A Blog About Sweet Tea, Front Porches, and Loving Like Jesus.
Faith, Fried Chicken, and Folks Who Stress Us Out
On Sunday morning, we'll sing about loving our neighbors. By Sunday afternoon, we might be arguing with them on Facebook. We'll pray for the stranger, then avoid eye contact with the person who makes us uncomfortable. We'll thank Jesus for His grace while struggling to extend that same grace to the people sitting across from us.
The truth is most of us don't struggle to love the lovable people. We struggle to love the difficult ones. The ones who hurt us, who disagree with us, who we don't understand, or who we were taught to fear. And sometimes, if we're being honest, the hardest person to love is the one staring back at us in the mirror.
This blog is about that struggle. It's about faith, family, front porches, football, fried chicken, church hurt, hard conversations, and learning how to love our neighbors without pretending everything is simple. We'll talk about the things Southern culture gets beautifully right, and the things some of us had to unlearn with a whole lot of prayer, humility, and maybe a little counseling. We'll talk about racism, poverty, addiction, mental health, disability, sexuality, immigration, church culture, family patterns, and why "that's just how we were raised" may explain something without excusing it.
But this won't be about pointing fingers from a high horse. I don't own a high horse. I might have a stubborn mule somewhere on the family farm, but that's another conversation. The goal here isn't to win arguments, shame people, or act like becoming more like Jesus is easy. It's to ask better questions, listen longer, laugh when we can, repent when we need to, and to figure out what it looks like to hold truth and compassion in the same two hands. Because Jesus didn't tell us to love our neighbors only when they vote like us, talk like us, live like us, believe like us, or bring the right kind of potato salad to the potluck. He just said, "Love your neighbor." Simple to read. Much harder to live.
The older I get, the more convinced I become that the world doesn't need louder opinions, another culture war, or one more person telling everyone else why they're wrong. What it desperately needs is more people willing to love like Jesus. Not just in church or online, and not just when it's easy. Every day, neighbor, conversation, and uncomfortable moment.
So, grab a glass of sweet tea and pull up a chair. We’re going to talk about some things that may challenge us, make us laugh, and hit a little too close to home. But if we leave a little more humble, a little more compassionate, and a little more like Christ than we were yesterday, I’d call that a pretty good day on the front porch. God bless you, Darlin’, y’all come sit a while.
Ephesians 4:2
“Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love.”
Jesus Didn’t Create Us to Reject Us
I grew up in a small Southern town in what I lovingly call L.A., Lower Arkansas, where everyone knew everyone, or at least something about them, and if they didn’t, they might make it up. Alan Jackson played through grandma’s speakers, and if you got in trouble at school, your momma knew before you got home. We loved Jesus. The harder question was whether we loved like Jesus. My questions were rarely popular. Too often I heard, “We don’t ask questions,” “I’ll pray for you,” or my personal favorite, “God bless you, Darlin’.”
One of my earliest memories of difference happened in second grade, when our teacher said a new student was joining our class and that he “looked different,” but we shouldn’t treat him differently. At seven, I didn’t understand why that needed to be said. I was confused not by him, but by why adults prepared us to see difference before teaching us to see people. We weren’t born believing certain children were “other.” We learned it quietly, through tones, warnings, and fears adults carried.
Years later, a friend mentioned she had a crush on another girl. After she left the locker room, several girls said they weren’t comfortable changing around her anymore. At twelve, I couldn’t understand why who someone liked made them unworthy of dignity, and I learned that doing what you believe is right can cost your social acceptance.
By high school, the injustice around me had become too loud to ignore, so I transferred to a school in a bigger city, hoping for something more fair and welcoming. Instead, I learned that changing schools doesn’t eliminate injustice; it just changes what it looks like. At a gas station, a cashier watched my friend’s every step and barely looked at me while she handed me my change. Prejudice doesn’t belong to one color, town, denomination, or political party. It is a human problem.
Years later, I met a father accused of medical neglect because his son hadn’t received dental care. On paper, it looked simple; in person, it wasn’t. He wasn’t careless. He was terrified. His son was a U.S. citizen; he wasn’t. He feared that taking his child to the dentist might expose his immigration status and lead to separation. What looked like avoidance was a father trying to protect the one relationship he couldn’t bear to lose.
Fear can look like neglect when no one asks what a person is afraid of. Poverty, immigration status, language barriers, trauma, shame, and isolation can turn ordinary systems into places that feel dangerous. Scripture tells us to love the foreigner as ourselves and speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves. That doesn’t mean ignoring a child’s needs. It means refusing to reduce a frightened parent to a label.
Not long ago, I almost peeled a simple “Ally” sticker off my laptop because I became aware of who might be watching. For a split second, I wanted to hide it. Then God stopped me with a question: You can hide your laptop. What about the people who can’t hide who they are?
An LGBTQ+ person doesn’t get to zip themselves into a backpack every time they fear rejection, judgment, ridicule, or exclusion. Many have spent years hiding parts of themselves just to feel safe. I wasn’t convicted for supporting LGBTQ+ people. I was convicted because fear had spoken louder than love. That is where moral juxtaposition shows up: the tension between conviction and compassion, truth and grace, holiness and humility.
Jesus never sacrificed truth to love, nor love to truth. He moved toward the people everyone else moved away from.
Respect shouldn’t end where consequences begin. If the only time we use someone’s name or pronouns correctly is when a policy requires it, that is not respect; it is compliance. Love doesn’t wait for rules, permission, or proof that someone has earned dignity.
We also need to remember that biblical terminology is not the same as the terminology used today to oppress LGBTQ+ individuals, immigrants, and other marginalized groups:
Passages such as Leviticus 18:22; Leviticus 20:13; Romans 1; 1 Corinthians 6; and 1 Timothy 1 are often used to shame or exclude LGBTQ+ individuals today, but in context they addressed ritual purity laws, temple prostitution, idolatrous sexual practices, power-imbalanced relationships, and exploitation, not modern concepts of sexual orientation, gender identity, or loving, consensual same-sex relationships.
Deuteronomy 28:43 is sometimes misused to justify fear or exclusion of immigrants, but it was not a command to mistreat foreigners. It was a covenant warning about what would happen if Israel abandoned justice and compassion, while the Torah repeatedly commands God’s people to protect, welcome, and love the foreigner.
When we force ancient texts into modern categories, we risk using Scripture to harm people Jesus would have moved toward. The Bible was not written with today’s sociological, psychological, or identity-based language in mind, and modern oppression often relies on terminology the biblical authors never used or meant.
Regardless of where someone lands on Scripture’s complex passages about sexuality or gender, one truth remains: every person is made in God’s image, loved by God, invited to Christ, and every follower of Jesus is commanded to love. If my theology gives me permission to dehumanize someone, I have misunderstood the heart of Christ.
The greatest transformation God worked in me wasn’t changing a sticker. It was changing my heart. Following Jesus has never been about finding people worthy of love. It is about remembering that none of us were, and He loved us anyway. Love your neighbor as yourself. Simple to read, much harder to live. But God didn’t create us to reject us. He created us to reconcile us to Himself and to one another.
Lord, replace our fear with perfect love. Teach us to see every person through Your eyes. And may the world recognize us, not because we won every argument, but because we loved like Jesus. Amen.
Keeping Christ in Crisis
For most of my twenties, I felt like I was drowning in a storm that never seemed to end. Every year brought a new wave, deeper, heavier, more relentless than the one before. What began as quiet anxiety grew into severe mental and physical health struggles that consumed my life. I didn’t know it then, but my story would become a journey of SOUL transformation: See, Observe, Understand, and Live. It was the slow, steady rebuilding of a life with Christ at the center.
S — See: When Life Breaks Open
Verse: “The Lord is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit.” — Psalm 34:18
My breaking point didn’t come from one moment. It came from many. Before anything could change, I had to see my reality clearly, without numbing, minimizing, or spiritualizing my pain.
Family Trauma, Church Hurt, and Workplace Wounds…Oh My!
I grew up in a home where emotions were either ignored or weaponized. When conflict erupted, I learned to shrink myself, to stay quiet, to survive. Those wounds followed me into adulthood, shaping how I trusted, how I loved, and how I feared. In my early twenties, I tried to return to church, hoping for refuge. Instead, I encountered judgment disguised as righteousness. People spoke about grace but withheld it from me. I left feeling more ashamed than supported, convinced God must feel the same way. At work, my supervisor belittled me, created false narratives where I was an aggressor, insubordinate, or difficult, recruited others to believe them, and used micromanaging as control. Every day felt like walking onto a battlefield. The same people I once had casual conversations with became distant, the leaders who I respected and led me to build my confidence became the same ones who nearly broke it. My body carried the stress: migraines, weight gain, panic attacks, exhaustion that sleep couldn’t fix.
Coping in the Dark
With nowhere safe to land, I turned inward. I numbed my pain with substances. I comforted myself with food. I isolated to avoid being hurt again. Each coping mechanism felt like relief for a moment, then became another chain I couldn’t break. My mental health spiraled. My physical health deteriorated. My faith felt distant. My hope felt gone. And then, in the quiet of one day, exhausted from running from everything, I whispered a prayer I wasn’t even sure God would hear: “I can’t do this anymore. If You’re real, I need You.” It wasn’t eloquent. It wasn’t polished. But it was surrender. Seeing my reality was the first step. Seeing my need for God was the second.
O — Observe: When God Begins Rearranging What Chaos Disordered
Verse: “Be still, and know that I am God.” — Psalm 46:10
Once I could see my situation honestly, God began teaching me to observe my inner world with clarity instead of fear. Observation became the bridge between crisis and healing. God didn’t fix everything overnight. He didn’t erase my pain or undo my past. Instead, He began gently reordering my life from the inside out.
Emotional Regulation as Spiritual Maturity
I learned that emotional regulation wasn’t just psychological growth. It was spiritual maturity. It was learning to pause before reacting, to breathe before spiraling, to bring my emotions to God instead of letting them rule me. Example: When anxiety surged, I practiced naming the feeling instead of fearing it: “I feel overwhelmed, but I am not abandoned.” “I feel afraid, but God is with me.” “I feel triggered, but I can choose a different response.”
Physical Healing Through Stewardship and Spiritual Rebuilding
I began caring for my body not out of shame, but out of reverence. I sought medical help. I met with a counselor. I learned how trauma affects the nervous system. I started walking, stretching, nourishing myself with intention. My body slowly responded. My energy returned. My mind cleared. My sleep improved. I found a new church that welcomed me without conditions. I joined a small group where people listened without judgment. I opened Scripture again, not as a rulebook, but as a lifeline. God was not distant. He was patient. He was present. He was healing me in layers. Observation helped me recognize what God was doing, even when life still felt messy.
U — Understand: When God Reveals What Pain Tried to Hide
Verse: “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding.” — Proverbs 3:5
As I grew, I began to understand my story differently. Understanding brought meaning to the chaos, and compassion to the parts of myself I once rejected.
Understanding My Trauma, My Patterns, and God’s Heart
I learned that my reactions weren’t failures. They were survival responses. My body had been protecting me long before I knew how to protect myself. I recognized how fear shaped my relationships, how shame shaped my choices, and how exhaustion shaped my coping. Instead of condemning myself, I began to show compassion to the parts of me that had been hurting for years. I realized God wasn’t waiting for me to get it together. He was waiting for me to come home. My understanding shifted from: “God is disappointed in me,” to “God is restoring me.” From: “I’m too broken,” to “He heals the brokenhearted.” From: “I have to fix myself,” to “He transforms me.” Understanding brought peace. Understanding brought identity. Understanding brought hope.
L — Live: When Healing Becomes Overflow
Verse: “I have come that they may have life, and have it abundantly.” — John 10:10
As I healed, I began to live differently. Not perfectly, but intentionally. Not fearfully, but faithfully. Living became the evidence of my transformation.
Love Towards God, Others, and Myself
I stopped speaking to myself like an enemy. I learned to rest without guilt, to set boundaries without fear, and to celebrate progress instead of perfection. I became more patient, more empathetic, more present. I listened deeply. I forgave wisely. I loved without losing myself. My relationship with God became intimate, steady, and honest. I prayed with confidence. I worshiped with joy. I trusted even when I didn’t understand. My crisis didn’t disappear, but my identity changed. I was no longer the woman drowning in storms. I was the woman learning to walk on water with Christ.
My Transformation Today
I still have hard days. I still face triggers, memories, and moments of doubt. But I am not who I used to be. I am emotionally regulated because I am spiritually anchored. I am physically healing because I am spiritually surrendered. I am mentally stronger because I am spiritually renewed. My SOUL, once fractured, is becoming whole. Not because I tried harder. Not because I pretended to be fine. But because I finally let God into the places I once hid. My story is not about perfection. It is about transformation. A slow, holy, beautiful rebuilding, one surrender, one step, one healed layer at a time.
