Ann Voskamp's Blog, page 59
July 3, 2021
Only the Good Stuff: Multivitamins For Your Weekend [07.03.21]
Happy, happy, happy weekend!
Let’s not let the everyday routines numb us to the miracle of living every day! Some real, down in the bones JOY to celebrate today! Links & stories 100% guaranteed to make you smile a mile wide & believe like crazy in a Good God redeeming everything. Never, ever give up…there really is hope, even for us.
Serving up only the Good Stuff for you & your people right here:
Ginny Sheller
Ginny Sheller
Ginny Sheller
Ginny Sheller
Ginny Shellertoo beautiful not to share with you…exhale deeply as you rest and restore this weekend
woah! Man builds an entire village for his little outdoor friend
stories like these?! never, ever get old…love love love this one
come along for a quiet visit? and a glimpse into a life on a tiny Scottish Island in the Outer Hebrides. Last Autumn they spent an entire month living and working on Vatersay, a tiny island of 90 people, a 5 hour boat journey from the Scottish mainland
View this post on InstagramA post shared by Good News Movement (@goodnews_movement)
what’s not to love here? had to share…
how about some Red Eyed Gravy?!
because she’d kinda the best
At age 70, Yankees fan gets to live out her dream of being a bat girl
Six decades after the team said no, Gwen McLoughlin served as a bat girl for her beloved New York Yankees
“You know when they say dreams come true? This is it…”
oh, these words…Scars in Heaven
What is the Neurocycle, and how can it combat grief, burnout and stress?
Communication pathologist and cognitive neuroscientist Dr Caroline Leaf explains how this method works
Believe Who God Says You Are
Our favorite farmhouse #FreeTrade Resource: set of 3 Ceramic Bowls… classic loveliness in our Fair Trade store, Grace Crafted Home:
using these ceramic nesting bowls every day here on the farm…they are as sweet as the soul that made them. Always have the perfect bowl with this set of three nesting bowls. Every piece in our Grace Crafted Home collection is Fair Trade and brings dignity to the artisans who created them. The art of making clay pottery is as old as human civilization. This age-old tradition of making clay pottery still exists in Nepal. Despite all the influences of modernization and development, the potters of Kathmandu Valley still find their livelihood on their potter’s wheels.
Your home and life can tell a story — that’s changing the story of the world.
(100% of all funds not only empowers artisans around the world, but partners with Mercy House Global to support several homes for young women and their babies in crisis pregnancies in the slums of Nairobi, Kenya)
Craft a home that embodies your values: classic beauty, heirloom quality, fair trade — Grace all around
reunions like these? tears every time
An Invitation to the Bored and Disappointed
glory, glory, glory
Well, hello JULY!
“Whatever you do, do everything…*giving thanks” Col. 3:1
God’s will is for us to give thanks in all things…because this is how God knows we can live through anything.
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!
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Print the month of July Joy Dare, and the entire year of Joy Dares, right here:
And pick up a copy of the new 10th anniversary edition of One Thousand Gifts, and count all the ways He loves you, & fall in love with Him all over again! AND, when you do, you get an entire FREE Joy Tool Kit which includes 5 exclusive printables: a “How to Always Find Joy” Frameable, a Daily Joy Map & Planner, a Family Gratitude Gift Jar kit, a 12-Month Joy Calendar, and a Daily Joy Compass. Learn how you can get yours today!
full stop: powerful teaching from Francis Chan for every one of us…
Dysfunction to Dynasty – Ch. 6: Reed Robertson shares his deeply personal story…
Instagram: @historycoolkids
In this short video, Holocaust survivor Gerda Weissmann Klein and her husband, Kurt Klein, share their experiences of liberation and meeting for the first time.
because someone may need these words today: Trusting God in the Darkness
You Already Have What You Need, Now Let God Work
she can preach! thank you for these words of truth, Priscilla Shirer
One Surprising Reason for Pain // Ask Pastor John Piper
Why Abel Never Lost Hope During His Cancer Battle
Beyond grateful for the life saving work of Compassion International
Psalm 148 is a call for the whole cosmos to praise God. In the climactic conclusion of Psalm 148, we read that Israel should praise God because He has raised a horn for them. But what’s the deal with this horn? And why is God lifting it up? In this video, we explore how Psalm 148 fits into the overall story of the book of Psalms—the story of God’s promise to raise up a king who will bring victory to Israel and rescue the world.
Books for Soul Healing:
Joy is actually possible, right where you are.
Take the dare to discover: Life is not an emergency…Life is a GIFT. Life is too short to do anything but truly savor it — to count all the ways you truly loved.
What if Brokenness is the Path into the Abundant Life?
You don’t have to be afraid of broken things — because Christ is redeeming everything.
There’s no other authentic way forward — but a broken way — right into a profoundly abundant life.
Journey into a deeply meaningful life with this devotional and take sixty steps from heart-weary brokenness to Christ-focused abundance. The Way of Abundance — is the way forward every heart needs.
Be the Gift is a tender invitation into the next step of deeper transformation, less stress, more joy and abundantly more peace & purpose. You only get one life to love well…to Be The Gift.
on repeat this week: His Name is Jesus
The world will say they will love you if you are beautiful—but the truth is you are beautiful because you are already loved.
Because He who is Love loves you unconditionally.
Please hear me, Girl: The world has enough women who know how to do their hair. It needs women who know how to do hard and holy things.
The world has enough women who live a masked insecurity. It needs more women who live a brave vulnerability.
The world has enough women who are trying to do it all—spending everything they’ve got to be found in the crowd. It needs more who are doing the only thing that is necessary—spending time at His feet, being found and known by Him.
We need more women who would rather be beautifully sacrificial than perfectly artificial.
Don’t let Hollywood define it; let the pages of Truth define it: Romance is a long sacrifice.
Say that quiet to yourself at the mirror, over the stove, over the toilet bowls, and let your soul feel the caress of God who knows: Romance is a long sacrifice.
And then it will happen to you, like it happens to all the women who are soul beautiful and loved:
For a beautiful countenance—count blessings.
For beautiful lips—only speak words that make souls stronger.
To carry yourself with poise—carry each other’s burden.
For the most beautiful shape—simply live with one hand receiving all as gift, and other hand giving away the gifts. You becoming the shape of a gift—
Becoming the shape of a Cross.
Go ahead, Girl, run your hands wild through your hair and smile unashamed and be at peace in the fullness of you and pour your beauty out like an alabaster perfume:
Beauty doesn’t live in your skin.
Beauty lives in the lining of your heart.
[excerpted from our little Facebook family … come join us each day?]
That’s all for this weekend, friends.
Go slow. Be God-struck. Grant grace. Live Truth.
Give Thanks. Love well. Re – joy, re- joy, ‘re- joys’ again
Share Whatever Is Good.
June 26, 2021
Only the Good Stuff: Multivitamins for Your Weekend [06.26.21]
Happy, happy, happy weekend!
Let’s not let the everyday routines numb us to the miracle of living every day! Some real, down in the bones JOY to celebrate today! Links & stories 100% guaranteed to make you smile a mile wide & believe like crazy in a Good God redeeming everything. Never, ever give up…there really is hope, even for us.
Serving up only the Good Stuff for you & your people right here:
Mary Anne Morgan
Mary Anne Morgan
Mary Anne Morgan“The whole of the life — even the hard — is made up of the minute parts, and if I miss the infinitesimals, I miss the whole. These are new language lessons, and I live them out. There is a way to live the big of giving thanks in all things. It is this: to give thanks in this one small thing. The moments will add up.” ~One Thousand Gifts
it’s a grace to share your gifts of stunning beauty… thank you, Mary Anne Morgan
View this post on InstagramA post shared by Brodie the Goldendoodle
(@brodiethatdood)
… kinda crazy beautiful 
In all kinds of ways: We all carry each other over the drains
50 Times People Found The Most Unexpected Things
we circled ’round this one! fascinating…
come along for a quiet visit?
couldn’t stop watching! amazed!
Martin Makowski
Martin Makowski
Martin Makowskitears here… doesn’t get any better than this:
Dads and Brides: come see how this photographer captures these special moments at weddings
thank you, Jesus!
On Saying “No” to Famous Rockstars… thank you for this one, Scott Sauls
too good to miss!
a most powerful story of love, sacrifice, and a new family bond. Must, must see
cheering loudly!
“I would like for the whole world to know that it’s never too late to go back to school, no matter what age you drop out…it’s never too late. It is important. Education is very important.”
explore some of the 10 best moments of beauty, drama and spectacle of our natural world
View this post on InstagramA post shared by Good News Movement (@goodnews_movement)
never, ever give up
just sharing because I adore Philip and Jennifer Rothschild… could listen to them talk all day..
Suffering in Silence: The Menstruation Taboo
Beyond grateful for the life saving work of Compassion International
because we all need a hero to come and lift us up
… classic loveliness in our Fair Trade store, Grace Crafted Home:
using this Natural Macawood Ladle every day here on the farm…they are as sweet as the soul that made them. With its curved handle and deep bowl, all this ladle needs is a pot to be in. This spoon is ideal for serving soups or gifting to a friend!. There is also a hole carved at the end of the handle, so that the ladle can be hung as décor in the kitchen when it is not in use.
Your home and life can tell a story — that’s changing the story of the world.
(100% of all funds not only empowers artisans around the world, but partners with Mercy House Global to support several homes for young women and their babies in crisis pregnancies in the slums of Nairobi, Kenya)
Craft a home that embodies your values: classic beauty, heirloom quality, fair trade — Grace all around
YES, yes, yes: Perspective changes things… thank you, IF: Lead and Chrystal Evans Hurst
Joy ProutySometimes the healing we pray for doesn’t come, sometimes prayers are answered with heartbreaking no’s, and sometimes our faith just doesn’t seem like it’s enough.
But there’s a deeper truth that you don’t want to miss:
Living in the Tension of “He Can” and “Even if He Doesn’t”
don’t miss her story!
“More than anything I was angry at God in the sense of… I thought this is what I was supposed to be doing and if this is what I’m supposed to be doing then why did you take it away from me?”
The Power of Vision
glory, glory, glory
Post of the week from these parts here:
Yeah, dear women…& our daughters & our sisters…when you’re dog tired of media voices telling you what Beauty & Love is:
Girl, This is Why You’re Beautiful, & No Men, Magazines or Media can Argue With This
on repeat here: Same God
Pick up a copy of the new 10th anniversary edition of One Thousand Gifts, and count all the ways He loves you, & fall in love with Him all over again!
AND, when you do, you get an entire FREE Joy Tool Kit which includes 5 exclusive printables: a “How to Always Find Joy” Frameable, a Daily Joy Map & Planner, a Family Gratitude Gift Jar kit, a 12-Month Joy Calendar, and a Daily Joy Compass. Learn how you can get yours today!
Ephesians 3:14–19 : Why Does Paul Pray After Teaching?
Books for Soul Healing:
Joy is actually possible, right where you are.
Take the dare to discover: Life is not an emergency…Life is a GIFT. Life is too short to do anything but truly savor it — to count all the ways you truly loved.
What if Brokenness is the Path into the Abundant Life?
You don’t have to be afraid of broken things — because Christ is redeeming everything.
There’s no other authentic way forward — but a broken way — right into a profoundly abundant life.
Journey into a deeply meaningful life with this devotional and take sixty steps from heart-weary brokenness to Christ-focused abundance. The Way of Abundance — is the way forward every heart needs.
Be the Gift is a tender invitation into the next step of deeper transformation, less stress, more joy and abundantly more peace & purpose. You only get one life to love well…to Be The Gift.
believe it: Make It Right
“Even though I walk through the valley…
I will fear no evil, for you are with me.”
Psalm 23:4
Just four quiet words today: You are with me.
Discouragement trailing? But You are with me.
Worries hounding? But You are with me.
Valleys ahead & shadows looming? But You are with me.
I may feel useless, but only one thing is needful: that I am with You and You are with me.
If God is within us — it doesn’t matter what is without.
[excerpted from our little Facebook family … come join us each day?]
That’s all for this weekend, friends.
Go slow. Be God-struck. Grant grace. Live Truth.
Give Thanks. Love well. Re – joy, re- joy, ‘re- joys’ again
Share Whatever Is Good.
June 24, 2021
Girl, This is Why You’re Beautiful, & No Men, Magazines or Media can Argue With This
Dear Daughter,
In the days just after you blew out your birthday candles, when we stood in the check-out and you leaned over and said, “What? I can’t hear you?” I could read it right then in your eyes.
Right there by all the glossy magazines screaming at you like a pack of jockeying hawkers.
If you listen long enough to all the loud voices about who you should be, you grow deaf to the beauty of who you are.
Listen — read the covers of magazines and you’d think romance is a function of cleavage and plastic surgeon noses and spray tans.
“If you listen long enough to all the loud voices about who you should be, you grow deaf to the beauty of who you are.”
Read the glossy covers and you’d think love is a function of waist size and heel height and bare flesh flaunted for every gawking eye. Read everything in the check out line and they check you out of reality.
That’s what the media is selling: X-rated Beauty. That’s the thing about the check-out line: The media’s fuelled by changing the definition of beauty, romance, and love from what is true to what is trendy.
Media tries to define you with likes as a measure of your loveability.
Media votes you on or votes you off, as if a woman’s worth is a popularity contest instead of being permanently won by function of being made in the image and likeness of God.
Be defined by Real Love — or you’ll go looking for love in the pages of some cheap novel of romance porn, some plot line that is artificially augmented and harlequin liposuctioned, you’ll go looking for love under the warmth of some guy’s hands, you’ll go looking for love in the size of your jeans.
“The world will say they will love you if you are beautiful —- but the truth is you are beautiful because you are loved.”
Listen for the small voice who is Love who cups your face close and names you Beloved, listen to “hear His voice, and He calls His own sheep by name and leads them out.”
Listen to the Voice who says, “I love you so much that when the wolves come to devour your real identity — I become a lamb Myself. I sacrifice Myself for you, so you never have to sacrifice yourself to the gods of this world.”
Listen to the Voice who says, “I am the Shepherd that when the wolf comes to consume you with lies, I would rather lose my life, than let you lose your value.”
Listen to the Voice who says, “I will never drive you to photo-shop expectations or to the dangerous cliff of conditional love —- because I’m never the One driving you, I’m gently leading you. I lead you, no matter where you are, I am with you, leading you.”
Listen to the Voice who assures: “I am making your good decisions work for good — and I am working your bad decisions into the best loving plan for your ultimate good.”
Listen to His Voice: God is turning everything around to turn you into the beauty He knows you are.
“Please hear me, Girl: The world has enough women who know how to do their hair. It needs women who know how to do hard and holy things.”
The world will say they will love you if you are beautiful —- but the truth is you are beautiful because you are already loved.
Because I love you.
Because He who is Love loves you unconditionally.
Please hear me, Girl: The world has enough women who know how to do their hair. It needs women who know how to do hard and holy things.
The world has enough women who live a masked insecurity. It needs more women who live a brave vulnerability.
The world has enough women who are trying to do it all — spending everything they’ve got to be found in the crowd. It needs more who are doing the only thing that is necessary — spending time at His feet, being found and known by Him.
Look at the bent woman ahead of us in the check-out, her gnarled and arthritic hand counting out the potatoes she’ll bake tonight for the old man leaning against the cart. That is the quietest reality that hushes all the media voices: We need more women who would rather be beautifully sacrificial than perfectly artificial.
“The world has enough women who live a masked insecurity. It needs more women who live a brave vulnerability.”
Don’t let Hollywood define it; let the pages of Truth define it: Romance is a long sacrifice.
Say that quiet to yourself at the mirror, over the stove, over the toilet bowls, and let your soul feel the caress of God who knows: Romance is a long sacrifice.
And then it will happen to you, like it happens to all the women who are soul beautiful and loved:
For a beautiful countenance — count blessings.
For beautiful lips — only speak words that make souls stronger.
To carry yourself with poise — carry each other’s burden.
For the most beautiful shape — simply live with one hand receiving all as gift, and other hand giving away the gifts. You becoming the shape of a gift —
Becoming the shape of a Cross.
Go ahead, Girl, run your hands wild through your hair and smile unashamed and be at peace in the fullness of you and pour your beauty out like an alabaster perfume:
Beauty doesn’t live in your skin.
Beauty lives in the lining of your heart.
You are soul beautiful.
Hear that: You are truly a beautiful soul.
Just as you are, right now.
You are the shape of a gift— because you are becoming the shape of a Cross.
Turn these pages of Be The Gift and unwrap the beauty of who you are and who you are meant to be and accept it —-
Accept the gift of light breaking into all your broken places, all the places that feel kinda abandoned…
In the places where we feel abandoned — are the places where we can abandon ourselves to God — and find the gift of a broken way to a truly abundant life.
June 21, 2021
Living in the Tension of “He Can” and “Even if He Doesn’t”
As a remarried widow, Tricia Lott Williford is closely acquainted with the greatest tension of all: believing God can do anything and yet knowing that he might choose not to. Take a moment to read her honest words on how we can still believe God is good, even when he says no. It is a grace to welcome Tricia to the farm’s front porch today…
guest post by Tricia Lott Williford
I don’t like the theology that says healing depends on my faith. What does that mean when God doesn’t say yes? Does it mean I didn’t have enough faith? And is a “lack of faith” my fault?
My husband (Peter) and I have two vastly different stories of faith miracles. He begged and pleaded with God from a desperate place in a jail cell, and God told him yes. The miracle is that he was set free.
“How do we learn to hold both sides of that equation, the belief that God can, but the understanding that He might not? It’s the greatest tension of all.”
I begged and pleaded with God from a desperate place on my bedroom floor as my first husband lay dying in my arms, and God told me no. The miracle is that my faith stayed intact at all.
When Peter and I pray together, when we ask God for things, it sounds different. He prays for miracles in the hope of a heart-stretching yes; I pray for comfort in the likelihood of a heartbreaking no.
If faithfulness is a fruit of the Holy Spirit, then is it his job to grow it in me? If I don’t have it, then how in the world do I get it? And is it my fault that someone is sick—or dying—because of my “lack of faith”?
That really doesn’t feel good to me. It makes me feel like I didn’t study hard enough for this test, as if I’m being overlooked by God.
How do we learn to hold both sides of that equation, the belief that God can, but the understanding that He might not? It’s the greatest tension of all.
Joy Prouty
Joy Prouty
Joy Prouty
Although it doesn’t give us an answer for the tension, the Bible helps us sit in it. It shows us the heart of God, the deep love and grief and profound power, the mystery of how He thinks and acts and is. The Bible doesn’t give us a reason for suffering. It gives us a God who is over it and with us in it, even as we live in the ache.
“The Bible doesn’t give us a reason for suffering. It gives us a God who is over it and with us in it, even as we live in the ache.”
A trio named Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, all the way back in the Old Testament, shows us how to hold the tension with both hands.
Their friend Daniel is best known for his time in a lions’ den, and these pals of his are known for making a stand in a fiery furnace.
Both these Bible stories got some airtime in Sunday school, in large part because Daniel and his friends were young men who demonstrated that there is more to being young than making mistakes.
Adults are quickly won over by young people who show wisdom and discernment, and Daniel’s friends—Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego—show us the power of their convictions. Together they silently defied King Nebuchadnezzar’s order to fall down and worship his gold statue, a tower that was taller than the White House. They chose God, even in the face of certain death.
The king gives these guys “one more chance” to bow down to this statue: “But if you refuse, you will be thrown immediately into the blazing furnace. And then what god will be able to rescue you from my power?” Daniel 3:15
But the three friends hold their ground. They will not bend their convictions.
Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego reply, “O Nebuchadnezzar, we do not need to defend ourselves before you. If we are thrown into the blazing furnace, the God whom we serve is able to save us. He will rescue us from your power, Your Majesty. But even if he doesn’t, we want to make it clear to you, Your Majesty, that we will never serve your gods or worship the gold statue you have set up.” Daniel 3:16-18
They knew what they had asked God to do, and they believed He absolutely could do it. They even said He would. And then they finish the sentence with the giant caveat: But even if He doesn’t, we will not bow to any other god.
That’s the balance right there, resting in the tension between the first sentence and the last, between the left hand and the right.
“When we know what we want Him to do, we believe He can, and we might even say that He will. And we choose this day to remain faithful to this God. Even if He doesn’t.”
When we know what we want Him to do, we believe He can, and we might even say that He will. And we choose this day to remain faithful to this God. Even if He doesn’t.
Listen, I believe God can do anything. That is a complete sentence, with nothing added.
I believe He can perform healing miracles. I just haven’t seen it in my life.
I believe He can, but I cannot say that He always does because you and I both know that sometimes He doesn’t. (Otherwise, probably every person any of us have ever loved would still be alive.)
When someone tells me I need to have enough faith in order for God to bring healing, then I feel like they’re telling me I must have pure faith without any doubt.
I feel like I have to put all my faith in my left hand and hold it open to receive the gifts God’s waiting to give me, and I should put all my doubt in the right hand, lock it up tight, and throw away the key, just to be sure there’s no whisper of question.
But I’m looking at those same two hands, and I see different choices.
In one hand is faith: I believe He can do anything.
In the other hand is sovereignty. Even if He doesn’t, I believe He is still good.
Tricia Lott Williford is a writer, blogger, teacher, cohost of the podcast Let’s Talk Soon, and the author of five books. Tricia has recently released This Book Is for You: Loving God’s Word In Your Actual Life, a book about falling in love with the Bible, even if you have long felt like it was written for someone else.
With raw transparency, honest grief, laughable joy, and a captivating voice, Tricia shares how God’s words have become her daily lifeline. Tricia will surprise you as you engage in an unexpected dialogue with God and His word.
With slice-of-life stories, humor, and charm, Tricia Lott Williford will help you discover that the Bible can be your lifeline, too.
[ Our humble thanks to NavPress for their partnership in today’s devotion ]
June 20, 2021
What Your Tender Places Need This Father’s Day
I sat with a man once —
who told me about falling in love with a woman who was most alluring not in satin but in sweats,
her hair undone and falling, laughing about something long ago, her head thrown back and her neck arching bare and lovely.
He said that he couldn’t take his eyes off her when she was like that, vulnerable and unmasked. Maybe that’s what beauty is, the brokenness of bare exposure.
“What does it matter what people think of you when you know that you’re known by God?”He said that’s all he ever wanted.
He wanted her. And he wanted to live unafraid because what does it matter what people think of you when you know that you’re known by God? Let people have their bloated opinions — he’d take God’s bottom-line approval any old day.
Thing was, every time he went to ask for her hand, to commit to a taking and holding gently a life like that, to daily daring to lay down for a life like that, some voice in the back of his rattling mind mocked him for thinking he was a man.
That he wasn’t man enough for a woman like her, that he wasn’t man enough for a brave life where souls lived unashamed and uncovered to each other, that he wasn’t man enough to live unmasked in a world of stiff suits and swaggering loud certainty.
So he’d gone to his dad.
Joy Prouty
Joy Prouty
Joy ProutyHe’d knew where to go — and it was back to his father.
Because a Father is the seed of your beginning, he is the catalyst of your being, the genesis of your becoming.
Because sometimes the only way to silence the voices in the back of your head is to stand face to face with your Father.
Because when we dream of making a life, dream of making a love that will make life, we return to the beginning. And and we pray for a moment when our Father leans close over our hoping to breathe the warmth of His willing self into us.
That is what makes him your Father: He is your beginning.
So he went and sat at his Dad’s table.
He looked his Dad in the eye and told him the life he wanted to have and to hold, about the woman he wanted to make a life with.
Told his Dad that there was something in him that said that there was something in him that wasn’t enough for her, a voice that told him that he wasn’t good for living vulnerable dreams, a voice that told him he was less than —his voice broke — that he was less than others, less than expectations, less than enough.
“Sometimes what you want most is your father to give you the greatest gift anyone can give someone: for him to believe in you.”He’d looked his father in the eye and that was his Esau Moment.
It happens. And you don’t know when it will come, how often it will come: Every child, every man, every woman, has these Esau Moments when everything in them wants to beg a blessing from their father.
When you want the man that began you to bless you — to say that you are one of his dreams come true, that you are what he hoped for, you are his desires and love incarnated and there is nothing he will leave behind that compares to the masterpiece of you changing the world and everything coming ahead.
Sometimes what you want most is your father to give you the greatest gift anyone can give someone: for him to believe in you.
So that’s what he said — He looked into the face of the man who had given a part of himself to conceive him and he let the Esau words come:
“Dad — I need you to say that I’m enough of a man.”
I need you, Dad — to say that I am yours and you aren’t ashamed of me.
I need you, Dad — to say that I am loved and nothing I can ever do or fail to ever do will change how you forever love me.
I need you, Dad — to say that I am enough of a man.
And his father turned to him and said —
“I can’t.”
When I heard that that was what his father said? I could hardly breathe.
And then this happened:
Joy Prouty
His father had said, “I can’t tell you everything you need me to say —
because my own father never said it to me.”
And he looked into the eyes of his own seeking father — and that’s what he felt:
For the first time in his life he felt all his wounds bleeding right there on the inner walls of his own father’s heart.
The Esau Moment of begging blessing had become an Epiphany Moment of softening—
His hardened dad was still but a broken boy who himself had never heard I love you.
His stiffened and masked dad was still a kid who himself had never gotten his own blessing.
His distanced dad was but himself a question still reaching across the chasm of generations, desperate to find something under fingers to touch, to believe in — and pass on.
Nothing wounds like the elusiveness of love.
“You can’t deeply love your parents — until you grieve the deep wounds of their life.”But it can happen and it can be your tender miracle:
There can be an unspoken bond with the one who has wounded you — because you know you both carry the same wounds.
Hurt people, hurt people.
You can’t deeply love your parents — until you grieve the deep wounds of their life.
My own Dad looked different to me when I saw him that spring, when I saw his worn hands slipped into his Levi jeans, the way time silvered at his temples and his eyes tried to say things I knew his words never could.
I felt it like a slow thrum around the tender places — how there is nothing stopping me from being the voice that reaches across the chasm of generations, from me being the whisper of what he never heard from his own dad — but he could hear now from his own child.
I could be the one to say the words he’s always longed to hear:
“I love you. And nothing you’ve ever done or ever failed to do will change how I forever love you.
You’re mine and I’m not ashamed of you but I acclaim you for the battles you fought and won, for every struggle that counts as a win because you stayed in the game, you kept breathing and kept wrestling and kept getting up again.
You’ve never lost if you’ve learned. You’ve never failed if you’ve let your feet find the floor again come morning.
“And if I’ve loved redemption and grace and mercy for the likes of me, how can I love anything less for the wounds of yours?”And if I’ve loved redemption and grace and mercy for the likes of me, how can I love anything less for the wounds of yours?
Love is patient and patience is a willingness to suffer — and simply, I choose to always love and suffer with you.”
And maybe there’s a way every kid can someday, maybe, get a little closer to the hope of saying that.
Maybe… maybe there’s a hope that someday, maybe, every one of the wounded can move closer to the healing of that:
Because when you look in the mirror, there it is, in the sheen of the lit reflection, and you recognize it — a glimpse of your own father’s face.
And that face sees their own father’s face who sees their own father’s face— and the reflecting washes over you and on and on until there’s the beginning and there’s a glimpse of the face of God.
And you hear the words your longing is guaranteed to hear, your Esau Moment becoming an Emmanuel Moment, because you, your father, his father — we all have a Father who is always with us, always blessing us:
“A Father’s most important job is to know his own heart is secondary to that of His children’s.”“You’re the child I imagined and dreamed about and chose before creation, whose name I etched into the palm of my hands with dying affection,
You’re the one who I think about more than there are grains of sands on the seashore, the one I can’t stop singing love for.
You’re the one who gets what you want most, your Father to give you the greatest gift anyone can give someone: I believe in you — because I am in you so you can believe in Me.
You’re the one I made and will remake and will never forsake —
You are my child and I am Father and to love is to suffer, and I will suffer for you, and I will suffer with you, and I will carry you through till you suffer no more.
Bear my name and nothing you’ve ever done or ever failed to do will change how I forever love you.”
You can sit with that. You can heal because of that.
Joy Prouty
Joy Prouty
Joy ProutyAnd you can look in the mirror and no matter what you know of your father on earth –– you can know of your Father in heaven: A Father’s most important job is to know his own heart is secondary to that of His children’s.
And your Father in heaven broke His heart for you on that Cross because His love for you is second to none.
And there you are —
You can exhale the relief of the awed grace of something you’ve longed for….
You have your Father and all you’ve ever really wanted —
the tenderest miracle of a redeeming Fatherhood at the core of the universe… at centre of all our seeking hearts.
Need someone to throw you a lifeline of grace?
This one’s for you.
Need some courage to begin again, to feel loved again?
This one’s for you.
Need the paradoxical, transforming secret to the abundant life?
Really: This one’s for you.
Pick up a copy of The Broken Way — and begin to experience the abundant life like you’ve always hoped.
June 19, 2021
Only the Good Stuff: multivitamins for Your Weekend [06.19.21]
Happy, happy, happy weekend!
Let’s not let the everyday routines numb us to the miracle of living every day! Some real, down in the bones JOY to celebrate today! Links & stories 100% guaranteed to make you smile a mile wide & believe like crazy in a Good God redeeming everything. Never, ever give up…there really is hope, even for us.
Serving up only the Good Stuff for you & your people right here:
Mary Anne Morgan
Mary Anne Morgan
Mary Anne Morganmy world kinda slows and rests when she invites us into her world…
to fathers near and far… thank you
because we all need a friend
View this post on InstagramA post shared by Good News Movement (@goodnews_movement)
when friends step in – life gets better
Like Father Like Son: a Tribute to Fathers… never give up
Holding onto hope and beauty in the midst of darkness and pain just might be our fiercest battle, especially when a war for our mind is raging.
Don’t miss this—Beauty has a story to speak into your life today:
A Story of Hope from out of the Midst of Darkness
Breathtaking off-grid Mountainside Farm: and the community that stepped in the help
then/now and before/after
… you’ll want to share this one with a friend. Fascinating!
50 Interesting Comparison Images That Will Give You a New Perspective
a wedding out of the ashes… only possible with the support of a town full of love
When it sparks hope around the world — it sparks joy in our homes. Join the Grace Flame candle monthly subscription
Resource: Grace Crafted Home
Turns out? All our homes tell a story.
Friends, tomorrow we celebrate World Refugee Day!
World Refugee Day is marked on June 20th each year to celebrate the courage and resilience of the tens of millions of people forced to flee their homes due to war or persecution. Each Grace Flame soy candle pictured here is lovingly hand-poured by Muna and her mother Nadja, Syrian refugees resettled in Houston, Texas, in 2019 after fleeing war in their home country.
Will you help us celebrate our refugee artisans?! When you support our artisans by purchasing their handmade items, not only are you providing dignified jobs — you also are making a statement — Refugees, we welcome you. You. Are. Welcome. HERE. We are using these items every day here on the farm…they are as sweet as the soul that made them.
Come look at all of the classic loveliness in our Fair Trade store, Grace Crafted Home:
Wherever there is a place of Grace — we find more of Home. Come see.
stunning… worth your time to check these out: Winners Of The Nature TTL Nature And Wildlife Photographer Of The Year 2021 Have Been Announced
a quick word of truth with Beth Moore
The (really good!) Story of a Devoted Father and His Boys
Beyond grateful for the life saving work of Compassion International
tears: Happy Father’s Day… say what you need to say.
How Jesus Redeems Our Failures
In the story of the Bible, God is depicted as a generous host who provides for the needs of his guests. However, humans live from a mindset of scarcity and hoard God’s many gifts. In this video, we explore God’s plan for overcoming our selfishness by giving the ultimate gift of himself in the person of Jesus.
grateful for the work of BibleProject
View this post on InstagramA post shared by Christine Caine (@christinecaine)
do you prefer to be verified by man than validated by God?… listen in
every word of this… Believe For It — share with a friends who needs to hear?
View this post on InstagramA post shared by Juli Wilson (@itsjuliwilson)
some real encouraging words for those missing fathers and spouses this weekend…
Placing God First
As co-founder of We Welcome Refugees, and as a family who personally welcomed and supported a refugee family from Syria and a family from the Democratic Republic of the Congo, we, as a family, are looking forward to World Refugee Day this Sunday, June 20th, which is an internationally recognized day designated by the U.N. to honor refugees around the globe.
As advocates for those refugees fleeing crisis, it is Christ-like for us to take time to hear from refugees. We have so much to learn from our sisters and brothers who have stories to share — and those stories are some of the most powerful I have ever encountered:
I Went to the Border: Crisis at the Border & Loving The Stranger Like Christ (World Refugee Day)
Did you see that golden buzzer the other night? The one that felt like manna falling out of the sky for our own hungry hearts to learn how to honestly lament and taste the healing presence of God? I am undone by the reverberation of the Holy Spirit in every beat of Jane’s thrumming heart—the ones you will hear in these unforgettable, haunting words, as you lift and rise with her:
How To Meet God at Your Lowest
“The note that I’ve been given to sing in the orchestra of life is short and insignificant, truly, but I want to sing it well,” she said “I want to sing it well.”
Dysfunction to Dynasty – Ch. 4: Al & Lisa Robertson: how they chose to fight for their marriage and discovered all things are possible with Jesus Christ.
How do you breathe in a world where your father no longer breathes? How do you navigate the world when your father’s hands have fallen like the hands of a compass falling?
I never realized how much safer the world felt because my Father was in the world too:
I love You, Dad: When You Love Your Father, When You’re Missing Your Father
glory, glory, glory
Pick up a copy of the new 10th anniversary edition of One Thousand Gifts, and count all the ways He loves you, & fall in love with Him all over again!
AND, when you do, you get an entire FREE Joy Tool Kit which includes 5 exclusive printables: a “How to Always Find Joy” Frameable, a Daily Joy Map & Planner, a Family Gratitude Gift Jar kit, a 12-Month Joy Calendar, and a Daily Joy Compass. Learn how you can get yours today!
Why Do You Want to Be Loved by God? // Ask Pastor John Piper
Books for Soul Healing:
Joy is actually possible, right where you are.
Take the dare to discover: Life is not an emergency…Life is a GIFT. Life is too short to do anything but truly savor it — to count all the ways you truly loved.
What if Brokenness is the Path into the Abundant Life?
You don’t have to be afraid of broken things — because Christ is redeeming everything.
There’s no other authentic way forward — but a broken way — right into a profoundly abundant life.
Journey into a deeply meaningful life with this devotional and take sixty steps from heart-weary brokenness to Christ-focused abundance. The Way of Abundance — is the way forward every heart needs.
Be the Gift is a tender invitation into the next step of deeper transformation, less stress, more joy and abundantly more peace & purpose. You only get one life to love well…to Be The Gift.
on repeat this week: Wait on You
It’s been hard.
You know — a brutally hard year, an unexpectedly hard season, an endlessly hard road.
You know — you got that call and you heard the words that you prayed against, begged against, braced against. You found it hard to hear, your heart banging like a sledge hammer, trying to pound its way out.
Or…you never get a call at all. The silence of all that isn’t, and won’t be now, about drives you mad.
In the dark, in the middle of the night, it gets very clear:
He who is driven by fears, delays the comfort of God.
You can want someone to reach over and touch your unspoken broken, your thin bruised places, and smooth out the pain you can hardly speak of:
Suffering begs us to do anything to end our ache — when actually only God can.
It takes incredible courage to wait on God in what feels like a hellish place— and trust that love of heaven is holding us.
It takes courage to trust that the writing of one’s whole good and redemptive story takes time. Healing take longer than you think; the ways of God take longer than you want. It takes time, a lifetime, to turn the ache of our longings toward Him.
We can simply want our situation solved — when God simply wants to be our answer.
And the best situation — is always what makes God your best hope.
And no matter your situation today, there’s this truth that rises through the dark:
In the middle of things seemingly not working out for us — God is working out something in us.
[excerpted from our little Facebook family … come join us each day?]
That’s all for this weekend, friends.
Go slow. Be God-struck. Grant grace. Live Truth.
Give Thanks. Love well. Re – joy, re- joy, ‘re- joys’ again
Share Whatever Is Good.
June 18, 2021
I love You, Dad: When You Love Your Father, When You’re Missing Your Father
When I get the call from my sister, and she says, “Ann, I don’t think Dad is with us anymore,” I drop to the floor.
I pound the beat up pine planks there in the kitchen with my fist like a wild woman slamming the walls of eternity, begging for you back, Dad, even for just one blink of a minute.
“Grief feels like forsakenness.”
How is it even possible that can you not be with us, how can a child keep breathing without her father, how can the universe keep spinning if you aren’t in it? How in the world can you not be with us and why can’t I call you, find you, go to you? How come I never knew:
Grief feels like forsakenness.
That’s what the silence shakes with, in the haunting silence after every last heart beat: My God, My God, why have You forsaken us?
Your grandchildren, Dad, they hear my howl to the heavens at your leaving us, and they run up the stairs wide-eyed, fling in from outside, bewildered, and they circle hushed and stunned, and your first son-in-law, he kneels on the floor beside me, trying to hold me, hold me together, hold me up, and my throat hurts with this primal, guttural cry, and my fist stings with my begging pounding, but it is my heart that’s ripped and split with the severing shock.
It’s a quarter past 11 am on a grey Thursday morning, the very end of April, when my father is killed, and who I once was, or thought I was, dies too.
A child has to learn how to breathe in this world without her father, and I don’t know how to, I’ve never done this before, not even once, and my lungs burn with the gasping.
When you have to breathe in a world where your father no longer breathes, every breath can hurt.
Joy Prouty
Joy Prouty
Joy Prouty
Levi Voskamp
“When you have to breathe in a world where your father no longer breathes, every breath can hurt.”
My Father was killed under the wheel of a tractor, face down in the dirt. I will have to tell myself this over and over again for weeks, repeat it to myself like a wheel going round and round, because I cannot believe this, like the neurons in my cerebellar cortex absolutely cannot compute. How is this the abbreviated story? How is Dad never going to drive in the lane again with his rattling white diesel pick-up truck? How am I never going to touch Dad’s humongous work-hewn hands ever again?
When our oldest son, Caleb, was five, his goat died, and then it happened for a month: the child started every conversation, every call with his grandfather, or his aunt, or his grandmother or the mail lady or the Fedex guy, with that one line, “Hi. My goat died, she just died,” like he had to keep telling his mind, and everyone else, to grasp the reality of the surreal.
I’d smiled weakly, flushed embarrassed then, but now, now I want to roar it, keep roaring it, like the reverberation of it could somehow make the world, and it’s all maddening fluff, rightly stop: “My father died, he just died.” I know the world moves on, the sun and moons and stars, but my lungs hurt when they move, and how does a child move on from the common era of their father, as if time could exist beyond the man whose hands had a part in her whole world?
“Fathers are our fortresses of knowledge, and keepers of the hacks, and masters of the trade called Life.”
I never realized, Dad, how much you moved like a sentry along the outer edges of my life, like my own bulwark keeping watch through the night, like a defender of family, like a lookout, always on guard for me.
I never realized, Dad, how one can be a full-grown, with grown children of your own, and yet part of you still be the child who needs to know her Daddy isn’t far, but nearby and close.
I never realized how much safer the world felt because my Father was in the world too.
How do you navigate the world when your father’s hands have fallen like the hands of a compass falling?
If you told me once, Dad, you told me a million times, like when I asked where to find old barn beams when we resurrected this farmhouse twenty-some long years ago, or when we needed an honest tile drainer for the farm next door only two months ago: “Just tell them that you’re Bryan Morton’s daughter, just tell them whose daughter you are.”
I was and am and always will be your daughter, and time and miles and the grave can’t ever stop you from being my Father.
“I never realized how much safer the world felt because my Father was in the world too.”
It is true, I am daughter of the man who was killed, face down in the dirt, I know that’s what the farmers down the road say now, but we are all more than our most terrible moments, we are all more than all that went terribly wrong.
Come Father’s Day and its pixelated streams of hallmarketized Fathers, I may not have a Father to sign a card for, but I know who I am:
I am daughter to a father whose eyes misted when he said my name.
I am daughter to a father who gave me his cowlick and his grit and his tears at the end of every moving story, like he’d rinsed his world of its scales, and said he could see again, the glorious romance of being alive.
I am daughter to a father who loved 49 Fords and worn Wrangler jeans and Welch’s grape juice with his grilled porkchops, and my Mama’s raspberry kuchen on Sunday nights for years, and I am daughter to a father who choked up when he’d close his eyes and say I love you too.
Now who knows where that carpenter is that makes those single pane windows from pine, and where the cheapest place is to get heritage hens, or where was it that Great Uncle Elmer Chambers walked those hitched horses backward from the mill store or was that all family lore, and you tell me, Dad, how I’m ever going to know how to plant that magnolia tree of yours come next spring?
“Listen long while they’re alive, the silence will be so deafening when they’re gone.“
But that’s just it: Now you can’t tell me one thing more, Dad.
How can there be so many things I forgot and didn’t hold on to, because I magically thought I’d somehow always be holding on to you?
I knew it but I didn’t:
Listen long while they’re alive, the silence will be so deafening when they’re gone.
That’s what your first son-in-law said, that farm boy who started working for you when he was green out of high school, a fresh-faced farm boy of hardly 18, and is now a wizened Farmer too because he learned it all from you, and he’s said it more than a few times in the weeks after you seemed to up and vanish into thin air: “So many things I think of, that I wished I’d asked him, that only he knew,” answers that could be found only in the ringing recesses of his mind.
Fathers are our fortresses of knowledge, and keepers of the hacks, and masters of the trade called Life.
Why did I think the hands of time would be easy on us and there’d always be more time with another rap at the back door, another call and you right there: “So this is your Faaaatheeer calling,” like you needed announcing, like you could ever hide the gentle tease and fierce love in your voice.
You were our family repository for rare and uncommon knowledge, of all sorts of lost how-to-do-itness and wonders, of our creased and tattered memories, the yellowed newsprint of fading family tales.
You were a watchtower always looking out for me when I wasn’t even looking.
You were a shield that I didn’t even know I gripped in a million battles.
You were always the sure voice at the end of the line that felt like a steadying lifeline.
Is this why I feel adrift in a world without you, in a world where you will never pick up my call again and I will forever ache for your voice?
“Sometimes you don’t know who you are counting on till they are no longer counted among the living.”
Sometimes you don’t know who you are counting on till they are no longer counted among the living.
On the Shaker peg hooks lining the mudroom, Dad, you’d find it hanging there permanently, like a memorial flag flying at half mast, your blue plaid flannel jacket, that one you wore out to the shop, to the barn, to the tractor, to our kitchen, a solid 8 months of the year.
The day you were killed, I held on to your faded plaid jacket, hugging it close, stroking its arms and weeping,“Dad, oh Dad,” as we waited for the police to release your covered body laying there in the rain, as I split with the clouds, cried with the sky.
And my sister was right, and she was wrong.
You aren’t with us anymore, Dad, and you will be with us evermore.
Fathers are a singular gait you can still see coming across the back lawn like love looking for you, and they are a gate to a million places you can close your eyes and return to anytime you need, and fathers are a remembered line in your mind at just the right time, and you find you’re never lost, you’re never alone, you’re never forsaken.
Your father is still with you, always with you. Like a faded thin jacket you’ve pulled on and wear like skin, like the fingerprint-grooved worn hands you’ve memorized like a map, like a floor you can drop to and the memories hold.
How is there any other way for a true Father to be, but like the Father: with us.
Pick up our story of The Broken Way and how to love a brokenhearted world. This one’s for all of us who have felt our hearts break a bit…
This one’s for the brave and the busted and the real and dreamers and the sufferers and the believers.
This one’s for those who dare to take The Broken Way… into abundance
June 17, 2021
How To Meet God at Your Lowest Point
When I witnessed this woman’s audition on American’s Got Talent, I could feel it with millions of others around the world — a rare and holy thing was happening. And when Jane Marczewski, a graduate of Liberty University and a cancer warrior, stood under the falling awe of the show’s golden buzzer, we were all the ones that felt like manna had fallen out of the sky for our own hungry hearts to learn how to honestly lament and taste the healing presence of God. I quietly reached out to Jane and asked if we could repost some of her words here, because we are hungry to learn from a sage who has walked through the darkest valleys and leaned close enough to God that she now soars on wings of grace — and she is honoured to share her brave, vulnerable heart with you and I am undone by the reverberation of the Holy Spirit in every beat of her thrumming heart — the ones you will hear in these unforgettable, haunting words of Jane’s, as you too lift and rise with her:
guest post by Jane Marczewski (Nightbirde)
I don’t remember most of Autumn, because I lost my mind late in the summer and for a long time after that, I wasn’t in my body. I was a lightbulb buzzing somewhere far.
After the doctor told me I was dying, and after the man I married said he didn’t love me anymore, I chased a miracle in California and sixteen weeks later, I got it. The cancer was gone.
But when my brain caught up with it all, something broke. I later found out that all the tragedy at once had caused a physical head trauma, and my brain was sending false signals of excruciating pain and panic.
“I have had cancer three times now, and I have barely passed thirty. There are times when I wonder what I must have done to deserve such a story.”
I spent three months propped against the wall. On nights that I could not sleep, I laid in the tub like an insect, staring at my reflection in the shower knob. I vomited until I was hollow. I rolled up under my robe on the tile.
The bathroom floor became my place to hide, where I could scream and be ugly; where I could sob and spit and eventually doze off, happy to be asleep, even with my head on the toilet.
I have had cancer three times now, and I have barely passed thirty. There are times when I wonder what I must have done to deserve such a story.
I fear sometimes that when I die and meet with God, that He will say I disappointed Him, or offended Him, or failed Him. Maybe He’ll say I just never learned the lesson, or that I wasn’t grateful enough.
But one thing I know for sure is this: He can never say that He did not know me.
@jacquelineday
@technopaul
@joanna_lampa
@christopherkchurchill
“Call me bitter if you want to—that’s fair. Count me among the angry, the cynical, the offended, the hardened. But count me also among the friends of God.”
I am God’s downstairs neighbor, banging on the ceiling with a broomstick. I show up at His door every day.
Sometimes with songs, sometimes with curses.
Sometimes apologies, gifts, questions, demands.
Sometimes I use my key under the mat to let myself in. Other times, I sulk outside until He opens the door to me Himself.
I have called Him a cheat and a liar, and I meant it.
I have told Him I wanted to die, and I meant it.
Tears have become the only prayer I know. Prayers roll over my nostrils and drip down my forearms. They fall to the ground as I reach for Him. These are the prayers I repeat night and day; sunrise, sunset.
Call me bitter if you want to—that’s fair. Count me among the angry, the cynical, the offended, the hardened. But count me also among the friends of God.
“It’s not the mercy that I asked for, but it is mercy nonetheless. And I learn a new prayer: thank you. It’s a prayer I don’t mean yet, but will repeat until I do.”
For I have seen Him in rare form. I have felt His exhale, laid in His shadow, squinted to read the message He wrote for me in the grout: “I’m sad too.”
If an explanation would help, He would write me one—I know it. But maybe an explanation would only start an argument between us—and I don’t want to argue with God. I want to lay in a hammock with Him and trace the veins in His arms.
I remind myself that I’m praying to the God who let the Israelites stay lost for decades. They begged to arrive in the Promised Land, but instead He let them wander, answering prayers they didn’t pray. For forty years, their shoes didn’t wear out. Fire lit their path each night. Every morning, He sent them mercy-bread from heaven.
I look hard for the answers to the prayers that I didn’t pray. I look for the mercy-bread that He promised to bake fresh for me each morning. The Israelites called it manna, which means “what is it?”
That’s the same question I’m asking—again, and again. There’s mercy here somewhere—but what is it? What is it? What is it?
I see mercy in the dusty sunlight that outlines the trees, in my mother’s crooked hands, in the blanket my friend left for me, in the harmony of the wind chimes.
“Call me cursed, call me lost, call me scorned. But that’s not all. Call me chosen, blessed, sought-after. Call me the one who God whispers His secrets to.”
It’s not the mercy that I asked for, but it is mercy nonetheless.
And I learn a new prayer: thank you. It’s a prayer I don’t mean yet, but will repeat until I do.
Call me cursed, call me lost, call me scorned. But that’s not all. Call me chosen, blessed, sought-after. Call me the one who God whispers His secrets to. I am the one whose belly is filled with loaves of mercy that were hidden for me.
Even on days when I’m not so sick, sometimes I go lay on the mat in the afternoon light to listen for Him.
I know it sounds crazy, and I can’t really explain it, but God is in there—even now.
I have heard it said that some people can’t see God because they won’t look low enough, and it’s true. Look lower.
God is on the bathroom floor.
And only God could write this story: Jane’s audition song, “It’s Okay” on America’s Got Talent was #1 on iTunes this week… Marinating in her words over here and here is like an elixir that will help you take wing… and give words to your own sacred story that is meeting God right where your feet are right now.
June 15, 2021
I Went to the Border: Crisis at the Border & Loving The Stranger Like Christ (World Refugee Day)
As co-founder of We Welcome Refugees, and as a family who personally welcomed and supported a refugee family from Syria and a family from the Democratic Republic of the Congo, we, as a family, are looking forward to World Refugee Day this Sunday, June 20th, which is an internationally recognized day designated by the U.N. to honor refugees around the globe.
As advocates for those refugees fleeing crisis, it is Christ-like for us to take time to hear from refugees. We have so much to learn from our sisters and brothers who have stories to share — and those stories are some of the most powerful I have ever encountered:
I once stood at the Mexican border wall and reached my hand through to pray with a woman on the other side.
She still had scissors in her hand.
She’d been bent down, rummaging through garbage heaps, just on the other side of the wall, plucking out plastic bottles, to cut the tops off for manipulatives in her kids’ classrooms. But she’d come near, and here we were praying, me holding her hand through a slot in the border wall while she was standing there holding a pair of scissors.
“The only way to see Jesus is to look at the person across from you and see that person through the cross.”
It looked like we were about to cut through all the noise to hear the heart of God—much like this book is about to cut through the confusion of these times so that you can hear the beat of God’s heart.
Through the slats in the wall, just past her, just behind her, was a steeple topped with a cross. When I looked over at her—I could see the cruciform symbol of the church everywhere—I could see light in the woman’s kind eyes.
The only way to see Jesus is to look at the person across from you and see that person through the cross.
The person on the other side of things is always an image of Jesus. Christ is the one in every crisis.
And Christ is in the crisis at all the borders—and often the crisis is at the borders, too, of our comfortableness, at the edges of our faithfulness.
The voices that speak in this book will help navigate those borders within and the borders around us and guide us toward deeper faithfulness.
With our sponsored children who were refugees in Syria
“We are all more alike than we like to think we’re all different.”
There at the wall, back behind me was a cross atop a mountain. It faced her, and that, coupled with the cross atop the church on the other side of the wall, which faced me, made me wonder whether, when we make someone else into “the other,” we have made for ourselves a god other than the One who died on the cross.
She said she had seven children. I told her I did too. And she pointed at me, eyebrows raised—you too? I grinned and tried to joke how we were both mothers of one and a half-dozen kids, and she and I, we laughed loudly in the wind, because true, good news lets everything that destroys empathy blow away like hot air and laughs with hope of healing at the days to come.
We are all more alike than we like to think we’re all different.
We find ourselves in days where it’s too often considered a radical, dangerous act to simply see our shared humanity.
But in actual fact, maybe it’s far more dangerous when we can’t see that.
What if we leaned in and listened to voices and stories and sat with the hope that we are family not because we have the same nationality—but because we bear the image of the same God.
What if we were a society that wasn’t so profoundly image conscious but was more profoundly conscious of the image of God in each other?
What if we were less devoted to projecting a certain image and were more devoted to protecting the image of God in each other?
What if we took time to honestly ask ourselves:
Why in the world are we all born where we are born?
Where we live has to mean more than getting something—it has to mean that to those who have been given much, much will be required.
“Does God command us to love the stranger more than He commands us to love Himself because loving the stranger is how we love God Himself?”
It has to mean that those who have privilege can’t live indifferently but are meant to live differently so others can simply live.
It has to mean that we are living meaningful lives only if we are helping others get to live meaningful lives.
Those seeking a meaningful life no matter where they have to go are seeking exactly what we are. They aren’t like “animals or criminals”—they are like us.
And yes, it’s true, the world and governments are complicated, but what isn’t complicated is that outreach can change the world like outrage never will. What isn’t complicated is that every single believer has to wrestle with the fact that God’s commandment to care for the stranger is more important to God than the other commandments in the Torah—even more important than the commandment to love God.
Does God command us to love the stranger more than He commands us to love Himself because loving the stranger is how we love God Himself?
Does the Torah instruct care for the stranger far more than it commands rest on the Sabbath or any other law because God doesn’t want us to rest until all laws find ways to care for the stranger?
In Lebanon. Photo by Esther Havens
With a Mama and children who are refugees who just escaped Syria: Photo by Esther Havens
With our sponsored children who were refugees in Syria
With a Mama and children who are refugees who just escaped Syria. Photo by: Esther Havens
The Farmer with our sponsored family who were refugees in Syria
Esther Havens
With a young man who was trying to survive war in Iraq. Photo by Esther Havens
With a Mama and children who are refugees who just escaped Syria. Photo by: Esther Havens
With our sponsored children who were refugees in Syria
In Lebanon with children who are refugees
I looked into the eyes of the mama of seven just like me, just on the other side of the line, who is living in a world of people who want just what we all want—a good life for our families.
***********
The crisis at the borders of the world isn’t about violent criminals; it is about those genuinely seeking asylum from violence and criminals.
“Seeking asylum isn’t a dangerously wrong thing to do; it’s a human thing to do when you’re in danger.”
Seeking asylum isn’t a dangerously wrong thing to do; it’s a human thing to do when you’re in danger.
This conversation about immigration isn’t about disregarding the law but about how to regard people made in the image of God.
And this conversation isn’t about open borders; it is about being open to the compassionate, humane treatment of fellow human beings who are trying to make the best decisions for their families, just as we are trying to do for our families.
So, how do we treat them as we would want to be treated?
Abraham, one of the fathers of faith, told a lie at the Egyptian border, and told his wife to lie, because he was driven by starvation and desperation.
How can we have anything but compassion for the same motivation?
Those who find themselves behind bars are not always against God or good laws: Samson, Joseph, Stephen, Jeremiah, Peter, Shadrach, Meshach, Abednego, Silas, John the Baptist, Paul, and Jesus himself, the perfecter of our faith, were all jailed for seemingly breaking a law, but man’s laws are not always God’s laws, and laws change all the time, and laws can change to reflect how our hearts are reflecting more of God’s laws.
“The faithful always believe there are ways to shape laws to be faithfully just and faithfully compassionate.”
The faithful always believe there are ways to shape laws to be faithfully just and faithfully compassionate.
The faithful believe there are ways to have a deeply robust pro-life ethic, and be Pro-Pro-Pro:
Pro-life, which is to be pro-life for all life, including a refugee’s life
Pro-security, which is to be pro-life for all life, including every community’s life
Pro-flourishing, which is to be pro-life for all life, including the economic flourishing of every community.
Believers have to believe there are nuanced, considered ways to not create an “either/or” world but a “Pro-Pro-Pro” world.
Christians need not all agree on laws around immigration, but we all need to find real ways to move into Jesus’s kind heart toward those in need.
***********
The woman on the other side of the wall, she patted my hand gently and I nodded:
If any national citizenship is prioritized more than our citizenship in heaven and the care of all the citizens of earth, can any of us claim discipleship of Jesus?
In that church right behind the woman whose hand I was holding, I knew what they read—because it’s the same thing read in evangelical churches around the world:
“If any national citizenship is prioritized more than our citizenship in heaven and the care of all the citizens of earth, can any of us claim discipleship of Jesus?”
how Jesus is not only compassionate to individual persons in need but is also passionate about the structural policies that prevent showing compassion to persons in need (Luke 6:6–11).
We are truly caring about people only when we care about the policies that are truly affecting people.
And I wanted to somehow find words and tell the woman on the other side of the wall how I wonder which side of the fence I’m actually standing on.
Do I stand on the side Jesus calls the Blessed:
blessed are the poor, blessed are those who mourn, blessed are those who hunger and seek for rightness . . . for they are on the right side of history?
Or do I stand on the side Jesus calls out with the Anti-Beatitudes of the Multitudes—the Four Woes of the Comfortable:
“But woe to you who are rich,
for you have already received your comfort.
Woe to you who are well fed now,
for you will go hungry.
Woe to you who laugh now,
for you will mourn and weep.
Woe to you when everyone speaks well of you,
for that is how their ancestors treated the false prophets”? (Luke 6:24–26)
Woe to those who are rich in comfort now,
who are well fed now, who laugh now,
who are spoken well of now . . .
for they are on the wrong side of things for all eternity.
Esther Havens
With a young man and his mother who were trying to survive war in Iraq. Photo by: Esther Havens
I looked down at my feet on this side—and her feet on the other side.
“Which side of things you are on now decides which side of forever you are on. Share what you have now, or you’ll have your share of woe forever.”
Maybe those of us who are on the comfortable side of things now will be on the hellish side of things forever.
And those who are on the poor side of things now will be on the blessed side of things forever.
Which side of things you are on now decides which side of forever you are on.
***********
I looked up and looked her in the eye. As a Canadian family, we personally sponsored other families to come live in our community, first a Middle Eastern family of six from the war-torn apocalypse that is Aleppo, Syria, and then an African family of five from the tangled bloodshed that has been the Congo.
But in that moment all I could see was Jesus: Share what you have now, or you’ll have your share of woe forever.
My chest was burning with conviction, and I tightened my grip on my sister’s hand on the other side of the wall, and I could hear it loud, reverberating off all the walls within, and it was like the rocks and the ground and the crosses on both sides of the wall were crying out with the Word of God and it was all I could hear, standing there:
“For he himself is our peace, who has made the two groups one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility” (Eph. 2:14). A moment can speak to you, cut right to the quick—if you let it.
What does evangelism look like at its best?
Evangelism can hurt sometimes. Well-meaning Christians who welcome immigrants and refugees and share the gospel with them will often alienate the very people they are trying to serve through cultural misconceptions or insensitivity to their life experiences. In No Longer Strangers, diverse voices lay out a vision for a healthier evangelism that can honor the most vulnerable—many of whom have lived through trauma, oppression, persecution, and the effects of colonialism—while foregrounding the message of the gospel.
With perspectives from immigrants and refugees, and pastors and theologians (some of whom are immigrants themselves), this book offers guidance for every church, missional institution, and individual Christian in navigating the power dynamics embedded in differences of culture, race, and language. Every contributor wholeheartedly affirms the goodness and importance of evangelism as part of Christian discipleship while guiding the reader away from the kind of evangelism that hurts, toward the kind of evangelism that heals.
Excerpted from No Longer Strangers: Transforming Evangelism with Immigrant Communities edited by Eugene Cho and Samira Izadi Page ©2021 (Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co.) Reprinted by permission of the publisher.
June 14, 2021
A story of hope from out of the midst of darkness
Sarah Clarkson is a writer who loves books, beauty, and imagination, and wants to offer those as hope to a broken world. Having wrestled with mental illness and impossible questions for decades, her passion is to help her readers discover the healing power of God’s beauty as it reaches out to them in the very heart of their suffering. She’s been writing about story and beauty for a decade, and in her latest book she explores the profound healing she’s found in the ‘taste and see goodness’ of a beautiful God. It’s a grace to welcome Sarah to the farm’s front porch today…
The summer of my ninth year, I had butterfly mania.
Early one morning I discovered a dewy-winged marvel of a creature in my grandmother’s garden, all midnight black and iridescent blue with circles of white that glimmered up at me like eyes. “Oh, it’s a swallowtail,” said my grandmother when I showed her.
“I still find it hard to write about the obsessive, intrusive images that have plagued me throughout my life.”
She gave me an old Audobon guide, and it became my obsessive study as the names, the rare, gleaming colors of the butterflies opened an otherworld of beauty that made me hungry for something I couldn’t name.
One day, I followed that hunger deep into the crackling heat of the summer fields in chase of a ‘buckeye’ butterfly. I ran until my breath gave out. I remember sinking to the dirt, knees knobbled by the pebbles, laughing after my fifth attempt to catch the little thing.
I was delighted in the hunt after that beauty, the way it flashed out, an unexpected grace in the brown landscape, the way it made me hungry and happy all at once. My breath slowed. The pounding of my blood eased in my ears and I sat back on my heels, alert and still.
Abruptly, and more completely than I can describe, my sense of time was suspended as I lifted my face to the great blue dome of the Texas sky, brimmed with the honey-tinged light of late afternoon.
The sounds of the earth grew distant, and a quiet came into my mind and body.
For one mesmerizing moment I became aware of the personal, present goodness thrumming in every atom of the world around me.
I knew that this was the beauty whose presence I yearned to touch in the mystical beauty of those butterfly wings.
I knew that I was encountering God. And I knew, with a knowledge as pervasive within me as my own heartbeat, that I was loved, loved, loved.
I felt as if the brown wings of the cosmos itself had fluttered open and what I glimpsed was the mesmerizing beauty of Love.
This, I knew in my bones, is my story.
Until a dark night, probably just a few weeks later though I cannot now exactly remember.
“I knew that I was encountering God. And I knew, with a knowledge as pervasive within me as my own heartbeat, that I was loved, loved, loved.”
I had been kissed and put to bed as usual by my parents. I lay in the darkness, waiting for the descent of sleep.
But my brain seemed strangely wired; my thoughts began to careen toward images of horror that terrified me. My heart beat faster. My imagination ran at frenzied speed, peopling the room I couldn’t now see with evil shapes as my imagination flung scene after scene into my mind, images that baffle and disgust me to this day.
I still find it hard to write about the obsessive, intrusive images that have plagued me throughout my life.
I tried to describe them to my mom when I was young, but even then I was too ashamed to give full description to the violent, perverted ideas and pictures that came from out of some void inside my own brain, wrapping themselves around my inner pictures of the people I loved most in the world.
“I think this is the fight to which each of us is called every day of our lives as we question where God dwells in the midst of our deepest pain.“
I felt attacked and guilty, terrified and contaminated.
It would be eight more years before I was diagnosed with a lesser-known form of OCD when hormones and stress brought about a near breakdown when I was seventeen, but the absolute nature of that darkness, the caged, sticky sense of having evil resident inside the closed rooms of my own imagination—I tasted that first as a small child.
And I immediately knew its radical power, its intended threat to the story told into my being by my recent encounter with beauty.
For at nine years old, I understood that the darkness in my mind presented me with a powerful narrative about existence: it closed the horizons of hope by caging me in with fear; it cut me off from relationship as I drew away in shame from others; it told me that the bleak, shattered reality I experienced was the ultimate reality of the world and of my guilty, miserable self.
Thus, in that luminous and grieved summer of my little girlhood, I was introduced to the rival stories of the world.
Beautiful or broken?
I’ve been trying to answer that question ever since. I’ve been trying to decide which story is true.
“My deep belief is that beauty has a story to tell, one that was meant by God to speak to us of His character and reality, meant to grip our failing hands with hope.“
And I think this is the fight to which each of us is called every day of our lives as we question where God dwells in the midst of our deepest pain.
For we all experience both perspectives, often from littlest childhood. We bear within ourselves the narratives of our deepest pain. Abandonment, abuse, miscarriage and divorce, tsunamis and unexpected cancer—these are the daily, pervasive, personal realities we taste and touch.
And the story they tell us is of a world so evil, so shattered and grieved that we wonder how goodness could ever have been.
Like Job, we are drawn into the strange, bleak landscape of God’s seeming silence as we grapple with the kind of pain that could unravel us altogether.
But just like Job, we are also called to journey into the wild reality of a broken world where evil happens and God battles by coming into the very heart of our darkness intent upon healing.
With Job, we are summoned ultimately to an encounter with breathtaking beauty and in it, to touch the goodness of God Himself.
For ah, Beauty. That’s the second story I think we’re all told.
Beauty comes to us in moments that unravel our cynical surety. Our hearts seem to come apart at the touch of an odd slant of light on an evening walk or to melt at the touch of someone we love.
We hear a strain of music and begin to yearn. We read a novel, a story of someone who forgave or fought or hoped, and we feel something stir to life as precious, as fragile, as urgent as a newborn child within us.
We are encountered by beauty, and suddenly the story of our grief seems to be the passing thing—that faint, ghostly illusion that one day will melt in the beams of a great, inexorable love.
My deep belief is that beauty has a story to tell, one that was meant by God to speak to us of His character and reality, meant to grip our failing hands with hope.
“To believe the truth that beauty tells: this is our great struggle from the depths of our grief.“
We know God when we behold His beauty, when His goodness invades the secret rooms of our hearts.
To believe the truth that beauty tells: this is our great struggle from the depths of our grief.
To trust the hope it teaches us to hunger toward: this is our fierce battle.
To craft the world it helps us to imagine: this is our creative, death-defying work.
This book is the story of my battle to get my hands round beauty and hold to it through all the great and changing grief I have known. This is the song of hope I sing from out of the midst of my own darkness.
Beauty and brokenness told me two different stories about the world.
I believe that Beauty told true.
Sarah Clarkson is an author who loves to explore the kinship between literature, beauty, and theology. Her latest work is This Beautiful Truth: How God’s Goodness Breaks into Our Darkness (Baker Books). She studied theology (BTh, MSt) at Oxford and hosts a regular series of talks exploring theological ideas through her favorite novels. She can often be found with a cup of good tea and a book in hand in her home on the English coast, where she lives with her Anglican vicar husband, Thomas, and their children.
In This Beautiful Truth: How God’s Goodness Breaks into Our Darkness, Sarah shares her own encounters with beauty in the midst of her decades-long struggle with mental illness, depression, and doubt. In a voice both vulnerable and reflective, she paints a compelling picture of the God who reaches out to us in a real and powerful way through the “taste and see” goodness of what he has made and what he continues to create amid our darkness.
[ Our humble thanks to Baker for their partnership in today’s devotion ]
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