Language shapes the ways in which we experience the world — including how we encounter God and navigate faith. Or at least, this has been my experience. A few years ago, my school dream of someday visiting Paris became a reality. Preparing for that dream (mostly reading travel blogs, listening to French podcasts and completing language exercises on DuoLingo) stirred a sense of urgency to know that God was at work in France.

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The Bible makes it clear that all of life is spiritual. The ancients knew this and lived accordingly, and it wasn’t until the Enlightenment that people decided that they should segregate their lives. People decided that religion might be important, but it belonged in one bin of their lives. I’ve long thought that putting religion or faith into a compartment means we really don’t believe it. If we look at religion as something we do on Sunday morning, sometimes a weeknight and maybe even an occasional retreat, we really don’t believe it.

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“Everything Is Spiritual” describes how Heaven relates to Earth. In the Bible, Heaven and Earth are separate, but they overlap with each other in surprising ways. Heaven is God’s place, sure, but it’s never as far away as people think. Jacob dreams of Heaven at the top of a ladder. Isaiah is brought there in a vision. A voice calls from Heaven at Jesus’ baptism. John of Patmos watches it descend to Jerusalem at the end of ages. For centuries, Christians have read these things and understood that Heaven is active, interested, and near.

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Knowing Jesus loves me has never been an issue for me. Knowing he likes me, well, that’s a whole different story. For a long time, I looked at God’s love for me like the relative you love, but don’t particularly like (We all have them!). I love them because they are family; I never want anything bad to happen to them, but they aren’t on my Christmas gift list. Sure, if they are in a real fix, you help them out, but never above and beyond like for those you have real affection for.

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History is filled with tales of amazing journeys — like those of the runaway slaves on the Underground Railroad.

These stories are taught in American classrooms as examples of exceptional courage by a few brave souls who had perilous adventures 200 years ago. But there are universal and timeless lessons that can resonate with all of us on a deeper level. After all, the fugitive slave’s journey to freedom is ultimately a story about the heart. And whether you are a young girl slaving in the fields of Mississippi in 1818 or a mid-level corporate manager in 2018, any journey of the heart is courageous.

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"Shut up," I said aloud after I started the video. "Yanny, Yanny, Yanny," repeated the nasal voiced man as I thought, "There is no way in hell anyone could hear 'Laurel' in this." If you have no idea what I'm talking about, I'll explain. A viral Twitter post provides an audio clip of a man speaking, and like the Great Dress Debate of 2015, the internet can't decide what he's actually saying. Around half of the people think he's saying "Yanny," while the other half think it's "Laurel."

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What does it mean to be a respecter of the journey? Our own? Of our loved ones? Of the other? I think these are hard questions. I think for most of us who are trying to live this value, the tendency can be to take a quid pro quo approach: as long as you are just as respectful of my journey as I am of yours, then we are good. But if you “ break” that contract first (i.e. disrespect me), then all bets are off. I now have free rein to disrespect your intolerant and disrespectful faith/journey as much as I want to.

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Throughout my college career, I learned countless lessons; how to make my lengthy prose fit into the page requirement (change the margins), how to survive on the least amount of sleep (a love affair with coffee), how to do everything (and at the same time, never do or be enough). The stakes were high, stress was high and I wanted control of my changing world more than anything. I found myself thinking, “if I could just (fill in the blank),” I would be happier and then I wouldn’t have to worry anymore. This is where I met my enemy.

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As a History teacher and a 9 on the Enneagram, I attempt to see through my own biases. I usually try to see both sides to an argument and therefore may be especially adept at loving my enemies. What does this love look like in practice? It starts with seeking to understand the motives of your enemies' actions. Usually, I have a stance, and it almost always differs from that of my enemies. However, I don't know if love means agreeing with their thoughts or actions.

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I’m not a fan of guns. I guess they just aren’t my thing. Growing up, I played with pellet guns in my backyard using soda cans as target practice. My only memory of using a “real” gun was when I was a freshman or sophomore in high school. My uncle and cousin took me out to a field and let me shoot one of their handguns (Glock 9mm, I believe) at a book of upholstery samples, believe it or not. I can’t deny that was loads of fun for thirteen-year-old me. But with that being one of my few experiences with guns, they certainly never became important to my life. On the contrary, since they cause so much destruction in our society, I’d prefer to steer clear of them all together.

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I love sharing things I create with others, and I expect them to be good stewards by caring for and enjoying my creation to the fullest. I want to believe that God had the same intention when He shaped what we know as creation, and that He feels our love for Him when we enjoy His creation to the full extent.

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Like many fellow Imagoans (Imagonites? Dei-ists? someone please tell me!), I grew up in a fairly traditional church background. They taught (among other things), a literal Six-Day Creation, complete with flannel-graphs, finger puppets, and pastel-colored paintings. Creation really spoke to me, and I was fortunate growing up that our family took trips to national parks did a lot of hiking. It was pretty awesome as a kid to imagine mountains and valleys and rivers and waterfalls being spoken into existence in literal days.

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A few years back, I was brought to my knees by a rather unfortunate series of events. It wasn’t the first time life had broken my heart. I was sure it wouldn’t be the last. And I was tired. I was so tired and so disappointed, and even with all of the good life had brought to me, the bad continued to be exhausting and heartbreaking. I didn’t really see the point. To keep going seemed like a waste of time.

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To write about love of Creation could easily be an ode to the beauty all around each of us, all the time, in millions of ways. For me, that beauty calls to me to come in. An invitation. Know me. Remember me. We’re long-time friends. Soul mates. Feel those invisible threads tugging? We are not separate.

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Early in my spiritual journey, I encountered the idea that we can experience God through our relationships. As Victor Hugo so powerfully wrote in my favorite novel, Les Miserables, “To love another person is to see the face of God.” I still hold tightly to that idea — but in the last year, my belief in this idea has expanded. I’ve discovered that receiving love from another person is also a way to experience God actively at work in our lives. I personally experienced God’s love through the ways that others poured love, care and help into my life.

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