live on one income now than it was then.
And so families sacrifice. ALL families sacrifice. Whether we’re sacrificing one spouse’s income so they can stay at home with the kids, or whether we’re sacrificing one spouse’s time to either leave the house for work or to work from home – whether part-time or full time – everything is a sacrifice. Families are working hard to take care of their kids and their bills, and the last thing any of us needs is to feel judged or to judge others for our choices.
So when I first read about the recent gender roles controversy, I wrote it off. I thought some of the claims people made were silly, but as I said at the beginning, I didn’t have the time or the cortisol to waste on a conversation that is so nuanced and complex and personal and which so many people reduce to maxims and memes.
The longer I heard and saw people talking about it, however, the sadder I got. There are a lot of women walking around without knowing their worth. Without knowing their belovedness. Without understanding their deep value to God apart from what they do.
When we know our belovedness, no one’s opinion of what women should or shouldn’t be doing with their lives can push us off kilter. We know who we are, we know who God made us to be, we know who loves us, and we know the ones we love. We don’t have anything to prove to anyone, because we are secure in Christ’s love.
I can say, “I am a child of God, and I know my Father loves me.” And I can say to you, “You are a child of God, and your Father loves you – whether you stay home with your children or whether you work from home or whether you work out of the home or do any of it for pay.”
This is what I wish we all knew, truly knew, deep in the viscera of our bodies and the basement of our souls:
The woman who stays at home? Loved. The woman who works from home? Loved. The woman who works nights so she can be with her kids during the day? Loved. The woman who works days because it’s the only way to make ends meet? Loved. The woman who stays home when her kids are little and then goes back to work? Loved. The woman who works because she genuinely enjoys her job? Loved.
You are the beloved of God, and no one can take that away from you. You are hidden in Christ with God, and your real self is found in Him, not in the approval or disapproval of other men and women. You are a child of God, and that is the most important thing about you.
The God who adopted you as Daughter will lead you in ways that are personal and particular to you. Your life may look different from mine, but we are all the beloved of God. He is ours, and we are His.
May we cherish each other in the same way the God of the universe cherishes us. May we honor each other’s choices, just as we honor the same God who leads us in different directions. And may we remember that our value comes from Him, not the particular ways we serve our families and communities. For we are the beloved of God, and no power on earth can convince us otherwise.
It’s been about a year since I published one of these roundups, so buckle up! There’s a lot to talk about. From the best missions books to the Duggar documentary to menopause, married sex, and toxic masculinity, it’s all in here. ~Elizabeth
BOOKS
Magic for Marigold by Lucy Maud Montgomery. I’ve loved Lucy Maud since I was in sixth grade reading Jane of Lantern Hill on a porch swing with V-8 in hand. I even dressed up as Montgomery for a middle school language arts assignment. But I’d never heard of Magic for Marigold until last year. It was absolutely delightful (and cheap on Kindle!). When I got to the last page, I was ready to begin all over again.
And I think I’ve mentioned this before, but I like to read Montgomery’s The Blue Castle about once a year. It’s also cheap on Kindle and well worth the read if you’ve never experienced it. (I love to read from my Kindle before bed; it doesn’t have the bright blue lights to keep me awake, and I don’t have to worry about a book falling on my face or about flipping the book from side to side as I read.)
Mere Motherhood by Cindy Rollins. This was perhaps my fourth time through the book and my first as a parent of adult children. Somehow Cindy speaks to the moms of littles, middles, and bigs all at the same time. Each successive reading has been better than the previous. I wrote more about Mere Motherhood here, so be sure to check that out if you’re interested in Cindy or her book(s).
Facing Fear:The Journey to Mature Courage in Risk and Persecution by Anna Hampton. I loved Anna’s work on both witness risk and dysfunctional family systems so much that when I found out she was writing a new book, I practically begged her for the opportunity to read an advance copy and endorse it. This book specifically focuses on facing the fear that comes with living in “witness danger,” but the Biblical teachings in Anna’s book will help and encourage any believer who deals with fear, even one who doesn’t live in danger or risk. Here’s my official endorsement of the book:
“Facing Fear is a book for all believers. Author Anna Hampton dives deeply into the Hebrew and Greek words for fear and courage, explores the neuroscience of fear and attachment and their implications for our relationship with God, and shows us a better way to respond to the grief and suffering of others through her compassionate treatment of the wife of Job. For those living in dangerous situations, she also offers a roadmap for assessing risk and discerning the next right step. Facing Fear offers comfort, courage, and a way forward even in the darkest of circumstances.”
The Missionary Mama’s Survival Guide: Compassionate Help for the Mothers of Cross-Cultural Workers by Tori R. Haverkamp. Tori was my first book coaching client to reach publication. And while I’m super excited for her and so proud of the book she has produced, her message also moved me on a deep heart level. Tori helped me understand how hard it was for my own mom to be separated from family (those grandkids!) for so long. Reading Tori’s book also inspired me to host more pieces from parents of missionaries at A Life Overseas; this has historically been a missing part of the missions conversation.
You can read an excerpt from my favorite chapter at A Life Overseas. Even though I’m only launching my kids to college and not the mission field, I still relate to what Tori writes in that excerpt. And I love that she’s not afraid to talk about menopause or midlife (more on menopause later!).
She Deserves Better: Raising Girls to Resist Toxic Teachings on Sex, Self, and Speaking Up by Sheila Wray Gregoire, Rebecca Gregoire Lindenbach, and Joanna Sawatsky. I don’t know how they did it, but the authors of The Great Sex Rescue have managed to create another gem for the modern church. Each page is packed with Biblical and thought-provoking commentary, along with data analysis (which the scientist in me loves). If you grew up in the church and sometimes wonder about purity teachings that, though well-intentioned, placed a disproportionately heavy burden on the backs of girls only, while giving boys a pass, you’ll be interested in this book – especially if you have daughters yourself.
Gregoire, Lindenbach, and Sawatsky produce theBare Marriage podcast, which unpacks a lot of the ideas in both The Great Sex Rescue and She Deserves Better. Importantly, they discuss the fact that evangelical women have much higher rates of pain with sex. This can be traced back to the obligation sex message, the idea that women “owe” their husbands sex whenever they want it. But in the Bible, in both the Old and New Testaments, sex in marriage is painted as something that is mutually pleasurable. So if we’ve got pleasure for the husband and pain for the wife – or even pleasure for the husband but no pleasure for the wife – that is not how God designed sex in marriage to work. If this is your situation, please know there is help available. You can see a counselor, a physician, and/or find resources for female pleasure on Gregoire’s site.
REFLECTION & CONTEMPLATION
Aviva Romm (a midwife, herbalist, M.D., and expert on all things healthy living) on perfectionism.
This article (if you can access it) reflects even more deeply on masculinity in society. I found the discussion to be nuanced and well-researched. There are a number of reasons masculinity is in crisis in our society, and we need solutions and role models other than the voices pushing toxic, abusive forms of masculinity.
Shiny Happy People, a documentary about IBLP and ATI, the homeschool group my husband Jonathan grew up in. We found it to be both highly accurate to the experience and empowering to survivors. WARNING: the subject matter begins dark and only gets darker throughout the episodes. So if you’re not in the mental space to watch it, please feel free to give it a pass.
If you are in a place to view the documentary, the Aftershow is also worth watching. There’s good news here: you don’t have to reject Jesus or even the church because of the false teachings in IBLP-adjacent groups. Gothard and other teachers twisted Scripture to control people, and it distorted many people’s view of God. But there’s hope – we can find God outside fundamentalism. Alex Harris was particularly well-spoken in the follow-up interview (yes, THAT Alex Harris – co-author of Do Hard Things and brother to I Kissed Dating Goodbye’s Joshua Harris). So if you watch nothing else, skip to the second segment at 23:15 and watch only the parts where Alex talks.
FULL DISCLOSURE: There was a time a few years ago when I wanted to reject everything I had ever believed. I wanted to be an atheist and was about to give up on God. Not believing in God seemed like a less painful option than believing in the God some people around me were preaching. I had to do some hard soul searching and some hard seeking after God, and eventually I found Him again.
What I know now is that I wasn’t chafing against Christ himself, but against Christian nationalism and other forms of cultural Christianity, such as those depicted in Shiny Happy People. It took me so long to untangle man-made religion from the God of the Bible.
I wanted to say this here in case any of my readers are in a dark place right now. It’s ok to be where you are. It’s ok if you find yourself rejecting human religion and desperately searching for something more. It’s ok to respond out of pain. It’s ok to not understand everything. It’s ok to take time in the valley — there’s no need to rush. What I want you to know is that God is still with you and that it’s possible to find God again.
HEALTH & LIFESTYLE
Ballet class. I’m still attending ballet class and finding it to be a good workout. Like any good workout, it is both challenging and relaxing. The teacher added a tap class this summer, so I’m getting back to my roots. (I took both ballet and tap as a child, but I wasn’t very good.) These days I’m working hard on my technique and enjoying the process.
DISCLAIMER: I am not a doctor or medical practitioner. I am just a woman living in a 40-something body who still wants to be happily married to a man in a 40-something body. The things I’m writing about below are things that have helped me, but do your own research and talk to your own doctor.
At first I wasn’t sure if I wanted to talk about this, but I’ve talked about everything else in life, and neither Jonathan nor I have shied away from talking about sexuality, so here goes: Hormone therapy has been life changing for me.
I never thought I would say that. I never thought I would use hormones. I was into natural living, and besides, everyone knows hormones are dangerous. The Women’s Health Initiative proved that in 2002, right?
But the more I looked into solutions for perimenopausal and menopausal symptoms, the more I became convinced that not only is hormone therapy safe, but it also reduces the risk for heart disease, osteoporosis, and dementia (diseases that increase after a woman enters menopause). And of course, hormone supplementation reduces the bothersome symptoms of perimenopause and menopause.
I wanted to manage my symptoms as naturally as possible for as long as possible, but my symptoms started getting worse this year, and I was determined not to walk out of my midwife’s office without a prescription. Thankfully we had discussed options in the past, so when I told her things were getting worse, she whipped out that prescription pad immediately.
My symptoms improved almost overnight. Hormones are like magic.
I don’t share all of this TMI just for the sake of oversharing. I want this information to help someone. So first of all, if you’re in your late 30s or early 40s, you might be experiencing symptoms of perimenopause. That’s because your hormones can start shifting up to 10 years before your periods actually stop.
So what does perimenopause look like? It might look like worsening anxiety or PMS. It might look like heavier or more painful periods. It might look like sleeping problems or brain fog or increased irritability. It might look like frequent urinary tract infections or pain during sex. It might look like hot flashes or a sudden gain in weight, especially around the middle. Your mind and your body just aren’t working the way they used to, and these hormone changes might be affecting your relationships.
But we don’t just have to suffer through the symptoms, even in perimenopause. There are a number of safe, effective, inexpensive, FDA-approved formulations of body identical (bioidentical) hormones, so if your symptoms are feeling more and more unmanageable, please talk to your doctor, midwife, or nurse practitioner about your options.
Importantly, be aware that there are local estrogen therapies to treat the genitourinary symptoms of menopause (whether that’s dryness or pain with sex or recurrent urinary tract infections), and these medications are not absorbed systemically. For more information on local estrogen therapy (usually in the form of a cream, tablet, or ring), see: Dr. Kelly Casperson or Dr. Rachel Rubin (both urologists). A woman’s quality of life matters. Her sex life matters too. Hormones help with both.
I still do a lot of lifestyle interventions to stay as healthy as possible, especially when it comes to diet and exercise – because there are certain changes with menopause that hormones can’t fix, such as loss of muscle and increased insulin resistance. The following authors have helped me on my journey:
1. Lift heavier than before. It’s harder to build and maintain muscle in midlife and beyond, but we need muscle to keep our strength and our balance and to manage our metabolism and blood sugar. This motivated me to buy a heavier set of dumbbells.
2. Eat more protein. We need more dietary protein as we get older because our bodies aren’t as good at building and repairing muscle. Protein also helps us modulate our blood sugar. This motivated me to increase my protein intake.
3. Do more interval training (especially high intensity interval training, or HIIT). Interval training is kind of hard, and I don’t always like it, but I gave it another try and found that I actually do like the way it makes me feel.
4. Stretching, mobility, and balance are more important than before. Honestly I’ve always skipped stretching and core work because they were SO boring. I’m trying to adjust.
The Galveston Diet by Dr. Mary Claire Haver (also check out her YouTube channel, which has a wealth of information). One of the main things I’m learning from Dr. Haver is the importance of intermittent fasting. As women get older, the hormone shifts of perimenopause and menopause cause us to be at higher risk for insulin resistance, metabolic syndrome, and diabetes. Intermittent fasting, or time-based eating, is one way to reduce our insulin resistance. Humans are designed to eat during the daytime and not eat at night, but modern life with its electricity and constant streaming capabilities has interfered with this pattern. Intermittent fasting honors it. Intermittent fasting doesn’t have to be extreme – Dr. Haver doesn’t recommend going over 16 hours of fasting. Just go at least 12 hours without eating at night: it’s the way humans used to live.
Like Stacy Sims, Dr. Haver also recommends increasing our protein intake in perimenopause and menopause. Actually, she recommends tracking all macro and micronutrients. I refuse to do this. It would be stressful and would take over my life. So I loosely aim for more protein in my morning and noon meals but stick to a plant-based meal for dinner, because I find I feel better and sleep better that way. And all the menopause experts say you need to get better sleep.
Cold brew coffee. I loved cream in my coffee and couldn’t imagine drinking it black. But one of the ways to go 12+ hours without eating is to drink your morning coffee black. I tried Dr. Haver’s tip of adding a pinch of salt to cut the bitterness, but it didn’t impress me much. The black coffee hurt my stomach, and my taste buds still cried out for cream. Then I tried cold brew. It’s so much smoother and richer than hot brew, and it never gives me a stomachache. I think this has something to do with the reduced acidity (though minor) in cold brew as compared to hot brew. It also tastes a lot better!
[I know, I know, we’re not supposed to consume caffeine at all, and a few years ago I had managed to wean myself off all caffeine. But these days I find I still need a little bit of kick in the morning, so I use a mixture of half caf and decaf in my morning coffee.]
MUSIC & SPIRITUALITY
The song “Wandering Day” from the Rings of Power series. Granted, the show wasn’t the perfection of Peter Jackson in the original Lord of the Rings, but it was good for what it was (something completely made up), and this song was breathtaking.
Chording. This year I’m trying to teach myself chording so I can play modern worship songs (and songs like “Wandering Day”) with lead sheets. I only took a year of piano lessons as a child, so my skill level is very low, but I’m still learning and enjoying as I go. Every few years I try to get back to piano, but this is the first time I’ve tried to learn chording.
Searching for song. I’m happiest when I’m singing. Some of you might remember my first email address, isingbunches@yahoo.com. What you might not know is that I fell in love with singing when I was 10, the summer I went to church camp for the first time. I’ve been told that on the three-hour trip home, I was either singing or sleeping. If I was awake, I was singing.
And I’ve been singing ever since. Some of you may remember me as the girl in youth group who was always saying, “Let’s sing!” And since we were in a cappella churches, we really could just sing anytime, anywhere. All we needed were our voices and our memories. (Excuse me a moment while I reminisce.)
All of this to say, I have to do whatever I can to get enough singing in my life. One of those things is playing the piano and singing at home, and another one of those things has been attending worship nights at local churches wherever I live. There were a couple international churches in Phnom Penh that hosted regular Saturday worship nights, and I tried to attend whenever I could. It was always such a rich experience with God.
Here in Joplin there’s a local church that hosts a worship night once a month. It reminds me of worship at our international church in Cambodia, the way the leader creates so much time and space to commune with God. I cried the first time I went to one of these monthly worship times. It felt so much like being in Cambodia. I can’t make it every month, but it’s been such a comfort to have the option of more worship through song.
Lent series on the saints and their different expressions of Christian spirituality. When I attended Ash Wednesday service in February, I saw an announcement for a teaching series on the saints and their various forms of spirituality. I was intrigued; I didn’t know anything about the saints or their spirituality.
I’m so glad I went each week during Lent. I would walk in, and the tension in my shoulders would start to unwind. I could breathe more easily. Father Ted just had a way of ushering us into a deeper connection with ourselves and with the Lord. I’m know I’m drawn to contemplative Christianity and am currently trying to figure out how to get more of it in my life. I’m considering finding a spiritual director; I think I would benefit from the guided prayer times. But whatever I decide to do in the future, I’m glad I spent this spring learning about the saints and their faith.
This week I’m at Velvet Ashes. The title kind of says it all, I guess. It’s a brand new story I’ve never told. But if you’ve been following my journey the past few years, I think this post will weave together a lot of the strands of things I *have* written about: anxiety, depression, dance, PMS, being underweight, etc.
As scary as it is to talk about, Jonathan and I decided together that it was time to start being more open about this difficult season in our life and to maybe, just maybe, be able to offer hope to others in dark seasons of their own.
I don’t know where you are today, but wherever that is, I hope that you will be as gentle with your own story as you are with mine. And if healing is what you need today, what I want you to know is that God wants to walk with you into healing, whatever that journey might look like for you.
Actually, this is a post about the best Christian book on sex that I’ve ever read. Christian marriage books often bother me. (I talked about one of them here.) Sometimes they give bad relationship advice in general, and sometimes they give bad sex advice in particular. Many times they offer a poor theology of marriage. On the other hand, secular books often give good relationship advice or offer scientifically valid sexual information, but their values don’t always align with mine.
This book is different. It’s called The Great Sex Rescue: The Lies You’ve Been Taught and How to Recover What God Intended, and it was written by Sheila Wray Gregoire, Rebecca Gregoire Lindenbach, and Joanna Sawatsky. It’s based on research and takes women’s sexual issues seriously. The authors also take the Bible seriously. So they’re able to explain, with data and with Scripture, all the things that tend to bother me about Christian marriage books. And they’re able to offer a better way.
So if you’ve ever been frustrated by the state of the Church’s teaching on sex (especially for women), this book will speak to you. If you’ve ever wondered if sex is supposed to be more than just a way to keep your husband from sinning, this book will speak to you. If you’ve ever searched for practical answers to your difficult sexual issues, this book will speak to you.
Sex is not supposed to be good only for husbands; it’s supposed to be good for wives too. I could say much more, but the book says everything far better than I ever could — and far better than I’ve ever seen anywhere else. Read the book if you want to know what I’m talking about, and then spread the good news about sex — share it with your friends and pastors.
***I’ve been working on telling the story of how we found our house, but it’s just not coming together yet. So until that story is ready to tell, I’ll be dropping other content into your inboxes.
Jonathan & Elizabeth Trotter 