The Meaning Behind My Blog Name

After five years of blogging and nearly two years of running A Fresh Brewed Faith, I wanted to devote a post to the reasons behind this blog’s name, and why I’ve chosen to make blogging such a passionate hobby of mine.

It seems like there are always moments – on my blog and in my life – that require newness. A fresh start. Revision. Deleting. Repurposing.

The meaning behind my blog’s name was once fresh-brewed, too… Something new in my life that would result in more blessings I ever thought possible at the time of its beginning. Because I so desperately needed some place to write and create, I took the naming of my blog pretty seriously, and decided on a three-fold idea.

Fresh. (adjective) 1. newly made or obtained, recently arrived, just come, new, not previously known.

Fresh air. Fresh drinking water. Fresh flowers. Fresh, brewed coffee.

Is the word fresh not just refreshing to hear in itself?

Five years ago, I ran a smaller blog – all about my baking experiments – called Baking Con Brio. I blogged just for fun while I was busy teaching a third grade classroom full time. It was a great creative outlet, but the blogging hobby eventually took a back seat to work and raising a family. Baking Con Brio wasn’t a necessity in my life, and I was fine with that.

In 2013, our house was destroyed in a total loss fire. Between working full time, learning the ropes of parenting for the first time, being a new home-owner, and dealing with the chaos and trauma of the fire, I spiraled into a clinical depression that took over a year to treat. You can read more of my story here. This blog, A Fresh Brewed Faith, began anew in the summer of 2014 as a form of healing and writing therapy for me.

It blossomed into a huge amalgamation of things I love: coffee, baking, gardening, education, parenting, books, and God. Blogging quickly became my own personal, tangible space of serenity. A place where I could fully express myself in picture and word form, and for the most part, do so anonymously.

It became exactly the fresh start that I needed.

Life constantly needs to be brewed afresh. And I’m glad it does.

I must continue to breathe afresh every day, or my life will cease.

-Augustus Toplady

While starting life over, I knew I wanted that new life to be full of good things – steeped, soaked, and saturated in peace and hope and positivity.

Brew. (verb) to boil, steep, soak or cook.

To brew something is to allow for deep saturation of one thing in order create something new. You make coffee with part of a plant that’s been ground into near dust. You pour scalding water over the beans. Somehow, when making coffee, these different elements and ingredients – plant, water, and heat – transform into one remarkable, universal, and beloved drink that offers energy, warmth and of course, happy tastebuds.

It’s black and steaming from a corporate company mug.

It’s topped with foam and a to-go lid in the hand of the hard-working doctor.

It’s chilled over ice and served in a glass with a straw on your neighbor’s porch.

Whether viewed as comfort in a cup, or necessary caffeine (via an IV drip, please?), coffee embodies warmth and renewed energy. That’s exactly what I wanted out of my new blog two years ago when I began. I needed to be deeply saturated by God. I needed Him to be poured over the ground up parts of me. I needed His warmth and comfort to transform me into a person who could look on the side of hope with a smiling face, unafraid of the future.

Not only did I need a fresh start that was soaked in the Lord’s grace, but I also wanted that hope to spill over into my relationships with others, and into my hobbies – including blogging. I wanted to offer words of warmth, encouragement, and hope for anyone who might be reading.

It seems that in a dark, and growing-ever-darker world, there is much need for all things new, hopeful, optimistic, and faith-filled…which brings me to the last part of my three-fold blog name.

Faith. (noun) confidence or trust.

For me, the word faith has several meanings aside from the one you’ll find in the online Webster. It’s a name of great importance in my family, and name that’s been passed down for multiple generations and has become – by choice – my blogging identity.

The Bible also has my very favorite definition of the word faith:

Source

From Hebrews 11:11, Scriptures tell us that faith is all about leaping without seeing. Choosing to trust, even when our mind is in the overwhelm of fear. In my darkest hours, God revealed in His perfect time how and why I should trust Him above all else, and how to have faith that rises above my circumstances.

I want my faith in God to be consistently fresh-brewed, steeped in His love, and continuously flowing out of me.

Jesus is my number one reason for Hope in this crazy life, and my desire is to share his immense, grace-filled, and unmistakable love through small and simple things on this little blog.

The title “A Fresh Brewed Faith” was born out of these ideas and desires.

I’m thankful for the creative outlet this blog has provided for me. I’m thankful that God can heal through many different avenues.

I’m also thankful for the people who keep encouraging me to write. They have helped fuel my faith and in turn, have helped A Fresh Brewed Faith continue to be a place where I can write about my passions and encourage others to pursue the God that never leaves or forsakes.

It’s been an exciting adventure to learn more and more about the blogosphere in these least two years. But all SEO, tags, and stat-tracking aside, it’s been a  huge blessing to grow my blog in a way that reflects my personality, tells my family’s story, and hopefully encourages others and honors God in the process.

If you’re here reading, thanks!

I hope you come back for more.

❤

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