Love has many facets. It can be fun, passionate, enduring, broken, healed, playful, reverent, bold, intimate, verbose and silent. It has highs and lows and plateaus. It can have different chapters, like a book, and it can deepen and mellow with age, like a fine wine. It can be like a multi-faceted diamond. This presents […]
Author: Steph Penny
A Stranger on Earth
Living on earth can take a toll on us. Pandemics. Natural disasters. Poverty. The exhaustion of politics, corruption and social causes. This life can be painful. And some days it can feel like the pain will never end. As a person living with chronic illness, the pain is literally never-ending. Don’t get me wrong. Some […]
Ducklings in Winter
‘I saw ducklings today,’ said my husband. I paused, mid-movement. ‘That’s nice’ was my astute response. The cogs in my brain slowly began to turn. ‘Wait… ducklings? We’re in the middle of winter!’ ‘That’s what I thought!’ replied my husband. Yes, ducklings are usually a feature of springtime. They come out with the other baby […]
Single vs Pre-Married
I walked into church and was greeted by an usher. ‘Hiya Steph,’ he said cheerfully, ‘How’s your love life?’ Oh no. You did not just ask me that. My sarcastic inner voice nearly replied out loud. ‘It’s great. Who are you, by the way?’ This man barely knew me. We were not close, yet he […]
Fragrance
‘One thing I have asked of the Lord, And that I will seek: That I may dwell in the house of the Lord [in his presence] All the days of my life, To gaze upon the beauty [the delightful loveliness and majestic grandeur] of the Lord And to meditate in his temple.’ (Psalm 27:4 Amplified) […]
Linger
When I was a kid, I loved going on sleepovers. It was about the whispered sharing of secrets and stories by torchlight while snuggled in sleeping bags. It was about gorging ourselves on junk food. It was about movie marathons and video game tournaments. It was definitely about not having any grown-ups around. But it […]
Unrestrained
I used to be self-conscious about worshipping God in public. As a teenager, I would look around church on a Sunday morning, watching other worshippers engaging rapturously in songs of praise. They would sing, eyes closed, some with arms lifted, expressing their adoration for Jesus. Some of the less self-conscious ones would dance on the […]
The Worship Suite
Ever since I can remember, I have loved singing to God. When I was a child, I would put on kids’ praise and worship cassette tapes (yes, I am betraying my age here) and sing my lungs out. I know that I sang my lungs out because my parents would tell me. In no uncertain […]
Creative Compost
I wrote a blog earlier today. And it stank. It stank like a bucket of prawns in the sun. It stank like a drain. It stank so much it took my mind off the stinky cat litter in the next room. It stank like a compost heap. Why am I writing about a stinky blog? […]
I Wanted A Family
Some of us wanted to have a family. We wanted a partner, children, grandchildren. We wanted to live a life surrounded by our loved ones. It is painful to live without the longed-for family. For single people, longing to find a partner, to love and to be loved by just one person, it can be […]