Story Warren

Kindling Imagination for Kingdom Anticipation

The Warren & The World Vol 9, Issue 14

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The trees in my neighborhood are beginning to green. I look across the street to the stand of woods on a hill and still see mostly branches, hazed over with spring color. I can still see the windows of the house on the hill behind the trees, but it won’t be many weeks before I forget what it looks like—its presence will only make itself known in twinkles of light from the windows coming between the moving leaves, rustling in a late summer night breeze.

Easter is coming. I’ve lived in places where Easter was still full in the grip of winter, and places where you might get away with wearing that pretty sleeveless dress—if it falls late enough on the calendar and the weather imps are kind. But this year, the timing is perfect, and the green azalea leaves are covering the bushes just as we turn the corner to Good Friday. The buds might burst on Easter morning.

Around the Web

Picture Books and Accounting

Sally Lloyd-Jones reminds us that beauty is not something that is easily counted.

  • As we slowly emerge from winter into spring, we’re also transitioning from quite a year.
    As we start to see glimpses of getting back to normal, how are you doing? Are you looking back at this time in lockdown and wondering what you’ve accomplished? With so much pressure to “use this time wisely”—what, exactly, did you do this year?
    Read more

The Louvre Just Put Its Entire Art Collection Online

If you’ve ever dreamed of that trip to Paris to see the Mona Lisa, but wondered whether it would ever happen, here’s a chance to get a glimpse without the plane ticket.

  • The pandemic may have forced both culture vultures and casual museum-goers alike to stay away from their favorite institutions. But the Louvre has come up with a tres bien way to bring art back to the masses.
    Read more

Toward a More Curious Faith

In the light of early spring, Lore Ferguson Wilbert takes stock of how her faith has grown in the darkness of winter.

  • The river rose yesterday in less than an hour, lifting from shallow glass with a barely detectable current to rushing over our dock poles, curbing debris into our cove, whitecaps by afternoon. We pull on our boots and raincoats and drive to the falls a few miles upriver, where they lift the dam on the water a few times in the spring before the regular summer releases. We hike and pause, hike and pause. It is so green, so brown, so rushing, so earthy. The composted dirt thick with pine needles, moss carpets curved over fallen trees. A few months ago Nate wrote a poem called the Ecology of Tolerance (one of my favorites of his) and I can’t help but think of the cathedral of nature, man’s first sanctuary, the grace of this space.
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Five Fantasy Films for Tweens

Need something for your next movie night with the older kids? Check out these recommendations from Rambling Ever On.

  • A few weeks ago it hit me that my eldest child is going to be in middle school next year, and his younger brother is only a year behind him. I decided to come up with a way of celebrating this growth rather than freaking out about it.
    Having been a long time fan of fantasy books and films (and my boys are beginning to follow in my footsteps in that regard), I decided we should watch some of my favorite fantasy films.
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Around the Warren

My Eyes Have Seen You

Andrew Senior looks to the night sky and beyond.

  • Growing up, my Grandma and Grandad would come and see us every Friday night. My Grandad and I would go for walks on the country lanes north of Sheffield on the edge of the Peak District. During one winter—I must have been around eleven years old—he showed me the night sky and taught me to recognise some of the major constellations. It came out in conversation that the stars had first caught his attention during WWII, when he was stationed beneath the war-darkened skies of Jerusalem, and in possession of powerful, army-issued binoculars.
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So Tall Within

Helena Sorensen reminds us of the story of Sojourner Truth and points us to Gary D. Schmidt’s So Tall Within.

  • How is it that a person becomes convinced of her inherent worth? How does a child sold for a hundred dollars along with a flock of sheep know that she’s worth more than the sheep, more than a hundred dollars?
    Read more

Something to Do with Your Kids

April begins! And what would a new month be without a list of fun activities for your family to do this month? 

Something to Watch

If you’ve been around for a while, you might remember that I have a strange fascination with all things Bolero. I first heard Maurice Ravel’s piece watching Torvill and Dean’s 1984 Olympic Gold Medal ice dance performance (I’m guessing on a replay, but maybe three-year-old Carrie was as enthralled with it as her later self would be). But anyway, I’ve been obsessed ever since, and this video of the Wiener Cello Ensemble 5 + 1 playing the piece together on one cello is amazing.

Thanks for reading. We’re on your side. 

–The Story Warren Team

Carolyn Clare Givens
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