O Holy night! The stars are brightly shining What if my stars seem so dim and far away Lord? When others seem to rest constantly in Your light and love?  It is the night of our dear Savior's birth Birth. The dreaded word. On a holiday that can wound more than heal for me and for so many others. The little stockings never hung on the wall. The excited pitter patter never reaching my ears.  Long lay the world in sin and error pining What was my sin? Our sin? What do I have to d

When the Fruitful Hollow team was planning for this Advent season, one word kept coming to mind: “awaiting”. Merriam-Webster has a captivating definition listed: “to remain in abeyance until”. Abeyance: “a state of temporary inactivity: suspension ”. Each week in Advent we will dive deep into the abeyance. Perhaps many of us are intimately familiar with waiting. I’d like you to embrace the suspension in the upcoming weeks and experience the joy that Christmas brings when the

A different approach to gratitude We’ve all heard the well-meaning advice to focus on what we have rather than what we don’t have - “comparison is the enemy of contentment” or “comparison is the thief of joy”. But doing the often recommended “write down one thing you're thankful for a day” can feel pretty empty when you’re longing for a child, and instead are supposed to relish in your journal entry of “I’m thankful for the takeout we had for dinner”. It can feel like a rathe