Ann Voskamp's Blog, page 41
November 14, 2022
How to be a Color-Courageous Follower of Jesus
So I first had the joy of meeting Michelle Sanchez at an evangelism conference where we were both speakers, given the task to inspire disciples to advance the kingdom of God. With clarity, grace, and joy, Michelle invited us all into a new kind of discipleship journey: one that demonstrated from the Scriptures how Jesus has always called His disciples to the courageous work of resisting and dismantling racism for the sake of advancing the kingdom of God. While racial inequity remains a heartbreaking reality in our world, as disciples of Jesus, we can do something about it. I am excited for Michelle to share more of her story with you. God has truly graced her to help move us from color-blind discipleship to color-courageous discipleship. It is a joy to welcome Michelle to the farm’s table today…
Guest Post by Michelle T. Sanchez
As I make my way through the corridors of my office, I’m aware of my palpitating heart. It’s time for my first performance review.
Earlier in the year, I had jumped from leading discipleship at a local church to leading discipleship for an entire denomination of churches across North America.
Honestly, it was a steep jump.
I started as both the youngest executive and the first person of color to lead discipleship. You better believe I was giving the job my all. My main motivation was to glorify God.
But if I’m honest, I was also striving to prove that those who took the chance to hire me—young, Black, female me—had made the right choice.
I knock and my boss ushers me in with his characteristically warm welcome. The review begins.
He showers me with affirmations. Yet my heart is clenched. Okay—but what have I missed? I sense him shifting gears to constructive feedback mode, and I brace myself.
“Michelle, I’ve noticed a pattern. It seems that most White people appreciate you, yet there are some Black folks who aren’t fans. Why do you think that is?”
My confident facade shatters and, to my horror, I erupt in tears. I struggle to remain in the present, yet I am pulled to the past.
“Again, I am that little girl, frightened and ashamed, haunted by race.”
I watch my childhood bullies parade by in quick succession. Punching a hole through the wall of years, they taunt me again with the refrain that I am an Oreo—Black on the outside, White on the inside, and (I fear) ultimately unacceptable to all sides.
Again, I am that little girl, frightened and ashamed, haunted by race.
I’m not White, so I’ll certainly never be “White enough” for Whites. And apparently I can’t be “Black enough” for Blacks.
So… who am I? And what am I supposed to do?
I realize that not everyone will have a dramatic incident that prompts them to ask deeper questions about race. That said, I would argue that our generation has experienced dramatic events as a society, events that galvanized the most widespread protests in U.S. history.
As disciples, we are invited to be like the people of Issachar “who understood the times and knew what Israel should do” (1 Chronicles 12:32).
If you accept that invitation, you might find yourself considering similar questions:
Who is God calling me to be? What am I supposed to do? And where do I begin?
For disciples of Jesus, the answer is as simple as it is profound: We begin with Jesus.
I took my racial challenges to Jesus…eventually.
“My Christian discipleship had been characterized by a color-blind approach rather than a color-courageous one.”
I hadn’t been taught to engage race as a disciple. My Christian discipleship had been characterized by a color-blind approach rather than a color-courageous one. It took a long time to move past my discomfort and enter into the racial challenges before me with a clear head and a learning posture.
Yet God was patient, whispering, “Hey, there, discipleship leader! Remember that at the end of the day, race is a matter of discipleship too.”
God was reminding me that the journey of color-courageous discipleship—like any other—starts and ends with Jesus, because “Christ is all, and is in all” (Colossians 3:11).
Jesus invites us to keep saying yes to Him as Lord, to honor Him as supreme in every area, including the areas of race and ethnicity. He also invites us to keep saying yes to him as Savior, which means admitting our racial brokenness on every level.
If you identify as a disciple of Jesus, I invite you to ask your King,
“What am I missing? How can I grow?”
Only Jesus can answer these questions in their fullness. He loves you and will show you. Maybe you’ve already started the color-courageous discipleship journey. That is so good!
But don’t stop now.
Ask again.
Keep on asking.
I guarantee that Jesus will keep on transforming you in new and surprising ways.
Although I didn’t realize it at first, that fateful afternoon in my boss’s office was an important step on my own journey of racial discipleship. After I emerged from the fog of my initial pain and discomfort, I saw the truth:
I had room to grow.
I began to understand that I can do more to help and clearly recognized the voice of Christ calling me to grow as a color-courageous disciple for the sake of the church and the world. I wasn’t even sure what it would entail. What I did know was that it would be a precious opportunity to face my fears and grow.
So, I said yes to another new discipleship journey with Jesus, holding tightly to Him as Savior and Lord.
“Following Jesus is not a one-time invitation.”
I’m sure you know by now that following Jesus is not a one-time invitation. After you initially say yes to Jesus, He will present you with many additional discipleship invitations over the course of your life.
And guess what?
Each invitation will be a new adventure.
As disciples of Christ, our call to courage is simultaneously a call to the cross.
I have no idea what your unique cross may entail on this journey, but God may invite you to:
enter into repentance, confession, and forgivenessengage in conversations that produce discomfort, anger, and disagreementuncover unconscious biases that have caused harmrevisit painful momentsacknowledge the shortcomings of the church or other institutions you loveexperience suspicion or rejection by otherssacrifice in unfamiliar ways as you courageously love God and others“Discipleship never ends with the cross…it ends with resurrection.”
Yet, let’s also remember that discipleship never ends with the cross…it ends with resurrection.
On the other side of the cross, there is always new life. What that resurrection life will entail for you on this journey is God’s surprise, but perhaps you may:
grow in your ability to see the world and its people from God’s perspectiveunderstand the gospel more deeply, both with regard to the depths of your own brokenness as well as the heights of God’s awaken to life-changing insights through the racial and ethnic journeys of othersenjoy new friendships and richer, more authentic communityexperience more extensive liberation from fear, sin, and shamebe healed or help others to healbecome more effective at bringing shalom and beloved community to your worldcelebrate when witnesses to all these events find new life in Christ as a result!At times, color-courageous discipleship will feel difficult, dangerous, or both—which is precisely why we need Jesus as our leader and the Bible as our anchor.
We need supernatural courage for this journey.
Only in Christ will we find the inexhaustible power, wisdom, and grace we need to flourish as color-courageous disciples.
What if we keep asking…
“What am I missing Lord? How can I grow?”
Michelle T. Sanchez (MDiv, ThM) serves as the senior discipleship and evangelism leader for the Evangelical Covenant Church, a multiethnic denomination of 900+ congregations throughout North America.
She has served in various capacities with the Institute for Bible Reading, Cru, the Lausanne Movement for world evangelization, and the Pelican Project: a guild of women fostering commitment to Christian faith and practice across cultural, denominational, and racial lines. A writer and frequent conference speaker, Michelle is a regular columnist for Outreach Magazine and a contributor to the forthcoming Message Women’s Devotional Bible. Find Michelle on instagram @michelle_t_sanchez and at colorcourageous.com.
Michelle is the author of Color-Courageous Discipleship, Color-Courageous Discipleship Student Edition, and a picture book for children, God’s Beloved Community – books that are committed to dismantling racism and growing our discipleship from color-blind to color-courageous. Check out Color-Courageous Discipleship!
[ Our humble thanks to WaterBrook for their partnership in today’s devotion ]
November 12, 2022
Only the Good Stuff: Multivitamins For Your Weekend [11.12.2022]
Happy, happy, happy weekend!
Come along with us here because who doesn’t need a bit of good news?
Let yourself smile, be crazy inspired, laugh, love & really live the gift of this life
just a little bit more this weekend…
Serving up only the Good Stuff for you & your people right here:
Daniel Kay – Photographer
Daniel Kay – Photographer
Daniel Kay – Photographer
Daniel Kay – Photographer
Daniel Kay – Photographercome along through this English countryside and enjoy the glory of our good God?
View this post on InstagramA post shared by Ann Voskamp (@annvoskamp)
THIS, this, this!! My Mama! And:
Time is made of all the seconds–and all kinds of second chances to be kind.
& have you caught all the pics of my wild road trip with my Mama?!?
View this post on InstagramA post shared by Amy Hope Rylander (@amyrylanderart)
Such a beautiful picture of how Jesus holds us through the dance of life!
Remember: Whatever you’re going through this week, Jesus has your back.
Let Him walk with you through it all.
Did you see the red moon eclipse earlier this week? Wow! So stunning!
And the way it looked over our farm fields! Our son Levi captured this astonishing shot! WOW!
View this post on InstagramA post shared by Worship Together (@worshiptogether)
Praising God again, and again, and again!
“How the Persecuted Church wants us to pray for them”
Are we? Really — what if we at least did this?
Start Here: Print One Prayer Guide –– and make it a part of your daily sacred rhythm.
It’s not the least we can — it’s literally the first, and most important thing to do.
“Why Millions Are Still Unreached by the Gospel”
If the good news of being saved is unspeakably precious to you — then you’ve got to watch this.
Sit with this. Be changed by this. I can’t stop thinking about this.
Oh to live blessed, broken, and given around the tables we gather at—a MUST read before Thanksgiving.
View this post on InstagramA post shared by Tracy Wilson Writing Life (@tracy_wilson_writing_life)
*Shoutout to each one that make us want to be the Big Wings people, too.*
“My heart and my flesh
Cry out for You
Humbly I come to You now
Thirsty for the living water”
New! from The Keeping Company: Thanksgiving Greeting Cards!
Thanksgiving Breadboard and CardsShare the gratitude this Thanksgiving with this set of whimsical greeting cards. Featuring three autumn woodland scenes of giving painted by the talented Aurora McGee, (who also illustrated The Light Gift). They portray little woodland creatures, giving thanks and giving in this special season of thanksgiving.
that coordinate with Unwrapping the Greatest GiftPick up your Thanksgiving cards + a whole collection of heirloom treasures
AND !!! Buy 2 Get 1 FREE at Target!Get all 3 Advent books for the price of 2!! Or pick up extra copies for the perfect Christmas gift for everyone on your list! Hurry, this sale ends November 12!
This year, let His wonder awaken you again, captivate you, capture your heart! More Of Jesus Only — and have a STRESS-FREE, WONDER-FULL Christmas.Read the whole Christmas Love Story, from Creation to the Creche, with all 3 of our Advent Books:
The Greatest Gift
(adult edition)
Best Devotional of the Year, ECPA, 2014, NYTimes Best Seller
(family edition)
Best Inspirational Book of the Year, CBA, 2016, NYTimes Best Seller
The Wonder of the Greatest Gift:
Best Devotional & Gift Book of the Year, CBA, 2019
(pop-up edition with your own 14 inch tree, 25 days of readings, 25 day advent flap calendar, hiding all 25 Biblically inspired ornaments! For any age)
So you don’t miss out on Jesus this year & the The Greatest Christmas.
Have you seen this? Really beautiful!
“150 Weeks of Composing Psalms Reaches Its Finale.
After nearly three years, Poor Bishop Hooper’s accidental pandemic project
concludes with a new psalter for the church.”
– oh these melodies on Psalm 1 –
View this post on InstagramA post shared by Good News Movement (@goodnews_movement)
Nothing, nothing, NOTHING is *impossible* and this young skater shows us just how true that is
this might just be *the* most important van in NYC – don’t miss this inspiring story!
View this post on InstagramA post shared by Good News Movement (@goodnews_movement)
one inspiring Grandma right here – meeting her Grandkids where they’re at
< ALL SMILES >
View this post on InstagramA post shared by Michael Jr. (@michaeljrcomedy)
who doesn’t need a good smile this weekend?
Post of the Week From Around These Parts
This world is a broken-heart factory, and it’s full of His glory,
and it’s only holding both of those, that you let go and find joy.
But how?
How can you possibly find God’s glory and hold thanks in the midst of so much hard?
When It’s Kinda Hard to Give Thanks
Have you signed up yet for the
1000 Gifts Thanksgiving Challenge?
It’s not too late to join! It’s never too late to pick up a pen and begin counting gifts, begin noticing all the ways He loves.
When you join, you’ll receive a bundle of FREE resources to help you along the way:
Journaling pages to record your gifts in one place
Weekly devotions to your inbox to help encourage and cheer you on during the challenge
Bonus: A special calendar to help you commit to praying for a specific person that you’re grateful for each day of the challenge. Just write a different name down for each day and cover them in prayers of gratitude and blessing!
If you want to join this joy-giving challenge, you can sign up at: https://www.thomasnelson.com/p/otgchallenge/
Sign up now to join this joy-giving challengeWhat does the Christ-life really look like when your days are gritty, long — and sometimes even dark? How is God even here?
My story of just that: One Thousand Gifts and the 60 DAY DEVOTIONAL with 1000 numbered lines to count your #1000gifts: One Thousand Gifts Devotional: Reflecting on Finding Everyday Graces.
Are you ready to begin—or begin again—a life-changing habit of daily gratitude? Want to reset, refresh, reboot your life and literally rewire your brain? Be one of the more than one MILLION people who have stepped into the life-change of this experience.
turns 107 years old and shares THIS bit of gold – stunning!
a list every mama DEFINITELY wants to say yes to!
View this post on InstagramA post shared by Hope Dawn Farm (@hopedawnfarm)
oh His glory really is, all around
Your Christmas needs this!
AND!!! Sign up for this FREE “Breath from Heaven” Christmas series to breathe peace into the season, and get a COMPLETELY FREE 35-page Christmas Anxiety Toolkit!
On The Book Stack at the Farm
Read Misty Arterburn‘s recent guest postFinding Hope in the Bumps and Bruises of Life
Read Teresa Swanstrom Anderson‘s recent guest postHow to Love Radically Even In the Middle of Pain
take a seat and fly over this beautiful expanse of God’s creation with us?
this is just simply stunning.
For every person who is walking a hard way and looking for a way through, WayMaker is your sign. Your sign that there is hope, that there are miracles, and that everything you are trying to find a way to, is actually coming to meet you in ways far more fulfilling than you ever imagined.
Grab your copy of WayMaker — and begin the journey you’re desperately looking for…
PICK UP YOUR COPY OF WAYMAKER– turn this song up this weekend –
…yeah, it’s ridiculously tempting to think:
“I am what I accomplish. I am what I weigh. I am what I achieve. I am what I do.”
But shake off that lie:
Your *activity for Christ* does not give you your identity.
*You are not what your hands do.*
Your *intimacy with Christ* is what gives you your identity.
You are what your heart is.
And your heart is held in His no matter what fails today,
your heart is loved by Him no matter what any numbers say today,
your heart is strengthened in His no matter how overwhelming things look today.
Identity literally means “the same” —
that regardless of changing circumstances,
the core of you is unchangeable, stable, is the same.
When your identity is in Christ, your identity is the same yesterday, today and tomorrow.
Criticism can’t change it. Failing can’t shake it. Lists can’t determine it.
When your identity is in the Rock — your identity is Rock Solid.
As long as God is for you, it doesn’t matter what mountain rises ahead of you.
You aren’t your yesterday, you aren’t your messes, you aren’t your lists.
You are brave enough for today because He is.
You are strong enough for what’s coming because He is.
And you are enough for all that is because He. always. is.
#HeIsEnough #TheWayofAbundance #1000Gifts
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.
November 11, 2022
When It’s Kinda Hard to Give Thanks
“Watching your little sister get crushed and killed under a wheel when you’re only only four-years-old? That’s a moment that’s going to take decades to process.”
My therapist says it steady, his eyes searching mine, reading my face.
And I turn away, as if not looking into his eyes but out the window, I can turn back all this startling wave of drowning ache.
“This world is a broken-heart factory, and it’s full of His glory, and it’s only holding both of those, that you let go and find joy.”
“I’m kinda worried about you, Annie,” a friend comes looking for me after that therapy session. “You… okay?”
“Yes, of course, I am… and no, I’m not… and yes, I am. You know… ” I smile weakly, bravely, through everything brimming.
Every single one of us is walking through some kind of deep heartbreak, and real life strain, and if you look into people’s eyes, and ask the right tender question, there it is: a fracture of pain right up the side of their one life. Bruised relationships, and draining bank accounts, and weary dreams, and sheer mountains ahead of us, and who isn’t a bit tired of the fight called life?
This world is a broken-heart factory, and it’s full of His glory, and it’s only holding both of those, that you let go and find joy.
I return to the story again this week, this story that keeps coming to find each of us aching a bit with our unspoken broken, that story of one man, King Jehoshaphat, who is up against it, and worn down with exhaustion, and facing all kinds of overwhelm, and he just howls it to the heavens for every single one of us:
“We don’t know what to do, but our eyes are on you.” (2 Chronicles 20:10)
And then, in the face of the impossible, he just takes the next step:
“Early in the morning…Jehoshaphat stood and said, “Listen to me… Have faith in the Lord your God and you will be upheld.”… Jehoshaphat appointed men to sing to the Lord and to praise him for the splendor of his holiness as they went out at the head of the army, saying:
“Give thanks to the Lord, for his love endures forever.”
As they began to sing and praise, the Lord set ambushes against the men of Ammon and Moab.. and they were defeated.”
Don’t know what to do?
The next right step is always to walk forward with thanks, eyes on God.
“Doxology is always the first line of defense against the dark.”
Doxology is always the first line of defense against the dark.
We may be up against it and not know what to do but:
Our eyes are on God because He is where we see good.
You can’t afford to take your eyes off God if you’re looking for help.
You’ve got to keep your eyes on where God is, if you want to see where your help is.
If you don’t know what to do, the relief is, you don’t have to. You just have to do only one thing: Keep your eyes on God.
Because:
“When your eyes are on God, your heart bursts into a flame of thanks … and thanks burns back the dark.”
When your eyes are on God, your heart bursts into a flame of thanks … and thanks burns back the dark.
When your eyes are on God, your eyes see gifts.
If eyes are on God — how can a heart not fill with thanks?
Gratitude is an overflow of keeping eyes on Him. When your eyes keep seeing gifts of grace, you’re given the courage to keep going.
Do we know how much our eyes, our attention, is fixed on Him — by how much gratefulness is in our hearts?
When you pay attention to even just one thing to give thanks for, you put one step in front of the other, to walk into more joy.
I can’t stop thinking of meeting 90-year-old Norma for her birthday, Norma who keeps a binder out at her house, a binder titled the “Goodness of God” with years of memories of God‘s faithfulness.
“Some of the things we write down as God’s goodness, may seem like hard things, deep trials, like a stroke, but in the midst, we have written down all the amazing things we have seen God do, as we trust in the work of His hand,” Norma’s daughter tells me. “It is a legacy to our family and gives God the glory He deserves.”
And I nod, seeing that the kind of brave, defiant joy that’s written all over 90-year-old Norma’s face, glorifies God in undeniable ways.
“I’ve just got to tell you: Giving thanks keeps giving me a new lease on life,” is what 90-year-old Norma, with this megawatt smile, says as she squeezes my hand for all she’s worth.
“The way to keep your heart soft in a hard world, is to keep giving thanks through the hard things.”
I give way to grinning like a fool, because, even in the midst of all the things, it’s all true:
Giving thanks is always worth it, because the fight for joy is always worth it, and God is always worthy of it.
The only way to not grow old and bitter is to have habits that protect all the hard, from making your heart hard.
And the way to keep your heart soft in a hard world, is to keep giving thanks through the hard things.
When I meet a woman who tells me that she dared herself to write one thousand gifts by Christmas, I can see it written all over her face:
“Give thanks and you give yourself the gift of joy.“
Give thanks and you give yourself the gift of joy.
Which is also to say: Counting gifts is the way you can count on more happiness.
Research has discovered that those “who felt grateful showed a marked reduction in the level of cortisol, the stress hormone. They had better cardiac functioning and were more resilient to emotional setbacks and negative experiences” (McCraty & Childre, 2004).
The more gifts you count, less cortisol you have.
The more gifts you count, the more resilient you are.
The more you navigate life with gratefulness, the better you can navigate life’s negative experiences.
And: Giving thanks is the way we reverse age.
And, wildly: Giving thanks gives us a new brain.
“When we express gratitude… our brain releases dopamine and serotonin, the two crucial neurotransmitters responsible for our emotions…. By consciously practicing gratitude everyday, we can help these neural pathways to strengthen.” Research concludes: “People who express gratitude have been shown to have a higher volume of grey matter in their right inferior temporal gyrus. Grey matter in the brain serves many functions, but is primarily responsible for processing information.”
Our brain on thanks, is what turns all the lights on in our dark.
“The more of life’s little gifts you count, the more you can handle all of life’s big things.”
The more of life’s little gifts you count, the more you can handle all of life’s big things.
Whatever is coming and keeps coming hard at you, the reality always is:
You can handle stress better, if you always keep gratitude in one hand.
So in the midst of everything, and hard and tender things, I keep taking pen in hand, and counting gifts, giving thanks, keeping eyes on the Giver who is good and showers all us weary and worn with grace.
And as I look for gifts every day to give thanks for, to write in my gratitude journal, I realize it all over again, I feel it all over again:
Gratitude is a daily eye-opener — that opens our hearts up to joy.
Because, if we’re honest:
Most of our days are spent chasing what we don’t yet have.
Giving thanks changes the direction of our days, to appreciate all that we already have.
Gratitude changes the direction of our days from trying to gain more, and getting more things done, to gaining more joy, and enjoying what God has already done.
“When your eyes rest on the goodness of God, your heart burns with thankfulness to God — and that blaze of thanks lights the way through.”
If you want to change your trajectory, choose doxology.
On a mid-November morning, I jot down another string of gifts in my gratitude journal, and life crushes, and broken parts of us can take decades to process, and in the midst of tender, everyday grief of every day being in a broken world, the next right step is always gratitude.
And I’m exhausted but I exhale:
You don’t have to know what to do, you just have let your eyes rest on God.
When your eyes rest on the goodness of God, your heart burns with thankfulness to God — and that blaze of thanks lights the way through.
And you can feel it, how a heart can burn like all the praising trees across the fields, how even a cracked heart can blaze with thanks.
And even a long dark can light with joy.
Have you signed up yet for the
1000 Gifts Thanksgiving Challenge?
It’s not too late to join! It’s never too late to pick up a pen and begin counting gifts, begin noticing all the ways He loves.
When you join, you’ll receive a bundle of FREE resources to help you along the way:
Journaling pages to record your gifts in one place
Weekly devotions to your inbox to help encourage and cheer you on during the challenge
Bonus: A special calendar to help you commit to praying for a specific person that you’re grateful for each day of the challenge. Just write a different name down for each day and cover them in prayers of gratitude and blessing!
If you want to join this joy-giving challenge, you can sign up at: https://www.thomasnelson.com/p/otgchallenge/
What does the Christ-life really look like when your days are gritty, long — and sometimes even dark? How is God even here?
My story of just that: One Thousand Gifts and the 60 DAY DEVOTIONAL with 1000 numbered lines to count your #1000gifts: One Thousand Gifts Devotional: Reflecting on Finding Everyday Graces.
Are you ready to begin—or begin again—a life-changing habit of daily gratitude? Want to reset, refresh, reboot your life and literally rewire your brain? Be one of the more than one MILLION people who have stepped into the life-change of this experience.
November 10, 2022
How to Love Radically Even in the Middle of Pain
When we find ourselves face-to-face with someone in pain, it tears at our hearts too. But even in our deep empathy and compassion, we often find ourselves unsure of how to respond in the face of so much brokenness. In her Bible study Finding Your Place in God’s Story, Teresa Swanstrom Anderson explores how God used the women in Jesus’ lineage to unexpectedly change the world amid their broken circumstances and shows us how we can do the same. It is a grace to welcome Teresa to the farm’s table today…
Guest Post by Teresa Swanstrom Anderson
Four of our children are adopted, and that comes with heartache. The thing is, people often like to put adoption in a pretty little box. We’ve heard stuff like “They must be so thankful to have you” and “It’s so great you saved them!” (ugh).
“The reality is, although our story is beautiful, it’s also full of significant loss.”
The reality is, although our story is beautiful, it’s also full of significant loss. One of my daughters cries for her “Ethiopia Mommy” every single day. Every day! No matter how much we laugh and love in our family, my children carry stories filled with deep, deep pain (and no, we certainly didn’t “save” them).
Sadly, that’s life. But why is it that we so often romanticize hard stuff?
Is it that we can’t handle the pain-filled truth that life is difficult?
“Trying to turn something into a pretty picture undervalues the beauty in the struggle.”
Trying to turn something into a pretty picture undervalues the beauty in the struggle. It causes us to miss the richness and redemption of love.
So let’s talk about the book of Ruth. Because I think we tend to do the same kind of thing to this story.
The Bible currently in front of me says that “the book of Ruth is a delightful short story with a classical plot that moves from crisis to complication to resolution . . . inviting us to identify with [characters’] personal anxieties and joys and in the end to celebrate the movement from emptiness and frustration to fulfillment and joy.”[1]
I don’t know about you, but that doesn’t feel like it really captures what’s happening here.
Ruth’s life is hard.
Her husband is dead. The other two men in her husband’s family, her brother-in-law and her father-in-law, are also dead. This means she’s lost all her protection and security in a world that was not kind to women.
As you read her story, think about what she might have been feeling. Think about the temptation to despair, the fear of starvation, the grief of loss.
The book of Ruth isn’t a sweet love story plopped down to add some levity between the heaviness of Judges and 1 Samuel.
“The real human cost in this story is heavy.”
The real human cost in this story is heavy.
This isn’t Pride and Prejudice, and Boaz is not Mr. Darcy.
Ruth’s story begins with another woman’s massive pain and loss. Naomi has lost everything—her land, her husband, her sons, her home. Ruth and her sister-in-law were both married for a decade, and neither had children.
Naomi’s family line had come to an end. This was it. Life as she knew it was over. With no male family member to provide food, shelter, and safety, she was doomed to become destitute. She’s an outsider in a foreign country. And things in her own country were dark and painful.
All this stress heaped high on top of her deep grief.
Naomi was a female Job.
Or, as Carolyn Custis James says, “I think Naomi actually out-Jobed Job.”[2]
Think about it. Both Naomi and Job suffered the loss of a life they spent years creating and caring for. They both endured massive tragedy in the death of their family members. And yet Job still had his wife and friends by his side (not that they were helpful and encouraging, but still).
And also?
Job was not a woman (with no rights) and an immigrant (which equaled major second-class status).
Blow after blow became too much for Naomi.
It was just. too. much.
The woman is grieving. She’s barely surviving, and she’s done.
D-O-N-E and undone.
There’s nothing left for Naomi in Moab, so she’s going home, though she’s been gone for years and doesn’t have an actual home to go home to.
Would her community embrace her? Would they even remember her?
Yet what does Ruth do?
Ruth, too, has lost everything. Her husband. The hope of children. But Ruth perhaps would have had a home to go back to. She could have started over right where she was. She was, after all, among her people in Moab. At the very least, she wasn’t an outsider.
But Ruth does something extraordinary. She walks alongside. She goes with. She loves radically.
Radical love is at the heart of the gospel. Jesus uses the unexpected, the marginalized, the outsider, to point the way toward radical love.
“as we act in radical love, as we move toward the broken, we participate in the restoration of all things.”
Ruth shows us a glimpse of what Jesus ultimately showed us: that as we act in radical love, as we move toward the broken, we participate in the restoration of all things.
Where you go, I go; and where you live, I’ll live. Your people are my people, your God is my god; where you die, I’ll die, and that’s where I’ll be buried, so help me God—not even death itself is going to come between us!
What if there was space made in your day to talk to the Lord about being brave enough to love radically even in the middle of your pain?
What might it look like to bring and be His love in any and all of the brokenness around you today?
Teresa Swanstrom Anderson is an author, speaker, and Bible-study teacher. She is the author of Beautifully Interrupted and the Get Wisdom Bible Studies. Her study Living for What Really Matters was a 2021 ECPA Award Finalist in the Bible Study category. She lives in Denver, CO, with her husband and six children and is passionate about helping women understand the Bible.
Finding Your Place in God’s Story is a Bible study that equips women to study Scripture for themselves and discover how to participate more fully in the story of God. The lineage of Jesus is full of surprising, imperfect people, but perhaps none more than the five women memorialized in Matthew 1. These women are not the expected matriarchs like Eve or Sarah or Rebekah. Their stories are hard and complicated. And every one of these women is just like us: resoundingly ordinary, tainted by sin, and yet unexpectedly used to change the world when they found their place in God’s story.
[ Our humble thanks to NavPress for their partnership in today’s devotion ]
[1] Holy Land Illustrated Bible: A Visual Exploration of the People, Places, and Things of Scripture (Nashville: Holman Bible Publishers, 2020), 345.
[2] Carolyn Custis James, The Gospel of Ruth: Loving God Enough to Break the Rules (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2008), 44.
November 9, 2022
Whoa! Weary As the Holidays Begin? Easiest Way to Find the Wonder Again
So this turns out to be the tenderest relief in a wild season: There are just SIX Mondays from now and Christmas Eve.
And when the holidays hit in a year like this? We’re all choosing holy days more than hyped-up days.
“Holy days — over hyped-up holidays. Falling in love — over falling in debt. Wonder — over worry.”
When the holidays hit this year, we’re all not choosing to fall more in debt because of consumerism, but we’re choosing to fall more in love because of Christ.
When the holidays hit this year, we’re all not going to be hit by all the worry — we’re choosing to be hushed by all His wonder.
Holy days — over hyped-up holidays. Falling in love — over falling in debt. Wonder — over worry.
The wonders of His love are everywhere — if you are in love with the wonder of Him. This is how the brilliant live.
So when she opens it up, I stop everything, and kneel right down.
“Look, Mama!” She laughs like a shower of stars.
Our baby girl’s eyes are saucers — awed.
All 3 of our Advent books are ON SALE! Pick them up on Amazon:
The Greatest Gift
,
Unwrapping the Greatest Gift
, &
The Wonder of the Greatest Gift
OR,
grab them now from Target & Buy 2 Get the 3rd one FREE
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I’m lit by her brazen wonder, her unabashed enthusiasm.
Enthusiasm always blazes in the best kind of life — because enthusiasm is about “entheos” — which literally means “God within.”
She holds this book wide open with contagious, igniting enthusiasm — God’s within, God’s within.
When the holidays hit this year, we choose wonder — because wonder is one step toward choosing a wonderful life.
“Nothing wonderful happens in our lives without wonder. Wonder makes this a wonderful life. Wonder nurtures wisdom.”
Nothing wonderful happens in our lives without wonder. Wonder makes this a wonderful life. Wonder nurtures wisdom.
If the next generation is to have any wisdom, then our generation must choose wonder now.
Wonder over grace and mercy and the ways of Jesus, because we have never needed His ways more than now.
And I grin, witnessing her fascination over that rising tree. Because the legacy we’ve got to leave, to centre the next generation, is the knowing that at the centre of our Garden Beginning, and His Christmas Coming, and our Calvary Saving, there always stands a tree that roots them forever and sets them free for eternity.
And nothing stands firmly anywhere, unless it’s rooted in the very beginning and the tree of Calvary, and the wonder that we’re grafted into the family tree of God.
She leans over the open book, her little fingers groping along the edges of the Advent flaps, one by one — wide-eyed, wonder seeking.
God’s within. God’s within.
This Christmas, the nations, and our generation, and the next generation, are ultimately seeking, not more plastic, not more pixels, not more products — we are seeking, whether we know it or not, more of the presence of Jesus — the Greatest Gift.
Behind one of the 25 Advent flaps, she finds an ornament — a tree stump with reaching green shoots — to hang on her risen tree.
“There shall come forth a shoot from the stump of Jesse, and a branch shall grow out of his roots…. In that day the root of Jesse shall stand as a banner to the peoples; Him shall the nations seek…”
Him shall the nations, and the next generation, seek.
She’s turning the more the pages of that little accompanying devotional booklet, that tells story after story from the Greatest Story ever told, from Creation to the Creche — of how nothing ever has stopped His love from coming for us.
“Nothing is worthwhile compared to this—searching Scripture…seeking the truth of God’s Word,” Elie Wiesel once said.
For the nations— and the next generation — to seek Him — this generation can seek nothing less.
“This is the year — we give our people the gift of our story — so they know the story — their story —their family tree.”
And our little girl, she sits in the thickening gold light and keeps hanging the ornaments, one after another, and that’s what her tree is telling: the grandest Gospel story, from the Beginning to Bethlehem!
And I nod, knowing— this is the year.
This is the year to forget whatever the bombardment of ads keep trying to pummel us all into believing.
This is the year to give the wonder of living, in the land of the living.
Forget burying our kids in more plastic trinkets, forget piling the debt and a culture of death on them, forget giving them what cannot last.
Nothing is more important than leaving to the next generation wondrous living, and nothing is more at risk. Just turn on the news.
“When we reclaim the wonder of Christmas — we reclaim the wonder of living.”
The legacy we, the people, want to leave to our children, the next generation, is the wonder of dwelling in the land of the living, a land where our roots are nourished in the truth of miracle of Whose we are, and the shattering grace of where we come from, and the astonishing hope of who we’re meant to be.
This is the year — we give our people the gift of our story — so they know the story — their story —their family tree. Right from our genesis beginning to our King’s coming under Bethlehem’s star — this is our story.
And I lean in and kiss the of my baby girl’s head. She will know who she is, Whose she is and she will know her story.
This story is our inheritance — The Greatest Story ever told. And we will claim our inheritance.
When we reclaim the wonder of Christmas — we reclaim the wonder of living.
The wonder of living in the land of the real, wondrous living. W e could get to live a wonderful life.
Our baby girl grins a whole world wide as she turns back the 25th flap and pulls out that star.
She’s bursting, tangible joy as she leans in to places that glowing atop her own tree, her own crowning, Christ-formed story.
“The way to get our Christmas MOJO back — is More Of Jesus Only.”
This is the year: The way to get our Christmas MOJO back — is More Of Jesus Only.
Christmas is about: JOMO for MOJO — the Joy Of Missing Out (on all the pressure!) — for More Of Jesus Only (all of His presence!)
#JOMO for #MOJO. JoyOfMissingOut …. for … MoreOfJesusOnly
When she smiles over at me, I blink it back — she’s holding her own story — and the Wonder of the Greatest Gift.And it’s hers –He’s ours. All of ours.
And there’s all this golden light flooding the place, lighting up her very own tree — the Tree for all of us.
All this wonder that all those living too long in the shadows — can now feel a great light dawning.
She laughs.
The enthusiasm! the wonder!
God within. God within.
AND !!! Buy 2 Get 1 FREE at Target!Get all 3 Advent books for the price of 2!! Or pick up extra copies for the perfect Christmas gift for everyone on your list! Hurry, this sale ends November 12!
This year, let His wonder awaken you again, captivate you, capture your heart! More Of Jesus Only — and have a STRESS-FREE, WONDER-FULL Christmas.Read the whole Christmas Love Story, from Creation to the Creche, with all 3 of our Advent Books:
The Greatest Gift
(adult edition)
Best Devotional of the Year, ECPA, 2014, NYTimes Best Seller
(family edition)
Best Inspirational Book of the Year, CBA, 2016, NYTimes Best Seller
The Wonder of the Greatest Gift:
Best Devotional & Gift Book of the Year, CBA, 2019
(pop-up edition with your own 14 inch tree, 25 days of readings, 25 day advent flap calendar, hiding all 25 Biblically inspired ornaments! For any age)
So you don’t miss out on Jesus this year & the The Greatest Christmas.
November 7, 2022
Finding Hope in the Bumps and Bruises of Life
As a wife, mother, author, speaker, addiction recovery expert, church leader, mentor, friend and survivor, Misty Arterburn has a keen understanding of how often life can become overwhelming, messy, even seemingly unbearable. Yet, through some of the most chaotic moments of life, she has experienced God’s light shining the brightest. The palpable hope of God, by which we learn that we are not just survivors, but with God’s power we are overcomers. It is a joy to welcome Misty to the farm’s table today…
In more than 25 years of parenting my five children, our family has either been to the ER or called 911 no less than—drumroll, please—38 times. This, of course, is just the number of incidents we actually remember. Lord only knows how many instances we may have forgotten.
Thirty-eight. (!!)
How is this even possible?
Ready for a sampling from our list?
We’ve had soccer injuries, skateboard accidents, gas leaks, falls, gashes, suspected burglary, puncture wounds, dental emergencies, stitches, flaming marshmallow burns, and then the time I ran over my son James with the car!
Now on that one, in my defense, I was nearly parked in our garage when my 9-year-old decided to unbuckle his seat belt, open his door and jump out of the car before I put the car into park. When he jumped out of the car he slipped on the wet-from-rain floor, and his leg slid under the tire as it rolled one more rotation. That was a 911 call.
You get the idea. We are on-the-go and things are always happening.
“I take comfort that we aren’t the only ones who’ve had a litany of life crises.”
Life gets complicated and messy.
Thankful that we can now look back and laugh, I look at this list with a mix of disbelief and sheer relief, mind-boggled that we are all still here. My mamma’s heart is so thankful to have survived each of these alarming, scary, threatening, even agonizing crises.
I take comfort that we aren’t the only ones who’ve had a litany of life crises.
Let’s take a look at Paul’s list!
“Five different times the Jewish leaders gave me thirty-nine lashes. Three times I was beaten with rods. Once I was stoned. Three times I was shipwrecked. Once I spent a whole night and a day adrift at sea. I have traveled on many long journeys.
I have faced danger from rivers and from robbers. I have faced danger from my own people, the Jews, as well as from the Gentiles. I have faced danger in the cities, in the deserts, and on the seas. And I have faced danger from men who claim to be believers but are not.
I have worked hard and long, enduring many sleepless nights. I have been hungry and thirsty and have often gone without food. I have shivered in the cold, without enough clothing to keep me warm. Then, besides all this, I have the daily burden of my concern for all the churches.” (2 Corinthians 11:24-28, NLT)
“through every crisis or unexpected twist, God was accomplishing His exact purposes through Paul’s winding life journey.”
This list is exhausting just to read, let alone to have lived through.
What about your list? We all have one—an account of survival through the trials of our own human experience.
Paul was a survivor and undeterred in his mission to bring Good News. Although it may seem that Paul was deterred many times from his mission, the reality is that through every crisis or unexpected twist, God was accomplishing His exact purposes through Paul’s winding life journey.
God is doing the same for me. He is doing the same for you.
My list of crises extends well beyond the countless ER trips and 911 calls. Experiences of trauma and drama ad nauseum have accumulated over a lifetime.
Some of the pain and grief runs dreadfully deep.
“As I keep my heart surrendered to Him, I am never off course and I will always have what I need in this day, in this hour, and in every situation.”
Yet I remember Paul and others like Joseph, Deborah, and Jehosheba, Miriam and Mary, countless men and women throughout history and Scripture…
Those whose lives were not lived in a bubble of protection or clean upward progression, but whom God strengthened and equipped to meet every challenge they faced.
He is doing the same for me. He is doing the same for you.
“That’s why I take pleasure in my weaknesses, and in the insults, hardships, persecutions, and troubles that I suffer for Christ. For when I am weak, then I am strong.” (2 Corinthians 12:10, NLT)
“In every way we’re troubled, but we aren’t crushed by our troubles. We’re frustrated, but we don’t give up. We’re persecuted, but we’re not abandoned. We’re captured, but we’re not killed. We always carry around the death of Jesus in our bodies so that the life of Jesus is also shown in our bodies.” (2 Corinthians 4:8-10, NLT)
“We can rejoice, too, when we run into problems and trials, for we know that they help us develop endurance. And endurance develops strength of character, and character strengthens our confident hope of salvation. And this hope will not lead to disappointment. For we know how dearly God loves us, because he has given us the Holy Spirit to fill our hearts with his love.” (Romans 5:3-5)
Yes, I much prefer the rescue-me-out-of-trouble plan (and He ultimately will/has)—but I am oh so grateful for the equip-me-for-my-challenges-today plan as well.
As I keep my heart surrendered to Him, I am never off course and I will always have what I need in this day, in this hour, and in every situation. Amen.
Misty Arterburn is an author, speaker, Life Recovery group facilitator, and mother to five children. A Hoosier native, Misty is a graduate of Ball State University, and has spent more than 20 years studying and creating recovery literature, practicing the principles personally, sponsoring members of 12 Step programs, founding new meetings and recovery programs, and experiencing the benefits of recovery herself.
She has authored or coauthored multiple books including Lose It for Life Day by Day Devotional, The One Year New Testament for Busy Moms, The Mediterranean Love Plan, and various material in The Life Recovery Workbook and resources. She is also the founder of Recovery Girls, a growing organization for women on all paths of recovery, which offers group startup materials as well as help, hope, and life changing resources.
Misty is the author of the devotionals in The One Year Bible for Women. Each day’s reading includes a two-minute daily devotional as well as passages from the Old Testament, the New Testament, Psalms, and Proverbs. This perfect combination of women-centered devotionals and the beloved One Year Bible reading plan allows you to bask in God’s presence as you read through the entire Bible in one year. Learn more at theoneyearbible.com.
[Our humble thanks to Tyndale for their partnership in today’s devotion]
November 5, 2022
Only the Good Stuff: Multivitamins For Your Weekend [11.5.2022]
Happy, happy, happy weekend!
Come along with us here because who doesn’t need a bit of good news?
Let yourself smile, be crazy inspired, laugh, love & really live the gift of this life
just a little bit more this weekend…
Serving up only the Good Stuff for you & your people right here:
Jack Walker – Photographer
Jack Walker – Photographer
Jack Walker – Photographer
Jack Walker – Photographer
Jack Walker – Photographerit’s truly a world full of wonders,
and nothing’s outside the care of our wonderful God.
View this post on InstagramA post shared by Paul Nicklen (@paulnicklen)
…what a capture! the tenderness of this unbelievable moment feels holy.
I
keep turning her words around
,
savoring their truth:
“What is good is not just a matter of what we know but *how* we live it out…
Habits and rituals reflect and cement what we worship;
what we worship determines the purpose of our lives.”
View this post on InstagramA post shared by Kelsey Sparkman (@kelseyshawntastic)
– what a vision of love! –
View this post on InstagramA post shared by The Daily Heartwarming (@thedailyheartwarming)
oh to love long and unwavering like this!
oh my, oh my! dare you not to grin wide & laugh loud on this one. PURE JOY!
Cradle-to-Cross Wreath that coordinate with Unwrapping the Greatest GiftWhen our holidays are about Staying in the Story, being with Him — Peace leads us — and we can have ourselves The Greatest little Christmas yet!
A Whole Collection of Heirloom Pieces to Help you Stay in the Story this Advent Season
Read the whole Christmas Love Story, from Creation to the Creche, with all 3 of our Advent Books:And didn’t want you to miss this: ALL of our Advent books are ON SALE right now on Amazon — the lowest prices we’ve seen this year!! (But hurry, we have no idea how long the sale will last)
The Greatest Gift
(adult edition)
Best Devotional of the Year, ECPA, 2014, NYTimes Best Seller
(family edition)
Best Inspirational Book of the Year, CBA, 2016, NYTimes Best Seller
The Wonder of the Greatest Gift:
Best Devotional & Gift Book of the Year, CBA, 2019
(pop-up edition with your own 14 inch tree, 25 days of readings, 25 day advent flap calendar, hiding all 25 Biblically inspired ornaments! For any age)
God’s glory bursting through these ocean pictures from the UK – you just *have* to see these
the Truth is always the path to healing –
how hard words can actually inspire and heal when said through the lens of scripture
host a neighborhood soup party? well, this is just the best
View this post on InstagramA post shared by Upworthy (@upworthy)
this Daddy’s tender love & care for his baby?
Post of the Week From Around These Parts
What a Wild Road Trip with Your Mother Can Teach You About Hope & Love & Honoring Your Parents
So last week? My own Mama & I road trip over 1000 kilometres together (!!!) & it was wild & healing & if you want some hope to begin writing, with your life, a love letter to your parents, to your people — before it’s too late? Start here:
Read the whole thing right HEREYou’re Invited!
Being joyful isn’t what makes you grateful. Being grateful is what makes you joyful.
We’re thrilled to embark on the One Thousand Gifts Challenge and warmly invite you to join us!
We’re committing to journaling daily gifts from God during the three weeks leading up to Thanksgiving — because? No amount of regret changes the past. No amount of anxiety changes the future. Any amount of grateful joy changes the present.
When you join, you’ll receive a bundle of FREE resources to help you along the way:
Journaling pages to record your gifts in one placeWeekly devotions to your inbox to help encourage and cheer you on during the challengeBonus: A special calendar to help you commit to praying for a specific person that you’re grateful for each day of the challenge. Just write a different name down for each day and cover them in prayers of gratitude and blessing!
Sign up now to join this joy-giving challenge
View this post on InstagramA post shared by Ashley
Hiking + Travel (@appalachianash)
– just take a moment to pause and enjoy life’s beauty –
a beautiful message from our very own intern –
and what powerful words on thanksgiving & God always at work in the midst of hard things
View this post on InstagramA post shared by Dylan Avery | Artist (@thedylanavery)
creating, painting, decorating – so many beautiful ways to use the gifts God’s given
Pomegranate might just be some of the prettiest fruit on God’s earth!
Maybe try one or two of these festive, beautiful recipes with them?
Read Colleen Chao‘s recent guest post: When Suffering is the Soil of a Miracle
Read Audrey Elledge & Elizabeth Moore‘s recent guest post: When You Want to Show More Grace to Strangers
May we never tire of God’s beauty and majesty found all throughout the earth
glory, glory, glory
For every person who is walking a hard way and looking for a way through, WayMaker is your sign. Your sign that there is hope, that there are miracles, and that everything you are trying to find a way to, is actually coming to meet you in ways far more fulfilling than you ever imagined.
Grab your copy of WayMaker — and begin the journey you’re desperately looking for…PICK UP YOUR COPY OF WAYMAKER“Come magnify the Lord with Me,
And lift our faces up to majesty
Come magnify the Lord with Me“
Well, hello NOVEMBER!
“Whatever you do, do everything…*giving thanks*” Col. 3:17
God’s will is for us to give thanks *in all things*…
because this is how God knows we can live through *anything*
All the research concludes that if you write down just 3 things
you’re grateful for every day, you increase your happiness by *25%*!
Who doesn’t want *that*?!
And giving thanks in all things is a God-command for our *joy*.
Let’s do it!
Take the Joy Dare (3 prompts a day to find 3 gifts) –
and hang it on the fridge for the whole family to take the #JOYDARE too!
Scavenger hunt for God’s glory this month!
.
Print the month of November Joy Dare, and the entire year of Joy Dares,
right here: https://annvoskamp.com/subscribe/
[Subscribe/log in for free access to the entire resource library.
Look for the “Joy Dare Collection” under Free Tools]
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.
November 4, 2022
When You Want to Show More Grace to Strangers
There is nothing too small, too ordinary, or too specific that we can’t offer to the Lord in prayer. In their stunning collection of prayers in Liturgies for Hope, Audrey Elledge and Elizabeth Moore beautifully touch on the anxieties, exhaustions, joys, and longings of our days, while drawing from the time-tested wisdom of Scripture. In today’s post, they share with us, “A Liturgy for Showing Kindness to Strangers,” a much needed reminder for us all as we seek to navigate our days in this unpredictable world with a tender heart and Christ-like generosity. It is a grace to welcome Audrey and Elizabeth to the farm’s table today…
Guest Post by Audrey Elledge and Elizabeth Moore
As residents of the ever-bustling New York City, there is no shortage of strangers to bump into at any given moment.
Ask any New Yorker, and we’ve all brushed arms or tangled elbows with people in subway cars, in tight grocery store aisles, or on a crowded avenue.
Even in this post-pandemic world where skin contact with strangers has become a relic of the past, it’s still impossible to step outside without crossing paths with dozens, if not hundreds of people you have never met.
Every person we encounter has an invisible history: a conglomeration of memories, desires, hopes, disappointments, devastations, likes, dislikes, and longings that we could never know.
“our perspective can fundamentally change if we believe that each stranger is a beloved, irreplaceable child created and pursued by the Living God.”
Each stranger is actually on the center stage of their life, acting as the main character while we, as passersby, may be nothing but fleeting background extras in their unfolding story, all while we take the spotlight in our own.
From one mere glance, we cannot possibly know the mountaintops or valleys a stranger traverses. We cannot possibly understand their highs and lows, or even believe that they could be as high or low as our own.
However, our perspective can fundamentally change if we believe that each stranger is a beloved, irreplaceable child created and pursued by the Living God.
The writer of Hebrews says when we are hospitable toward those we don’t know, we might be unknowingly entertaining angels.
Extending kindness and grace to strangers is a way to encounter the Divine, to ultimately cross paths with the Holy on a mundane Tuesday.
“We look like Jesus when we listen to and linger near strangers.”
We look like Jesus when we listen to and linger near strangers, when we don’t view people as threats or inconveniences, when we don’t let fear rob them of their humanity.
A hospitable spirit toward strangers is hard to manufacture on our own, especially when we’re running late, feeling impatient or scared, or just generally having an off day.
But we can always call on the Holy Spirit to grant us a softened heart and an unmerited compassion for anyone we meet.
Here is a liturgy that puts into words what may feel difficult or even inexpressible in your conversations with the Lord. Feel free to take these words and repeat them as a prayer at the start of your day, or any time you get ready to embark outside your front door:
A Liturgy for Showing Kindness to StrangersToday, Oh God, we will brush against many we do not yet know
in the places that mark our lives:
offices,
stores,
traffic,
street corners,
lines.
Before stepping outside, we first ask for the unwarranted grace and self-forgetful love
to face the myriad and unpredictable temperaments of those around us.
“Refresh our memory of the kindness You first extended to us
so that we may freely give it to those we meet.”
Refresh our memory of the kindness You first extended to us
so that we may freely give it to those we meet.
Oh Lord, we do not know the weights others carry.
We do not know the heaviness with which a person got dressed this morning.
We do not see the grief that sits in their ribs like stones
or the joy we could so easily crush with any stray snideness.
May we walk and drive and move today as if the gospel were emblazoned on our chests,as if every word and action were an ambassador for You.
May even our thoughts toward strangers be lovely,
rooted in humility and dressed in compassion.
Oh Faithful One, we know that generosity of heart will not make us poor
and that we will not lack anything after giving away kindness too liberally.
Today we will practice blessing our fellow sojourners
and will expect nothing in return except for the pleasure of our Messiah.
For if kindness is motivated only by hope of reward,
then how are we living like You, the One who humbled Himself to the point of death?
Purify our intentions and rid us of pride
so that all who encounter us may be surprised by our light,
paused by our patience,
touched by our tenderness,
and—above all, Oh God—seen by the One who created their inmost being.
Amen.
By way of the South, both Audrey Elledge and Elizabeth Moore now live in New York City.
Audrey works at SparkNotes and Elizabeth at Penguin Random House, and they both serve at Church of the City New York.
When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, Audrey and Elizabeth, dear friends who bonded over writing, were inspired to create an anchor of hope for their own local community, and they moved forward by turning to the past, to a time when Christians looked at the collapsing world around them and resolved to offer something beautiful—something true—through poetic prayers.
The stunning result is Liturgies for Hope, their debut collection of modern liturgies reminiscent of past generations of faith and designed to awaken contemporary readers’ prayer lives. They are currently writing their second forthcoming collection of liturgies.
[ Our humble thanks to WaterBrook for their partnership in today’s devotion ]
November 2, 2022
What a Wild Road trip With Your Mother Can Teach You About Hope & Love & Honoring Your Parents
Just call us our own kind of Thelma and Louise — or Smokey and the Bandit?
Last week, my Mama and I road trip over 1000 kilometres, through 3 provinces, 2 provincial parks, across to one island out in the ocean, over a bridge that takes more than 10 minutes to cross, driving down the longest bridge in the world across waters that freeze in winter.
“Long bridges can still be crossed.“
And something between us bridges in entirely unexpected ways.
It’s refreshingly true: Long bridges can still be crossed. Whole oceans between two lives can still be crossed.
Crossing a bridge over churning waters is more possible than it seems.
This is how it happened:
When ministry took me to the country’s edge, out to the ocean, I did what I’ve never done before, and I gave my mama a ticket to wing her way alone out to the waves too, to share a wander with her along the ocean one more time, just her and I.
“Time is short but our arms can be long and reach out to hold on to each other as long as we can.“
Time is short but our arms can be long and reach out to hold on to each other as long as we can.
We all know it: The future refuses to reveal its hand to any of us.
And Mama’s already been given 71 years, braved and weathered profound trauma, burying her baby girl, and all these people she loves and parts of her heart, and parts of her are strong, and parts of her are fragile, and I witness her courage and pain in so many of the steps forward now, and I see it: When mobility is a challenge, the challenge is to share experiences that keep moving the heart.
So it’s on a Saturday morning, after I’ve served on a Friday night, that we throw our bags into the back of a rental, buckle up, tell Siri to take us toward the shore and the edge of all the things, and my heart feels it after the jarring, painful loss of one parent:
Life with your parents can be like living with a safety harness to the mother ship in ways you only realize once they’re gone and it’s severed, and then you strangely feel like you’re floating through the cosmic dark of space, untethered to your first home, in ways you’ve never known.
As Mama and I pull out onto the highway, I smile, reach over, pat her hand. While you’re still given the gift of a parent, you want to reach out and hold on to that tethering, hold them, and not take the grace of any of these fleeting days for granted.
Mortality gives the gift of clarity, of knowing that time surely holds much uncertainty, so hold on to each other while there is still time.
“Mortality gives the gift of clarity, of knowing that time surely holds much uncertainty, so hold on to each other while there is still time.“
We turn down side roads. We get off the beaten path. We drive through old cover bridges with worn wood planks, down into sleepy little villages with faded church steeples. I pull over on narrow sideroad’s barely-there shoulder so Mama can flip open the folded case of her phone to frame up another picture that she can’t see that well on her smudged screen.
When she gestures wildly for me to turn around and go back to an old shingled, woodworking shop, I find a laneway to wheel us around because love is always about a matter of direction.
This is what we do:
Crank Old Playlists to Feel Young AgainAs I drive and lay down the miles, I ask her to remember songs she loved and she tells me names of folk artists, and we play the rich depths of Karen Carpenter, and croon to Del Shannon’s “Runaway” and I tell Siri to play Don McLean’s “American Pie” and she sings at the top of her lungs, “Did you write the Book of Love? And do you have faith in God above?”
Feeling young again is always a close and invigorating possibility.
And as the suns blushes pink through the passing pines, we sway to John Denver’s “Country Roads” and she quietly asks me to play “Annie’s Song” and I can remember her playing that for my father and we both brim a bit when we sing it as the Atlantic shimmers to the east: “Like a sleepy blue ocean/ You fill up my senses/ Come fill me again …”
Turning down roads, we turn up tunes, and this playing old playlists with your parents lets you see them young again, let’s them feel their youth all over again.
I turn the volume up and how had I not known it? Feeling young again is always a close and invigorating possibility.
Ask Questions to Find KnownnessAt a friendly gas station somewhere south of Pugwash, Nova Scotia, I download an app with 36 questions because:
The real destination is always communication — so souls feel known.
“The real destination is always communication —
so souls feel known.“
So as Siri directs, and we wind around bends in the road tracing along shorelines, I ask her:
Given the choice of anyone in the world, whom would you want as a dinner guest?
What would constitute a “perfect” day for you?
For what in your life do you feel most grateful?
When I ask her the next question that the app suggests, “When did you last sing to yourself? To someone else?” we both throw our heads back and howl laugh because how many miles have we now spent singing our whole hearts out?
I tell myself to memorize this, because this is where I always want to arrive:
Asking questions is how you arrive at the ultimate destination of helping someone feel known.
Curiosity is the key to intimacy.
Curiosity is the key to intimacy.
We roll windows down. We talk and ask questions and we listen. We clear the air.
The wind blows Mama’s hair, silver lining in twilight.
The Present is for embracing the Gifts that AreSomewhere north of the Bay of Fundy, Mama reaches over and squeezes my hand and she lets her hand linger and I don’t know how many miles we drive like this. This is where our journey can lead: We can find more of each other.
The places where we’ve missed each other can still give way to U-turns.
The ways a parent falls short can completely fade in comparison to the ways they’ve loved long.
What a parent wasn’t able to give you, can be dwarfed in this present moment, by what they did give.
What a parent wasn’t able to give you, can be dwarfed in this present moment, by what they did give.
I look over at Mama, her eyes twinkle dancing with gifts and truths she’s still giving me, still living with me:
Change defies time. It’s never too late to change. What we choose to focus on ultimately defines our lives.
When we focus on the dark, it blinds us to how we can be part of the Light.
The future we long for is simply a string of short present moments that can tie us to the gift of change.
“A flood of forgiveness can raise the tides, raise all our boats and bring us home to hope.“
Make a peace treaty with all the unknown, and live into all the peace of letting yourself be known.
When I’m not sure how to turn the lights on in a rental car, Mama leans over and points. I nod and flick on the lights. I can see their glint reflected in her eyes.
A flood of forgiveness can raise the tides, raise all our boats and bring us home to hope.
They Helped With Our Dreams, Now We Can with TheirsAfter a long day of driving and turning, always this turning, again and again, toward each other, we pull into a tiny AirBnB on a dark, dead end street on the edge of the world, and though we can’t see anything, we can hear the waves lapping, kissing the shore again and again.
I kiss Mama’s forehead and whisper goodnight. She still smells like home to me.
In the early dawning of the next morning, after she’s rushed outside to stand on the rocky shore in her pyjamas, her phone case flipped open, to take pictures of waves and sea gulls and all matter of seaweed washed in, I greet her at the door.
True, that: I grew up asking her for all the things I wanted.
But now it’s her turn to me all me all that she wants: Where do you want to go? What do you want to do? What would make your heart large with joy? Here I am, at your service.
“When we focus on the dark, it blinds us to how we can be part of the Light.“
In a world of options and dreams, she surprises me and she doesn’t, because hasn’t she always been about seeing the value in restoration?
“Thrift stores! Let’s find thrift stores!“
Deal! Siri! Value Village! Siri finds one, just one street back from the water. Mama finds the identical bear pattern to the bear pattern she sewed up for us in my childhood. She nods my way with giddy smile, winks, and tucks the pattern in her basket — she will use the very same pattern to sew another generation of teddy bears for grandchildren, and old patterns can surprise us with new hope! I watch her thumb through shelves of old children books and I can remember the tattered Eloise Wilkin books she used to read to me under a knitted afghan on her bed.
There is still time to read each other.
Read Aloud to Read Quiet Parts of Our SoulsSomewhere in the caverns of the thrift store, I find a book on growing older gracefully for $4.99. I read the introduction aloud to her after tea that evening. She asks me if I will read another chapter aloud to her the next morning.
We fall into this rhythm of cups of steaming tea, and watching waves, and reading aloud about meaning and time and regret and life being a series of new beginnings again. And I realize:
When we read aloud to each other, we make space to hear the quiet things within each other.
I promise Mama that long after she returns home, I will call her to keep reading loud to her, to keep reading more of the quiet places in her soul.
One morning in the tiny kitchen, in front of the stove, with the tea kettle gently whistling that it’s time, it’s time, my mama turns round toward the canvas of windows filled with the blue expanse of ocean and all these rocking waves wearing down the stones along coast, and she murmurs it to me slowly, unexpectedly, tears in her eyes,
“Would you hold me, Ann — just hold me for a moment?”
And I hold Mama.
“Time is made of all the seconds, and all kinds of second chances to be kind.“
I hold my beautiful little Mama and we rock, me the babe she first rocked in arms, and her now my white crowned mama, held in mine.
I’m no longer the scent of a newborn in arms. She’s now the cherished fragrance of age in mine.
I inhale the glory of this moment and all this wave of emotion.
Time is made of all the seconds, and all kinds of second chances to be kind.
And whatever time has held, as long we are still here, there is still time to find each other, to hold on to each other. Bitterness, regret, jadedness doesn’t have to have a hold on us; we can choose to be held by the vulnerability of intimacy. The only way to really forge forward is not to let your soul be forged in a furnace of bitterness, but to forge toward others with kindness.
There will be a day in the future where now will be but a photograph you can’t get back to, that only memory has the key to return to. But today? Right now?
The present moment
is a gift
of a love letter that you get to write
with your whole life right
now,
and send out into forever.
Holding Mama in my arms, my heart aching for all its holding, the heavenly cloud of her white hair brushes my cheek and I kiss her forehead again.
“It’s okay, Mama, it’s okay. You are loved, Mom… I so love you, Mama.”
“And I love you, dear daughter.”
And whatever detours and bends and turns in the road any of the the trip has held, there are bridges that still hold.
Wishing there was a way to change all kinds of things? A new way for all kinds of stories? Looking for more than just a way through, but a new way of being?
For every person who is walking a hard way and looking for a way through, WayMaker is your sign.
Your sign that there is hope, that there are miracles, and that everything you are trying to find a way to, is actually coming to meet you in ways far more fulfilling than you ever imagined.
Grab Your Copy of WayMaker —
and begin the journey you’re desperately looking for…
October 31, 2022
When Suffering is the Soil of a Miracle
Words we never want to hear: “Cancer. Stage four. Terminal.” Yet when Colleen Chao received this unexpected diagnosis, God gave her the most wondrous gift in a dark and unexpected place. In her new book, In the Hands of a Fiercely Tender God, Colleen reminds us to look at the beauty of suffering in light of God’s goodness, and graciously points us back to the Only One who can turn our bitter griefs into breathtaking gifts. It is a grace to welcome Colleen to the farm’s table today…
The summer of 2017 was the first time in a decade that I felt well. I was tucking in more than three hours of sleep each night, I had energy, and the aches and pains of chronic illness were minimal. On top of that, my six-year-old’s health had improved enough for us to experience the edges of normalcy. My husband and I looked at each other and whispered with relief, “We’re not in crisis mode anymore!”
But as I showered before church on a midsummer Sunday morning, I felt a little lump in my right breast. My eyes filled with tears as I wondered, what if this is cancer? After all we’ve been through, what if we’re about to face our biggest health crisis yet? God wouldn’t do that to us, would He?
“Even in the scariest moments, holding my breath for that decisive phone call, mind racing, body trembling—I knew He was with me.”
We began a long and complicated testing process. Some days I had miraculous calm and confidence in God’s goodness. Other days I couldn’t loosen fear’s vise-grip on my heart.
Don’t make me walk this, Lord, I begged Him. And then just as quickly I would add, but if this is where You are going, I want to go with You. I don’t want to miss out on what You’re doing.
Even in the scariest moments, holding my breath for that decisive phone call, mind racing, body trembling—I knew He was with me. And as I hid myself in Him during those waiting weeks, His Spirit clearly impressed upon my spirit: “this lump is a gift.”
What kind of gift, I could not fathom. As we continued to test and wait (and test and wait some more), I hoped for the best, but readied my heart for the worst. Because what if the worst was the gift?
“What if the worst was the gift?”
Early in those 14 weeks of testing, I made a trip to an imaging specialist in San Diego. When I saw the images of my scans that day—I knew. There was no doubt. It was cancer.
I got into my car, trembling from head to toe, and began my ninety-minute drive home. As I drove, I poured out my heart to God—and while I have forgotten most of what I said to Him that day, I will never forget crying out to Him again and again, “Give me more joy and peace than I’ve ever experienced before.”
It wasn’t a timid question: “Would You give me joy and peace, God?” It was a bold request: “If this is where we’re going together, I’m going to need You to give me what I can’t conjure up on my own.”
In those moments, God’s presence seemed to fill every inch of my car. He was surrounding me. He was holding me together. And even as my body trembled and my heart quaked, I knew He was prompting me to cry out for the impossible as we set out for places I did not want to go.
He wanted to give me mind-blowing gifts—but first He wanted me to boldly ask Him for them.
“And here’s the thing about gifts from God: they’re not meant for us alone—they’re meant to be shared.“
And here’s the thing about gifts from God: they’re not meant for us alone— they’re meant to be shared.
I intuitively knew that if God was giving me the gift of cancer, and if He was going to give me supernatural joy and peace to go with it, it would not just be for me—it would be for others as well.
Like the depression and singleness and chronic illness that preceded it, cancer was to usher me into the sacred places of others’ sufferings, allowing me to be a conduit of Christ’s compassion and comfort and love.
F. B. Meyer said, “The grave may be dark and deep, the winter long, the frost keen and penetrating; but spring will come, and the stone be rolled away, and the golden stalk shall wave in the sunshine, bearing its crown of fruit, and men shall thrive on the bread of our experience, the product of our tears and suffering and prayers.”
For the past five years, cancer has been just that: dark and long, keen and penetrating—but all these tears and pains and prayers have been turned not only for my own good, but also for the good of other sufferers. It is the beauty of 2 Corinthians 1:3–7 at work:
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and the God of all comfort. He comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any kind of affliction, through the comfort we ourselves receive from God.
For just as the sufferings of Christ overflow to us, so also through Christ our comfort overflows. If we are afflicted, it is for your comfort and salvation. If we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which produces in you patient endurance of the same sufferings that we suffer.
And our hope for you is firm because we know that as you share in the sufferings, so you will also share in the comfort.
Even as I live in the cruelty of this terminal diagnosis, I am forever grateful for the gift God has given me in this suffering and struggle. It has not just been a gift but countless gifts.
Immeasurably good gifts. As for the joy and peace I begged God for five years ago, they have come in stunning proportions. He has out given everything I asked Him for.
Anxiety still pays me the occasional visit, depression peeks his head in every now and then, but joy and peace reign. If you knew me and my history with anxiety and depression, you would understand that is nothing short of miraculous.
“Our deepest sorrows, our sharpest pains, are right where God wants to outgive us with His breathtakingly good gifts.”
God loves working miracles on behalf of His suffering children. We see proof of this throughout Scripture and throughout history. Our deepest sorrows, our sharpest pains, are right where God wants to outgive us with His breathtakingly good gifts. It was Lilias Trotter who wrote, “Take the very hardest thing in your life—the place of difficulty, outward or inward, and expect God to triumph gloriously in that very spot. Just there, He can bring your soul into blossom!”
Whatever your suffering may be, God can do miracles in you and for you and for those your life touches—miracles of the heart and soul that will echo into eternity.
Even as our hearts quake in our suffering, we can ask for more peace and more joy and more faith and more hope and more wisdom—and we can trust that a fiercely tender God is holding us together and working these wonders in our souls to “brings us into blossom.”
Colleen Chao has written extensively about finding God’s goodness in the unexpected chapters of her life, including singleness, chronic illness, and terminal cancer. She’s worked as an editor and writer for global organizations, and an English teacher to some of her favorite people on earth—teenagers. When she’s not wrangling words, she enjoys beautiful hikes, side-splitting laughter, and half-read books piled bedside. She makes her home just outside Boise, Idaho with her husband Eddie, their son Jeremy, and Willow the dog.
Learn about how you can find hope and joy in life’s darkest days, in Colleen’s new book, In the Hands of a Fiercely Tender God. How do we suffer long and well? What do we do when we feel cheated? How do we face pressing darkness?
One thing Colleen has learned is that we cannot bear the suffering alone. We need lots of help. To that end, Colleen shares a precious devotional gift with the suffering soul: thirty-one days of wisdom, hope, and encouragement. Drawing upon stories from past saints, rich truths from Scripture, and habits that build joyful endurance, Colleen helps fellow sufferers to embrace one day at a time, to trust and love Jesus more, and put themselves In the Hands of a Fiercely Tender God.
[ Our humble thanks to Moody Publishers for their partnership in today’s devotion ]
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