Ann Voskamp's Blog, page 80
May 18, 2020
When Confusion Over Choices Leads You to the Wrong Destination
Here’s a woman who knows a lot about sowing seed and reaping a harvest. The child of a king, daughter of a farmer, and wife of a pastor, Maggie Wallem Rowe has been connecting souls with God’s peace for decades. Maggie breathes life into the stories of great women of faith through original historical dramas. She speaks and people listen. Sometimes they laugh. Most often, they remember. It’s a grace to welcome Maggie to the farm’s front porch today…
guest post by Maggie Wallem Rowe
If I ever write a memoir, I think I’ll title it The Woman Who Went Out for Pizza and Ended Up in Montana.
Before our kids entered their teen years, my husband Mike and I borrowed a pop-up camper and drove across the country to visit many of America’s natural parks with them.
One evening, as it was growing dark, we pulled into a campsite next to the interstate somewhere in northern Wyoming. Mike and the kids hustled to put the camper up while I drove back to a pizza place we’d spotted on the way in.
We didn’t have a GPS or mobile phones in those days, but I was sure I could find my way back with our dinner.
I groaned when what I thought was the entry road to the campground turned out to be the entrance ramp for the highway instead.
No big deal—I would just drive to the next exit and reverse my direction back to the campground (whose name I didn’t know, in a tiny town whose name I hadn’t noticed). Piece of cake (actually, make that pizza).
Only there was no exit.
With cars whizzing by me on the dark interstate and signposts indicating that the nearest town was fifty miles away, I drove northwest for nearly an hour with stone-cold pizza in the back seat and cold-sweat panic in the front.
Where in the Wild West was I, anyway? When I finally passed the “Welcome to Montana!” sign, I had a clue. Since I lived to tell the tale, you know I eventually found my family again one state back, but it sure wasn’t a road trip I ever intended to make.
I bet you have a story or two like this of your own.
Times when your intentions were good, but you ended up in a place you never would have chosen.
Times when you meant well but others misread your motives. Times when you went out for pizza in Wyoming and ended up in Montana.
The Irish have a blessing meant for well-intended people like us: “May you have the hindsight to know where you’ve been, the foresight to know where you’re going, and the insight to know when you’ve gone too far.”
My pastor, Chris, often comments that our windshield needs to be as unobstructed as our rearview mirror. Wouldn’t it be lovely to see where we’re going as clearly as the places where we’ve been?
“How grateful I am—how utterly, radically grateful—that the God of our journey doesn’t leave us directionless.”
How grateful I am—how utterly, radically grateful—that the God of our journey doesn’t leave us directionless.
In the nineteenth century, Cardinal H. E. Manning captured the assurance we can have in offering our lives to God:
Seeing my intentions before he beholds my failures;
Knowing my desires before he sees my faults;
Cheering me to endeavor greater things, and yet accepting the least;
Inviting my poor service, and yet above all, content with my poorer love.
Friends, we are made with a purpose.
The intentional life happens because we learn to make careful choices about the future, even as we grow in maturity from the lessons learned in the past.
What God forms, He fills with His perfect will. He teaches us—through His Word and others’ wisdom—to attend carefully to our daily choices.
We can have confidence in our calling because the one whom God calls, He also equips.
“We can have confidence in our calling because the one whom God calls, He also equips.”
If, like me, you focus too often on the road trips and detours you wish you’d never taken, please know this: failure is never the final word in God’s economy.
If you thought you were doing it right only to have it go all wrong, that doesn’t mean God wasn’t present. Sometimes it’s hard to see him in the windshield, but glance through the rearview mirror of your life and you’ll find reminders of the times his presence was palpable.
I love M. Robert Mulholland, Jr.’s words in Invitation to a Journey:
The journey of faith, the path to spiritual wholeness, lies in our increasingly faithful response to the One whose purpose shapes our path, whose grace redeems our detours, whose power liberates us from the crippling bondages of our previous journey, and whose transforming presence meets us at each turn in our road.
I may have felt alone when I went out for pizza and ended up in Montana, but I wasn’t. Not for a hot minute.
Grace was riding in that car with me along with that cold pizza.
And it was grace that led me home. It knows the way.
This Life We Share is your guide to living well, whether you are struggling with anxiety and insecurity or gripping the everyday moments of life too tightly. Consider this your walking stick, water bottle, and warm companionship to refresh your journey. You will read and re-read these fifty-two reflections for timeless wisdom and practical principles that will inspire every season of your life.
Maggie Wallem Rowe is a national speaker, dramatist, blogger, and writer who has contributed to more than ten books, including numerous devotional Bibles. Maggie has traveled extensively throughout the United States and abroad, performing original one-woman dramas that she authored, and speaking at outreach programs, conferences, community events, and retreats. She holds an undergraduate degree in communication with a minor in education, as well as a graduate degree in biblical studies, both from Wheaton College (IL).
A catalyst for spiritual and personal growth, This Life We Share is a gift for your own soul care and even richer when read with a friend.
[ Our humble thanks to Navpress for their partnership in today’s devotion ]
May 16, 2020
Only the Good Stuff: Multivitamins for Your Weekend [05.16.20]
Happy, happy, happy weekend!
Some real, down in the bones JOY to celebrate today! Links & stories this week 100% guaranteed to make you smile a mile wide & believe like crazy in a Good God redeeming everything — and that there’s love everywhere & for ((you))!
Serving up only the Good Stuff for you & your people right here:
@fineartshot
@fineartshot
@fineartshot
start the weekend off with a walk under the stars
wheelhousephoto on Instagram / www.georgewheelhouse.com
wheelhousephoto on Instagram / www.georgewheelhouse.com
wheelhousephoto on Instagram / www.georgewheelhouse.com
wheelhousephoto on Instagram / www.georgewheelhouse.com
wheelhousephoto on Instagram / www.georgewheelhouse.com
amazed at his work: wildlife photography like maybe you’ve never seen before
(oh, and love that he plants a tree for every print sold!?!)
They met at a hospital during the height of the coronavirus crisis:
Inside zoos closed for COVID and the creative ways they’re coping
Ryan Johnson
grateful for the work of Samaritan’s Purse
a nurse that went above and beyond
God hears you, God sees you, and God loves you because you are His.
This is what our aching hearts are crying out for. My dear friend Elisa Morgan and Eryn Eddy of So Worth Loving – showing women their beauty and worth every day – are the voices of the new God Hears Her Podcast.
Grab a cup of tea and sneak away to a quiet corner to feel His embrace, truth and unending love.
…because we all need to smile
glory, glory, glory
Natural Macawood Ladle (handmade by the women of UPAVIM Crafts in Guatemala)
Turns out? All our homes tell a story.
Every blanket, every spoon, every plate, in every home — began somewhere in the world, was made by someone in the world, and somehow changed a bit of the world —
for better or worse.
And the welcome mats under our feet, the steaming mugs in our hands, the full bowls on our tables, could all tell a grace story — a story of fair trade, a story of life change, a story of saving, Gospel grace.And THESE DAYS at home? Maybe these days at home require a little extra GRACE?
Wherever there is a place of Grace — we find more of Home. Come see.
From Prison to the Olympics… what choice will you make?
When It All Still Hurts A Month After Easter
Amen!
How We Got the Bible: The Great Story of Sacred Scripture
“The way in which God brought about the Bible is the story of his providence in history, played out over thousands of years. And by understanding what God had done over the ages, we will see that it is reasonable and justified to trust that the Bible in our hands is a translation of the trustworthy words of Scripture.
We could talk about ten reasons why to trust the Bible. But it may be more effective if we understand the larger narrative of the history of the Bible…”
this video explores the “water of life” theme through the biblical story and how it leads to Jesus, who presents Himself as the one bringing living water to a world that is desperately thirsty.
grateful for the work of BibleProject
Quarantine at the Edge of the World: Portraits from the Arctic
he’s devoting his life to love the next one God calls to be placed in his path
just too good to miss: I have come to remind you WHO YOU ARE
Post of the week from these parts here
Yep, it’s wildly tempting to keep asking when we can just go back to normal. Maybe there’s a far better question? One that gives you the tools you need to not lose your actual mind through this pandemic but successfully navigate the reopenings:
3 Ways to be Safe in a Pandemic Reopening without Losing Your Mind: How to Survive this Virus: Chapter 3
Don’t Waste Your Sorrows – Psalm 126: a Meditation by Tim Keller
This month. May. What is needed now more than ever?
That we be the hands and feet of Jesus for each other, that we help be what each other needs, that we #ShowUpNow for each other, that we #BeTheGift to each other.
Because actual lives depend on it.
Right now, we all desperately need to be the gift to each other. To stand together in solidarity—FOR each other—knowing that an act of kindness, giving it forward, can be more powerful than the spread of any pandemic, more powerful sword in starting movements that move us all toward Love.
Dare with us? Let’s spread kindness, start a bit of a movement, a giving, generous, caring, broken and given and transforming revolution that turns things around.
Could there be a more beautiful way to live your one life in times like these?
WE CAN #SHOWUPNOW, DO THIS THING AND #BETHEGIFT!
Download the Free COVID-FRIENDLY #BeTheGift Calendar under “Free Tools” here: http://bit.ly/StickyNotesForYourSoul
AND CHECK OUT SHOWUPNOW right now — to bring new hope to this new month!
The Hawai’i Blessing… just so beautiful
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 intivation 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: Love Moved First
…carry this with you all this week: Success isn’t about being amazing…it’s about being obedient.
Before you blink and your one life’s a tendril of smoke, a memory, a vapor, gone, know this: you are where you are for such a time as this — not to make an impression, but to make a difference. Break free of your comfort zone today and do something — touch someone, give something, help someone, pray for someone, serve someone, #BetheGIFT for someone.
What really matters is living a life that is good on the inside — not one that just looks good from the outside.
Today and through the week to come — only move with compassion. Go slow enough to be moved with compassion: “When [Jesus] saw the multitudes, He was moved with compassion.” Matthew 9:36
Do whatever He puts in front of you and do it with great love — this is what makes any day, any life, anybody great. Miracles keep happening in the mundane.
[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.
May 15, 2020
3 Ways to be Safe in a Pandemic Reopening without Losing Your Mind: How to Survive this Virus: Chapter 3
“A
nybody need any saving today, Mama?” The kid comes swirling into the kitchen, hollering like she’s Superwoman swooping in on a wild unfurling of cape.
“It’s wildly tempting to keep asking when we can just go back to normal.”
“Cuz I am here to save the day!” She flings her arms out like she’s watched one too many Paw Patrol rescue missions, and I kneel down to kiss the tip of her crinkled button nose.
Yeah kid. I need saving, the world needs saving, strange and unimagined days like these need saving.
Worst economic crisis since the Great Depression.
A strange new virus that never existed in humans ever before, now ringing the globe, stalking the family of humanity, a virus which was initially thought to be a respiratory illness, but is now actually thought to “kill as a cardiovascular virus” — that causes a flood of blood clots, causes a lightning strike of strokes in the young, sets off a killer blood storm of excessive inflammation, even overcoming the youngest of children.
It’s wildly tempting to keep asking when we can just go back to normal.
Levi Voskamp
Levi Voskamp
But frankly:
For most of the world, for most of world history, our kind of comfortable has never been normal.
“Maybe the question isn’t: When will this be over — but how can we overcome?”
We were blithely living very rare days of ease that we generally and easily took very much for granted.
And now in these strange kind of days, we get to experience what was never strange to the vulnerable — we get to get comfortable with being vulnerable, which can lead us all to better love the vulnerable.
Maybe the question isn’t: When will this be over — but how can we overcome?
Maybe it’s not about when this will be over but how can we now overcome indifference by showing up to make a difference, overcome self-interest by prioritizing the vulnerable’s interests, overcome all kinds of tribalism by being kind to all human kind.
Caring for the vulnerable is the new normal.
“You know how you can know I can help save the day, Mama?” Our littlest flings her arms around my neck.
“Because I’ve got a mask on! Superheroes always wear a mask!” I’m kinda dumbstruck how the kid’s pulled together this whole superhero outfit all by herself, like she knows what these days call for, and she twirls around for me to see her in all her masked glory — and yeah, kid, I’m seeing it:
All heroes don’t wear capes — but these days maybe all the heroes do wear masks.
“All heroes don’t wear capes — but these days maybe all the heroes do wear masks.”
Maybe: Wearing a mask isn’t about right or wrong policies, but about loving right.
Maybe: Wearing a mask isn’t about making some kind of statement, but wearing a mask is simply about being kind.
Maybe: Wearing a mask isn’t about being fearful — it’s about being thoughtful.
The only way we open up safely is by being open to a new normal that keeps the vulnerable safe.
Masking for your neighbour unmasks your heart for your neighbor.
And I kiss my little hero’s forehead and think this is the beginning of how to survive this virus:
Be masked to
Be kind
To humankind.
Levi Voskamp
Levi Voskamp
Levi Voskamp
Levi Voskamp
When I scoop our little Superhero up in the evening, head out to the field to bring dinner to the Farmer planting the new 2020 crop in the fields, we climb up into his tractor and he tells me:
“Yeah, looks like this is the year of the new normal. Wearing masks when we go to get equipment parts, supplies, in town — and then planting a crop like we never have before.” He turns to look at the planter behind him.
We’re cropping a field that I remember my grandfather planting when I was a kid, me riding in the old International tractor exactly where our littlest is sitting now.
But this is the first year ever, that we haven’t broken up the soil to plant a crop, but instead we’ve chosen a different planting approach — called “minimal disturbance.”
Strangely appropriate when a global pandemic is causing global maximum disturbance.
Instead of turning and plowing the whole field in the fall, and breaking up and cultivating the entire seedbed of the field this spring, like we have done for generations — the Farmer and our sons are only breaking open very narrow strips of soil to plant the seeds in — and leaving the rest of the field, between the rows, undisturbed.
“In a world that’s figuring out how to open back up, you’ve got to keep figuring out all the ways to keep your heart open to God.”
Sitting in the tractor beside the Farmer, I find it strangely calming to watch this new way of planting. In a world disrupted and disturbed, there can be new ways of doing things.
“I’m an old dog, learning new tricks —“ his dust laden flashes a smile and the Farmer winks.
“And honestly — learning a new way of doing things this year, a new way of opening the soil up — should bring in a better yield this year,” the Farmer nods to the planter behind him.
I hand him the bunless, lettuce-wrapped burger I made and brought for his dinner. We are always learning new ways of doing things. And when we open things up by doing things differently than we have before — maybe things yield better things than expected.
“Papa?”
Our Littlest Girl, sitting in the tractor buddy seat, tugs at the Farmer’s sleeve.
“Why you not wearing your hat, Papa? You always wear your hat.”
“The way you live with a pandemic is to keep living with the God who is with us.”
The kid’s right again. I had thought that, how it’s unbelievably strange to see the Farmer without his cap on — but these are strange-to-us days and maybe the wind coming across the field had caught its peak, as he hauled up into the tractor, and blew it away?
The Farmer leans in to his little daughter and says it quietly:
“Papa took off his cap — because I was passing all the hours of planting — with praying.”
And I swallow hard. And see his Farmer’s cap laying there in the corner of the tractor cab.
He’s been putting on a mask to care about his brothers and sisters — and he’s been taking off his his hat to pray to his Father.
In a world that’s figuring out how to open back up, you’ve got to keep figuring out all the ways to keep your heart open to God.
Maybe the point is that we have to do more than live through a pandemic — we have to learn to live with a pandemic.
The way you live with a pandemic is to keep living with the God who is with us.
I watch his eyes watching the field. As we move toward Pentecost — he’s welcomed the wind of the Spirit to move across these fields, across these unprecedented days, and catch his heart up in God. I catch a vision of it too:
This is how you live though a pandemic: you yield to God, and you yield to the vulnerable — and your life yields the most.
“Instead of focusing on personal freedom, it’s a life that freely yields to others that always yields the most.”
Instead of focusing on personal freedom, it’s a life that freely yields to others that always yields the most.
The way through a pandemic — is to commit to finding more ways to pray. When we pray more about the ache of this world — we find more ways that we can be answers to that ache and those prayers.
In the middle of a pandemic, we are deciding:
You live through a pandemic by living an others-first ethic.
You live through a pandemic by not being prayer-anemic.
You live through a pandemic by not being apathetic. To either God or the vulnerable.
As we all feel more vulnerable — physically, mentally, financially —
These days of vulnerability give us the gift of caring for the vulnerable in community — and entering into a vulnerable communion with God.
Levi Voskamp
Levi Voskamp
Levi Voskamp
I reach over for the Farmer’s hand wearing the dirt of all his essential work.
“All heroes don’t wear capes — but these days maybe all the humble heroes do wear masks — and take off their hats to spend time in unmasked prayer.”
All heroes don’t wear capes — but these days maybe all the humble heroes do wear masks — and take off their hats to spend time in unmasked prayer.
The Superhero Girl grins up at her Farmer Papa, and I feel it like a smiling, growing:
There’s new ways to plant hope in a world in dire need of saving.
We can put on the kindness of Christ. We can take off the barriers between us and yielding to intimate prayer with God, and we can yield freedoms so we can yield a life more like Jesus, so that more see the only Superhero who can ever save the day in these unprecedented days.
And one little girl throws open her arms to her Papa, and the field opens up in new ways for the seed, and you can feel it — the world opening up and growing into new ways of being even more kind.
All this Light floods the fields.
Related:
How to Survive This Virus Chapter 1: This is not a drill. The World’s on Fire. We practiced our faith for days like these
How to Survive This Virus Chapter 2: Losses Come in Waves: How to Find The Way Through & The Complete Passage Deal
May 13, 2020
Your Story Matters: How to Keep Pursuing the Truth of Your Life
Leslie Leyland Fields was not only my first writing mentor: She continues to mentor me with the way she actually lives her life and then shapes it into an unforgettable story that gives sojourners hope—and gives God all the glory. She is a profoundly wise, Christ-formed guide whose every word I will always read. Why? Because she was there at the very beginning of my journey as an author. Leslie is a profound teacher of story. It’s a grace to welcome her to the farm’s front porch today …
guest post by Leslie Leyland Fields
A few years ago, I was standing on a stage, a mic at my throat, facing a sober audience.
Just a few days before, a man had pulled out twenty-three guns and shot into a crowd of twenty-two thousand.
Fifty-nine were killed, hundreds more wounded. Most of us remember that day, though it blurs with so many other hostilities and attacks around the world that visit us on our screens each day.
This was a writing conference. Each person had come to learn and to be inspired.
I had planned to say some of what I’ve written in my book:
Write your story for you, for your family. Write your story to name the world and give it back. Write your story to wrestle God. Write your stories to pass on the comfort you have received in all of your distress. Write your stories to attend to what God attends to. Write your story to pass on all you’ve seen and heard of the sacred in this world .
All of this was still true. I believed every word. But that day, I wanted more.
I wanted to hand out bulletproof vests instead of pens. I wanted to hand out shields and swords instead of speaking words into the air about writing words on the page.
Never had I felt so shaken, so helpless. What good were all these words? Can words stop bullets and end violence?
But then I remembered that in His own violent world and time, Jesus didn’t call out the military or teach self-defense classes or hand out swords, though all of this was warranted.
“Every story Jesus told was riveting, challenging, new.”
Instead, He told a story.
“A man was on his way from Jerusalem to Jericho . . .,” about a man who was violently attacked, robbed, and left for dead. Who was then ignored, despite his need, by the very ones—a lawyer, a priest—who should have rescued him.
The one man who stopped to bind his wounds and to nurse him to strength and health was a man Jesus’ listeners despised. A man of the wrong lineage, the wrong ethnicity and religion.
Jesus just gave them that story.
Maybe He used his hands and acted it out a little as He spoke, but He just gave them a story. Words that show us what it looks like to be blind, what it looks like to see beyond political and religious labels, what it looks like to be a neighbor, what it looks like to love.
So I did that too.
“Sometimes in our comfort and security, we forget: The good news He came to speak is not safe, not for anyone.”
I stood there and told that story, with a few changes: a Democrat passed by, a pastor passed by, a Republican passed by, but a liberal stopped and bound his wounds. Or a libertarian stopped and bound his wounds. I moved the labels around.
I remembered that stories can do what guns and shields cannot: They can move us beyond affiliations, under the skin of our neighbors, even into the hearts of those we think are our enemies whom we are to love because they, too, are made in the image of God. Every one of us—carrying the image of God.
But I couldn’t stop with that parable.
Because after that story we might think, Okay, we need uplifting, hopeful stories that show love and mercy, where all turns out happy and well.
But do we know how hard that story was to hear? It rattled and shook up the entire social order. (Wait. The social outcast is the good guy? The super religious are the bad guys? We have to take care of strangers?)
Don’t we know Jesus did this a lot? Every story Jesus told was riveting, challenging, new.
He valued people no one else valued: the lepers, the blind, the insane. He had deep friendships with women. He was scary in the breadth of His love and forgiveness.
Sometimes in our comfort and security, we forget: The good news He came to speak is not safe, not for anyone.
The gospel’s revolutionary message is not safe, but it is true. And it is beautiful, but it’s a beauty that must cut to heal.
If we really want to offer healing to this cracked-up world, our stories must do as Jesus’s did: tell the whole truth about this human existence.
Yes, about its goodness and hope as well as its tragedy, absurdity, and folly. And, like Jesus, we need to tell these stories with original words so our readers’ ears and eyes will stay open and awake.
What will happen then, when your words go out, near or far, to many or a few? Who can know what will happen?
One summer, I roamed the hills and grass of our island in Alaska with a clutch of papers in my hands—a first draft of a book from a young woman in Canada.
We wrote back and forth about her poetic words, about narrative arc, about story. Her words were piercingly beautiful, and I hoped she would garner a large readership, but who can guarantee such a thing? I had written seven books by then and knew the ropes.
“If we really want to offer healing to this cracked-up world, our stories must do as Jesus’s did: tell the whole truth about this human existence.”
Solemnly, I prepared her for the reality of a first release, which often doesn’t sell well.
A year later, Ann Voskamp’s One Thousand Gifts launched into the world, selling a million copies within the first two years.
But fame and fortune are uncommon visitors for most of us.
I know hundreds of writers, and only a few can claim even a passing visit with these handsome suitors whom we imagine are hovering around our doorbell, waiting for the moment our brilliant words take flight.
I am not immune. I confess to occasional pangs of jealousy toward the twelve authors in the world selling a bazillion books. I think, in a temporary swoon, How easy their writing lives must be!
But then I remember from my own modest shots of fame that every burst of attention brings greater responsibilities, not fewer.
Another friend landed a spot on the New York Times bestseller list. His agent, readers, and global fan base now hold their collective breath for his next book. How can he write with so many others now to heed and please?
So enjoy the quiet. Your obscurity as a writer right now is a gift.
Keep freely pursuing the truth of your life.
Keep using “that one talent which is death to hide,” as John Milton writes.
If you’re doing any of this now, you’re already famous.
Your Story Matters presents the dynamic and spiritually formative writing process that award-winning author Leslie Leyland Fields has been using and teaching for decades. Practical and inspiring, this book will help you remember, reflect, and ultimately transform your life through the messy and beautiful process of story.
Your story is bigger than you know. No matter who you are or what your age and stage of life, your story matters. From the tiniest details to the most dramatic events, your story is sacred and worthy of attention.
Whether your goal is healing from your past, legacy for future generations, or publishing your first book, you will sojourn together with Leslie and a host of others. In the pages you’ll soon be writing from your own life, you’ll discover new spiritual truths, reclaim the past, share hope, and pass on your own extraordinary legacy.
A video curriculum, Your Story for His Glory, recorded on the Alaskan island that Leslie Leyland Fields calls home, is also available as a companion to the book. The curriculum features one of Leslie’s wilderness writing retreats with several students and guest lecturer, bestselling author Ann Voskamp.
Your story matters. It’s time to find and tell the truth of your story. It will be a compelling story. A crafted story. A healing story. A bigger story. And in the finding and telling of this story, you’ll live it too. Leslie is a profoundly wise, Christ-formed guide whose every word I will always read.
[ Our humble thanks to Tyndale for their partnership in today’s devotion ]
May 12, 2020
She is Priceless: The Gift of Home
Kristen Welch and I are sorta, kinda, soul sisters? As I serve on the board of directors of the ministry Kristen founded, Mercy House Global, and we daily serve together to dream up for you the best #FAIRTRADE beauty of The Grace Crafted Home and The Grace Case that 100% supports the Kenyan maternity homes of Mercy House — so I get to see it first hand again and again, what we can all do together to change the world for women, if we say our brave yes. — and I am all in here with Kristen, with Mercy House Global, and togESTHER — we are the Esther Generation. Called for such a time as this, right where we are, to change the world for our sisters…. I absolutely love this woman with all my heart — a grace to welcome my soul sister, Kristen, to the farm’s front porch today…
Home. It was the last place I’d planned to be.
I should have been on a long plane ride to Kenya and instead I stayed home for another long week.
This season has brought a new kind of grief –the kind that comes with staying instead of going.
“This season has brought a new kind of grief –the kind that comes with staying instead of going.”
Yes, this pandemic has provided disappointment and discouragement.
At the same time, it offers us the gift of perspective.
It’s the kind of present that is hard to unwrap—a way to look at our loss and mounting problems from a new vantage point.
It’s the kind of gift that offers to show us what we have, instead of what we don’t. It doesn’t make our loss less, and yes, there has been so much loss-but sometimes just seeing what others don’t have, makes us grateful for what do have.
While North America bemoans the boredom of quarantining day after day, the Global South goes to bed hungry night after night.
While we absorb the impact of cancellations and church online, children in poverty go to bed on an empty stomach.
Social distancing, staying home, stimulus checks—this is the vocabulary of the privileged.
Those who live on less than a dollar a day cannot comprehend our luxury.
Instead of flying to Kenya with Mercy House Global, I was feeling the first world loss. Instead of hosting an art camp for teen moms, I was logging in my daughter for her art lesson online.
In the middle of my homebound days, I received this urgent message from our Kenyan staff,
“The greater majority living in the slums and streets have no concerns towards the spread of this dreaded disease. People in the slums live hand to mouth. In order to survive, they have to step out and look for casual jobs, open their small businesses where they sell vegetables.
Their deplorable living conditions has meant that access to safe clean water and hygienic conditions is a mirage- something that can never be achieved. They don’t see the sense in following government directives of staying indoors to curb the spread. This to them only translates to spending days and nights without food.
Friends, my beloved friends, while some of us complain about boredom due to necessary quarantine and isolation, the poor complain they are being denied their source of survival: food.”
“While North America bemoans the boredom of quarantining day after day, the Global South goes to bed hungry night after night.”
These words have both haunted and reminded me that while my full pantry and stocked refrigerator at home don’t erase my loss of income or diminish my disappointment, they do remind me that I have so much to be grateful for in the middle of a global pandemic.
I am home.
They also offer me an opportunity to share my own abundance by remembering the poor. The word home has never meant more to me (or the world) as much as it does right now.
Today is “She Is Priceless”, the annual Giving Day of Mercy House Global.
Each year Mercy House Global raises funds to rescue 6-8 new pregnant girls and alter their course for a lifetime. The goal is to bring them home.
We step into their lives; remind them that God loves them. Together, we say, “You are Priceless!”
In the middle of the COVID-19, the maternity homes and all of Kenya are on strict lockdown. While we can’t yet rescue new girls, we want to continue to provide a home for the 55 teen moms and their children.
We have already identified girls that need to be rescued and we want to be ready to bring them home.
This year we are trying to raise two months of operating expenses in Kenya.
What will this do? It will put Mercy House Global in a position to be ready to rescue new girls once the lockdown is lifted.
“It’s a home—a lot like yours—only a whole lot bigger—It’s a sisterhood of second chances.”
Monthly costs to run three maternity homes in Kenya – $35,000 includes:
Food for girls, babies, and on-site staff
Electricity, Clean Water
Pre-Natal, Post-Natal and overall Healthcare for mother and baby
Counseling, Group therapy
Transportation
Education and Vocational Training
Staff Salaries
It’s a home—a lot like yours—only a whole lot bigger—It’s a sisterhood of second chances.
Will you link arms with Mercy House Global today to remind these girls—and those unreached—they are loved by helping us continue to provide a home for them in the most difficult of circumstances?
Will you join me and unwrap the gift of perspective in the midst of a global crisis today?
We are joining together to remind the world —
that every woman matters.
“She Is Priceless” Is A Campaign To Make A Difference In The Lives Of Oppressed Women
Might you join us and pray?
Would you pray and, in faith, consider making a donation today?
Because every woman matters…
May 11, 2020
When You’re in Need of a Fresh Approach to Move Out of Anxiety, Stress, and Survival Mode
Aundi Kolber spent much of her life believing that the only way through pain was to white knuckle and shame herself. She hoped that if she armored up and tried hard enough, maybe she would finally be found lovable by God and others. In a beautiful turn of events, Aundi came to find through safe relationships, her training as a licensed therapist, and the profound compassion of Jesus–that she has always been deeply loved. It’s a grace to welcome Aundi to the farm’s front porch today…
“Aundi,” she said to me gently, “it’s okay to cry. It really is.”
As my mentor spoke, years of bottled-up tears tumbled down my cheeks, and my whole body seemed to exhale.
“You don’t have to have all the answers. It’s not your job to fix everyone. You can let yourself rest. You’re safe with me.”
Little did she know how much I needed those exact words; I was starved for them like a tree in the desert longs for rain.
“We are quite literally created with the capacity to move through hardship when our minds, bodies, and spirits have the support they need to fully process pain.”
It wasn’t that tears or emotions were new to me. But usually my big feelings were accompanied by profound shame and blame. One minute I felt as though I couldn’t hold them in any longer, and the next I felt angry about my perceived weakness.
My inner critic had become adept at warning me that my vulnerability and aches were not welcome—and so I did everything possible to project the strength I believed would make me lovable.
Growing up in a family with significant relational and attachment trauma certainly did teach me I had no choice but to be tough, and my experiences seemed to prove that love was as flimsy as a stack of cards.
And so of course I learned to hide, suppress, and numb my pain.
But this is what happens when pain goes unvalidated and unwitnessed: We learn to internalize the false story that we aren’t worth the effort to be cared for.
Yet through the deep, unwavering grace of a God who is crazy about us, I have come to learn that our bodies are designed to heal.
We are quite literally created with the capacity to move through hardship when our minds, bodies, and spirits have the support they need to fully process pain.
“Ultimately, we move toward healing as we learn to steward toward ourselves the profound compassion God has for us.”
Our ability to move toward wholeness and healing doesn’t happen because we pretend, ignore, or white-knuckle our way through the hard stuff of life.
As my mentor reminded me, healing happens when we begin to try softer with ourselves in the face of all that threatens our peace.
Ultimately, we move toward healing as we learn to steward toward ourselves the profound compassion God has for us.
A New Story
During my fourteen-year journey healing journey as a survivor of childhood trauma, I have come to experience the story of belonging and abundance that I believe Jesus invites us all into. It is a story of connection to the God who allows us to live from our truest selves—emotions and all.
Yet our culture and—even more significantly, our families—often teach us that pushing down trauma and pain is the only way to be in the world.
“God is with us in the pain.”
But Jesus tells us a different story, doesn’t He? He tells us that we don’t have to shame the pain; that instead, God is with us in the pain.
God is our Waymaker through the pain.
Jesus—the God who took on flesh to feel all the emotions and realities of our humanity—came and met us in the muck so that we can experience what it’s like to be known, loved, and fully human.
The God Who Weeps
It’s possible that my favorite example of the way Jesus invites us to try softer is in His interactions with His friends Mary and Martha after their brother, Lazarus, died.
The shortest verse in the Bible, “Jesus wept” (John 11:35, esv), sums up Jesus’ response as they and others grieved near Lazarus’s tomb.
Jesus absolutely knew what was about to happen: Even though His friend had died, He would be raising him back to life momentarily. But—don’t miss this—Jesus still wept.
What kind of God is this?
His friends had just lost their dear brother—of course they wept.
Yet Jesus didn’t shame them; instead, He honored and entered into their present grief and validated their humanity.
When Jesus lamented with Mary and Martha, He was allowing them to process their emotions.
Joining them in grief, Jesus knew that as they processed their feelings, they would tap into their bodies’ natural ability to integrate difficult experiences.
“Yet Jesus didn’t shame them; instead, He honored and entered into their present grief and validated their humanity.”
And as the Creator of their neurobiological structures, I suspect He even recognized that their minds and bodies needed to do this so the pain didn’t become a form of trauma.
Notice that God-in-the-flesh did not rush Mary and Martha along but instead provided empathy and patience.
This is a model for us as we seek to pay compassionate attention to our own experiences.
It might sound strange to most folks, but Jesus’ weeping is one of my favorite things to talk about.
This is the Jesus I know and serve and give my life to; the One who holds the redemption story in one hand and the fragility of our human emotions in the other—and loves them both.
An Invitation to Try Softer
Today, dear reader, I wonder if you can sense the invitation from your Maker to begin to honor the experiences of your own humanity.
Perhaps you can do so by letting yourself rest one moment longer in the presence of someone who helps you exhale.
Maybe you can listen when your body asks you to feel an emotion.
Even more simply, you might allow yourself to pay attention to what is actually going on in your inner person.
Regardless of your next step as you learn to try softer, my prayer is that you and I each know and experience the God who is profoundly compassionate with us.
Licensed therapist, speaker, and author Aundi Kolber lives in Castle Rock, Co with her husband and two children. She is passionate about the integration of faith and psychology and has received additional training around her specialties of trauma and body centered therapies. Aundi is the author of Try Softer: A Fresh Approach to Move Us Out of Anxiety, Stress, and Survival Mode and Into a Life of Connection and Joy. As a survivor of trauma, Aundi brings hard-won knowledge about the work of change, the power of redemption, and the beauty of experiencing God with us in our pain.
In a world that preaches a “try harder” gospel-just keep going, keep hustling, keep pretending we’re all fine-we’re left exhausted, overwhelmed, and so numb to our lives. If we’re honest, we’ve been over-functioning for so long, we can’t even imagine another way.
It is the joy of Aundi’s life to invite readers to understand that God is stunningly kind to us—and because this is true, each of us are invited to steward that compassion toward ourselves too. With a thoughtful combination of story, faith, and research-based practices, this book will guide you toward cultivating a gentler posture toward yourself.
[ Our humble thanks to Tyndale for their partnership in today’s devotion ]
May 9, 2020
For All the Ways Mother’s Day is Complicated: Tribe of Mothers
I
am the mother of my daughter whose first mother I’ve never met.
When your story comes from a long line of women — how do you make the lines of your story write a love story back to them?
My daughter moved inside the womb of a woman I wouldn’t know if I passed her on the street. And before my heart wrapped around my daughter’s, her heart had beat for nine months under the rhythm of another woman’s heart, a woman who made space within herself to grow this miracle I now get to behold.
When your story comes from a long line of women — how do you make the lines of your story write a love story back to them?
How do you kiss the shoulders on which you stand?
How do you embrace all the women who come behind you who are now lodged like all this light in your heart?
My aunt never held a child of her own. But on one of my darkest days, when I was fighting a plan to end all the pain I didn’t know how to stop — I had texted her. And she saved my life, she gave me life.
You don’t have to birth someone to birth hope into someone.
Any woman who has grown a soul within her, or has grown space in her life for a soul to keep on growing — is a mother.
Any woman
who has grown a soul within her,
or has grown space in her life
for a soul to keep on growing,
Is a mother.
When you’re a fountain of love, your offspring is everywhere & you’re mothering and watering souls wherever you go.
When I hear Dolly Parton crooning out a tune on some kids’ playlist yesterday, I dance around like my tiny Grand Ruth used to do, crooking my neck to my shoulder just like she used to as she shimmied to country western refrains, and I can still hear her humming and the creaking of her knees.
How can her old tapestry purse still be here in a closet, but she’s no longer here? Missing her is a way of not missing out on her now.
Even after our mothers go home to our Father, their love still mothers us.
I hear my 21 year old daughter tell her father yesterday, “You know what I just noticed? I have the same dimples as Grandma Voskamp had. Dimples. Both cheeks. Just the same as her.”
The Farmer smiles, stilling holding the phone in his hand from talking to our 23 yr old son who recites chapters by memory of Ephesians every night to his dad. On a top bookshelf in the study, up above the old hymnals, are all of Grandma Voskamp’s dog-earred, underlined and dated Bible Memory Association booklets, James, Colossians, 1 John, Philippians, a stack.
Grandma Voskamp has been gone to glory now, singing with the heavenly host for the last 13 years. Her dimples smile on in her granddaughter, her legacy of memorizing the Word carries on in her grandson.
Every mother can be a star, her light going on and on and on. Every woman can be a wave whose love kisses the ragged edge of things time and again, even after time’s rolled on. Every woman can a torch that passes on a legacy that never passes away.
Every mother can be a star, her light going on and on and on.
Every woman can be a wave whose love kisses the ragged edge of things time and again, even after time’s rolled on.
Every woman can a torch that passes on a legacy that never passes away.
My own white crowned mama, whose frail heart beats with lionhearted love, she sews masks for us all in these strange days, every day letting me unmask my heart when I call her, and she still holds my exposed fears with a gentle wisdom she’s told me a thousand times if she’s told me once, “It’s not that you aren’t going to blow it, it’s what you do with it afterward.”
And who doesn’t ache in these strange days to gather up all kinds of our kind mothers, their real sacrifice strengthening our arms for these days, their enduring courage strengthening our backs for this journey,
their singular love still coursing through us,
still carrying us through all the days.
When I set out a bouquet of wild daffodils in my mama’s vase this weekend, when a kid here raises the volume of a tune my Grandmother danced to, when our youngest daughter, born in another country to another mother, raises up on her tiptoes to grab my neck and pull me close to whisper in her little lispy voice, “My heart is tied to yours always and forever, no matter what, Mama,” — something in me rises, and there it is:
May we all rise for our long tribe of mothers:
May we honour our brave tribe of mothers,
may we reach out as a true tribe of mothers,
and may we raise up a kind tribe of mothers,
so every man, woman, and child feel how they belong
to the forever kin
of our Father.
This Mother’s Day Get What You Really Want for Free:
A Truckload of Grace, A House of Prayer, a 10 Point Parenting Manifesto
All Three Free Gifts have profoundly impacted my 25 years of parenting — so I just really wanted to wrap it all up & give to ((YOU)) as a free gift from my mama heart to your brave one — or for your own mother — a deeply meaningful gift that you don’t have to go out anywhere for, or spend any money on — kinda perfect in strange days like these — and it’s exactly what every mama want the very most: a 10 Point Parenting Manifest for JOY (regardless the age of your kids), everything you need to literally make your house into a house of prayer (especially needed in days like these) — and a printable that gives every mama what she wants most: a Truckload of Grace.
What you really want most this Mother’s Day
Click Here for all you need for the (FREE!) perfect way to Disappointment-Proof this Mother’s Day
Only the Good Stuff: Multivitamins for Your Weekend [05.09.20]
Happy, happy, happy weekend!
Some real, down in the bones JOY to celebrate today! Links & stories this week 100% guaranteed to make you smile a mile wide & believe like crazy in a Good God redeeming everything — and that there’s love everywhere & for ((you))!
Serving up only the Good Stuff for you & your people right here:
Jessica Walker
Jessica Walker
Jessica Walker
Jessica Walker
so we’ve been told? These guys are all less than one inch big…
what a glorious God of the details!
This Mother’s Day thank the women who have loved, mentored, and mothered you
Bethany Hope
Bethany Hope
Bethany Hope
can you even?!? Happy, happy Mother’s Day
You’re invited to reminisce with us this Mother’s Day!
Mothers of every kind – physical or spiritual – influenced you, believed in you, prayed for you, and taught you about God and Scripture. Honor your mother’s legacy by giving the gift of hope to others through Scripture in their heart language.
love this idea… Visit Seed Company here: to give a gift in her honor!
This Mother’s Day Get What You Really Want for Free:
A Truckload of Grace, A House of Prayer, a 10 Point Parenting Manifesto
All Three Free Gifts have profoundly impacted my 25 years of parenting — so I just really wanted to wrap it all up & give to ((YOU)) as a free gift from my mama heart to your brave one — or for your own mother — a deeply meaningful gift that you don’t have to go out anywhere for, or spend any money on — kinda perfect in strange days like these — and it’s exactly what every mama want the very most: a 10 Point Parenting Manifest for JOY (regardless the age of your kids), everything you need to literally make your house into a house of prayer (especially needed in days like these) — and a printable that gives every mama what she wants most: a Truckload of Grace.
What you really want most this Mother’s Day
Click Here for all you need for the (FREE!) perfect way to Disappointment-Proof this Mother’s Day
she shares some really good words here
How woke do you really want to be? Do you really want some 20/20 vision this year?
Love God. Love People.
“Jesus said, “The first in importance is, ‘LISTEN, Israel: The Lord your God is one; so love the Lord God with all your passion and prayer and intelligence and energy.’ And here is the second: ‘Love others as well as you love yourself.’ There is no other commandment that ranks with these.””
Mark 12:29-31 MSG
Turns out? All our homes tell a story.
Every blanket, every spoon, every plate, in every home — began somewhere in the world, was made by someone in the world, and somehow changed a bit of the world —
for better or worse.
And the welcome mats under our feet, the steaming mugs in our hands, the full bowls on our tables, could all tell a grace story — a story of fair trade, a story of life change, a story of saving, Gospel grace.And THESE DAYS at home? Maybe these days at home require a little extra GRACE?
Wherever there is a place of Grace — we find more of Home. Come see.
a message of Hope
I’m Dying: Lore Ferguson Wilbert shares some really profound words here
there is peace…even in the storm
Avery Sass
Compassion Graduate: From Shoeshiner to National Director… YES: amazed at this!
Dear Mom… (don’t miss)
I will wait for you
so yeah, tears here: I’ll Love You Forever
a story of the power of music…
Kinda strange, hard days to be raising kids. What does hope look like? Hope for them, hope for you, hope for us all — that we can change, that we can do hard things, that together, we can rise!
Because there’s no giving up, but here’s how to keep giving it our all:
Parents Who Want to Give Up: how to raise up kids even when you want to give up
Why Do Greetings Matter? Philippians 4:21-23
Favorite Home Dress: Tribe Alive
Post of the week from these parts here
You don’t even know how to say how tender Mother’s Day is for you. Yeah, you are so not alone & I just really wanted to give you everything you need to disappointment-proof Mother’s Day, give you everything you need to know about mothering,
right here, for you:
How to 100% Disappointment-Proof Mother’s Day:
Get Everything You Want for Mother’s Day & Get Everything You Need To Know About Mothering
More than Enough
This month. May. What is needed now more than ever?
That we be the hands and feet of Jesus for each other, that we help be what each other needs, that we #ShowUpNow for each other, that we #BeTheGift to each other.
Because actual lives depend on it.
Right now, we all desperately need to be the gift to each other. To stand together in solidarity—FOR each other—knowing that an act of kindness, giving it forward, can be more powerful than the spread of any pandemic, more powerful sword in starting movements that move us all toward Love.
Dare with us? Let’s spread kindness, start a bit of a movement, a giving, generous, caring, broken and given and transforming revolution that turns things around.
Could there be a more beautiful way to live your one life in times like these?
WE CAN #SHOWUPNOW, DO THIS THING AND #BETHEGIFT!
Download the Free COVID-FRIENDLY #BeTheGift Calendar under “Free Tools” here: http://bit.ly/StickyNotesForYourSoul
AND CHECK OUT SHOWUPNOW right now — to bring new hope to this new month!
thankful for the scars…
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 intivation 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: Mighty To Save
It’s okay. Slow down & breathe.
Let the goodness & mercy that follows you every. single. day. of. your. life. — no. matter. what. — catch up & overtake you today.
“Surely goodness & mercy shall follow me
ALL the days of my life” Psalm 23:6
*When we feel how His goodness overtakes us,
nothing can overwhelm us.*
Just that today: Slow down & see how His goodness catches up to you.
And then let Him take your hand.
Don’t simply follow your heart —
but follow a Light so lovely that it will ignite 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.
May 8, 2020
How to 100% Disappointment-Proof Mother’s Day: Get Everything You Want for Mother’s Day & Get Everything You Need To Know About Mothering
H
onestly, you don’t have to know what you’ll do when the kids grow up, buy a Mother’s Day card for you, while they tell their friends, their therapist, and their kids that you got so much wrong.
You just have to know that you’ll humbly own it.
Because they aren’t wrong.
Favorite Home Dress: Tribe Alive
“Parenting is never about how your kids turn out. It’s always and only about how you keep turning toward your kids & their Maker.”
It’s tender and true: You could have held them longer after they grew too big for your arms: held space for their pain, held their eyes, held them up in relentless prayers. You could have said yes to more campfires, jumped more on the trampoline and been known more for your loud, rowdy laughter instead of being the ready critic. You could have asked more honest questions and lingered longer, simply honouring them with listening space. You could have said yes. And No. Both at the right time.
Where you tried and fell short, they now trip and fall and have bruises to prove it.
Much dysfunction is a function of denying brokenness. The madness of much dysfunction ends now, ends with our owning it. Yes, things were broken. And: All the brokenness can be the tender breaking open of a seed to grow better.
No matter your hidden regrets or their current age: You can tenderly own that you took some wrong turns and it’s never too late to simply turn toward the Light.
Life always turns on the turn.
“The work of every parent is to give the best they know how now — and the work of every child is to forgive their parents the best they can now.”
And it’s worth writing down by the kitchen sink: Parenting is never about how your kids turn out. It’s always and only about how you keep turning toward your kids and their Maker.
It’s okay: Motherhood is never about training your children to be good so they won’t ever fall — it’s about letting them see you fall in love every day with a good God.
And even after you’ve fallen hard — they see you keep falling hard for God.
Simply: The work of every parent is to give the best they know how now — and the work of every child is to forgive their parents the best they can now. Our work will look different, but we both have growing work to do.
There is always grace coming to meet us.
I became a mother on the eve of Mother’s Day. I was a wide-eyed girl of 21. He was 4 weeks early. I wasn’t ready, he was tiny, a curled soul in my hand, and I had no idea how to unfurl him into man.
“Our nightmares end when we accept that where we are, can still be where dreams come true. To accept is to wake.”
That boy who made me a mother now turns 25. I’ve now been a mother for a quarter of a century. I had no idea I’d end up becoming the mother of one and a half dozen kids — which is a tongue-in-cheek way of saying I’m the mother of 7 kids — while saying that a whole lot of days that felt more like mothering 18 kids.
I have lived through days —countless of them — that were unashamedly our actual dreams come true — and I have lived through honestly our very worst nightmares.
Prodigals. Rejections. Diagnosis. Needles and daily injections. Constant meds. ICUs. Self-harming. Open heart surgeries. More than once. Mental health fractures. Mine and theirs. Car accidents. More than once. Drop outs. More diagnosis. Sleepless nights. Prayer pacing and soundless tears at 3 am. More than once.
Seven miraculous kids has meant non-stop riding seven roller coasters with all of the wondrous, exhilarating heights — and heart-dropping plunges.
“Motherhood is never about training your children to be good so they won’t ever fall — it’s about letting them see you fall in love every day with a good God.”
Life always comes in waves, the cresting and the crashing — and we just have learn how to accept the way of the waves.
Our nightmares end when we accept that where we are, can still be where dreams come true. To accept is to wake.
All l needed to know about mothering I learned that first long, sleepless night of being a brand new mother.
It wasn’t that wails of the brand new baby that kept me awake. He barely stirred. I stared at him for hours, as dusk deepened into dark and his face was lit by the hospital hallway, him swaddled in the bassinet rolled up to the side of my bed. I couldn’t turn away from his newborn sleep, couldn’t hardly breathe through the mounting realization that I could wreck this tiny human being entrusted to my blatant inexperience.
My terror was kinda palpable: How do you mother and raise an actual living human being?
I’d opened up the most ancient book and traced a trail of words that had been worn down as tried and found true for centuries:
“He carries them close to his heart
and gently leads those that have young.” Isa. 40:11
In the shadows of a dark room of a neonatal ward, I’d laid there wide awake with The Mother Epiphany:
“God gently leads those who have young, because He is leading us on a journey — that journeys with our kids who are on a journey of their own.”
You need to carry out your mothering the best you can, but the Shepherd carries your babies close to His heart, and He is the one responsible for carrying your babies home. God is ultimately the shepherd of our children, we just have to keep faithfully carrying on.
God gently leads those who have young, because He is leading us on a journey — that journeys with our kids who are on a journey of their own.
No parent gets to decide a child’s outcome — we only get to decide to always come alongside our child. We only get to offer our child with-ness and witness on their way — we don’t get to determine their way.
We can only relentlessly pray that they will choose the only One who is the only Way.
“No parent gets to decide a child’s outcome — we only get to decide to always come alongside our child.”
It’d take me years to realize:
Parenting 101:
No shock, no shame, no matter what they do.
Only sharing the sheltering arms of the Shepherd.
Parent or child, we are no different, we are all wandering sheep, easily lured, who all need the rescue of the Shepherd from the lostness of lesser loves into the embrace of the greatest Love, Love Himself.
When a mother stops seeing herself as the shepherd who needs to be good enough get her child safely Home, but instead sees her and her child both in need of a Good Shepherd, this is how she always stays safe in the home of God.
“Mother, in the arms of your Father: You are not lacking. You lack nothing.
You. do. not. lack.”
When I’d turn toward the expanse of dark hospital room windows, there was my reflection, a mother desperately fearing she was not enough, backlit by the glow of hospital hallway , and there was clear Heart of the Father:
Mama, trust Me:
You are not lacking.
I brimmed….. dropped my eyes, shook my head…..
But there is the Comfort of the Father, gently gathering up all the Mothers of children, hushing away all the fears with the song they know by heart:
The LORD is my shepherd, I lack nothing. Ps. 23:1
Mother, in the arms of your Father:
You are not lacking.
You lack nothing.
You. do. not. lack.
Mother, in the arms of your Father,
no matter how things unfold with your children:
You are Beloved.
Live out of your Belovedness,
Parent out of your Belovedness,
Love out of your Belovedness —
because your perfect Belovedness kicks all fear out to the curb.
On the eve of Mother’s Day, my hours old newborn son slept soundly, and I cried quietly in the arms of my Father and it would take me a long quarter of a century and 7 kids later to know it fully:
“God’s a perfect father with His own prodigal kids — and He only has perfect grace for prodigal parenting of imperfect, glorious kids.”
God’s a perfect father with His own prodigal kids — and He only has perfect grace for my prodigal parenting of these imperfect, glorious kids.
It would take me all this quarter of a century of mothering to find the relief of it:
If we don’t turn inward — it all turns out.
Turn outward — toward your children, and toward your Shepherd — and in the end, it will all turn out.
You will get things wrong, the prodigal parent with prodigal kids, and you and the kids will both make wrong turns, only to turn and find the arms of the Shepherd who left everything to come and find and gently lead all the way through.
A Shepherd who whispers to each of us, New Mother, Young child, Old Mama, Adult Child, Wounded and Wandering and Wondering, no matter where any of us are on our own journey:
Beloved. All will be alright, all will be all redeemed, all will be all restored.
“Beloved. All will be alright, all will be all redeemed, all will be all restored.”
So honestly? The truth is, no matter what anyone says about you, to anyone, you don’t have to know how any of the journey will go, but you can quietly forgo buying any Mother’s Day card and simply make one of your own — for you, for your own mother, for your own child, one that simply transcribes the heart of the Father right now:
Beloved,
I am your Shepherd &
You are mine.
You are not lacking,
You Lack Nothing.
You are not lacking.
You are Beloved.
This Mother’s Day Get What You Really Want for Free:
A Truckload of Grace, A House of Prayer, a 10 Point Parenting Manifesto
All Three Free Gifts have profoundly impacted my 25 years of parenting — so I just really wanted to wrap it all up & give to ((YOU)) as a free gift from my mama heart to your brave one — or for your own mother — a deeply meaningful gift that you don’t have to go out anywhere for, or spend any money on — kinda perfect in strange days like these — and it’s exactly what every mama want the very most: a 10 Point Parenting Manifest for JOY (regardless the age of your kids), everything you need to literally make your house into a house of prayer (especially needed in days like these) — and a printable that gives every mama what she wants most: a Truckload of Grace.
What you really want most this Mother’s Day
Click Here for all you need for the (FREE!) perfect way to Disappointment-Proof this Mother’s Day
May 6, 2020
Parents Who Want to Give Up: how to raise up kids even when you want to give up
When I was an oblivious 16, more than a few moons ago, I met this soccer mama who had it painted on her canvas sneakers:
Shoe #1: These 2 feet run
Shoe #2: After my 3 sons.
We ended up with 4 sons.
Four sons. Four sons who swelled me out like a melon and nobody tells mothers that: Once labor starts, it never ends.
Four boys that made mountains of laundry like they were tectonic plates, who furiously ravaged the fridge 24/7 and left a never-ending stream of empty plates. A quad of explosive testosterone, a quartet of dirt and wrestling and loud and dreams and books and mess and sweat and inventions.
And, frankly, there were a lot of days I wanted to have it wired up in neon blinking lights on a t-shirt:
These two arms
pull out a lot of this mother’s hair
over her 4 sons.
The one boy that was harder than all the other kids all put together?
The one who made me think he was either headed to delinquency hall, or I was literally headed to an insane asylum, who made me lock myself in the mudroom, slink to the floor and weep a primal grief? At least three times a week?
“Instead of giving someone a piece of your mind, it turns out far better if you give them a piece of your heart.”
He bought his own house the week before his 18th birthday. That he rents out to 7 other university students.
He now messages me multiple times a day with quotes of what he’s been reading. Links to good stuff. He’s one of my very best friends. One of my very favourite people in the whole wide world. I never want conversations with him to end.
A road always looks one way — until it makes a u-turn.
They don’t tell you that either:
The only way to raise kids — is by never giving up.
I’ve failed our kids like the Hindenberg. Crashed and burned of epic proportions. Daily. Turns out that: Whenever you want to light into someone, is exactly when you should lighten up.
Instead of giving someone a piece of your mind, it turns out far better if you give them a piece of your heart.
I confess: I wish I had done that. There’s support groups for moms of preschoolers, but where’s triage for the moms of teenagers? MOTHERSOFTEENAGERS #MOTS
The older our kids become, the greater our isolation can become, because while mothers of toddlers can instagram and commiserate together over the Terrible Twos — mothers struggling through a stretch of terrible teens can suffer alone.
“Redemption is the papery ash that’s falling, turning and uplifting as sparks of pure glory.”
Those hard teens? One of the younger ones scored in the 99.7 percentile on his ACT. Was offered a scholarship to his program of choice — mathematical physics — the week of his 17th birthday.
While the Farmer worked in the fields last night, planting way past midnight, that kid talked on the phone for hours with his dad. Recited to his dad all of Ephesians 1 — he’s been memorizing every chapter of Galatians and Ephesians with a goal to memorize all of the New Testament. He’s become more than I ever dreamed.
Redemption is the papery ash that’s falling, turning and uplifting as sparks of pure glory.
This happens. We don’t deserve this and redemption still happens.
And it begs us to never stop looking for it, to always stop and witness it.
* * *
So when our 4 boys show up this year, in the middle of a global pandemic, to ask their dad how they can help him put in this year’s crop?
“When a family works shoulder to shoulder through something, they find they can take on just about anything.”
Yeah, they end up in tractor seats — grinning a mile wide and nodding at us, and I remember how I once held these boys as babies in my arms.
Remember the year that they got stuck in the back field, tracks up to their knees.
How the cultivator had caught a bit of damp dirt at the edge of the woods.
And the phone had rang after midnight here in the farmhouse, a brother looking for his kid brother.
I’d still been up, making up something warm to eat for for that kid brother who’d just dragged in from another farm and planting 200 acres of soybeans on his own.
Both boys had have been up since 4 am the day before: Feeding hogs. Washing down barns. Hooking cultivators on to tractors. Cultivating up a seed bed for hundreds of acres for those seeds.
When a family works shoulder to shoulder through something, they find they can take on just about anything.
Their Dad was still out there, planting. Still out there going in the field behind the barn, out there underneath a milk moon, on an open tractor, eating dirt up and down the field, trying to get the last of those corn seeds into the ground.
When I’d taken a warm bowl out to the good man, his hands were bone cold. I’d told him that one of the boys had gotten stuck — but he’d called for his brother to come help.
“Growing in grace and wisdom and stature isn’t an immediate download — it happens the way a tree grows up: over decades.”
And Levi had left his steaming plate on the table, headed out to the shed to grab a chain, start up the tractor again, haul over to the farm a few sideroads over to pull his big brother out of the field in the middle of the night.
This old ma of theirs, I’d driven the pick-up tuck out to check on our boys. Stood in the dark and nod our Boy-me on. Brothers.
The Redeemed and the Rescued and the Remade. Gittin’ ‘er done with their dad. Doing whatever it takes to keep the other one going, get this crop in the ground and get this family through — because, for all our stumbling and wandering, that’s what families do.
Levi and Joshua had hooked that chain onto a tractor axle in the dark. Their bass voices echoed across the field. When did I turn and they grow up like this and how did this miracle of grace bond us all like this?
People can say what they want about teenagers & boys these days.
Say what they want about this next generation, say that kids can’t change, that we’re all going to pot here in a hand basket. But even in the midst of hard years, when raising kids is just plain hard, especially in these strange days, and I just want to whisper:
There’s a whole generation of young men who are becoming good men.
There are young men who need time. Oak trees don’t happen over night.
Growing in grace and wisdom and stature isn’t an immediate download — it happens the way a tree grows up: over decades.
There’s a reason why children begin as seeds. It’s okay — it’s okay — that growth and change take time — it’s supposed to.
There are good young men who simply need someone to tell them a dozen times a day, “You’re good at working hard and loving large. You were made for this.”
There are good young men out there who need to be unearthed from low expectations, and made over by relentless grace, and strengthened with daily doses of iron: the nails of service and the Cross of Christ.
“There’s a whole generation of the hardest boys who can become the greatest men.”
There are good young men who need someone to show them they are trustworthy by entrusting them with worthy work, who take the time to inspect their work so they know what to expect, who give them confidence to to do hard things by giving them hard things to do.
One of the boys hauls his brother out of the mire.
I had memorized the boys’ silhouettes in the lunar light — and I can still see it now.
How the two of them had stood in a shaft of moon, farm caps pulled low, deciding who will finish up this field now at 3 a.m., who will get up when the 4 a.m. alarm would go off in an hour for the barn again and those hungry hogs.
It doesn’t matter if they’ve both been up 22 hours now. It doesn’t matter that there are hours ahead of them and rain coming and only so much time to get these seeds into the ground. They’re both bent and bound to not quit now.
Don’t quit now.
There’s a whole generation of the hardest boys who can become the greatest men.
There’s a whole generation of young men who will rise up if we raise our expectations, who can turn over new leaves because we never stop believing in them and a redeeming God.
When you teach a kid how to work hard, you teach him how to work through whatever’s hard.
Yeah —- there’s more than just a few good young men.
There’s a whole world of them. Headlines could tout them. Facebook streams could flood with them and Instagram could capture them and Twitter could trend with our future men: #GoodYoungMen. And a whole generation of mothers and fathers could do the hallowed work of raising them up. Because a country needs them, a hurting world needs them, an eternity needs them, and the raising up of #GoodYoungMen is no small thing — it’s a hard and holy thing.
“When you teach a kid how to work hard, you teach him how to work through whatever’s hard.”
When the third born son, Levi, had caught a glance of a photo from the field, he had leaned in over the outlines by the tractors.
“That’s Dad?”
I had shook my head, no.
“Oh, that’s Dad?”
He points to the other silhouette in his peaked farm hat. “Wait — Dad was planting behind the barn that night,” he straightens up, confused.
“It’s you.” Something’s burning in my throat.
“It’s you and your brother.”
Levi leans in again over the picture. “Really? We both look like Dad. The way we are both standing.”
His mother nods, swallows around this burning ember.
The feet of all our sons run like all the good men ahead of them —
a crop of good young men planted by their Father, for a harvest worth all of a mother’s worn and faithful grace.
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