Daly Focus Blog
Author Rhonda Stoppe felt prepared to be a great mom when her daughter was born. But, a few years later when she had a son, her confidence dissipated. Raising a girl felt easy. Raising a boy felt intimidating.
Many moms can relate. They understand how their daughters think, feel, and see the world. Not so their sons. My wife, Jean, did an amazing job of adapting to our two boys and creating meaningful connections with both, but she worked hard at it.
Many people keep on the lookout for big opportunities that will change their lives. But often it’s the small, seemingly insignificant moments that have the greatest impact.
Author Cecil Murphy tells how a broken heel unexpectedly led to a new life for a woman named Betty. Going about her business one day, she broke the heel of her shoe as she stepped into the street. When she sat on the curb to nurse her ankle, she noticed a shoe store for the first time, even though she must have walked by it dozens of times.
Are you ready to take on the ultimate holiday movie challenge? It’s easy and, best of all, it will bring you together as a family. Here it is. Between now and Christmas, sit down together as a family and watch as many Christmas movies as you can.
I don’t usually recommend families spend more time in front of a screen, but I’ll happily make an exception in this case. The Christmas season is a wonderful time of year for families to reconnect.
The tingles can get you married. They can also get you divorced.
Dr. Gary Chapman has heard a lot of couples in premarital counseling talk about “the tingles” – that emotional flutter we feel when we’re attracted to each other.
“The tingles” play an important role in forming romantic relationships. They turn a simple hello into a lunch date, and before long the couple is so inseparable they decide to get married.
But the tingles fade.
On our Focus on the Family Broadcast “Laying Your Life on the Line for Christ,” I’m speaking with Virginia Prodan, who grew up behind the Iron Curtain in Romania, terrorized by dictator Nicolae Ceausescu. Although he promised U.S. authorities that he would respect human and religious rights in order to gain most-favored-nation status and be awarded hundreds of millions of dollars in trade, Ceausescu’s regime confiscated Bibles, demolished churches, and persecuted Christians.
Virginia’s family members had their bank accounts seized by the government and their homes raided by armed communist sympathizers.
When Dr. Tony Evans served as a chaplain for the National Football League, he got the opportunity to speak to players on the eve of the Super Bowl. What he remembers most about that moment was the intense focus he saw in their eyes. Each player was locked in on the task at hand: winning a championship. They weren’t satisfied with a great season or a winning playoff run. They wanted a Lombardi Trophy.
What’s your Lombardi Trophy?
Many moms feel overwhelmed by the shopping, cooking, and high expectations of the holiday season.
But making memories doesn’t have to be difficult or expensive. One of author Jessica Smartt’s best memories is taking her first communion class. She doesn’t remember a lot of theology, but she does remember her mother taking her through a McDonald’s drive-thru to get a cheeseburger afterward. Just the two of them together, eating in the family pickup truck.
This time of year, it’s good to remember that a good reason for traditions is to connect with your children, to let them know that their family supports them, and to bond them deeply to their Christian faith.
It’s been over 400 years since the first Thanksgiving – and yet the more times change, the more they remain the same.
Thanksgiving 2023 comes during a highly volatile and uneven time in America’s history. Dissension and dysfunction seem to be everywhere. Anger and frustration are running high. You can feel it. You can see it.
Whether politically, economically, socially or spiritually, nobody knows for sure what is coming next – or even if it’s coming at all.
Well, truth be told, that sounds a bit like the first Thanksgiving.
Hollywood and artists tend to paint that first feast in Plymouth, Massachusetts in 1621 as this idyllic Hallmark Hall of Fame kind of moment.
Author Kari Trent Stageberg – daughter of psychologist and author Dr. John Trent – and her husband, Joey, coach couples toward greater health and connection.
They say there’s a moment in every marriage that permanently changes the relationship. It’s called the “merge moment.” It occurs when husbands and wives realize their differences have the potential to drive them apart.
“Merge moments” are like two rushing rivers crashing into one another. They can be noisy, messy, and unpredictable.
What would you say are the most crucial ingredients to human survival? Food? Water? Shelter? Equally important is the need for hope.
The Jewish Holocaust was one of the darkest periods in human history. Over six million people were murdered in German concentration camps. Millions more barely survived horrific conditions of disease, abuse, and starvation. The misery was unbearable.
When the Allies liberated camps throughout Europe, they were shocked by what they found among the gas chambers and mass graves – drawings, writings, sheets of music, all created by prisoners.
Jim Daly is a husband, father and President of Focus on the Family and host of its National Radio Hall of Fame broadcast. His blog, Daly Focus, is full of timely commentary and wisdom designed to help you navigate and understand today’s culture. His latest book is Marriage Done Right.
