Presence

The Little Things

/ Baylee Snelling / 1 Comment

It’s in the little things.
The quiet things.
The things you don’t always think to write down.

Like playing chase around the house,
laughing so hard your sides ache.

Reading the same children’s book 15 times in a row
because that’s what love does.

Living in our jammies on cold days
with no real plans but each other.

These are the pieces I’ll miss one day.
The ordinary ones that don’t look like much —
until they’re gone.

So tonight, I’m not chasing more.
I’m just noticing what’s already here.

And giving thanks
for the beautiful, holy smallness of it all.

“Better is a little with the fear of the Lord than great treasure and trouble with it.”
Proverbs 15:16 (ESV)

A Full Kind of Thankful

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Today wasn’t quiet.
But it was good.

Full of noise.
Full of kids.
Full of the kind of moments you don’t stop to write down
because you’re too busy living them.

And maybe that’s its own kind of gratitude —
not the kind you journal,
but the kind you carry in your bones.

Anchor Verse

“This is the day that the Lord has made;
let us rejoice and be glad in it.”
— Psalm 118:24 (ESV)

Flowers in the Concrete

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I read something recently:
“You are allowing flowers to grow in between the concrete of your grief.”

What beautiful imagery.
And yet — why does it feel so hard to do?

It’s easy to get caught up in our circumstances.
To stay angry at the past.
To worry about what’s ahead.
So much so, we forget to notice the beauty that’s already blooming around us.
We forget to live here, in the now.

With Thanksgiving approaching, I’ve been thinking a lot about thankfulness.
It seems like such a simple thing.
“I’m so thankful I slept well last night.”
“I’m thankful I didn’t have to get out in the rain.”

Those are good things — small gifts worth noticing.
But I wanted to go deeper.

The root of the word thankfulness comes from Old English.
And it’s closely tied to the idea of thought and kindness.

Etymology:
“Thank” comes from Old English þanc (pronounced thah-nk),
which meant thought, gratitude, goodwill.
It’s related to the verb þencan, meaning to think.

So at its root, thankfulness literally means:
“A thoughtful awareness of goodness.”

Not a passing moment of gratitude,
but a deliberate choice to see what’s still good —
especially when life feels hard.

That’s what I want this season to hold.
Not just a long list of blessings.
But a heart that’s thoughtfully aware of the goodness around me,
even when grief is still growing in the cracks.

I want to see the flowers —
not in spite of the concrete,
but because of it.

“Give thanks to the Lord, for He is good. His love endures forever.”
— Psalm 136:1 (NIV)

The Beauty That Makes Us Shiver

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There’s a word I stumbled across recently that hasn’t left me since:

Frisson.

It’s that sudden wave of emotion.
A shiver down your spine.
A rush of goosebumps when something beautiful or true or overwhelming brushes past you.

It often happens when we hear a piece of music that moves us. Or when a film scene captures something so human it aches. Or when someone speaks a truth so deep it silences the room.

It’s beauty. But it’s more than that.

And the more I thought about it, the more I wondered:

What if the frisson we feel isn’t just emotion?
What if it’s a glimpse of glory?
What if it’s the evidence of God, brushing up against our earthly edges?

I don’t think it’s an accident that our bodies respond physically to beauty and truth. The goosebumps. The tear that wells up unexpectedly. The breath that catches in our throat. The stillness that follows.

What if those aren’t just reactions?
What if they’re reminders?

That we were made to recognize wonder.
That we were designed to be moved.

Because God is beauty. God is truth. God is presence.
And maybe frisson is what happens when our spirit remembers Him.

Maybe that moment where your heart swells, your skin tingles, and everything in you says, “This matters” — maybe that’s holy ground.

Not because the music was perfect.
Not because the words were eloquent.
But because, for just a second, you were aware of the Divine.

So the next time it happens—
When you hear something that gives you chills.
When you see something that steals your breath.
When you feel something that you can’t quite explain…

Pause.

Pay attention.

Don’t rush past it.

Ask: “God, was that You?”

Because maybe it was.
Maybe it always has been.

Anchor Verse:
“One thing I ask from the Lord, this only do I seek: that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze on the beauty of the Lord and to seek him in his temple.”
Psalm 27:4 (NIV)

The Light We Already Carry

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There are moments when everything feels heavy —
when the world feels dark,
and I find myself whispering,
“It’s really dark, God. Can You help shine some light?”

And I feel Him answer,
softly but clearly:
“My child, you are to be the light.”

I’ve stood in the dark before, wishing for a flashlight — only to realize there was a light switch within reach.

Maybe it’s the same in life.
What we’re asking for might already be within us.
What we’re craving, we might already carry.

This world has always known darkness.
But that’s why the light matters.

Even a small light can change what feels overwhelming.

Maybe today, it begins with you.

“You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden.”
Matthew 5:14 (ESV)

The Still Places We’re Afraid to Sit In

/ Baylee Snelling / 1 Comment

There are quiet places that don’t feel peaceful at first.
They feel empty.
They feel unfamiliar.
They echo too much.

Sometimes it’s the stillness itself that feels loud —
not because it’s actually noisy,
but because we’ve been moving so fast for so long
that stopping feels like something might catch up with us.

Maybe it’s grief.
Maybe it’s fear.
Maybe it’s the simple ache of being alone with your thoughts —
without the to-do lists, the baby monitor, the scrolling, or the noise of a world that never stops.

But stillness is not punishment.
It’s invitation.

It’s where God gently meets us when we’re no longer outrunning Him.
Not with reprimand —
but with presence.

Because He doesn’t need our productivity.
He wants our proximity.

He just wants us close enough to hear Him when He whispers,
“I’m still here.”
“I’ve been here.”

And the stillness begins to soften.
The silence turns holy.
And the ache doesn’t disappear —
but it rests.

Not because it’s fixed,
but because it’s finally held.

“Be still, and know that I am God.”
Psalm 46:10 (NIV)

When the Fire Flickers

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Some days, it feels like my candle is burning out.
And other days, I swear I could light up a whole city.

I’ve learned to pay attention to what fuels the flame.
And today — it was him.

It was the moment I held my busy toddler in my arms at church,
and he suddenly stilled.
His head nestled into my shoulder,
his little eyes focused on the woman singing behind us.
The stillness.
The wonder.
The quiet awe that washed over him — and me too.

And now, it’s this moment,
as I rock him to sleep, singing gently over his tired frame.
My voice may not be beautiful, but he doesn’t mind.
And neither does God.

He fills my heart.
He overflows my cup.
He ignites something holy in me.

When he’s not here, everything feels a little off —
my home isn’t messy in a way that I love,
and my to-do lists aren’t full of things I want to be doing.
There’s just… space. And longing.

But even in that longing, I’m reminded of a Father who feels the same.
A God who simply wants to be acknowledged when He draws near.
A Father who welcomes us into His home,
mess and all.
A Father who delights in the songs we sing —
even the off-key ones.
Even the tired ones.
Even the whispered ones.

These moments…
they’re sacred.
And I think He calls them beautiful, too.

“The Lord your God is in your midst, a mighty one who will save;
He will rejoice over you with gladness;
He will quiet you by His love;
He will exult over you with loud singing.”
— Zephaniah 3:17 (ESV)

The Place My Soul Calls Home

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There’s a kind of homesickness I can’t explain.

Not for a house or a city —
but for something deeper.
A nearness. A Presence. A peace that settles in the bones.

“How lovely is Your dwelling place, Lord Almighty.
My soul yearns, even faints, for the courts of the Lord;
my heart and my flesh cry out for the living God.”
— Psalm 84:1–2 (NIV)

I read that — and I don’t just understand it,
I feel it.

Because more than answers,
more than comfort,
more than clarity or resolution —
what I really ache for is God Himself.

To feel close to Him again.
To remember what it’s like to rest in His presence,
not rushing past it
or reaching for it like it’s still far away.
But to dwell in it.

To breathe it in like oxygen for a soul that’s been holding its breath.

Maybe you’ve felt it too.

That quiet pull toward the sacred.
That longing to feel seen,
held,
not alone.

The world offers distractions.
But nothing satisfies that ache like Him.

Not a new chapter.
Not a healed circumstance.
Not even peace in your situation.

The ache you feel?
It’s holy.

Because what your soul longs for most —
is the One who made it.

And He’s not far.
He’s right here, closer than you think.

For Now, We Leave It

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Last night after Beckett’s bath, I caught sight of the wall behind me in the mirror—a scatter of foam letters clinging in every direction, left exactly the way he placed them.

I almost picked them up. That’s what I usually do—tidy things, put them back where they belong. But something about this scene made me stop.

The bright reds and yellows. The upside-down twos. The jumbled alphabet, full of joy and nonsense all at once.

So instead of cleaning, I took a picture. And I left it.

Because one day, I’ll put these letters away for good.

One day, the tub will stay clean.

The walls will stay bare.

The toys will stop showing up in places that don’t make sense.

And while I love order, I know I’ll long for this more.

“Teach us to number our days, that we may gain a heart of wisdom.”

Psalm 90:12

It isn’t about counting time as much as noticing it—treasuring the little, ordinary moments that are easy to overlook. The jumbled letters on the wall. The bedtime routines. The small traces of a little boy who won’t always be little.

These moments are fleeting, but they are holy in their own way. They remind me to hold onto the beauty of right now—not just the milestones or the tidy, picture-perfect versions, but the messy, imperfect, ordinary ones too.

So last night, the letters stayed.

The mess stayed.

The reminder stayed.

For now, we leave it.

If the Pages Could Talk

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If the pages could talk,
they’d tell a story
not everyone saw.

Of nights where the only light
was the glow of the monitor
and the quiet hum of prayers
I never meant to say out loud.

They’d whisper of pages
tear-stained and half-written —
moments where I didn’t know what came next,
but still picked up the pen anyway.

They’d speak of healing that came slowly,
in margins and in pauses.
In prayers I scribbled sideways
when the ache was too heavy to carry upright.

They’d tell you about the girl
who kept writing,
even when the words were hard to find.
Who chose presence
over pretending.
Stillness
over striving.
Faith
over finality.

If the pages could talk,
they wouldn’t just tell you what happened —
they’d tell you what held me together
when everything else was falling apart.