These are the things you need to know about me and the reason for this website.

The goal and purpose of Ruby’s Rambles is to provide a safe place for moms like you who are asking the hard questions of faith. You may be deconstructing, but your intent has never been to give up on faith. It is to tear down the unhealthy and toxic traditions you were taught, and find a stable foundation to build something firm, strong, healthy and life-giving. To know God as He truly is – not as people told you He was. To know what God wants from you – not the list of rules and guidelines and fear-inducing cliches someone told you to follow.

I know this because you and I are a lot alike.

And we need tools. Tools for deconstructing, and tools to give our children. Not tools to hand to our children when this messy season is over, but tools IN the messy season. Tools to dig into Scripture together. And as individuals. Our kids need to know how to study the Word for themselves. They need to know how to hear from God for themselves, and not rely on what someone else says, or on what they’ve been taught – even by us.

We need to know how to dig in to Scripture, to discover who God is, what He really said, and we need to know how to apply His principles in our own lives – and how to teach our children these same things. 

For these reasons, I will not hesitate to call out toxic behavior and teachings in the church. I will freely acknowledge when I confront a Pharisaical attitude – in myself, or in something aimed at me. (By “Pharisaical attitude” I mean the attitude the Pharisees showed in the Bible. They made so many rules and guidelines, and made such impossible demands of people that no one could uphold them all – including themselves.)

I will write and speak the truth that God shows me in His Word. And I will encourage everyone around me to seek Truth as well. I want to make space for all of us to meet Jesus. I want to make it EASY for us to come to Jesus. Not make it harder. For you. For me. And for our kids.

I crave Truth above everything else. I can face a lot of crummy situations if I know the truth about it. What I can’t deal with is something false, something that is fake, something that is pretending to be something else. 

And this is the main reason why I despise it when someone takes a verse out of context, and creates an untrue doctrine that they perpetuate with people around them. Especially if that person is in leadership/ministry.

The problem is, many people (even in ministry/pastoral positions) haven’t been taught HOW to study the Bible. Some of these people have been told that the KJV is the only reliable translation, and out of their determination to hold onto faith, they have blindly followed that advice – without the education to properly study archaic English and without the tools to discover where the translation failed miserably – nor the cultural implications of the text. And therefore have misunderstood much of what they have read.

I can’t fix it all. But what I CAN do is share the tools I have. 

One of the best gifts my parents ever gave me was teaching me how to study the Bible. I had a wealth of resources at my disposal – Bible dictionaries, commentaries, Strong’s Concordance, Biblical maps, etc – even as a child – and I was taught how to use them.

My dad (also my pastor) included outlines and note-taking sheets during Wednesday night Bible study at church, and was always ready to discuss a tricky passage with anyone. He wasn’t put off by questions others would deem heretical. He enjoyed reading and studying and lively discussions.

My mom made Bible class in homeschool a focal point. Sometimes we focused on Bible memorization. Sometimes we studied the Old Testament, or the New Testament. Sometimes we did a book study, or a character study, or a topical study.

Handling the Bible with integrity was paramount with both of them.

And it still is. 

I’ve watched my parents grow in their own knowledge of God’s Word, and I’ve watched them begin teaching certain topics in new ways to others as they discovered Truth themselves.

Just within the last year or so my dad realized a certain passage had been taught to him in an incorrect way. As he studied and learned differently than he’d originally thought, he started presenting that passage to others with his newly learned Truth. He has always demonstrated to me the value of consistent study, the willingness to be wrong, and the amazing gift of being humble enough to change his mind when he learns new information.

This is how we learn.

This is how we grow.

This is how we know God better. 

This is how we become the people He created us to be.

All of these things are close to my heart and mind as I create new Bible studies and create content for this blog. I don’t want to be another voice adding to the rabble. I don’t want to write or speak unless I have something helpful to add to the conversation. Mostly, I want to point you to God Himself, to studying His Word, and to finding hope and grace and joy in this life of freedom that Christ gives us.

If you are a new believer, you are absolutely welcome here. But if you are a struggling long-time believer, or a deconstructing believer, or a former believer that walked away and is now trying to find your way home – I am writing for you – to you.

I have very strong feelings about people who create disciples of their own personal convictions and biases. You won’t find that here. The Bible studies I create are based on the Bible. Nothing else. I have tried very hard to keep my own thoughts and feelings out of the way, and create studies that invite you to discover what HE says – not what I think. 

You matter. To Him. To me. And you are welcome here.

And so are those messy kids of yours. They’ll fit right in with my own.

Come. Stay a while. Here’s a chair and a cup of tea. Let’s learn and grow together.

To Know God as He Truly Is.