Ann Voskamp's Blog, page 151
January 28, 2017
Only the Good Stuff: Multivitamins for Your Weekend [01.28.17]
Happy, happy, happy weekend!
Some real, down in the bones JOY to celebrate today! Links & stories this week 100% guaranteed to make you smile a mile wide & believe like crazy in a Good God redeeming everything — and that there’s love everywhere & for ((you))!
Serving up only the Good Stuff for you right here:
Mary Anne Morgan
Mary Anne Morgan
Mary Anne Morgan
if this doesn’t win your Saturday I don’t know what else to tell you
anyone else want one?!
do you remember how to write in cursive?
love
celebrating 101 years young. This grandmother’s life motto?
“You don’t always get what you want, but you get what you need.”
so what do you think? kinda a brilliant idea?
Why they say yes to foster care:
We will say yes because these kids have to do hard things. The least we can do is look into their broken eyes and say, “Yes. I will do hard things with you. I will hold your hand and kiss your head and calm your tantrums. By God’s grace, we will figure this out together.” We say yes because these broken babies need a safe place to land.
on grace
yes, this: you don’t need a microphone to share the good news. Just go and tell.
even when no one is looking? let’s #beTheGIFT
Attention mamas! How to Have a Scream Free Morning Routine: FREE video and print!
To help you not just survive but to thrive during the crush of the morning rush.
I’m telling you — play it twice: because we all need a friend
photo: Molly Sprecher
now this is really something:
how a coach took the time to teach his team how to honor military veterans
Balint Alovits
Balint Alovits
Balint Alovits
the most intriguing spiral staircases found in Hungary
oh, the wonder of it
let’s do this!? #beTheGIFT
at this restaurant – grandmas are the cooks
The Dream Center
We circled ’round this one: yes, yes, yes.
she’s learned from her darkest times: there’s power in sharing your story
a compilation video of all of the unopened voicemails from his mom: so many tears at this — please don’t miss
good thoughts here: understanding the detours life brings your way
Post of the Week from these parts here:
… a painful confession — humbly offered…. shook right to my core and laid right low:
A Painful Confession: How Do Christians Today Not Deny or Trample on Christ?
The Broken Way Online Bible Study – you aren’t too late to join us!
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wholeness and brokenness are not opposites
the abundant life you crave is found in the broken pieces of your life, and
you don’t have to be afraid of broken things, because Christ is redeeming everything.Sign up for the study now and we’ll get started right away! We’re making the companion study videos available to you for FREE. All 6 beautiful, raw, vulnerable sessions!
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This is our year — our year — to BREAK FREE!
Listening to this incredible new album on repeat: iTunes and Amazon
…you know, it’s a really kind & beautiful thing for us all to walk together through a hurting world realizing that every single one of us is fighting a hard battle & it absolutely changes everything when we realize that sometimes:
people aren’t being difficult — they are having difficulty.
We could be buckets poured out and crushed into bread to feed the busted and we could be dead to all ladders and never go higher, but only lower, to the lonely, the least, the longing, and the lost.
And that right there? Could be our love song today. Love is not always agreement with someone, but it is always sacrifice for someone.
[excerpted from our little Facebook family … come join us each day?]
That’s all for this weekend, friends.
Go slow. Be God-struck. Grant grace. Live Truth.
Give Thanks. Love well. Re – joy, re- joy, ‘re- joys’ again
Share Whatever Is Good.
January 27, 2017
Live in the truth that you have infinite value to God
When I first met Christine Caine, slack-jawed might be the only word? When you witness someone astonishingly gifted for such a time as this, there are no words. I’ve listened to her speak countless times, talked Jesus with her over dinners, late through the night and over early breakfasts and this woman is called like no other, and she is an unstoppable global igniter of a whole generation. The journey of truth, freedom, purpose, and destiny she has been on since childhood has been the greatest and most painful of her life, but as Christine says, “It’s been totally worth it!” Christine’s lived bound and she’s lived free, and she knows without a doubt which one she prefers and which one Jesus wants for you. It’s a deep & humbling grace to welcome a woman I so esteem and love to the farm’s front porch today to have her share what it looks like to sprint toward victory for the kingdom of Christ…
Our family recently went on a sugar fast and although my girls were not happy about it they knew that if they wanted sugar after the fast, then they would have to adhere to the rules.
One night, I heard this noise downstairs so I went into the kitchen and there is my refrigerator open and Sophia has her spoon stuck in the ice cream container.
Her mouth was covered with chocolate ice cream.
I gave her another chance to redeem herself, but man, she was stubborn and she stuck to her story. So I called my husband, Nick. He began to question her and she just crumbled, admitted her guilt, and started bawling her eyes out.
She lost her privileges for a few weeks, mostly because she didn’t tell the truth. But when she got to the point of saying, “You know, Mommy and Daddy, I’m so sorry, what I did was wrong,” she admitted her guilt, then she received her consequences and it was over.
She understood the difference between her who and her do.
She understood that what she did was wrong, telling a lie is wrong. But she didn’t internalize that to make her feel like she was wrong.
I never understood that, for many decades of my life. I spent most of the first half of my life feeling I was bad, that I was inadequate, that I was fundamentally unworthy of love.
I could not separate my who and my do.
And I didn’t only feel guilty about what I had done or the things that were being done to me, I felt fundamentally ashamed of the very person that I was.
I cannot remember one time in my life where I didn’t feel this way. Shame was a constant companion for me.
Maybe you felt like I did, that something you’ve done or something that has been done or said to you has made you fundamentally wrong.
Maybe you still feel like you’re flawed, the very foundation of who you are is broken.
If so, let me share some really good news with you.
God loves you!
God does not reject you!
God sees you as having infinite value and infinite worth.
Jesus Christ has borne your shame so that you no longer need to carry the burden of shame. Jesus wants to heal you and not to shame you.
It is my heart that you are going to come out of hiding and that you are going to experience the tender, loving, merciful, and unconditional healing love of your heavenly Father. I know that I have, and I know the same Jesus that did it for me can do it for you.
Experience and observation have shown me that countless women of all ages on every continent that I’ve had the privilege to teach on have been schooled and shackled by shame.
A lot of times we feel such shame that we never recover from what we did because we cannot separate our who from our do.
But I want you to understand, there is no one like Jesus.
There is nothing else on the planet that can set you free like the blood of Jesus Christ.
Only Jesus Christ can give us forgiveness for our past—and here is the power of it—a brand new life today. He can move you past your past, because of His redemptive work on the cross of Calvary.
Therein lies the power of the gospel of Jesus. You can leave your guilt and your shame at the cross and you can move past your past.
You are not a shock to God. He knew what He was getting into when He chose you and me. You are the apple of His eye, the object of His affection.
I wonder if you believe that, because let me tell you, I didn’t. I didn’t believe that for years.
I had to get into the Word of God, renew my mind, and confess this Word until what I knew in my head to be true actually dropped the three inches down into my heart where I know that this is true.
Did you know that God created us to know no shame? Genesis 2:25 says that, “Adam and his wife were both naked and they felt no shame.”
Can you imagine what it would be like to never, ever feel vulnerable? To be authentic, transparent, or completely you? Well, that was the relationship that Adam and Eve enjoyed with God before they knew shame. There was no hiding. Only pure, open, heartfelt transparent, authentic relationship.
The truth that very few of us, if any, have known what it feels like to have never felt a moment of shame in our life. Each of us bears a wound, a blemish, a secret, or some kind of scar from shame. Like me, you’ve probably spent years trying to cover up your shame wounds. So why would you want to uncover them now and look at them?
Well, here’s the reason: what we don’t reveal cannot be healed.
You see, our wounds need treatment and the only way they will ever be healed is if we acknowledge them, if we uncover them, and if we hold them up to the only one that can ultimately help us.
Believe me when I tell you that I know this is not easy.
It has taken me fifty years to write Unashamed and it’s curriculum, because I would say without a doubt that the greatest challenge I have had in my life is overcoming shame. But I do know that uncovering and exposing your wounds to the light and life of Christ does bring healing and deliverance and freedom.
God’s light is tender, not harsh. As you trust Him with your pain He will gently shine His healing light on all your wounds. He is for you, not against you. And He will never shame you or humiliate you. That kind of treatment is just not in His nature. He is good, He is merciful, and kind. He didn’t cause your pain or mine, but He is ready to help you through it.
Jesus paid for your guilt and He bore your shame. He carried it all to the cross, and here is the good news—He left it there.
Listen to what Isaiah 53, verses 4 to 5 say: “He bore our grief, sicknesses, weaknesses, and distresses and shame. He carried our sorrows and pain. He was wounded for our transgressions. He was bruised for our guilt and inequities…With the stripes that wounded him we are healed and made whole.”
When Jesus emerged from that tomb, He was no longer clothed in the sin and shame of this world. Sin and its shame were left entombed, conquered, vanquished, paid for, redeemed by His blood’s sacrifice.
It is finished.
The blood of Jesus has healed you. The blood of Jesus has set you and me free. Honestly, I feel like jumping through this screen.
If I could sit face to face, grab you by the shoulders, look you in the eye and read one thing to you, it would be that over and over again until you got it.
Therein is the power of our freedom.
It lies in the redemptive work of Jesus Christ on the cross.
It is nailed.
It is hammered.
It is finished.
Christine Caine is a lover of Jesus, wife to Nick, and mum to Catie and Sophie. She travels the globe preaching, teaching, and advocating for justice. Powered by hot, extra-dry, skinny, cappuccinos, Christine is a lover of words who speaks too fast, talks too much, and writes it all down. She and her husband Nick founded A21, an anti-human trafficking organization that fights slavery around the globe. Christine has a heart for freeing captives, both physically and spiritually, but ultimately it comes back to her primary focus: building the Church.
In Unashamed, Christine Caine reveals the often-hidden consequences of shame—in her own life and the lives of so many Christian women—and invites you to join her in moving from a shame-filled to a shame-free life. Along with the book is a five-session video Bible study, where Christine weaves examples from her life with those of biblical characters who failed but overcame their shame to show how God heals us and redeems us. Perfect for individual or group study, the Unashamed Study Guide provides group discussion questions, video teaching notes, and prayers to accompany the Unashamed DVD Study, plus between-session personal study helps and journaling space for personal reflection. This book and study will help you learn, or relearn, how to define yourself by God’s truth, and your life will begin to take shape as it was designed to be. A life of freedom and strength.
[ Our thanks to Zondervan for their partnership in today’s devotion ]
January 26, 2017
A Painful Confession: How Do Christians Today Not Deny or Trample on Christ?
The administration wanted him to trample on Christ.
The Japanese officials wanted him to deny Christ, to take the sole of his foot and press it into the image of Christ, a copper cast of His Savior pressed into the dirt, what the Japanese call the fumi-e.
“Trample. Go ahead —- trample on Him.”
Over and over again, the Japanese officials urges the Christian to deny his God and walk all over Him.
In a cavernous theatre, with only 3 other people sitting somewhere up in the dark behind us, I find it hard to keep remembering to breathe through each scene of the historically accurate movie Silence —- and the gut-wrenching telling of one man’s faith grappling with hellish suffering and a government’s demand that he deny Christ, trample on the image of Christ, to stop the torture Christians throughout the country. I keep leaning forward. Hold my head in my hands.
What would I do, had I landed in that scrap of history? Would I trample? I feel tortured. I think I would stand unwaveringly for Christ — but would I?
If hundreds of the faithful were being burned alive until I denied Christ — would I withstand the months of prolonged psychological torture by the governmental powers that be and refuse to trample Christ, refuse to deny Christ, refuse to step on the image of Christ?
I can hardly stand the question — the torturing my own soul.
I sit in a hushed and gutted theatre, two of my sons leaning forward with me —- and you could hear their ticking gears of courage:
There is always a way to walk forward that doesn’t trample Christ.
My sons and I are on the edge of our seats, watching a movie historically portraying the horrifying moral dilemma of the1600s and the torturous wrestling of Christians being called to deny their faith and I feel wrung out — nauseated.
But one of our boys turns to me, leans close and whispers to me:
“There is nothing that can happen in the public square that can shake the private convictions of the heart.”
My wrestling — quietly, momentarily, stills.
Maybe — No laws of the state can make you an apostate of your beliefs.
* * *
I have no idea how many of us stepped across their threshold.
But, I’m telling you, there were babies slung on hips of laughing mamas and worn farmers with hands stuffed into old Wranglers and nodding police officers and unflappable teachers and a string of nurses and a newly minted bank manager, and we’re a bunch of far flung neighbours circled up in that crowded living room of our Syrian refugee family like hope can actually move right in to wherever you are and set up house and you don’t have to be afraid of anything that might come leering around any corner because you’ve got people who will hold you up and a God who goes before you and you are never alone.
“I’ve just got to say…” Marlene’s voice was the first one to rise above the din, the women passing around sleepy babies and tired men comparing the edges of their days in low, nodding tones.
“Well — of everything I’ve ever done, getting to meet you, know you, support you, help you rebuild your lives has been one of the greatest experiences of my life.” She smiles over at, Zaccharias and Fatin, our Syrian newcomer family from Aleppo.
“Thank you — for letting us just— be your friends. And this —- this is what friends do —- .” Marlene’s hand makes a sweeping gesture around the crowded room of the community of us who’s tried to help one refugee family resettle. Marlene’s found our Syrian family a doctor, taken them all in for medical check ups, dentist appointments, eye appointments.
The art of really living is giving and our theology is best expressed in the willingness of our hospitality.
Oh dear God — How do I live with heart and hands and door open to the stranger?
My sister chokes up. “Fatin?” Fatin looks up, her little boy Mohamad on her lap.
“You’re like family to us,” my sister annunciates the words slowly, clearly, hoping Fatin’s growing English can understand. My sister leans over a stove every day with Fatin. Practices English with her every day.
You must not oppress foreigners. You know what it’s like to be a foreigner, for you yourselves were once foreigners in the land of Egypt.” (Leviticus 19:34, Exodus 23:9)
“And I — I can’t imagine — our lives without you.” My sister reaches out her hand to Fatin.
Fatin tucks back her white hijab, leans forward, like she’s trying to catch her heart before it breaks — but she’s too late and her heart’s streaming liquid down her face.
“She dropped to her knees, then bowed her face to the ground. “How does this happen that you should pick me out and treat me so kindly—me, a foreigner?” ” Ruth 2:10
“Thank you. Just — Thank you.” Fatin looks up, all her love and thanks and tears streaming down, and I try to hold her gaze, but everything’s swimming a bit with pieces of my heart. “Everything, for all the things. Thank you.”
The Farmer, who’s led us all, who’s sitting beside Zacch like he does nearly every day, he nods, him and I both brimming.
I know what he’s thinking:
“If I hadn’t been able to do anything — I wouldn’t have been able to bear it.”
I look into Fatin and Zaccharias’ faces — and they bear the image of God. They have survived the bombing hell of Aleppo, they have snatched their children from an imploding, crumbling world of blood-hunting bombs and decapitations and starvation, they have fled the mouth of the ravenous monster that once was their home — and they carry the image of God.
We will never really reflect the image of Christ to the world — unless we really see the image of God in everyone.
And who can trample on their hopes, who can trample on their children’s needs for safety, who can trample on their need to find refuge?
Sitting there, thinking how our Fatin, the woman sitting in front of me, could be buried under the rubble of Aleppo, how her 3-year-old Mohamad could be bloodied and orphaned and eating grass, I had never known it quite like I did in that moment:
There are a thousand ways to deny Christ.
There are a thousand ways to trample on the image of Christ, to walk through the world and be denying the Words of Christ, the Ways of Christ, the Welcome of Christ.
I feel as nauseated as I did there sitting watching Silence, watching officials implore believers to step on the image of God.
No forces in any era can force us to trample the image of God in the world.
No laws of the state can make you an apostate of your beliefs.
Do I trample on Christ when I walk through the world apathetic to those fleeing war and poverty and oppression in this world?
Little Hyiam sits on the floor at her mother’s feet, colouring — she has cousins in Aleppo who’s tummies are gnawing starved for a couple of mouthfuls of food every other day.
Do I trample on Christ when I am more about protecting my way of life — than protecting others’ very life?
Do I trample on Christ when I walk in ways that care more about my comfort in the world, than the comfort of His image bearers being crushed in this world?
Do I trample on Christ when my steps forward every day are more about my safety, my interests, my economic betterment — than about walking in the self-giving, self-surrendered, self-sacrificing ways of Christ?
Is the way I’m walking every day — trampling on Christ all the time? I feel more than bit undone — head in hands.
The only way not to trample on Christ in the world — is to not trample on the marginalized, oppressed and voiceless in the world.
If my life denies that I am about the oppressed and crushed —- my life denies the gospel and Christ.
I feel small in a small room in a small corner of the world and a small little boy from Aleppo, reaches his hand up, slides his fingers through mine.
And a whole world of people will decide who Jesus is — by who we are.
A whole world of hurting people will decide what they think about Jesus — by how we decide to respond to the hurting.
Little Mohamed looks up at me. And I look into his eyes —-
When we turn our backs on the fleeing — we turn our backs on Christ.
What if — Jesus comes in the disguise of the desperate refugee, and to refuse Him is to refuse one’s identity as a Christian? I don’t know — but the question is a kind of agony for the soul.
And I lean over and scoop up little Mohamed who’s young life has known the tortures of war and he puts his arms around my neck and now is the time to welcome Christ.
There can be more compassion in our hearts than fear in the world, and now is the time to care for Christ.
Mohamed’s sisters gather round for hugs too and we hold on to each other and now is the time to protect Christ, advocate for Christ, risk for Christ.
And there is the heart of God beating clearly in the silence, like a begging prayer pounding loud in my veins, my ears:
Because if you do not, if you trample Christ, reject Christ, deny Christ, then who will pray for your tortured souls?
I don’t know how long I sit there that night holding Mohamed, watching him play, watching his little feet dance — and maybe, feeling this growing hope, that there is always a way to walk forward that doesn’t trample Christ.
Sign your name now to stand with the refugee
“… Fear is a real emotion, and it can cause us to make decisions we wouldn’t have otherwise made. Fear leads us to fix our eyes inward instead of on the “other.” But, as I’ve written before, at the core of who we are as followers of Christ is a commitment to care for the vulnerable, the marginalized, the abused and the wanderer.
Today, millions of people have had to flee home, safety, family and livelihood due to threats of violence. In fact, according to the United Nations Refugee Agency UNHCR, 1 in every 113 people in our world today has been forcibly displaced from their homes. And each one of these refugees has a name and story.
As fear overcomes us, our ability to see facts clearly also dims. We need clear facts on the issue, not alternative erroneous ones, when it comes to refugees. “Alternative facts” can have incredibly harmful consequences for people made in the image of God who are seeking refuge from violence, oppression and poverty.
And, here’s an important fact: coming to the United States as a refugee would be one of the worst ways to try and get in our country if you wanted to do harm. There is simply no evidence that our refugee program has created a significant problem of terrorism. Anyone saying anything else is making up false facts.
We are in what will be, according to former CIA Director Leon Panetta, a decades-long war with radical Islamism. However, refugees are not causing the violence. They are the ones fleeing it. Almost all recent terrorist attacks in our own nation have come from long-term residents or citizens, not new refugees.
Americans are debating these facts, but incorrect — alternative — facts lead to bad decisions….
So how should evangelicals respond to the ban on refugees?
First, we must continue to reject false facts.
Evangelicals today desperately need truth. We need to find it in the Bible, and we need to find it in the world around us. Facts are our friends, and we have to look for them. In this case, the data is out there for us to see — if fear has not blinded us to real facts.
The Cato Institute published a very thorough risk analysis on terrorism and immigration that tells us that the odds of an American citizen being killed by a refugee-turned-terrorist is 1 in 3.64 billion per year.
New America also compiled a profile that shows us the overwhelming majority of terrorist acts in the U.S. did not come from foreign infiltrators. These are the types of statistics that we need to know before we start shutting our doors to those who need help.
Second, we need to recapture a vision of what it means that all are made in God’s image.
I’m antiabortion because the unborn are made in the image of God, as are refugees. So, I’m pro-refugee because I am antiabortion.
When we remember that all people are made in the image of God, we might just see refugees differently, an idea that aligns with the values Americans have held dear…
Scott Arbeiter, president of World Relief, says it this way: “The decision to restrict all entry of refugees and other immigrants … contradicts the American tradition of welcoming families who come to the United States to start their lives again in safety and dignity. The American people — most of whom can trace their own families’ stories through a similar immigrant journey in search of freedom — are a hospitable people.”
He’s right. But, it’s not just because we are Americans. It’s because we are Christians.
God’s people should be the first ones to open their arms to refugees. We should welcome them and do what Christians, in your church and mine, have been doing a long time — showing and sharing the love of Jesus with them.
Finally, we must fight for those without a voice.
… I certainly understand the struggle with fear in our current climate, but I imagine that there are many people on the other side of the world who have experienced fear like you or I have not seen. And they have just been told they have nowhere to turn.
As an American citizen, I cannot change [certain Executive Orders]. But as a Christian and kingdom citizen, I cannot cheer for it, and I cannot stay silent. It is time to pray for those who are hurting, and to plead with our leaders to change course.
We are not Europe and refugees can’t walk here. We have a well-run and safe refugee resettlement program with a long history of religious group involvement. And as an evangelical and a board member of the National Association of Evangelicals, I am thankful for its statement supporting refugee resettlement.
But, I will add that I am deeply disappointed to see this safe program maligned and discounted by others who use alternative facts to say that it is dangerous in ways it is not.
As Americans who are also Christian, we often cry out, “God bless the United States!” Fear cannot lead us to the point where our only cry left is, “May God have mercy on our souls!”
This is a safe program and one that evangelicals like me say…. “Give [us] your … huddled masses, yearning to be free.”
Alternative facts must not lead us to bad choices that hurt the most vulnerable — that’s not the way of Jesus and not in line with actual facts.” — to read Ed Stetzer’s complete article at The Washington Post
Related: ““Of all the categories of persons entering the U.S., these refugees are the single most heavily screened and vetted,” explains Jana Mason, a senior adviser to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees…. Please consider reading further the facts of how the Syrian Refugee Screening Process Works
From Here: How to ask the one question to make your life bearable
Our family’s story of welcoming in and adopting a Syrian refugee family
Sign your name now to stand with the refugee
Links for 2017-01-25 [del.icio.us]
Our #1 Best-Selling Drone--Meet the Dark Night of the Sky!
January 24, 2017
it’s okay to say it out loud — We’re All Really Waiting & Wanting & Ready for This:
T ell me —
You’re ready to Break Free too?
From the noise that deafens and duct-tapes love, the anger that cuts the only house we all call home right in half, from the divisions that mangle and maul all that could make our one roof strong.
Ready to break free from the agony of your Egypt, from your too-long exile, from your every day prison of never being enough, of having to prove and perform and perfect till your neglected soul feels infected with what it feels like everyone else expects, ready to break free from worry, and panic —– from the merciless tyranny of the fear of suffering.
Tell me —
Tell me, you’re ready to Break Free too from the small boxes your heart has stuffed itself into, because it’s felt like it’s too much, feeling like you’re too much heart or too much midsection, too much emotion or too much mental commotion,
Boxed up and confined and defined
by these lies pounding loud in your head, by your hounding past, by the sharp, stinging edge of wounds that have lashed you deeply …. or you’ve soundlessly cut yourself.
Tell me,
You’re ready to Break Free too, from relentless bondage, from sins that steal your first love, that kill your hope for change, that destroy your courage, from the idols that have you enslaved to their strategy, instead of emancipated to the freedom of His sovereignty,
ready to break free from the distortion of your redemption that tangles in the mirror, from the twisting of the truth of the beauty of who you even now are becoming, from the violation of your one given and unshakeable identity.
Tell me, You’re ready to Break Free too, from feeling forced to climb ladders higher, to consume more, from the deceit of the things that glimmer and shimmer and flake away, from wanting more things so you can hold the joy of becoming more, experiencing God more, of giving your heart more,
ready to break free from distractions and procrastination and condemnation, from the idea of the ideal life, from the perpetual lie of the perfect, from the soul-sucking rat race and run with unshatterable peace this spiritual race of faith set before you,
because you absolutely must break free from the tepid waters of ease and cynicism and apathy and negativity that are daily determined to slowly boil your one soul.
Tell me,
You’re ready to Break Free
from anger too, because Jesus never meant for your soul to become a container for anger — because anger is the only toxin that destroys what it’s carried in.
Tell me,
You’re ready to Break Free
because Jesus comes to give you freely through His suffering passion what every other god forces you to try to get through striving performance.
Tell me,
You’re ready to Break Free
because Jesus makes you so brave you do not have to pray for your Hard Thing to go away, because you have His bravery that’s bigger than the hard thing.
Tell me,
You’re ready to Break Free
because Jesus, The One whose breath births galaxies into being, births healing into the heart of the broken.
Tell me,
You’re ready to Break Free, too — because Jesus.
Tell me
you are ready to Break Free into the daily habit of Joy, into the command to celebrate, into the liberating business of joy, into the worthy fight for joy — joy in Him.
Tell me, you’re ready to Break free from the fear of being buried by everything
because the truth you can never afford to forget is: your life is a seed — and what feels like it’s burying you,
is the soil in which you are a seed breaking wide open —
into the freedom of new life.
What if there was an evening that’s like handing you own keys to break free?
One night that’s a gift to you: to break you free from the fears, from the weight, from the pressure, from the stranglehold of all the things.
Think exhale. Think holy space. Think candles. Think more Jesus.
Think music that sounds like the voice of worship and grace and the beauty of cruciform freedom: with Dove Award Nominated vocalist Best Female Artist of the Year, Christy Nockels.
Think gloriously, powerful moving words about breaking into the free that’s all yours right now: with Rebekah Lyons, author of You are Free.
Think of an unforgettable evening daring to take The Broken Way to abundant freedom.
Think of an evening lit with a door broken wide open to what you want most: freedom into more joy, more peace, more Jesus.
Christy, Rebekah and I, we’re so excited! Do we get to exhale relief & inhale breaking free with you?
We’d love to meet you & live Broken Free:
Winterville, NC: Reimage Church, Thursday Feb 23rd 7pm ET
Nashville, TN: Christ Presbyterian Church, Friday Feb 24th 7pm ET
Memphis, TN: Trinity Baptist Church, Saturday Feb 25th 7pm ET
Sugar Land, TX: Sugar Land Baptist Church, Sunday Feb 26th 7pm CT
Arlington, TX: Lamar Baptist Church, Tuesday Feb 28th 7pm CT
Tulsa, OK: Evergreen Baptist Church, Wednesday March 1st 7pm CT
Leawood, KS: Christ Community Church, Thursday March 2nd 7pm CT
Eau Claire, WI: Calvary Baptist Church, Saturday March 4th 7pm CT
Chicago, IL: Harvest Bible Church, Sunday March 5th 6pm CTThis farm girl will be humbly and gratefully be looking for you: TheBrokenandFreeTour.com
Links for 2017-01-23 [del.icio.us]
Our #1 Best-Selling Drone--Meet the Dark Night of the Sky!
January 23, 2017
Confessions of an Imperfect Mama & the Lessons My “Different” Child Taught Me
No one has mentored me quite like this woman. Sally Clarkson has poured me tea, has poured into me, has poured from a depth of rich wisdom and life well-lived and she loves from the deepest places. She has learned the secret of cherishing and celebrating life each day, always looking for the fingerprints of God to delight her. Raising four outside-the-box children and learning to embrace her life puzzle has taught her the freedom that comes from living to please only God, the only one who can offer unconditional love and total acceptance. Listening for the song of God through the dark moments in her life journey has given her peace of heart and joy in her moments. Mentoring others to know and experience God’s beauty is a passion that fills her days as she writes, loves, and moves through each day. It’s a grace to welcome Sally to the farm’s front porch today…
A pril 19, my son’s birthday, found me rocking slowly on my front porch, chilled from the Colorado mountain breeze, sipping tea before the sunset had closed the day.
I opened my computer, and the first e-mail I saw was from my 27-year-old, Nathan.
A smile spread across my heart. He was hundreds of miles away in New York City, and I longed for news every day to know that he was flourishing.
His life was an epic story I never knew I would live through.
His note was a surprise I didn’t expect, and never realized I needed, but it touched a hidden part of tenderness that brought the most satisfying joy.
Let me tell you about Nathan. He was different from the start.
We named him Nathan John, which means “A Gracious Gift from God.”
When I went into labor with Nathan, he almost slid out, after an hour of labor, and was one of the most beautiful babies I had ever seen.
Folding my arms gently around his warm little boy body, I thanked God that He had blessed me with the gift of this tiny, easygoing little boy, since now I had three children under five.
After giving birth to two children, I thought I was a pretty good mama. My first two children responded happily to my ways of loving, living, and training them, and I felt at ease as a seasoned mama.
This quiet lasted for two days.
From the third day, he rarely slept through the night. He would rage and scream, arch his back, and flail in my arms for hours on end. Unlike my first two, he refused to cuddle or allow me to be affectionate. He wouldn’t nurse, and he was inconsolable even after my attempts to sing him to sleep at nights. Often agitated, he wailed and wriggled for hours on end. Exhausted and disheartened, I stumbled through my days like a zombie. Nathan was different from the beginning.
Often, as people outside our family observed our little crew, they would feel free to give unasked-for input.
“Do you think you are disciplining your child enough?”
So often, voices screamed inside my head of my failure to control this little one, and invisible fingers inside pointed at my failures every time he screamed and fell on the floor in one more out-of-control moment.
How I hated to lose my temper, to raise my voice, to show impatience, because I wanted to be a loving, gentle mama. Yet he pushed so many buttons, I would eventually become exasperated, again.
There were some moments when he would curl into my mama arms and, for a few minutes, be as sweet as any toddler. More often, he would defy every request, fall on the floor and scream, and throw his older siblings into strife-induced chaos.
Eventually, he would be defined by letters and evaluations: ADHD, OCD, dyslexic, ODD, and a string of other interesting taglines.
One late afternoon, after a particularly challenging day, I was sitting on our mountainside deck, again pouring my heart out to God.
I was convinced that God had chosen the most inadequate person in the world to be his mama—and was quite sure He had made a mistake.
“How can I reach this precious little boy? How am I supposed to mother him? Train more? Discipline more? Sympathize and show patience more generously? Did God choose the wrong child?”
As I sat pondering, it was as though God convicted me,
“What if raising Nathan is an act of service I have called you to? Will you accept him as a gift from Me?
Will you submit to the circumstances he brings to your whole family because you believe I am in control? Will you humble yourself and accept My will and stop fighting against him? Even if no one else ever sees the battles you have lived through or knows your quiet faithfulness to love him, your service of worship to Me is not lost. I see you! You may feel alone because so few understand, but you are not alone. I am with you and with him every day. Nathan is fearfully and wonderfully made; I formed him in your womb. He is different because I allowed it. He has My fingerprints all over his heart, mind, and soul—and his personality is a gift, not only a challenge.”
It was a watershed moment in my life. I began to realize that my son was a gift from God. But God desired me to give up control and to live faithfully into the moments He had given me.
“Sally, don’t try to figure him out or change him to what you want him to be. I want you to love him as I love him. Treat him with honor and respect because he is made in My likeness, and I will give you the grace to raise him. Leave him in My capable hands.”
Yielding my beloved, difficult child helped relieve me from always feeling I was responsible for his maturity and well-being. I gave him into God’s hands. I learned to walk in faith.
I saw that my sweet boy was not a diagnosis.
Not a problem to be solved or a disorder to be fixed.
He was a child to be guided, cherished, trained, and gloried in.
Through the years, Nathan became one of my most cherished friends. He was a child who delighted me. Loving him taught me that God loved me so dearly, as I was, in spite of my imperfections.
I was stretched, challenged, humbled, and humiliated enough to know his story was not about me, but about being faithful to the God who had entrusted him to us.
Choosing to live into my God-ordained role of shepherding this little boy took precedence over my need to be approved of as a mother—and this release of expectations brought freedom and grace.
This truth dawned on me: we all are different in one way or another, all of us a little bit quirky.
The walls of our souls are covered with their own unique murals, and when God steps inside, He’s not looking to change, whitewash, or push us to conform.
Instead, He revels in the uniqueness He created each of us to have.
In the end, Nathan was, indeed, a gracious gift from God.
To learn what Nathan’s email said that morning, play this video:
Sally Clarkson is the mother of four wholehearted children, a popular conference speaker, and a champion of women everywhere. She is the bestselling author or coauthor of numerous books and articles on Christian motherhood and parenting, including The Lifegiving Home, Own Your Life, Desperate, The Mission of Motherhood, The Ministry of Motherhood, and most recently Different.
In this book, you will join Sally and Nathan as they share their stories from a personal perspective as mother and son. If you are in need of help and hope in your own journey with an outside-the-box child, or if you’re an adult trying to make sense of your differences, you’ll find deep insight, resonance, and encouragement in the pages of this book. Dare to love and nurture the “different” one in your life.
[ Our thanks to Tyndale for their partnership in today’s devotion ]
January 21, 2017
Only the Good Stuff: Multivitamins for Your Weekend [01.21.17]
Happy, happy, happy weekend!
Some real, down in the bones JOY to celebrate today! Links & stories this week 100% guaranteed to make you smile a mile wide & believe like crazy in a Good God redeeming everything — and that there’s love everywhere & for ((you))!
Serving up only the Good Stuff for you right here:
Meg Loeks
Meg Loeks
Meg Loeks
can’t ever quite get enough of the extraordinary that she shares again and again
just in case you’re always wanted to know? the art of making mini donuts.
So what a shot this one turned out to be
Amos Chapple
Amos Chapple
Amos Chapple
can’t help but love this dad
Book lovers? I think you’re gonna wanna pay this store (previously a 100 year old theatre) a visit!
so? how is this possible?
Phillip Haumesser
this self-taught photographer shares what he’s learned along the way
because sometimes we all need to be rescued
Mary Anne Morgan
“So friends, be encouraged. Here comes the rain. After a season of drought or grief, your prayers are being answered by a kind and loving Father God. He has not forgotten us.”
she’s living against the odds: and making the moments count
Adam Biernat
Adam Biernat
Adam Biernat
just had to share: their 18 month trip to Iceland? anyone else really wanna go?
glory, glory, glory… I never get over how the whole world is full of His glory — and how my soul needs to slow & witness His wonder
at 3 years old? she read 1,000 books. at 4? she doubled that. I just love her.
a story of bravery, small steps, and raising awareness for all parents
you’ve got to meet him: Jim Ford. #beTheGIFT
Post of the Week from these parts here
Can’t. Get. This. Out. Of. My. Head: how to always make your life bearable: the 1 question you have to ask
kindness goes a long way…#beTheGIFT
one not to miss here…”for who can have victory over God? No one.”
Hope to the Nations:
2 Syrian refugee brothers: their music and their amazing story
why you need a reading plan & good books for a new year:
how you can’t be wrecked by what you’re ready for [#WRT]
So we dreamed up — a BOOK CLUB! Join us this year for #WRT: We Read Toge(s)ther: 1 year. 12 books. For such a time as now.
We can do this toge(s)ther — 1 year — 12 books. We are where we are for a reason and a purpose and now, now, is our time to make a difference, change our world, and join Him in changing the world.
Steve McCurry
…and with reading & good books in mind? just had to share this one:
Striking photos of readers around the world
Our year to BREAK FREE. Let’s do this…. want to do this with you:
The Broken Way Online Bible Study begins on Monday!
Get access to all 6 FREE study videos + FREE downloads to get started
The Broken Way is a new FREE six-week online Bible study, where you will discover that…
wholeness and brokenness are not opposites
the abundant life you crave is found in the broken pieces of your life, and
you don’t have to be afraid of broken things, because Christ is redeeming everything.
Sign up for the study now and we’ll get started THIS week – Monday, January 23! I’ll kick things off with a FREE online event on Monday with all of our online Bible study participants. And we’re making the companion study videos available to you for FREE. All 6 beautiful, raw, vulnerable sessions!
Register now and get the schedule, free downloads, and all the great bonuses you need to get started right away — Please be in with us? You’re needed and wanted and belong.
(And if you need a copy of The Broken Way — just for you: 50% off right now at B&N)
Please click right here for all of the information you’ll need to sign up.
This is our year — our year — to BREAK FREE!
There is freedom found when we lay our secrets down at the cross…
…don’t ever get it backwards: Brokenness is always the beginning. Repentance, good brokenness, is the only way to progress in this life because growth only happens through the seed broken open. Have you ever stood in the majesty of an oak that didn’t come from a busted seed?
Jesus turns to our questions of why—why this brokenness, why this darkness?—and says, “You’re asking the wrong question. You’re looking for someone to blame. There is no such cause-effect here. This happened so the power of God could be seen in him.”
There’s brokenness that’s not about blame.
There’s brokenness that makes a canvas for God’s light.
There’s brokenness that makes windows straight into souls.
Brokenness happens in a soul so the power of God can happen in a soul.
The whole suffering world rings with the comfort of it,
how His nailed scarred hands cup our faces, hold our hurting hearts & He whispers: “I know… I know. Me too. Me too.”
We never cry alone.
Never, ever alone.
[excerpted from our little Facebook family … come join us each day?]
That’s all for this weekend, friends.
Go slow. Be God-struck. Grant grace. Live Truth.
Give Thanks. Love well. Re – joy, re- joy, ‘re- joys’ again
Share Whatever Is Good.
January 19, 2017
the secret to fighting the battles you’ve got ahead of you
We all struggle with identity—who we are, why we are, and what we have to offer this vast, broken world. About the time we find a scrap of worth or significance, something happens that leaves us fully aware of how much we lack. A harsh word. A wounded relationship. A mistake, misstep or failure. Then, in spite of our best efforts at positivity or affirmation, we can’t escape the aloneness, disappointment, and insecurity that linger. When it comes to this epidemic of misplaced identity, few people have earned the right to be heard like my friend Michele Cushatt. Michele knows what it’s like to have the breath knocked out of her lungs, to endure the kind of losses that leave a girl empty and desperate and lost in her own skin. But she also know what it’s like to push through the darkness, to cry out to God for mercy, and to discover the miracle of a God whose love and presence never fail. It’s a grace to welcome Michele to the farm’s front porch today…
He came home one day from seventh grade on the verge of tears.
Of course, he tried to deny it, to blink away the evidence. But I knew better.
This was my tenderhearted boy. The one whose well of emotion ran deep, the one who could never hide either his joy or his pain.
It took mere minutes of maternal questioning before he finally caved:
Bullies. Two of them. Fellow seventh graders.
These were kids he’d once called friends in early grade school. Now they were making an ordinary school day a nightmare.
It had been going on for a few weeks, he said. In Spanish class they openly mocked him, hurling insults in front of the entire class, including a passive teacher. At the end of each day, as he rushed to grab his backpack and catch the bus home, they blocked his way or pushed him to the ground.
Mean. Nothing but middle school meanness.
In seconds, I morphed from gentle mama comforting her baby to raging bear on the verge of attack.
No one hurts my child!
I grabbed my phone, ready to punch in the ten numbers for the school office and expose the bullies to the staff.
Then, a better idea. A face-to-face beat down! I grabbed my car keys, ready to give those boys a talking-to they’d never forget.
“Please, Mom. Don’t.”
My boy’s plea stopped me in my tracks.
“I don’t want you to do anything, Mom. I’ll take care of it. Please.”
Now, I know there are times when bullying needs to be confronted and stopped. I’ve read enough heartwrenching news stories to know the seriousness of adolescent taunts.
But in this case, I could also see my son’s perspective.
He wanted a chance to stand up to them, to handle it himself without running away.
Reluctantly—and after much deep breathing—I agreed.
Within a short time, my son had handled the situation and the bullies had backed off. And he’d found a solid group of close friends—his cross-country teammates—who provided a safe circle of friendship throughout his high school years.
Even better, he found himself.
He came to see his own value, something no bully could take away. That confidence serves him well to this day.
I’ve thought hard and often about those precarious weeks in seventh grade. It could’ve turned out differently. I still have moments when I question my decision to back off. And yet perhaps what my boy needed most I’d already provided:
A promise to go to battle for him.
He needed to know he had someone in his corner.
The fact that I was furious with those seventh-grade boys helped him to recognize the injustice of it. It also gave him courage to stand up to them.
I may not have driven to the school or picked up the phone, but I fought for him just the same.
I fought for his sense of value.
I fought for his dwindling courage.
And I fought for him to discover that no one, no matter how seemingly powerful, can steal who we are. Ever.
To a seventh-grade boy trying to find his way, those truths proved the difference between success and failure on the middle school battlefield.
Our battles may no longer include twelve-year-old bullies.
But every one of us—child and adult alike—need to know there is someone in our corner.
When we’re up against a fight, something that feels far beyond our ability to win, our strength is revived when we know we’re not alone.
This is clearly seen in Exodus 14, when Moses and the Israelites find themselves backed up against the Red Sea.
With an army of angry Egyptians pursuing from behind, they must press forward or be overcome. But how does a beat-down group of former slaves swim across an ocean?
In that moment, faced with personal frailty and the Egyptians’ cruelty, the Israelites panicked. They’d endured much, waiting for their freedom. Now it seemed they had no way out. Fear and doubt pressed in as hard as the approaching Egyptian army.
That’s when God spoke up through Moses:
“Do not be afraid. Stand firm and you will see the deliverance the Lord will bring you today. The Egyptians you see today you will never see again. The Lord will fight for you; you need only to be still” (Ex. 14:13–14).
I can almost hear God’s fiery pronouncement: no one hurts my children!
In the moments that followed, God did indeed fight for His children.
He didn’t swoop down with sword and chariot to cut down the Egyptians.
Instead, in dramatic display, He parted the Red Sea, allowing His children to pass through. Once they arrived safely on the other side, He allowed the waters to return to their place, swallowing up the Egyptian pursuers.
This isn’t the only biblical evidence of God’s willingness to go to battle for those He loves. He did the same when:
King Jehoshaphat faced a “vast army” (2 Chron. 20:15)
Joshua and the Israelites fought for Jericho (Joshua 5 and 6).
Joseph, Mary, and an infant Jesus fled a jealous king (Matt. 2:13–18).
A world filled with broken, desperate people prayed for a Savior (John 3:16–17).
We have a God who fights for us.
At times I want His fight to look like the elimination of all pain and suffering.
I want Him to swing His sword at every injustice, every disease, every evil.
At times, that’s what He does.
But like a mama who stayed close to her boy, helping him find the faith to navigate the world of middle school bullies, sometimes our God fights for us in ways we didn’t imagine.
He doesn’t remove the battle, but He walks with us through it.
Either way, our God never leaves us alone on the battlefield.
He fights for His children.
To the very end.
And He always wins.
Michele Cushatt and the love of her life, Troy, live in the mountains of Colorado with their six children, ages 9 to 24. She enjoys a good novel, a long run, and a kitchen table filled with people.
Pulling from her experiences of raising children from trauma, a personal life-threatening illness, and the devastating identity crises that came to her family as a result, Michele creates safe spaces for honest conversations around the tensions of real faith and real life.
The words of Michele’s most recent book—I Am: A 60-day Journey to Knowing Who You Are Because of Who He Is—were penned during her long and grueling recovery from a third diagnosis of cancer during which she was permanently altered physically, emotionally and spiritually. In it, she speaks with raw honesty and hard-earned insight about our current identity epidemic and the reasons why our best self-help and self-esteem tools aren’t enough to heal our deepest wounds. A profoundly needed, helpful read.
[ Our humble thanks to Zondervan for their partnership in today’s devotion ]
Links for 2017-01-18 [del.icio.us]
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