NIKI FLORICA

trodden: walked on . . . crush[ed] or flatten[ed] with the feet . . . pressed down into the ground. (Google) Who's feeling pressed down today? How about crushed? Flattened? Walked all over? Is your hand up? Hey, no shame. Mine is, too. Satan has been hard at work in me this week, stirring up struggles I just want to be done with but can't seem to shake, especially when I'm too tired to fight back. Relating? Jesus talks about the downtrodden in the parable of the sower, Luke 8

Crazy week, folks. Craaaazy week. Second-year has just begun and already there just aren't enough hours in the day; writing and AuthorTube and the blog are still vying for attention; my TBR is rapidly growing and my time for pleasure-reading is rapidly shrinking, and you know what the worst part is? My God-time is under attack. I'm probably not the only one fighting this constant battle against busyness in which God-time is usually one of the first casualties. I dedicate the

The moment I saw this Hebrew phrase on the page of Mark 7, I knew I had to blog about it. I knew because I felt called out by it. Challenged. Convicted. Commanded. Compelled. Eph'pha-tha. That is, Be opened. (Mark 7:34). The past year and a half has been a time of closed stores and closed doors, and many people have struggled with feeling closed-off because of it. I must confess, I can't relate. Lockdown has been, to me, permission to stay in my comfort zone without interrupt

Want to hear a secret? Just kidding—it's not really a secret. I'm a smidge of a pessimist. Just kidding—it's more than a smidge. I think it stems from my fear of being caught unprepared for an emotional blow; I hate having hopes dashed or high expectations crushed. I hate being let down, so my subconscious coping mechanism is to lower my expectations on all fronts so I can't be disappointed. The problem? It also makes it much, much harder to get excited. School starts tomorro

When you stop to count them, a TON of spiritual traits boil down to good ol' fashioned acts of will. Prayerfulness. Forgiveness. Thankfulness. Selflessness. Love. Even faith. We love to think of being inherently forgiving or prayerful or full of faith as if it just happens when we've been believers long enough. We look at those around us who excel in certain areas and say, "Well, So-and-So is just naturally forgiving. It's easy for her, much harder for me." We might even let

I'm usually pretty good at laughing at myself. You know, when the stakes are low. When things get stressful, though, and nobody else is laughing? Yeah, that kills my good humour. The past couple of months have marked a struggle to build competence in what I do. New tasks are always daunting, but new tasks along with the weight of dozens of people's expectations are crippling for someone like me. I wish I could say I'm a cauldron of confidence, but that would be a bald-faced l

Perspective is a gift. God knew we couldn't handle the full, grandiose scope of everything He's doing in our lives, so he gave us limited sight. A piece of the puzzle—our small, incomplete, but seemingly all-consuming perspectives of life. They're a gift in that we are not crushed by the overwhelming weight of the big picture, but Satan can use that gift and twist it to his advantage as well. C.S. Lewis' Screwtape talks about time as a spiritual thing. The present is where ti

I recently saw a post that said something along the lines of, "Be the best at whatever you do," and it struck me as slightly far-fetched. How can we all be the best at our jobs? Wouldn't it be more realistic to strive for hard-working, dependable, competent? Maybe. But it reminds me of our objective as followers of Christ, who very specifically instructs us to "be perfect" as God is perfect. Rest assured, Christ knows this goal is eons beyond our reach. We are innately flawed

Lost, chained, a fool, or at wit's end. Which one are you? Try finding yourself in the spectrum of Psalm 107's desperate people. Are you the lost soul wandering the wilderness, nowhere to go, hungry but not sure what for, craving a feeling of belonging? Are you the one who sits in deepest gloom, in chains of your own making? Are you the fool who turned your back on God, marched to the beat of your own drum, and now stand at death's door, crying out for help? Are you the sailo

"This was done for you." Season 2, Episode 2, The Chosen. Nathaniel sits under a fig tree with a stack of failed dreams in his hands—plans for a synagogue he'll never get to build (to know why, watch the show. Seriously). He turns his gaze to the radiant sky and directs a broken-hearted prayer to heaven. But even as he recites words of faith, the tears streaking his face as he burns the designs say what he's truly thinking, what he's feeling. "This was done for you. . . . Do

Don't you just love it when your daily devotion reaches out to slap you in the face? I certainly do. Well, mostly. Some of the time. It kind of depends on the slap. Sometimes a spiritual message targeted to what we're going through can be incredibly encouraging. Other times, that bible verse, song lyric, or line from a devotional is a hard wake-up call we need, but don't necessarily want. In both cases is evidence of God's intimate involvement in our lives, but if you ask me,

“I must say a word about fear. It is life's only true opponent. Only fear can defeat life. It is a clever, treacherous adversary ... It goes for your weakest spot, which it finds with unnerving ease. It begins in your mind, always ... so you must fight hard to express it. You must fight hard to shine the light of words upon it. Because if you don't ... you open yourself to further attacks of fear because you never truly fought the opponent who defeated you.” Why did I choose

I'm trying to start a new habit. I love going for walks down my country road when my head feels crowded with the things of this big ol' world we're just passing through. Sometimes I pray while I walk, but sometimes, especially lately, I listen to worship music. And though part of me itches against the idea that I need tunes to go for a walk—(FYI, I don't always)—most of me is thrilled about a new discovery I've made. The discovery that worship can happen anywhere, anytime, to

Life threw me for a loop this week, y'all. One minute I'm rolling along, feeling reasonably in-control of my routine, and the next I'm buying a car, job-hunting, preparing for my driver's test, and frantically trying to ready my latest manuscript for this year's #PitMad event—just to name a few of the surprises that, of course, had to fall within the same seven days out of 365. Naturally. At various points in this week, I felt absolutely out of control. Even now, I'm not too

Funny thing about toast—when you smell it, you want it. Ever notice that? I mean, there was a time when I would sooner eat dirt than toast, and I still can't deny its magical property of being appetizing in any and every context. It's just one of those things. Innately appealing, we need only to experience a whiff of it to crave it. Something in us just wants toast. What if I told you that Jesus and toast have a lot in common? See, the Word of God calls us to follow Jesus, bu

One thing I've been awful at since day one—discerning God's will when I don't know how to move forward. Especially in the publishing world, there are so many avenues an aspiring author can take, each with its own pros and cons. There are gazillions of advice websites, how-to-publish books, and social media accounts to get totally lost in. There are horrible, horrible odds of success when it comes to traditional publishing, specifically. And there are stakes, too—high ones, in

I can happily say that my new favourite show is officially The Chosen—not only marked by quality acting, sweet costumes, killer screenwriting, and loveable characters, but also featuring Jesus. Yeah, that's right. Jesus. Need I say more? As far as cinematic Jesus depictions go, The Chosen paints my favourite picture. Unlike in the original Ben-Hur film, he is not a faceless figure who floats through scenes on strings of otherworldly music. And, unlike in the film version of T

Anyone who's watched High School Musical or the Teen Beach Movie or any such Disneylicious teen drama know that at some point or another, the heroes and heroines always get hung up on the idea of the future. I never got it before. I mean, I've seen High School Musical a bajillion times and for years, Troy and Gabriella's anxiety about the future never resonated with me like it does now. Because now, I find myself where they are—older, actually, which is too terrifying to even

The 39 books of the Old Testament paint a picture of what C.S. Lewis calls the "hammering process—" centuries of God's hard-line training program to show Israel just what kind of God had chosen them and what He expected of them. "Hammering" seems like the right word. I mean, I'd be the first to admit that the Old Testament account, while bound together with the theme of God's tireless mercy and lovingkindness toward sinners, can also seem pretty, well . . . harsh. Those of us

I don't abide by everything in my psychology course, but here's a fun fact (at least as I understand it): between ages 15 and 25, the limbic system of the human brain is maturing more rapidly than surrounding sections. The result? Until roughly age 25, we tend to be ruled by our emotions. I don't know about you guys, but I'm pretty sure Mr. Psychologist is talking about me. What rules you? Is it your goals? Your logic? Your morals? Your personality? Or is it your emotions? Th