Join the quest and Accept The Love Challenge!
![The Advent of a Savior [Hope, Peace, Joy, and Love]](https://rachelwrains.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/12/D062F4C2-CBA0-4C02-B42A-374DBE58E9F4-scaled.jpeg)
The advent of a Savior was the ultimate gift on that very first Christmas morning. “The celebration of Advent is possible only to those who are troubled in soul. Those who know themselves to be poor and imperfect, and who look forward to something greater to come.”* Hope in the Advent “Hope has a name….
![How to Love Others [with the Heart of The Creator]](https://rachelwrains.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/435B6A2E-A5CF-43E1-A90D-C4A704094B14.png)
How to Love Others with God’s Heart My good friend, Michele, and I are reading/studying Bonhoeffer’s book, Life Together. And both of us agree this book will forever change our lives [and the way we greet and, subsequently, love our brothers and sisters in Christ]. Truth be told, we could walk away from reading the…
![Living A Life of Love… [the Believer’s Calling]](https://rachelwrains.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/6D2928BE-8440-4758-B829-B24B1683970D.png)
A Fallen, Wounding World God didn’t call us to a life of wounding, friends. He called us to live a life of LOVE. But because of our human-ness, we’re born into a world inherently wounding. And sadly, as creatures of a fallen, imperfect world, we inflict our own wounding behaviors on those around us. “With…
![The Best Christmas Pageant Ever… [a holiday movie review]](https://rachelwrains.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/30C39796-049F-4F25-A03F-EA5BDC534981-scaled.jpeg)
I had no idea what to expect when I walked into an early screening of The Best Christmas Pageant Ever🌟 last Saturday. Since I hadn’t read the book or seen the stage production, I guess I expected something of a Junie B. Jones, elementary reader nature. But instead, I encountered a wondrous story of God’s…
![10 Years Ago…. [Looking Back and Pressing Onward]](https://rachelwrains.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/01D74DE5-F8AB-433A-B8A4-C030317343A1.jpeg)
10 years ago this summer, two incredible things happened… A New Calling… “See I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up, do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland.” – Isaiah 43:19 10 years ago this summer, at the height of the Ice Bucket…
![How to Not Be a Stumbling Block for Others [and love like Jesus]](https://rachelwrains.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/9886033D-594A-47C8-9248-9C99A78006F5.jpeg)
Doing What I Do Not Want to Do “For I do not understand what I am doing, because I do not keep doing what I want. Instead, I do what I hate.” – Romans 7:15 Do you ever wish you hadn’t done or said something unkind? Or maybe you simply withheld a kindness when given…
![How to Love the World… [one challenging circumstance at a time]](https://rachelwrains.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/01/0793C85F-A059-44BE-8D72-81D06F7E9EB2.png)
When I issued the very first LOVE challenge to myself and asked others to join, what I really desired in this world more than anything was to be one of those “rare Christians” Tozer talked about. A Christ-follower whose very presence compelled others to become “better Christians” themselves. Apart from God, none of us are…
![How to Have Joy [and Be Joyful] in a Not-So-Perfect World.](https://rachelwrains.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/05A5D243-B06B-4D77-A18E-69ECE0C54FC3.jpeg)
Joyful people see with open eyes the hard reality of human existence and at the same time are not imprisoned by it.” – Henri Nouwen Radiating hope ✨ and Shining God’s love in a weary, not-so-perfect world is what the manger message is all about, friends. God’s love for us does not change like the…
To Correct or Not to Correct? Have you ever made a snap judgement about someone or something? Sadly, I often make snap judgements. But recently, I found myself the recipient of someone else’s snap judgement. And it took all the Jesus-lovin’ strength I could muster, friends, not to email this person and set them straight….