JESSE IHDE

In August of this past year, we closed on a home in Richardson, Texas just a few miles from where we live now.  Over the past handful of months, we have drawn plans for our new home and cut through the red tape required to make a project like this happen.  To celebrate the next step – tearing down the existing house – we brought our kids and our friends together for a morning of graffiti art. Watching the kids cover that old house with graffiti, I felt deep contemplation about the house I am leaving behind –  a home …

Take a breath.  Just stop with all the rushing around and slow down. Stop stressing.  You have nothing to stress about right now.  Life is care free. I know you don’t have that much money and you’re worried about your job and getting into a new house before you have kids and how come your in-laws haven’t fallen in love with you yet and all that.  But really, you have nothing to worry about right now so cut that shit out.  It’s exhausting. On Saturday morning, sleep in.  Stay in your jammies.  Drink coffee and read the paper until noon …

Years are hard and long and fast.  In 2013, I started a blog, watched Josh re-invent himself again, Ashley and I hired our team at Minerva, Stella learned to read, I kept seeing the therapist, we bought a house to knock down, Eli learned to go on the potty, our first non-blood family member, Hannah, moved in, my house was mostly messy, I still didn’t get enough sleep, I quit working out, and another woman broke up with me. I asked our staff and a few friends if they had new years resolutions.  A few were going to start running …

I find our spiritual reality and our relationship with God to be a bit of a conundrum when it comes right down to it.  Nothing is clear to me but the presence of God in my life.  Church has been difficult since college and I don’t find refuge there.  I find truth and I have a chance to worship which for me is an important opportunity in my relationship with God and his body.  But it does not feel like home. Home feels safe and loving.  Home feels authentic and not all dressed up or using the right words all …