Elizabeth Spencer
Crosswalk.com Contributing Writer
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7 Wonderful Gifts of Relationships with Your Adult Children
For Christmas one year, my oldest daughter gave me a tutu. It was a fetching pink-and-green tulle number she’d made herself, with help from my seamstress mom. My then-teenager gave it...Thursday, July 4, 2024
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7 Truths Your Teen Needs to Hear From You
How I feel about you also does not hinge on how any test or paper or project or semester or game or application or interview or audition turns out. Entirely apart from anything you do, I love who...Wednesday, April 24, 2024
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10 Things I Want for My Adult Children That God Wants Too
Yet some of the longings of my heart for my older kids are clearly reflected in the heart of God as evidenced by Scripture. These, I can give full weight to and ask God to fulfill, knowing I am...Tuesday, March 12, 2024
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10 Worship Songs I'd Be Fine with Never Singing Again (And Why)
If you’re reading this piece (and you obviously are), it’s probably for one of two reasons: 1) to see if your favorite worship song is on this list, or 2) to see if your least...Monday, July 24, 2023
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10 Verses for When You Feel Unsettled
Someday, if someone (a fellow mom of older kids, maybe) asks me how I got through this unsettling season of life, I hope I'll be able to honestly answer them, "By sinking into the unchanging,...Tuesday, July 26, 2022
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How to Help Your Kids Process Disappointment
When the news on my phone screen or written across my children's faces hasn't been good, I've learned to take a few steps in hopes of helping them process their disappointment and then, at the...Thursday, May 12, 2022
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What to Do When Your Teen Shuts You Out
In Abba, we see one of the crux truths in all of parenting: our job is not the outcome; our job is the input. Hard though it may be when we feel shut out by our older kids, when we choose to love...Thursday, April 28, 2022
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How to Bring Your Kids Up in the Faith
My girls grew up seeing their dad read the Word and avail himself of tools to help him dig into it. They got used to me saying to them at the dinner table, "Listen to what I learned at women's...Monday, April 11, 2022
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How to Comfort Your Child After the Loss of a Friend
I'll never forget the look on my daughter's face when she walked into the house the day she learned about her school friend's departure. I held her while she cried, and she told me, "Please don't...Friday, March 25, 2022
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6 Things to Do When Worried about Your Young Adult
Praying for our older kids gives us something to do with our worries about them. It turns our inward thoughts upward and hands them off to our children's Creator, whose plans for them are good,...Monday, March 14, 2022
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8 Promises for Exhausted Parents
God invented parenthood, and what God creates, He cares for. God sees us both as parents and His children, and His heart toward us is relational and tender. Throughout Scripture, God often helps us...Thursday, February 24, 2022
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7 Ways to Strengthen Your Mother-Daughter Relationship
The handy thing about mothering a daughter is that you are both females. The tricky thing about mothering a daughter is that you are both females. Being a girl or a woman is a complicated business,...Monday, February 14, 2022
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How to Support Your Spouse after They Lose a Parent
Sometimes you may think that mentioning them will make your mate think about them when they otherwise weren't. But of course, you know the truth: they already were. You just let them know they...Friday, February 4, 2022
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6 Prayers for Kids Going Back to School Amid COVID Surge
Thank you for all the ways you have upheld our students' wellbeing in the past. We ask you to continue to preserve their physical and mental health, even in this age of a pandemic.Monday, January 10, 2022
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How to Make the Most of the Holidays with Your Young Adult Children
I tried to leave wide margins in my mind and heart about what our time all under one roof again could or would look like. I tried not to assume how my daughter would feel being back in a place that...Monday, December 6, 2021
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7 Verses for Going Somewhere New
The indwelling presence of God provides us with GPS we can access anytime we need to know which way to go…especially when we’ve “never been this way before.” Does the road we’re thinking of taking...Monday, September 27, 2021
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8 Biblical Ways to Comfort Your Kids When Their Hearts are Hurting
When my older daughter was about four years old, she tipped too far back in the little plastic chair she often sat in to look at picture books and hit her head against the fireplace hearth. As soon...Friday, September 24, 2021
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5 Ways to Help Your Young Adult Make a Big Decision
As with all of parenting, I’m learning as I go, building a boat while I’m at sea, as it were. Along the way, I’ve found five pieces of what I believe to be Biblically sound counsel to offer my...Friday, September 24, 2021