Ann Voskamp's Blog, page 202

when you feel like you don’t fit or really belong

Someone has to be that Mother.

That mother who drives a full 3 hours to the border with a packed mini-van and anxious kids and creeps through a 20 minute traffic backup under the hot, beating sun—

only to rifle through her wallet and look up feebly to tell the custom’s officer she doesn’t have birth certificates for 2 of her children.

Yeah — that would be me.

“Do you have any ID at all — for either one of them?”

The custom’s officer asks it gently. Like he doesn’t want to push the flustered and flailing over any imagined or very real edge.

He glances back at the long snake of vehicles behind me, waiting. In the sun. That’s not moving either.

“Um… no.” I shuffle through my wallet again. “No, sir — I don’t.”

Does the earth open up and swallow the Abiram of mothers?

 

Click here to continue reading how I really blew it…

Only the Good Stuff: Multivitamins for Your Weekend [06.27.15]

when they all went out to the ballpark, no one expected the sky to do this & steal the show

so — what happens when you combine an artist with a photogenic bull terrier

well, if you take a whole lot of things literally — it gets sorta funny

okay, who saw this one coming?!?

“Here’s to the uncommon treasures in our lives we forget to acknowledge”

[ Dare to Live Fully ]

 sorta hard not to laugh along?

okay, this is pretty creative 

 … and our Creator astonishes when He created this

The American Civil War – then and now

Fascinating photography and commentary

the boys thought this was fascinating

I can never get enough of stuff like this: 

40 random acts of selfless kindness – promise: they’ll inspire your weekend

Easy ways to get some amazing photos

for the past 8 years? Two animals that should not get on but they do. It’s a great life lesson.

a regretful stowaway

inseparable: abandoned dog and his guide dog best friend

farmers are an interesting bunch: literally serenading the cattle home

How Being Specific is Changing the World

“We pray because we have hope for change —

 so faith means imagining what that change might be.“

this, right about now

sometimes the way we say  thank you changes everything

 maybe the only limits are the ones in our minds?

self taught photographer captures the most extraordinary images in China

maybe the most important thing about us, is the way we see

how this mama saves her bunnies?

On the Stack at the Farm this Week:

Anything: The Prayer that Unlocked My God and My Soul, by Jennie Allen. 

“Somehow I thought most of my life following God was not supposed to be too costly. Following God is flat costly….

“Great people don’t do great things; God does great things through surrendered people.”

“Caught in this familiar haze of worldly happiness and empty pursuits, Jennie Allen and her husband Zac prayed a courageous prayer of abandonment that took them on an adventure God had written for them. “God, we will do anything. Anything.

Anything is a prayer of surrender that will spark something. A prayer that will move us to stop chasing things that just make us feel happy and start living a life that matters. A life that is…Surrendered. Reckless. Courageous.

If we truly know a God worth giving anything for, everything changes.” One book, one prayer, to ignite your summer with.

 

The Better Life: Small Things You Can Do Right Where You Are, by Claire Diaz-Ortiz

“The Key to Big Change — is small change.” An easy, small book — to deeply inspire small & huge change. Paired with Jennie Allen’s Anything — and you’ve got fire in your bones for beautiful things!

a social experiment – on how we treat one another. Perspective

Why Would God Choose Me

“…all of our lives should be lived in the constant amazement of this — “

okay, the kids and I could hardly believe this?

Post of the week from these parts here:

…so, if we’re all being honest here — we’re all fighting a hard battle — and sometimes you just really need someone to gently throw our a real life line — and you’ll take it:

something to hold on to when you’re tired & the world’s broke your heart a bit

a boy on a mission – what if we all did something like this?

something to really cheer about — life lessons learned on and off the field

when we base life on simply what we see — we miss the power of living.

The Art of Experiencing Life

[ print’s free for you here ]

Dear Little Lies that are keeping us up late:

Yes, you Lies that are telling us it’s not going to turn out okay,

that God won’t be enough, that this mountain ahead of us is too high, that we’re going to fail, mess up, blow it, lies that give us no rest — well, guess what, Little Lies?

The Truth is that God’s got us, that He’s bigger than any mountain, He can make a road through any ocean, He’s in us & with us & for us & He is enough, so we will always have & be enough — and His absolute perfect love for us kicks all you Little Lies & all you Lying Fears right to the curb.

So consider yourself busted, Little Lies & Lying Fears:

When His Love’s got a hold of you?

There isn’t a lie in the universe that can pull you apart.

Love has a hold of us — so you fear & the lies really don’t.

Love, The Free & Absolutely Safe Us.

[excerpted from our evening devotions in our little Facebook community … come join us?]

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.

2 Questions to ask — that might keep a whole lot of us from walking away from God & church

So when Sally Lloyd-Jones came for an overnight jaunt to the farm, our kids sort of thought it was a bit like the Queen was coming — I mean, don’t they both have the loveliest British accents? And our kids have literally been raised up on The Jesus Storybook Bible (over a million copies sold!)  –– so Sally was like a bit of wonder and love coming for tea — or just bacon and eggs. You can’t help but fall in love with this woman of deep theological truths and endearing warmth. We absolutely loved everything about her — and are counting the days till she comes back.  The farm’s front porch is humbled and ecstatic to welcome Sally’s wonderful words today…

by Sally Lloyd-Jones

One of my strongest memories is when I was six, walking to church holding my dad’s hand, on a tree-lined street on a sunny Sunday morning in south London.

From the outside, you’d say “Oh. How lovely. A father and his daughter going to church together.”

But inside, what only God and I knew was that I was making a vow in my 6 year-old heart: “When I grow up I’m never going to church ever again.”

I was a Christian child, in a Christian family. I’d heard all the Bible stories. I’d been taught all the lessons.

What went wrong?

I dreaded that Sunday school.

It was all about was rules and how I wasn’t doing it right. I had enough of that at real school in the week. Why would I want to go and hear it again from God on a Sunday?

What was missing? The most crucial thing.

I had not heard The Story.

My imagination had not caught fire.

+++

When I go into churches and speak to children I ask them two questions:

1.  How many people here sometimes think you have to be good for God to love you?

They tentatively raise their hands. I raise my hand along with them.

2. How many people here sometimes think that if you aren’t good, God will stop loving you?

They look around and again raise their hands.

These are children in Sunday schools who know the Bible stories.

These are children who probably also know all the right answers — and yet they have somehow missed the most important thing of all.

They have missed what the Bible is all about.

They are children like I once was.

As a child, even though I was a Christian, I grew up thinking the Bible was filled with rules you had to keep (or God wouldn’t love you) and with heroes setting examples you had to follow (or God wouldn’t love you).

I tried to be good. I really did.

But however hard I tried, I couldn’t keep the rules all the time so I knew God must not be pleased with me.

And I certainly couldn’t ever be as brave as Daniel. Hard as I tried to imagine myself daring to be a Daniel, being thrown to lions and not minding… I knew I could never be as good as Daniel.

I knew I wasn’t nearly brave enough.

Or faithful enough.

Or good enough.

How could God ever love me?

I was sure He couldn’t.

One Sunday recently, I was reading the story of Daniel and the Scary Sleepover from The Jesus Storybook Bible to some 6 year olds during a Sunday school lesson.

One little girl in particular was sitting so close to me she was almost in my lap. Her face was bright and eager as she listened to the story, utterly captivated. She could hardly keep on the ground and kept kneeling up to get closer to the story.

At the end of the story there were no other teachers around and I panicked and went into automatic pilot and heard myself asking, “And so what can we learn from Daniel about how God wants us to live?”

As I said those words it was as if I had literally laid a huge load on that little girl.

Like I broke some spell. She crumpled right in front of me, physically slumping and bowing her head.

I will never forget it.

It is a picture of what happens to a child when we turn a story into a moral lesson.

When we drill a Bible story down into a moral lesson, we make it all about us.

But the Bible isn’t mainly about us, and what we’re supposed to be doing—it’s about God, and what He has done.

When we tie up the story in a nice neat little package, and answer all the questions, we leave no room for mystery.

Or discovery.

We leave no room for the child.

No room for God.

When we say, “Now what that story is all about is…”, or “The point of that story is…” we’re totally missing the point.

The power of the story isn’t in summing it up, or drilling it down, or reducing it into an abstract idea.

Because the power of the story isn’t in the lesson.

The power of the story IS the story.

And that’s why I wrote The Jesus Storybook Bible. So children could know what I didn’t:

That the Bible is most of all a story—the Story of how God loves His children and comes to rescue them.

That—in spite of everything, no matter what, whatever it cost Him—God would always love his children… with a wonderful, Never Stopping, Never Giving Up, Unbreaking, Always and Forever Love.

And that, in this Story, there is only one Hero.

I wrote The Jesus Storybook Bible so children could meet Him in its pages.

And become part of His Magnificent Story.

Because rules don’t change you.

But a Story—God’s Story—can.

 

With over a million copies sold, the Jesus Storybook Bible tells the Story beneath all the stories in the Bible. At the center of the Story is a baby, the child upon whom everything will depend. Every story whispers His name.

From Noah to Moses to the great King David–-every story points to Jesus. He is like the missing piece in a puzzle—the piece that makes all the other pieces fit together.  A Bible like no other, The Jesus Storybook Bible invites children to join in the greatest of all adventures, to discover for themselves that Jesus is at the center of God’s great story of salvation— and at the center of their Story too.

This book is a classic in the line of C.S. Lewis — written so magnificently, that it’s not just for children, but for people of all ages — adults love reading and re-reading the wonder that is The Jesus Storybook Bible. I can’t recommend this book highly enough — I’ve taken it all over the world, handing it out to children. It’s the one book I wish I could get into the hands of every child around the world — because it hands them Jesus. Absolute 5 Star. 

Links for 2015-06-25 [del.icio.us]

Homeschooling - It Was Worth It!

"...learn from and be encouraged by families who’ve gone before you." FREE e-book!
Famous

yes, yes, yes, this: "Famous is one thing: resurrection is another." @sarahbessey
Curbing Comparison

"Comparison is a quiet vulture, swooping in to peck its sharp beak at our joy, our camaraderie, and our witness to the world." @dukeslee
Is Suicide a Cowardly Selfish Choice?

"Death by depression looks different from death by heart attack or cancer but, in fundamental ways, it is the same." @shaungroves shares helpful, needed info...

Links for 2015-06-24 [del.icio.us]

How to Complain Without Grumbling

"Learn from the lamenting psalmists how to be a faithful complainer." @Bloom_Jon
A Simple Question That Keeps My Technology Use in Check

what a great perspective...

something to hold on to when you’re tired & the world’s broke your heart a bit

Sometimes you just need someone to storm heaven for you

Sometimes you just need someone to hoarse whisper it for you —

“Father of the Tired & Broken-Hearted…

oh, hear our prayer….

Give Your Child the wisdom to know it this week:

Hiding when you’re hurting won’t heal you and growing isolated can just let infection grow.

Give Your Child the love to live it:

The secret way to heal a broken heart is to let love leak out like an ocean through all the cracks.

Give Your Child grace to do the crazy impossible:

It’s the hurting and wounded who are always the ones called to be medics — to administer lavish grace, to cast the messy in the best, merciful light.

The best way to tend to your open wounds is to open your arms.

Out-loving is the only ointment that healed anything.

Let the broken choose it:

When you’re most wounded by words, run to the only Word that always brings healing.

Let the broken see it:

When you’re wounded and need dressing, look in the mirror, touch you face, and see how He clothes you in righteousness, wraps you in promises, swathes you in a Savior — who saves.

When you have Jesus on the inside, you’re never on the outside.

Let the broken say it:

When you’re bruised by lies, believe truth and whisper it louder: I am my Beloved’s.

When Love’s got hold of you, there isn’t a lie in the universe that can pull you apart.

Let the broken trust it:

Giving the benefit of the doubt — is what benefits the people of the Faith.

Doesn’t love always believe the best —  not the worst?

And may that wind, brokenhearted Child, may it fly her hair like a glory flag,

And may the hills that rise before her be but an exhilaration,

And may all her trials be but a trail,

all the stones on the way be but grace stairs to God.

:In name of Jesus  —

who broke His heart to heal ours…”

 

 

 

Resource: best candles with these perfect scents, the ones we keep lighting here… perfect for the tired & brokenhearted prayers. [Every candle from Claro has a different giving outcome that fights social injustice in our world.  Whether your purchase plants a tree, provides a meal, sends a child to school, clothes and feeds an orphan, or fights for the rights of abused women, your purchase has a lasting impact in the life of someone in need.  Burn a candle. Bring light.]

hope for all the prodigals… and their people

There are some stories that are important. Because there are a lot of people and parents and families that feels hopeless and scared. Tindell Baldwin gets it. She was a girl who made a lot of mistakes. She was a girl who had sex before marriage and then had a broken heart. She was a girl who did drugs and drank to fill the void that was deep in her heart. She was a girl who was desperate to be popular. A girl who, like so many others, didn’t know the dark side of sin. I’ve sat with Tindell, looked into her eyes, and heard her story first hand — seen  her heart for teens to hear her story —  and flee to Christ. Her greatest desire is that God would be glorified above all else. It’s a grace to welcome the powerful, hopeful words of my friend, Tindell Baldwin, to the farm’s front porch today…

~ guest post by Tindell Baldwin

 

I spent five years running from God.

Five years pretending I knew better than God.

Five years believing that this world had something to offer me besides a broken down life.

Then at the most unlikely age of nineteen I found myself surrendered to His will and humbled by my desperate need for a savior.

I met with a mom recently who told me she just wanted to keep her daughter alive.

They weren’t fighting against a bad boyfriend, broken curfew, or one too many parties anymore.

They were fighting to save her life.

She had already attempted to take her life twice when I met with her mother and they had two weeks until they were taking her daughter to inpatient treatment.

I listened heavy hearted to a woman that I can only describe as peaceful, hopeful even. She said she knew that God had already won the battle for her daughter’s soul and she was confident in the victory of the cross even though the current outcome of her circumstance looked dark.

My faith felt small and feeble as I slid my book across the table to her. I had signed the inside hoping my small gesture might give her mother hope. We talked, she prayed, and we thanked God for being bigger than our pain.

Then on the drive home I wept.

I wept for the mother whose daughter had lost her way and the many more like her, I wept for the tyranny of evil and the schemes of the devil, and I wept for this poor girl’s heart who so desperately needed truth and a savior.

I wept because I wanted to save her but I knew that wasn’t my job. This was why I wrote my story of my own running. These kinds of conversations and meetings breathed redemption into my broken past every time I got to look a mom in the eye and say with confidence, “it’s not in vain.”

Let us not become  weary  in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up. Galations 6:9

In this life sometimes it all feels in vain. It all feels broken and shattered and hopeless.

In this life we have thousands of conversations that feel mundane and we cry out to God with confusion and fear.

We wonder when the saving will come and we grow weary.

Before I got to know Jesus because my family walked for years down a road the felt like it might never end.

And they never gave up.

One thousand conversations and then one day it just all broke through like waters building at the edge of a dam.

Finally the truth came washing over me — but first there were the many drops of water.

 

GOOD FRIDAY… 10 years ago.

I promised my mom I would go with her to hear my brother at our church’s Good Friday service — as long as she would let me go to a party right afterward.

I was suddenly regretting that decision as we pulled up to the church. It was already 7 o’ clock and most of my friends would be drunk without me.

As we made our way into the candle filled sanctuary, something came over me like a wave of relief. I could almost feel God in this place. I quickly pushed it out of my mind; God had no place in my life.

The stage was set up in the middle of the sanctuary with chairs surrounding it. I saw my brother playing guitar by a wooden cross standing in the middle of the stage. We sat right in front of him, and I gave a tiny wave. He was the only reason I went to church, my pride in his talent outweighed my hatred of church.

Then he started to sing, and I tried to ignore the words as they washed over me.

Jesus paid it all

All to him I owe

Sin had left a crimson stain,

He washed it white as snow.

I couldn’t help but wonder if He, Jesus, could really wash my sin away. I knew my sin was more of a black cloak than a crimson stain, but for a second… I wondered. Slowly a battle of questions began in my head.

Could Jesus set me free?

Could He take this broken heart and fill it?

Could He forgive the horrible things I had done to my friends and family?

What about drinking?

Well, I have to drink —  I don’t know how to be fun without it — and I’m in love, or am I?

More words I try to ignore, “Oh praise the one who paid my debt, and raised this life up from the dead.”

I knew I had a debt that I knew. I knew I had too much sin for one man to take on. I needed my own cross. I needed my own Jesus — and I told myself Jesus could never help me.

I tried to stay strong and keep my thoughts on what I was doing after this but for some reason the tiny voice I had been trying so hard to destroy came to life.

My heart began to quicken and I could almost feel forgiveness —  I just had to ask. I didn’t want it though, I wasn’t ready to change so instead I let the tears fill my eyes and overflow down my cheeks.

I cried for my broken heart and for the shame of my sins.

I cried because I knew I needed Jesus —  but I wasn’t ready to give it up.

I cried because I wanted to stay in this place forever, sheltered from the pain of the outside world, sheltered from yesterday’s broken promises and tomorrows failure.

I cried because I wasn’t strong enough to make the right choice.

My mom reached her hand over and placed it in mine, a quiet reminder that she was there for me. I knew she was.

I knew that one day I would cry because God had redeemed me. I knew one day we might be great friends. There were many times like this, tiny things that made me remember that God wasn’t done with me yet.

A few years later I would sit at the edge of a different cross on a different day and beg for forgiveness and salvation — but it wasn’t that day.

Oh, I want the easy fix for everyone —  maybe even my own daughter someday.

How I want God to swoop in with His bag of gifts and fix the pain of all the mothers who have daughters who have wept tears and cried out in pain.

But what I want more is a God not made in human likeness with human frailties, what I want more is a God I can depend on because He makes all things new.

I want the God of redemption and grace.

I want the God who choose me when He put His Son on a cross to bear the weight of my sin.

So I will continue to tell mothers and daughters that it is not in vain.

I will continue to believe that the God who in His perfect timing saved my mess of a life for His glory —

will not forsake you in the midst of your pain because one drop at a time the water will rise….

And truth will rush over the hearts of the lost.

 

 

Tindell Baldwin has a heart for teenagers and mothers & she uses her story, Popular: Boys, Booze, and Jesus,  to bring teenagers back to the foot of the Cross and give mothers hope in some of the hardest days they might walk.  She’s volunteered in youth ministry in Atlanta for almost four years and has had the opportunity to speak to thousands of teenagers over the course of her journey. Her greatest joy is getting to see redemption from her broken past. Tindell lives in Marietta, GA with her amazing husband of almost six years and two babies, Claire and Briggs.

Highly recommending Popular: Boys, Booze, and Jesus, a helpful needed read for many praying mamas and their beautiful daughters.

Links for 2015-06-22 [del.icio.us]

Grief Is Like An Onion

"Grief allows us to become vessels and open the hearts of others. It allows God to work through us as He works in us."

Only the Good Stuff: Multivitamins for Your Weekend [06.20.15]

the world’s really beautiful if we slow down to look at it

yeah — why you have to schedule a nap today

…or maybe you need this instead

So…did you know that:

canned wood will get you grilling faster? #TellDad #FathersDayTips

you saw it coming, right?

log lamps. by a man who is legally blind. we’d like 3, please.

okay, on today’s lunch menu: a special of opera and smiles

so… did you know?

how your life can change by taking long walks  #PerfectFathersDayGift

all kids have special needs

which makes a whole lot of really special dads

#FathersDay

why you’ve gotta start seeing everything outside of the box #newperspective

why kids really need more green, more gardens, more grass #LetsGoPlayOutsideKids!

resume of kindness… yeah, all on 3 legs

Looks like Memphis is on to something here #FeelFreeToCopyCat

um… what a shot!?!

so, it’s okay everybody, calm down: Hobbes was found!

Yeah, well — after a bit of an adventure…

view of here — from our Father’s perspective?  #FathersDay #inHisHands

 okay, every booklover’s birthday? Perfect Gift Right Here: Check (instructions included)

just a man and his tortoise

Hurting Week & World: Breaking News not to miss right here —

“and the love of God is alive and well. It’s not going anywhere.”

Two Future Men. Saving — yeah, babies?!? 

#GreatFutureDads

Okay.  Books come from trees — and now a tree comes from a book? #yesplease

…who doesn’t need a happy ending like this?

this week, thinking all our hearts need some filling of hope

Sticky Notes for Your Soul: 

For the Fridge? Or a frame? Or a clipboard? Or a card?

Free daily printables to cheer you!

Simply fill in your email here and the whole library of free printables and tools unfolds right before you:

Subscribe/Sign-up here for immediate access to the whole library of free printables, framables & free tools!

  Quiet Relief Near-Daily Quiet Relief in one Weekend BundleSIGN-IN »

yep, they’re gonna be dads

Post that resonated deep in a whole lot of us from these parts here:

so yeah, maybe, when all the kids humoured me & recreated that 10 years-old-to-the-day photo, & I stood there like a choked up fool, looking at the two frames of all the kids 10 years apart — there was this epiphany about family:

when family breaks your heart right open #FathersDayWeekend

Shalom and I love partnering this Father’s Day weekend with DUTTON FARM loving those special kids #LoveDoesntCountChromosomes

How We Need You to  Stand Up & pray with one voice with thousands and  thousands this Sunday: One Church Liturgy. There’s no division in His Body. 

Praying for a hurting world & mourning with Charleston, SC, & all us grieving for the brokenness

We weep with you. We grieve with you. We break with you.  Shared tears are multiplied healing.

This man. Left the only comment on Dylann Roof’s Facebook photo.

Pretty unbelievable — or Believable. 

a good weekend to pick up the phone & say thanks #FathersDay #FamilyIsAVerb

Note to Self This Weekend: there is only one time to be happy — and that time is now.

no matter how Fatherless you might feel this weekend? Come real close.

Feel it?  How you’re actually one of the Fatherfull. #FathersDay

really, none of us can afford to: don’t hold back: #tellthemnow

Hey hurting world? We all really need this one this week: 

You are loved — more than you know…

As Sure As the Sun

[ print’s free for you here ]

Hey Soul? yeah, everything looks straight up hill, but what’s a mountain to a mountain-moving God?”

The mountains take one look at God

And melt, melt like wax before earth’s Lord.” Ps.97:5 MSG

That’s the plan: We’re not looking at the overwhelming obstacle of the mountain —

we’re focusing only on the overwhelming love of God.

Because that’s real deal: Just put one foot in front of the other & you can put any mountain behind you.

‪#‎FORWARD‬! ‪#‎PreachingGospeltoMyself‬

[excerpted from our morning devotions in our little Facebook community … come join us?]

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.

Links for 2015-06-19 [del.icio.us]

Mom Writes Grateful Letter to ‘Stranger Next to Us at Rodeo’...

...and the next day, she realizes who he is. Beautiful.