rebelling against low expectations
I’m seventeen. I’ve never been married. Never even courted or dated or any other such marriage-centered things. But today I want to write to you about marriage. A lot of us have grown up in the church with loving parents and youth pastors who have given us many valuable resources and talks about relationships and marriage. How to do them well, what to avoid, where the line is that you absolutely...
We would be wise to heed the words of John in 2018: “Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love for the Father is not in them. For everything in the world – the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life – comes not from the Father but from the world” (1 John 2:15-16, KJV). Truth be told, I had little, if any, love for the world in 2017...
“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.” Matt 5 43-44 ESV If you have lived around Christians for any time, you have probably heard, “Love your enemies.” But how do we do that? Do I just think about loving them really hard? Should I send my enemies valentine...
Whew! We’ve made it! It’s the beginning of a fresh and exciting NEW YEAR! If you’re like me, January feels like a beautifully clean slate God graciously gives us every year. Imagine if we were stuck in one drawn-out never-ending mistake-riddled year? Ugh. Just the thought of it is dampening my new year vibe. Praise God! We’ve been given a chance to reboot and start afresh...
I was a nice, settled homeschooled girl. I was safe in my little bubble of Christian, homeschooled teens. I was given a book called Do Hard Things. It ruined my life. I started volunteering at a ministry for women afflicted by human trafficking, drugs and abuse. It was difficult, painful and stressful. I thought that once I broke the proverbial sound barrier, it would be easy. That after the...
What are we doing here? We’re all in high school. But what does that mean for us? There’s nothing we can do for God – there’s nothing we can do to spread the love of Christ, we don’t have to worry about our relationship with God right now. Wrong. There’s a rumor going around, it’s hit every church and every school and every youth group, young and old. The...
Christmas: The time of year when we release our inner child. The vibrantly wrapped presents under the tree, the crooning music, and the sparkling lights on every corner tug our hearts back to a time of foggy memories and free spirits. We can be excited. We can be spontaneous. We can be little kids. And then the colorful paper is torn off and shoved in the trash, the music fades away, and the...
The moment I first got connected with Brett Harris and The Rebelution will forever be imprinted in my mind. I was seventeen and sitting in my friends’ living room in the middle of Chiang Mai, Thailand when I randomly remembered I had a Twitter account. “Ha, I should see what’s happening on Twitter,” I thought to myself. Despite my lack of Twitter intelligence at the time, I somehow managed to...
I was 11 the first time I heard about Brett and Alex Harris. I was introduced to these brothers like so many of you were — through a red book called Do Hard Things: A Teenage Rebellion Against Low Expectations. This book lit a white-hot fire within me that burned throughout my teen years. They empowered me: I wouldn’t let culture hijack my youth; I wanted to do hard things for the glory of God...
What are your goals for 2018? With the new year just begun—and a new semester starting soon—most of us have some sort of goal in mind. Maybe you plan to read a certain number of books. Maybe you want to start running, biking, or working out. Maybe you’re just looking forward to starting school again refreshed and rested. But what are your goals in relation to God’s word? As Christian teens, our...
rebelling against low expectations
