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Animals of the Bible, Faith, fear, Spiritual Growth, Spiritual Warfare, Anxiety, Rise Up and Build, Trust Dana Rongione Animals of the Bible, Faith, fear, Spiritual Growth, Spiritual Warfare, Anxiety, Rise Up and Build, Trust Dana Rongione

How To Turn on the Light When Fear Is Swooping

I have a confession to make: I am afraid of things that don't exist.

Not ghosts or monsters under the bed. I outgrew those...mostly. No, I'm talking about the imaginary monsters I construct out of thin air whenever I face a new deadline, a hard conversation, or an unexpected season of life. I can build something terrifying out of nothing, and sadly, I'm quite good at it.

Turns out, I'm in good company. Not just with other anxious humans, but with ancient settlers who looked up into the twilight sky and panicked over a little bird called the nighthawk.

By name alone, the nighthawk sounds ferocious. Something with hawk in the title ought to have razor-sharp talons, a hooked beak, and zero patience for your nonsense. Early observers watched it swooping through the dusk and slapped the most fearful label they could find on it: Hawk. Done.

The terror only grew worse from there.

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Weary, Encouragement, Comfort, Discouragement, Anxiety, Animals of the Bible Dana Rongione Weary, Encouragement, Comfort, Discouragement, Anxiety, Animals of the Bible Dana Rongione

When the Ground Disappears

I want to tell you something about greyhounds that sounds completely impossible until you see it for yourself.

When a greyhound runs at full speed, it uses what scientists call a double suspension gallop. What that means in plain English is this: twice during every stride, all four of the greyhound's feet leave the ground at the same time. Not once. Twice. In fact, when a greyhound is running full out, it spends roughly 75% of its time completely airborne. That elegant, flying creature is, at any given moment, more likely to be in the air than on the ground.

Think about that for a second.

For a greyhound, losing contact with the ground is not a crisis. It is not a catastrophe. It is not even a stumble. It is simply how the greyhound moves forward.

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Anxiety, fear, Deadly Darts of the Devil, Rise Up and Build, Peace, Spiritual Warfare Dana Rongione Anxiety, fear, Deadly Darts of the Devil, Rise Up and Build, Peace, Spiritual Warfare Dana Rongione

Are You Sleeping Through the Night?

My smartwatch and I have a complicated relationship.

Every morning, I roll over, bleary-eyed, and check my sleep score. And every morning, that little device has the nerve to tell me exactly how badly I failed at something I've been doing my whole life: sleeping. Honestly, you'd think I'd have gotten the hang of it by now.

Here's how the scoring works. I can earn 50 points for getting a full 8 hours. I can earn 30 more if I go to bed at my set bedtime of 9 p.m. And I can earn up to 20 points based on how many times I wake up during the night, not just a little shift or a sigh, but a full-on, heart-rate-changing, get-out-of-bed kind of awakening.

That last category? That's where things get embarrassing.

On more than one occasion, I have scored a big, fat zero on my interruption score. Zero! You know what that means?

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Hope, Anxiety, Animals of the Bible, Rise Up and Build, depression, Deadly Darts of the Devil, Spiritual Warfare, Encouragement, Comfort Dana Rongione Hope, Anxiety, Animals of the Bible, Rise Up and Build, depression, Deadly Darts of the Devil, Spiritual Warfare, Encouragement, Comfort Dana Rongione

Owls, Night Seasons, and the God Who Sees in the Dark

Did you know you can learn a lot of theology from a bird with big eyes and a funny hoot? I didn't either—at least, not until my Bible study on the animals of the Bible landed on the owl. Suddenly, this "spooky" night bird became one of my favorite little professors.

In Isaiah 43, God says something that stopped me in my tracks: "The beast of the field shall honour me, the dragons and the owls..." (Isaiah 43:20a). The owls honour Him... in the dark. They don't sing like the sweet little songbirds at sunrise. They don't trill in the bright blue sky. They hoot in the lonely, desolate places when everyone else has gone quiet and gone home.

Most birds are at their best in the sunshine, but the owl is built for the night.

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Encouragement, Comfort, Weary, Rise Up and Build, Anxiety, depression, Deadly Darts of the Devil Dana Rongione Encouragement, Comfort, Weary, Rise Up and Build, Anxiety, depression, Deadly Darts of the Devil Dana Rongione

Broken But Beautiful

I recently learned about a fascinating Japanese art form called kintsugi. Rather than tossing broken pottery into the bin, artisans carefully piece the fragments back together using a special adhesive made from tree sap. But here's the truly remarkable part: they don’t hide the cracks. Instead, they highlight them by filling the seams with gold, creating something even more beautiful than the original piece.

As I studied photos of these stunning works of art, tears filled my eyes. You see, I know what it's like to feel broken. The weight of anxiety and depression has left me with countless cracks and fissures. The battle against chronic illness has left me weary and battered. There are days when I feel utterly shattered by negative thoughts and overwhelming fears, wondering if I'll ever be whole again. Perhaps you can relate?

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