Debora M. Coty

Eureka! I found it! A little soggy maybe, and I sometimes leave there polka-dotted with more than a few mosquito pox, but it’s a special secret spot that I know Papa God picked out specially for me. Why do I need such a place? And more importantly, why do you need such a place? Read …

Where’s Your Secret Place? Read More »

I’ve just finished doing something that made me feel bad. Really, really bad. I immersed myself in a vat of scalding pain. Someone else’s pain. The shell-shocked parents who lost their beautiful 24-year-old daughter to suicide with no warning. No symptoms. No good-byes. The mom who went in to wake up her 21-year-old son for …

Why Your Prayers Matter Read More »

One of the chapters in my newest book, Too Loved to Be Lost, is about colliding with difficult people. It’s called, appropriately, “Dents in My Fender.” So of course a collision occurred this week. Papa God loves to bring home these lessons I think I’ve learned. Poetic justice. A brand new whopper of a chink now desecrates …

When You Love the Unlovable Read More »

It happened five days ago. It was shocking, mind-boggling, and completely unexpected. It shook my little world. I woke up in the morning as always and rolled out of bed. Yawning, I noticed my face felt oddly stiff … like I was wearing a mask. I reached up and touched my cheek. What in the …

When You Look Scary Read More »

I couldn’t believe it. My hero was not at all what I’d imagined. I’d run across her obscure but charming little novel in the 80s and fallen completely, surprisingly, obsessively smitten with her wise, witty, resonating characters and the subtle but searing Christian message that gripped my soul. I’d never read anything like that. Why, …

When You Find Out Your Hero Is Human Read More »

My stove jammed yesterday. I took it as a sign from God. Actually, it was the metal drawer beneath the oven, the one in which I store my pots and pans. A pot in the front somehow flipped itself over in the middle of the night (how do they DO that – impish kitchen elves?), …

Looking for a Sign From God? Read More »

Our bus arrived in Edinburgh on Sunday around noon on a breezy, sunny, altogether gorgeous autumn day, and I was up for adventure. Scotland was the third country on the long-awaited U.K. tour Chuck and I had been enjoying in honor of our 33rd wedding anniversary, and we were thrilled to be presented with a …

When You’re Completely Helpless Read More »

In my role as the preschool Bible Story Lady at our church, I was telling the story of Jonah and the Big Fish a few Sundays ago to the 3- and 4-year-olds.    The hard part wasn’t bringing the bit about Jonah deliberately running away from God down to the level of little people who …

When You Want to Hide Read More »

Do you find yourself hocking up anxiety over and over like a Guernsey regurgitating her cud?   Does worrying about the what-ifs suck the joy out of your soul?   If so, you’re not alone.   My goal for my new book, Fear, Faith, and a Fistful of Chocolate, is to introduce a few simple …

5 Ways Fear Attacks Your Soul Read More »

I was hiking a mountain trail last week when something stopped me in my tracks. It was a sight I truly didn’t expect to see. There, at more than 4,000 feet above sea level, a snail was painstakingly making its way across the gravel road. What in the world was a sea creature doing way …

When God Calls You to a Place You’ve Never Been Read More »

OK, here are some tried-and-true tools, gleaned from different people who’ve been there, done that, to help you grow trust in Papa God on your journey through the valley of the shadow of financial death.   1. Don’t Give Up Hope    He will continue to be faithful to us no matter what: “If we …

5 Tips From the Bible for Getting Out of Debt Read More »

The memory makes me smile now, but at the time I wanted to screech like a riled bobcat. When I was nine, my sister was two years older and light years girlier. She wore wrap-around skirts, red hair bows and shiny pink nail polish. I lived and breathed barefoot, wore ratty cut off jeans, baseball …

How Your Words of Wisdom Can Goad People Toward God Read More »

Ever have one of those days when everything possible went wrong? Sure you have. We all have. It’s how we respond that separates the weenies from the warriors. Take my friend Lana for example. Her story will make your eyebrows stand at attention. Lana’s daybreak flight from Denver to Philly was late. By the time …

When Everything That Can Go Wrong Does Read More »

While traveling to a wedding in Alabama last weekend, Chuck and I stayed at a motel in a newly developed area on the fading border between urban and rural. Next to our motel was a gigantic big-box-like store that I’d never seen before: Gander Mtn., known as your firearms superstore. Gulp. Now, I am not …

Are You Easy Prey for the Enemy? Read More »

I love to eat out, don’t you? Nothing better than kicking back and enjoying the food someone else has prepared in pans that you don’t have to scrub served on plates you don’t have to wash and put away. But I recently heard a story about a dining out near-tragedy that made me quiver in …

Don’t Miss the Obvious Needs Read More »