Ann Voskamp's Blog, page 93
October 10, 2019
How to Be the Friend You Wish to Have
The moment I met Rebekah Lyons, at Q Portland 2012, and she told me how our stories intersected—the story of a farm girl fighting for joy, being read by her in NYC, fighting for joy too—I only wanted to hear more of her God-story. Her latest book, Rhythms of Renewal, is called for such a time as now, for this particular moment, and is going to change and save countless lives—and I can’t imagine God’s story of freedom in the world right now without hers. The story God gives us is never meant only for ourselves—it’s meant to help someone through theirs. It’s a grace to welcome Rebekah to the farm’s front porch today…
Over the years, I learned how fickle friends can be and how anxious that fickleness makes me.
I had two friends who bailed in hard seasons: one in my twenties, one in my thirties. At the time, I couldn’t fathom losing either of them.
So each time, I became the squeaky wheel that demanded their attention.
“No matter how I tried to please people or change so they’d accept me, I couldn’t shake the anxiety. “
I worked harder to earn their love, tried to change who I was to convince them to stick around.
It didn’t work, and both times I was left wondering, What is wrong with me?
This anxiety bled into my other relationships. If a friend commented that I was too vulnerable, I would rein it in.
Too serious, I’d lighten up.
Too passionate, I’d get silly.
I’d change anything so as not to lose another friend.
It hurts too much. Dancing on eggshells, I was afraid to be myself, afraid to live into the fullness of who God created me to be. But no matter how I tried to please people or change so they’d accept me, I couldn’t shake the anxiety.
Am I too much or not enough? Why do I place so much pressure on friendships?
Then, the critique of a few friends became too loud, and before I knew it, a transfer occurred. The lies I heard stopped coming from them and began coming from my own thoughts.
I was listening to the voice in my head more often than I was trusting the heart God gave me.
Do I even know how to pick the right friends?
Am I placing the gift of friends over the God who gives them?
I’d let a few bad experiences reshape my outlook, and I needed a shift.
Joy Prouty
Joy Prouty
Hoping to change my attitude, which wasn’t getting me anywhere, I started studying friendship.
I discovered that, centuries ago, Aristotle defined three different types of friends who tend to make their way into our lives.
“I’d been just as guilty of being a friend of convenience, rather than a friend of virtue.”
There are friendships based on utility, friendships based on pleasure, and friendships based on virtue—the ideal. These friendships go deeper than convenience and encourage us in our shared commitments.
Aristotle wrote, “Those who love because of utility love because of what is good for themselves, and those who love because of pleasure do so because of what is pleasant to themselves.”
Yet what one finds useful or pleasurable, Aristotle wrote, “is not permanent but is always changing; thus, when the reason for the friendship is done away, the friendship is dissolved.”
This rang true. A few of the deep friendship hurts I’d experienced fit those first two categories.
Life seasons had brought us together, but shared passions and commitments weren’t always in the mix. I’d been just as guilty of being a friend of convenience, rather than a friend of virtue, as anyone.
Where have I only wanted to be a friend of utility or pleasure?
As I read Aristotle, I knew I needed to rededicate myself to making friends with people with whom I shared commitments. But where would I start?
One day I called a long-distance friend of twenty years, Trina, and I shared how tired I felt at the thought of making new friends.
She’s known me since I started my grown-up life, before babies and toddlers and teens, and she’s stuck with me through all my highs and lows.
After I spilled my guts, she reminded me how capable I’d been in faithful friendship, especially when I felt free to be myself.
I’d experienced the truth of Aristotle’s musings: I found it easy to sacrifice for friends who were like-minded and shared a similar vision for life. Trina convinced me it was all worth risking again and reminded me of an axiom she lives by: Be the friend you wish to have.
“Be the friend you wish to have.”
I decided to make some changes.
I’d let down the walls and look for opportunities to connect more with those around me.
I’d be open to whomever God brought my way while I adjusted my rhythms to make space for what He might have in mind.
What if we let God be in charge of our friendships? What if we trusted that He places the right people in our lives at the right times? What if we were authentic with those people, letting them see the good, the bad, and the uncertain? What if we sacrificed, showed up for those people, and were generous, gracious, and forgiving?
And in the difficult seasons when friends think we’re too much, or not enough, or need to change, what if we let them walk away? (That’d be freeing, wouldn’t it?)
I don’t always do this well, of course. Sometimes I still give conditionally.
“I’d be open to whomever God brought my way while I adjusted my rhythms to make space for what He might have in mind.”
I still get my feelings hurt, still nurse my hurt, and sometimes I still try to become what I think my friends want me to be. (Old habits die hard.)
But I’m learning, and the more I return to the idea of being the kind of friend I’d wish to have, the easier it is to right the ship and live the life of friendship God intends for me, to have friendships that keep me showing up.
We show up for each other in the little ways when we practice presence, proximity, and permanence. When we’re authentic. When we bless. When we love.
As we push into this kind of friendship, we find a rhythm of connection that rescues us from the anxiety of performance-based friendships and seats us in a community of love.
It’s this community of love that gives us the courage to go out into the world as the blessing we were made to be.
Rebekah Lyons is a national speaker and bestselling author. Alongside her husband, Gabe, Rebekah finds joy in raising four children, two of whom have Down syndrome. She wears her heart on her sleeve, a benefit to friends and readers alike. Her work has been featured on Good Morning America, CNN, Huffington Post, The Tennessean, Publisher’s Weekly, and more.
Her latest book, Rhythms of Renewal, is your guide to daily rescue and a way forward into the peace your soul longs for. Rebekah draws from her own battle with depression and anxiety and shares a pathway to establish four life-giving rhythms that quiet inner chaos and make room for a flourishing life: Rest, restore, connect, and create.
October 8, 2019
When You Pray But the Miracle Doesn’t Happen
Some lean over gravestones and say: The miracle didn’t happen.
“Why in the blazes do some miracles happen and others don’t?”
And others lean over gravestones and say they got their miracle because she was a miracle, and getting to love her was a wonder, and every moment together was a miracle of grace and there is no other was to explain the extraordinary that she was.
My sister was killed, run over, in front of my mama and I, and I watched my wild Mama sob-rock her baby girl’s bleeding body in her own begging arms, and I have paced-prayed for rain while our livelihood, the crops we’ve planted, shriveled up and died out there in parched fields, and I’ve cried till I’m hoarse, howling for God to save marriages that burnt to the ground, leaving us sting choking for years on ashes and all the flying embers.
We mustered faith and fasted for days and prayed through healing services, anointing the limp-sick with oil, only to end up burying our two baby nephews within 18 months, and grieving sharp for years.
Why in the blazes do some miracles happen and others don’t?
Joy Prouty
Joy Prouty
“Miracles are never a function of anyones’s goodness, worthiness, or earnestness — and miracles are always the mysteriousness of His ways.”
You can count on it like the spin of late summer stars and early September fog sifting in slow down by the woods:
Miracles aren’t a measure of anyone’s good standing, but miracles are a mystery that defy understanding.
By definition, miracles are mysteries: the way a miracle happens is a mystery — and if a miracle happens it’s a mystery.
Miracles are never a function of anyones’s goodness, worthiness, or earnestness — and miracles are always the mysteriousness of His ways.
The truth of it is, we breathe in a world of mystery: No two sunsets have ever painted the sky the same. And of all the snowflakes that have ever fallen to the earth since the beginning of time, 10 followed by 34 zeros, no two have ever even once been identical. And every one of our stories are infinitely unique, and singular miracles that bear a glory all of their own.
We breathe mystery. We inhale an otherworldly grace. The human experience isn’t explainable.
The human experience is nothing short of a holy experience.
“The human experience can be hard but that doesn’t mean it isn’t a holy experience.”
And the human experience can be hard but that doesn’t mean it isn’t a holy experience.
Six times a day, every single day, our youngest boy injects himself with a needle to stay alive. His pancreas is dead and 24/7 we have to be that organ, or he ends up dead. Our daughter with Graves Disease, who had to have her thyroid radiated, and daily takes meds to be her thyroid, she comes to me quiet this week and asks what we will do if her little sister with a congenital heart defect, three open heart surgeries behind her, and, Lord willing, a heart transplant ahead of her, doesn’t live a long life. And I nod. Three times a day alarms go off here for us to take her littlest sister’s heart rate, for us to give her a beta blocker to slow down her cardiac arrythmia.
Sometimes the miracle isn’t wholly healed bodies, but that we get to wholeheartedly love each other.
Those who long to see miracles,
see everyday miracles everywhere.
Those who long to see miracles, see everyday miracles everywhere.
And yes, we pray for healing, and we know that by His stripes we are already healed in eternal ways. We pray for restoration, and we know that by His mercy we know complete restoration and no condemnation. And we pray for more time, and we know that by His grace, we have been given time that goes beyond all time.
The miracle that always happens in prayer happens in the most important place: the heart.
Prayer isn’t so much about outcomes, but about is coming much closer to God.
Joy Prouty
” Miracles happen everyday, to everyone — maybe just not every one, or the one, you dreamed of. But stay awake to all the ones that did. And know: When the miracle doesn’t come like hoped,
God still comes like He always planned. “
I’ve held babies in my arms who looked long into my eyes and died and I can only choke out the wandering ways of my own busted heart:
There is no prayer more passionate than that of a mother begging God for a miracle for her child — and there is no greater passion than a Father who gave His Son as the miracle that answers every prayer.
Live like God is a genie in a bottle, and we become like angry drunks.
Live like God is king on a throne, and we become intoxicated with awe.
The King is working good out of everything, so nothing is wrong — trust His sovereign ways. His ways are good, not because His ways are my ways, but because His ways are gloriously higher than mine.
When we surrender to the mystery of His ways rising higher than our ways, our hope rises. The miracle is already here: God is near.
I don’t have to understand, as long as I know God stands close.
He is the mystery that dances slow with my question marks, the aching arms that carry the shards of my dreams, the hands that lift my chin and presses His broken heart close enough to catch every one of my tears so my suffering becomes the heartbeat of His sacrifice.
And on the days when I’m raw with begging God, I turn and look into His face tender with grace and read the embrace of His heart:
“Prayer isn’t so much about outcomes, but about is coming much closer to God.”
Miracles happen everyday
To everyone
Maybe just not every one, or the one, you dreamed of.
But stay awake to all the ones that did.
When the miracle doesn’t come like hoped,
God still comes like He always planned.
When things don’t make sense,
God still makes a way.
To keep breathing
To keep believing
To keep being brave.
“We may not always get our miracle, but we always get God.
And that is the miracle that is more than enough. Living in the tension of mystery and miracle ties a broken heart to God.”
When we feel discouraged —
God loans courage
that stared down the pit of hell
and crushed beady-eyed evil with his unwavering heel.
All is more than well — all is grace.
When our tears burn and we taste the wet saltiness of grief,
We taste God
who weeps kind with us at tombs
Even when He knows the rising is coming.
All is more than well — all is grace.
We may not always get our miracle,
But we always get God
And that is the miracle that is more than enough.
On the days that I wrestle hard with the questions, I sit long with honest songs, the tightened guitar strings echoing the ache of my prayers— and there are rests where I rest in the knowing:
Living in the tension of mystery and miracle ties a broken heart to God.
Need someone to throw you a lifeline of grace?
This one’s for you.
Need some courage to begin again?
This one’s for you.
Need the paradoxical, transforming secret to the abundant life?
I’m telling you: 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.
October 7, 2019
When you just need to hear you matter
Sally Clarkson has followed the beat of God’s heart for moms during more than three decades of personal ministry. Her books and messages, born out of her own family life, are woven into the fabric of my own life tapestry, bringing color and beauty wherever her thread runs. She has given her whole heart to helping parents raise wholehearted children for Christ with faith, grace, love, and joy. No one has mentored me quite like Sally Clarkson, who has poured tea for me—and poured life into me—from a deep well of wisdom and a well-lived life. She has raised four children, now grown, who are walking the path of life with God, already leaving the marks of His image on their worlds. It is a delight to invite her to the farm’s front porch today . . .
One early morning years ago, I found myself almost unable to get out of bed.
The exhaustion of three weeks of sleepless nights followed by a constant stream of demands by three little human beings under five years old were the unintentional culprits of my weariness.
The only thing that allured me at that moment was a very strong cup of English tea.
Just as I took my first sip, my four-year-old happily padded into the room and smiled to see that I was awake. I must admit, my stomach turned just a bit, knowing my alone time was about to disappear.
“Mama, can I sit next to you before the boys wake up?”
I made room, and she squished beside me. This little blonde-haired, blueberry-eyed delight had won her way deep inside my heart the moment she was born.
“Mama, I was thinking in bed this morning that probably when I was inside your tummy, I always wished when I came out to the world that I would have a mama like you who would kiss me, read to me, make cheesy eggs, and make me feel happy inside. I think you are the best mama!”
This little angel, in the form of a wiggly four-year-old, transformed my heart.
Somehow her words made me feel, for a moment, that all my giving of myself and my time and my body really mattered.
Joy Prouty
Joy Prouty
Now, as a grandmother who raised my four children to adulthood, I still remember her words.
And I feel more than ever that a mother’s love is a power that truly shapes, transforms, and changes our world.
“A mother can shape the spiritual formation of a child by being fully alive in her own faith in front of her child.”
But sometimes we just need to hear the words of appreciation and believe once again that our lives and our giving truly matter for a higher purpose than we see in the mundane moments.
A mother can shape the way her child perceives the love of God by embodying unconditional love through her caresses, kisses, nurturing, and singing .
A mother can shape the spiritual formation of a child by being fully alive in her own faith in front of her child.
A mother can shape a child’s whole understanding of the world by teaching and modeling her ideals while walking life side by side, holding her little one’s hand in work and play, and whispering the secrets of life into his or her little receptive heart .
A child’s view of human beings, family, marriage, church, and education is shaped through the mundane and sublime moments of life shared over years.
But motherhood is also hard.
“But motherhood is also hard.”
The day in, day out, relentless needs of children can spin us into a tornado of demands that tax us mamas to our toenails.
The sleepless nights, the making of meals, the settling of fusses, the bedtime and breakfast routines conducted over and over again without the seeming notice or appreciation of anyone drain us every day .
As I was writing this, I had to take stop because my own daughter needed a break from two weeks of sleepless nights with her first child, who is just over a year old.
I sat on crumpled bedsheets, intertwined with a soft, pink blanket and a half-drunk bottle of milk. After holding my tiny grandchild and soothing her demanding wails, I felt her small, fragile body finally begin to relax into the deep, sound sleep she so desperately needed.
She—and her mama and I—were all sorely in need of rest.
After succumbing to the terrible respiratory infection our whole family had shared with her, she had cried for a full half hour as she gasped and wheezed to clear her congested lungs. Now, as she slept with little rattles emerging from her open mouth, she looked like a little angel to me—so very precious and dear to my heart.
As I sat in the growing darkness, I actually thought of you mamas who are hidden in your acts of worship to God every day as you care for the little ones He has trusted into your hands.
I know that every day your life is challenging, demanding, and perhaps isolated as you fulfill this important role.
But you are my heroes. You are shaping the history of the next generation by choosing to be a lifegiving mother.
“You are shaping the history of the next generation by choosing to be a lifegiving mother.”
As I look back on the years of mothering my own four children to adulthood, I am more convinced than ever that God specially designed us to be lovers, teachers, spiritual directors, friends, and so much more to our children. Mamas civilize the world through the legacy of their children.
When we become God’s agents in passing on lifegiving messages to our children, we are serving Him and His Kingdom purposes in meaningful ways.
We sacrifice our lives so they can go into the world spiritually strong, emotionally healthy, and with virtuous character intact.
Yet because we only have so much energy, we can become empty and exhausted as we spend our mom-coins and pour out our lives every day. And if you are like me, no one prepared you for this task.
You had no idea what a marathon life as a mom would be—the years on end of giving, loving, feeding, correcting, clothing, and serving—with seemingly no end in sight.
The reality is that each of us needs to fill up on a regular basis to create a sustainable and fruitful life for ourselves.
“The reality is that each of us needs to fill up on a regular basis to create a sustainable and fruitful life for ourselves.”
I dreamed of giving little bits of truth, encouragement, and inspiration in bite-size pieces to mamas to help them keep going. Hearing the whispers of God’s wisdom every day is something that will keep us walking this road of faithfulness.
You are not alone. God sees you and is with you.
I am praying for you and count you as a woman of great worth because you are giving your life to bring His life to your precious children.
May He give wind to your sails and guide you through your journey with His generous grace and unfailing love.
It is my hope that my new book will give you a bit of His love, wisdom, and hope every day to encourage you in your journey of faithfulness.
And that most of all, in each moment, you will know His presence and love every step of the way.
Sally Clarkson has been giving parents help and hope for more than three decades, mostly through Whole Heart Ministries, the Christian home and parenting ministry that began in 1994. Sally’s extensive ministry has influenced countless mothers through 22 years of conferences, Mom Heart groups, her blog , and her podcast (At Home with Sally—more than 6 million downloads), and now her LifewithSally.com membership site. Her nearly 20 books, including Mom Heart Moments, Desperate, and The Lifegiving Home, encourage mothers around the world.
In Mom Heart Moments: Daily Devotions for Lifegiving Motherhood, Sally provides 365 days of inspiration—one devotion for each day of the year—to give mamas wisdom for each day through biblical insight, personal family stories, and a verse of Scripture each day. Sally provides understanding, wisdom, and tools to equip mothers to find strength and heart motivation every day to understand that their faithfulness in this profound role will last for all eternity.
[ Our humble thanks to Tyndale House for their partnership in today’s devotion ]
October 5, 2019
Only the Good Stuff: Multivitamins for Your Weekend [10.05.19]
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:
Jess Findlay
Jess Findlay
Jess Findlay
Let’s step out of comfort zones this weekend…every moment is a gift – begging us to be present
because we all need a community who cares
A professor held her student’s baby while giving a 3-hour lecture so the mother could take notes
“Love and compassion are part of the philosophy of my classroom. I’m hoping they can spread love, take it to other people who need it.”
Come catch a glimpse of her remarkable life?
From breaking through gender barriers as one of the Navy’s first female pilot, to safely landing the severely crippled Southwest Airlines Flight 1380 and helping save the lives of 148 people…
Milestone moment: ‘Mighty Quinn’ can play outside again
“We couldn’t ask for a better community”
so who knew?!? harvesting 3900 lbs of pumpkin seeds at once?!
as it’s Down Syndrome Awareness Month?
Stories of Yes – from a Dad’s Perspective so much love
just so good…The Mighty Influence of a Praying Mom: Rhonwyn Kendrick’s Story
it would be a grace to meet you here early next year
An event designed for pastors and ministry leaders to explore what it means to shepherd and lead in the way of Jesus: the singular emphasis of this conference is to commune with Christ
please visit here for additional info
how he’s working to empower today’s youth? good stuff
Jaime Fletcher/Jaime Denise Photography
Jaime Fletcher/Jaime Denise Photography
Jaime Fletcher/Jaime Denise Photography
love, love, love! Surprise September snowstorm leads to stunning wedding photos
Every Good Gift: Living Generously in a Self-Centered World
It’s a grace to be a part of this NEW six session Bible study which begins on Oct 7!
Will you join us?! Click here for more info
and watch the videos for free by registering here!
Pull together a group and do it together or study on your own with daily emails!
Ginny Sheller
Ginny Sheller
Ginny Sheller
what she does? …just too beautiful not to share with you
an ageless ballerina — and a tiny dancer too
thank you, Jon Bloom: All Men Seek Happiness
Never, ever give up. Inspiration for anyone in a battle for their life
photo: Ben Adams
photo: Ben Adams
photo: Jonatan Ruiz
photo: Juana Ordonez
photo: Helen Manson
Life is really beautiful.
Let’s maybe pause in the midst of all the busy to appreciate and breathe in all this …
love has no color. love has no boundaries.
cheering wildly through tears at this…
second chances – This School on a Bus Is Bringing Education to Everyone
Only forgiveness gives freedom. How can we hold on to bitterness for anyone’s sins, when Jesus holds our sins in arms of forgiveness?
He Asked to Hug the Woman Who Killed His Brother:
‘I Forgive You.’ ‘I Love You.’ ‘Give Your Life to Christ.’
This is for someone right now:
Don’t miss out on opening your hands to the joy you’re meant for:
How to Find the Relief of an Open-handed Life
What is the Difference between Forgiveness and Unforgiveness?
It was a joy to spend time with Better Together discussing what Love is —
Do you struggle to love those who have offended you? Do you find it easy to love God and others, but not yourself? What is the greatest act of love? God loves us at our worst…can we love unconditionally like Him?Shattered lives become mosaics in the hands of a Great Savior…are you ready to give Him your broken pieces?
We’re discussing this and more!
Please tune in all next week, October 7-11
Watch full episodes of Better Together weekdays at 1:30pm ET on TBN or anytime here
October is here!
Easy, doable ideas for *the whole family* to Give It Forward Today — to be the G.I.F.T. Love is a verb and that verb is give. For God so loved the world — HE GAVE. You only have one life — to love well.
And just for you, when you grab the “Be the Gift” book? Your farm girl here will immediately email you your own gift of THE WHOLE 12 MONTH *Intentional* Acts of Givenness #BeTheGIFT Calendar link to download and print from home!
Love is a verb and that verb is give. For God so loved the world — HE GAVE. You only have one life — to love well.
Pick up #BeTheGIFT — Then receive your own #BeTheGIFT printable calendar by letting us know you picked up a copy of “Be the Gift” here
Love is a verb and that verb is give. For God so loved the world — HE GAVE. You only have one life — to love well.
Pick up Be The Gift & live the life you’ve longed to
Philippians 4:1 // Part 4 // Stand Firm in the Strength of God. Thank you, John Piper
on repeat this week: Rescue Story
…the problems of hard times are answered in the presence of Himself: God is with us.
Today, we’re praying not so much for the danger to pass but for the fear to flee — because God. is. with. me.
I know how it can feel like life’s got us in a prison — but on the inside, where God is making new life, we’re free. It can feel like we’ve lost — but not a day goes by without His unfolding grace that. makes. us. win. this. race. It can feel like the night has won — but nothing can ultimately steal us from the One Who is.
So! “…we’re not giving up. How could we! Even though on the outside it often looks like things are falling apart on us, on the inside, where God is making new life, *not a day goes by without His unfolding grace.*” 2Cor4MSG
A grace that holds you when everything is breaking down and falling apart—and whispers that everything is somehow breaking free and falling together.
The bottom line, and the finish line, is simply this: just one foot in front of the other here & let today bring out the BEST in you — the joy, the hope, the grace, the beauty, the love of Jesus in you! That hard road: let it bring out the best hope in you.
[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.
October 3, 2019
How to Find the Relief of an Open-handed Life
For thirty spins around the sun, these nine old nanas kept a secret from their men.
They did it in the middle of the night.
When that old ball of sun sunk down low and pulled a cover of dark up over the backside of the world, those nine nanas creaked open their back doors and made a their way through the cracked dark.
They called them Drive-Bys.
“The positions that we take don’t make a difference like the love that we give.”
They did it because of MaMaw Ruth. I had my own Grandma Ruth; I knew about women named Ruth who make clandestine meetings with grace.
“MaMaw Ruth would read in the paper that someone had died and she didn’t have to know the family,” is what one of the Nine Nanas, Mary Ellen said. “She’d send off one of her special pound cakes. She just wanted to put a little smile on their faces.”
It was a girl’s night for Mary Ellen and her four sisters and their three girlfriends, sitting around a table reminiscing and laughing loud over old times.
“We started thinking about what we could do to make a difference like that. What if we had a million dollars? How would we spend it?’ she said.
Those nine women knew it:
We’re not here to make an impression —- we’re here to make a difference.
The size of our houses, our wallets, our closets, our trophy case and our cheerleading squad doesn’t make any difference compared to the size of our hearts.
And frankly: The positions that we take don’t make a difference like the love that we give.
We may be known for many things but we will be remembered only by one thing: our giving love.
Anyone can have any size of heart they want.
Favourite Kitchen Resources: all the fair-trade beauty of The Grace Crafted Home
Favourite Kitchen Resources: all the fair-trade beauty of The Grace Crafted Home
Favourite Kitchen Resources: all the fair-trade beauty of The Grace Crafted Home
Favourite Kitchen Resources: all the fair-trade beauty of The Grace Crafted Home
Favourite Kitchen Resources: all the fair-trade beauty of The Grace Crafted Home
Favourite Kitchen Resources: all the fair-trade beauty of The Grace Crafted HomeThose Nine Nanas began brainstorming around a kitchen table, and it was one of the sisters who came up with the idea: start doing their own laundry instead of using the dry cleaner. They sat there and came up with a list of scrimping and saving and shaving their lives clean.
“You can’t make a difference until you listen to the world differently than everyone else does.”
“So among the nine of us, we’d put aside about $400 a month. Our husbands never noticed a thing.”
Then came part two of the Nine Nana Plan: How do you make a difference? You make a difference — by doing things different.
You can’t make a difference by climbing the exact same ladder everyone else, by living exactly the same as everyone else, by consuming the same, buying the same, striving the same, dreaming the same.
You can’t make a difference until you listen to the world differently than everyone else does.
That’s what those Nine Nanas did — they started leaning in and listening at the local beauty shop or where they picked up their groceries.
And when they heard about a widow or a single mother who was in need, guess who would anonymously pay a utility bill or buy new clothes for the children?
Those Nanas would ferret out where that hurting person lived and send a package with a note that simply read, ‘Somebody loves you’ —- and the love they sent always had to come with one of MaMaw Ruth’s special pound cakes.
In the middle of the darkest night, love is always coming for you.
In the middle of the pitch black night, those Nine Nanas drove slow through neighbourhoods looking for fans stuck in windows.
“Kiss open wounds. Caress the bruised back of the broken. Embrace suffering because this is how you embrace the broken-hearted Christ.”
“That told us that the people who live there? Don’t have air-conditioning,” Mary Ellen said.
‘Or we see that there are no lights on at night, which means there is a good chance their utilities have been turned off. Then we return before the sun came up, like cat burglars, and drop off a little care package.’
For 35 years, these love stealthers have been breaking the dark.
35 years. 9 women. 4 am pitch black. Whipping up MaMaw Ruth’s pound cakes. Sending pound cakes all across the country to people making a difference in their community. Opening up the phone book and sending pound cakes to complete strangers.
35 years of hundreds of pound cakes delivered in the dead of night — and no one being none the wiser.
There are women who do not need to be noticed out on the street corners to have their backs patted — because there are women who know those who work in the dark are the ones shattering the dark in ways those in the spotlights never can.
There are women who work in secret because they know you always make real and giving love in secret.
There are women who don’t let the right hand know what the left hand is doing because hands that move unbeknownst are most known by the Beloved.
That which is done in secret, that which is broken and given in secret, is a practicing communion.
Live eucharist. Practice communion. Taste koinonia.
Mary Ellen didn’t know when her husband started puzzling over the extra mileage on the car. Didn’t know when he started scratching his head over withdrawals from their savings account of not small amounts of cash. Pulled out his highlighter and started charting a path through their confounding bank statements.
Mary Ellen and those Nine Nanas just knew they had to gather their men and ‘fess up’ to what was suspected: an affair of the heart.
“Small gifts of kindness are contagious. Start a joy epidemic.”
It could start a revolution and change the way this world revolves: What if the world focused on affairs of the heart instead of spending our one life on business affairs?
Kiss open wounds. Caress the bruised back of the broken. Embrace suffering because this is how you embrace the broken-hearted Christ.
Frankly, though, the husbands had had it — they wanted in on the eavesdropping and the drive-bys and the night gift-blitzing the town.
They wanted in on writing down addresses and anonymously paying utility bills.
They wanted to deliver a pound cake and press beauty out of the world.
They wanted in on the giving and the getting joy, they wanted in on breaking a thread or two of themselves to weave strength and hope into where the fabric of society was weak and torn, they wanted in on breaking out of the emptiness of themselves and breaking into the fullness of koinonia and community.
Those 9 husbands looked at how their wives were breaking and giving themselves away — and they wanted to break into the happy abundance of all that.
Small gifts of kindness are contagious. Start a joy epidemic.
Favourite Kitchen Resources: all the fair-trade beauty of The Grace Crafted Home
Favourite Kitchen Resources: all the fair-trade beauty of The Grace Crafted Home
Sometimes….
Sometimes you just want to break out of yourself and break into the sacred space of the other. And that Sacred Space of the Other you seek is found when you give to the Other.
The Nine Nanas said that:
“The way forward — is always to give forward.”
“This is our way of giving forward.” Mary Ellen nodded. “We want to make sure that happiness happens.”
The way forward — is always to give forward.
Life happens. And grace happens. Gifts happen. Happiness can happen. Love gives. Live given.
I do this: bake pound cake.
Bake a pound cake and pound out of hopelessness.
Bake a pound cake made in any old kitchen — and bring it out into the dark and pound out of your pitch black and out of yourself and break the isolation.
Taste Koinonia in the middle of the dark.
The sun will rise.
Want to live the relief of an open-handed life?
Don’t miss out on opening your hands to the joy you’re meant for:
Come join this new, life-changing Bible Study — perfect for this fall!We’re excited to announce a new Bible study in partnership with IF:GATHERING & RightNow Media: Every Good Gift: Living Generously in a Self-Centered World, starting October 7th. This 6-session study contains teaching videos from your Ann-girl — and features women’s real life stories:
Each week we’re going to talk about what it looks like to be generous with our hospitality, spiritual gifts, money, and time.
How this study works:
1. Pull together a group and do it together! Buy a copy of the study book and access all of the teaching videos FREE by registering with RightNow Media. There’s even a leader guide in the book for you.
2. Study on your own and on the go with your daily emails. You will receive the first email on October 7th and we’ll study together for the next 6 weeks!
Want to join us to Find the Relief of an Open-handed Life?
I’m saving a place for you right here beside me. Please — come.
October 2, 2019
When You’re Hungry For Your Little to Be More Than Enough
If anyone understands how hard it is to find quiet time with Jesus, it’s Asheritah Ciuciu. As a work-from-home wife and mama to three kids six and under, her days are filled with chatter and chores and beautiful chaos. But she’s learning to find joy in Jesus in the midst of it all, and she invites us to join her in the journey. Come sit with Asheritah and me as we visit on the front porch today…
guest post by Asheritah Ciuciu
I groaned when I heard his cries.
My infant had just woken up, and thus my morning time with Jesus had come to an end, barely five minutes since it had begun.
I’d just scribbled a few sentences of prayer in my journal. I hadn’t even managed to read the section of the Bible I had opened to.
And already, it was over. Too soon.
“Restful sleep had eluded me for six years, ever since I’d become a mother.”
Especially since it had been the first time in months that I’d managed to wake up before the rest of my household. The first time I’d snuck away in the early morning light to greet my Savior: “Good morning, King Jesus.”
I’d savored the quiet, like breathing air into burning lungs after being under water for too long. My soul longed for more time alone with Jesus. But it was not to be. Not right now, at least.
Help me see You, and savor You, and serve You, I prayed as I trudged up the stairs to my baby’s room.
Just down the hallway, my three-year-old was sleeping in our bed. She had woken in the night with a fever and I’d held her close until the medicine had put an end to the chills, and sweet slumber finally reclaimed her.
But restful sleep had eluded me for six years, ever since I’d become a mother.
Not that I begrudged my children for it. These three little humans are God’s greatest blessing in my life; I’d trade a lifetime of beauty sleep to be their mom.
But if I’m totally honest, I also miss the early mornings I used to have with Jesus in the days before anyone called me “Mom.”
He turned to look at me through the crib slats as I stepped through the door. A grin lit his face, interrupting his cry mid-syllable. “Good morning, little man,” I cooed, lifting him up.
I changed his diaper as I reflected on my meager moments with Jesus, and my mind went to another meager offering. Just a few days before, my children and I were sitting at the breakfast table reading about the feeding of the five thousand.
We’ve been reading through the Bible during breakfast, a practice I’d started after my third child was born—my white flag of surrender when I realized Quiet Time may never again be quiet while I have little ones in our home.
“So we open God’s Word and feed our bodies and souls together, as we sit around the breakfast table.”
So we open God’s Word and feed our bodies and souls together, as we sit around the breakfast table.
Earlier that week, we’d read how one little boy had offered Jesus all he had: five loaves and two fish. But what were they for a gathering of so many? How could a meager offering meet their needs?
“It’s enough!” my six-year-old exclaimed, straightening up over her plate as a smile split her face. “Jesus will feed them all.”
And indeed, we found out, He did. Because a little, in Jesus’ hands becomes more than enough. I read the familiar story while my girls ate their breakfast burritos and my son chugged his milk bottle.
Jesus took the bread and the fish, and after He gave thanks, He broke them and gave them to His disciples to distribute to everyone seated there. And He kept giving them bread and fish, and they kept handing them out, until “they all ate and were satisfied” (Mark 6:42 NIV).
Jesus hadn’t just given them a taste; He’d filled them with the little He’d been offered.
“The One who multiplied the molecules to feed the crowds so long ago, can multiply our moments in His Word to feed my crew today too.”
And then, to their amazement, the disciples gathered twelve baskets full of leftovers. As if it weren’t enough that the Creator of fish and grain and mankind had multiplied a little to feed a multitude, He generously provided more than enough for the days to come.
“More than enough,” I whispered again, as I finished my son’s diaper change. I held him close as I made my way downstairs, pausing to glance toward my Bible and journal where I’d left them on the couch. Then I headed to the kitchen to start breakfast.
Perhaps my moments of quiet had come to an end for the morning, but my soul was reminded that it’s alright, because a little, joyfully surrendered to Jesus, becomes more than enough.
And there would be more to come.
Just an hour later, we would gather around the breakfast table, feasting on the Bread of Life and on banana bread as we’d chatter excitedly about what we hoped our day would hold. The noise around the table would ebb and flow as I’d read the next few verses, trying to keep up with the cadence of Scripture in between cries for “more milk please” and “I need a napkin.”
“He bids this tired mama to come and find rest in Him, not by escaping the noise of my household but by seeking Him in the midst of the chaos.”
Our family Bible and breakfast time might be noisier than the Quiet Time I enjoyed before, but He gently leads those who have young (Is 40:11).
And the One who multiplied the molecules to feed the crowds so long ago, can multiply our moments in His Word to feed my crew today too.
Someday, perhaps sooner rather than later, my house will again be still and my sleep uninterrupted and my mornings quiet. And I will again relish an abundance of quiet moments with Jesus.
But I don’t want to miss out on the miraculous feeding happening right in front of me each morning.
Our Savior welcomes my little children to come to Him, and graciously feeds us from His hand.
He bids this tired mama to come and find rest in Him, not by escaping the noise of my household but by seeking Him in the midst of the chaos.
I picture Jesus sitting at the table, motioning toward us just as had with His disciples on the shore of the Sea of Galilee so long ago: “Come, have breakfast” (John 21:12 NIV).
We gather together to give thanks and break bread, and it will be enough.
More than enough, for He is with us.
Asheritah Ciuciu is a bestselling writer and speaker, wife to her high school sweetheart Flaviu and mama to three spunky kiddos. Her passion is helping overwhelmed women find joy in Jesus through creative and consistent time in God’s Word at www.onethingalone.com.
Experience the joy of spending time with Jesus every morning over breakfast with Bible and Breakfast: 31 Mornings with Jesus —Feeding Our Bodies and Souls Together
. Each day choose between a Snack-sized devotional for those mornings you’re in a rush, and an inductive Bible study FEAST for when you can linger at the table with God’s Word.
Download beautiful lock screens for your phone to remind you to find joy in Jesus in the chaos at www.BibleandBreakfast.com/freebies.
[ Our humble thanks to Moody for their partnership in today’s devotion ]
September 30, 2019
When your grief is almost more than you can handle
In the midst of loss, we sometimes wonder if God is with us. As Anne Graham Lotz reminds us, the Holy Spirit is God’s promise to us that He is always with us—no matter what. Anne has discovered this grace-filled truth in new ways through a recent cancer diagnosis and the loss of her husband and her parents. Through the mystery of God’s ways, it has been in these most difficult times that she has known more intimately the companionship of the Holy Spirit. It’s a grace to welcome Anne to the farm’s front porch today…
guest post by Anne Graham Lotz
I remember well the day my husband, Danny, gave me my engagement ring.
We were sitting on the couch beside the fireplace in my parents’ living room.
Inside a little black velvet box was the most beautiful ring I had ever seen. It was exactly what I would have selected had I done so myself. Just a single diamond in a Tiffany setting. I was thrilled!
That night when I went to bed, I couldn’t sleep. I kept gazing at the ring on my finger. It seemed to glow in the dark.
Early the next morning, I slipped down the stairs to my mother’s room so I could show it to her.
“I used to assume that the Holy Spirit was “assigned” to me.”
She agreed with me that it was as beautiful as any engagement ring she had ever seen.
But the ring was more than just a beautiful piece of jewelry because I knew it carried with it Danny Lotz’s pledge of marriage.
Every time I saw it, I was reminded that the day would come when his promise would be fulfilled.
I would become his wife, and we would live together until death separated us. The ring remained on my finger until the moment during my wedding ceremony when I slipped it off so Danny could place a wedding band on the same finger.
Then I placed the engagement ring next to the wedding band, where it remains to this day. It is a constant reminder of my husband’s love and commitment to me, and mine to him, even beyond his death.
The Holy Spirit within us is our “engagement ring.”
He Himself is the promise . . . the guarantee . . . the pledge . . . that Jesus loves us. That He is committed and faithful to us. And that one day He will return to take us to live with Him forever in the home that He is preparing. (John 14:2–3.)
I used to assume that the Holy Spirit was “assigned” to me.
Joy Prouty
I thought He had come into my life because He had no option. I was now His “job”—His responsibility.
My view of Him was that He was strictly professional, a perfectionistic stickler for details and Someone who would keep me in line until one day He would present me to the Father and say something like “Here she is. I’ve done My best to work with what I had.”
“I could have burned myself out trying hard to earn His love.”
This harmful attitude could have led me to living a lie, as I would have tried hard to impress Him. I could have burned myself out trying hard to earn His love.
Then one day while reading my Bible, I was gripped by the following: “Do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, with whom you were sealed for the day of redemption” (Ephesians 4:30).
While I understand that Scripture is warning us not to intentionally, willfully sin, the word grieve caught and held my attention.
I reflected on grief in my own life and knew I had experienced that emotion only when I deeply cared about someone or something.
I grieved when my mother went to Heaven.
I grieved when my husband followed her there about eight years later.
I grieved when my father joined them both.
And I realized that grief is a love word.
“I reflected on grief in my own life and knew I had experienced that emotion only when I deeply cared about someone or something.”
I grieve because I loved my mother and my husband and my father.
This realization turned the light on in my thinking as I realized that if I can grieve the Holy Spirit, it’s because He loves me.
The Holy Spirit loves me! That was a profound, revolutionary thought. He’s not just a professional partner. He’s not just assigned to me. He doesn’t live within me because He has to—He lives within me because He wants to live within me.
He deeply cares about what I do and who I become.
When I do the right thing, He rejoices. When I do the wrong thing, He grieves.
Not only is He spiritually and practically involved in my life, but He is also emotionally caught up in who I am and who I am to become.
What a difference that simple truth has made in my perspective. I can be myself with the Holy Spirit. I don’t have to be “on.” I can relax and be transparent with Him because He is God’s promise to me.
I can trust Him completely because He truly loves me!
And the Holy Spirit loves you too!
He cares deeply about what you care about because He cares about you.
It doesn’t matter how small or how large your concern is. He cares. He understands. He wants what’s best for you. He desires for you to fulfill your God-given potential.
He wants to ease your burden, solve your problem, comfort your broken heart, bind up your wounds, bring you through the valley of the shadow, shower you with blessing upon blessing.
And yes, He wants to make you holy—because He loves you! He will work all things—all things—for your good (Romans 8:28).
So gaze at your “engagement ring,” the Holy Spirit.
“Live with the confidence that you are deeply, unconditionally, permanently loved by Him.”
If He truly loves you fully, unconditionally—if He truly desires what’s best for you, if He truly cares about everything you care about because He cares for you—what reason do you have for not trusting in His providence and pledge?
Relax. Stop trying to impress Him.
Stop working so hard to earn His love.
Be open and honest and transparent.
Live with the confidence that you are deeply, unconditionally, permanently loved by Him.
The Holy Spirit is absolutely committed to fulfilling His responsibility to take good care of you until the day you are presented as a glorious bride to your Bridegroom.
And that’s a promise.
Anne Graham Lotz, called “the best preacher in the family” by her father Billy Graham, is an international speaker and the bestselling and award-winning author of numerous books, including Just Give Me Jesus. The New York Times named Anne one of the five most influential evangelists of her generation. Anne is the president of AnGeL Ministries in Raleigh, North Carolina and the former chairperson for the National Day of Prayer.
Anne’s latest book is a beautiful exploration of the Holy Spirit. In Jesus in Me: Experiencing the Holy Spirit as a Constant Companion, she draws on her own story and her rich biblical knowledge to help us understand that the Holy Spirit is not a magic genie, a flame of fire, or a vague feeling. He is a Person who prays for us, guides us in our relationships and decisions, comforts us in pain, and stays by our side at all times.
[ Our humble thanks to Waterbrook for their partnership in today’s devotion ]
September 28, 2019
Only the Good Stuff: Multivitamins for Your Weekend [09.28.19]
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:
Jess Findlay
Jess Findlay
Jess Findlay
get out and enjoy your weekend…every moment is a gift – begging us to be present
who wouldn’t want to be greeted like this every day!?
at 92? he volunteers at this nursing home – because everyone needs a friend to talk to
at 77? he wanted to become an artist – without paints
Foundation Announces 26 ‘Genius’ Grant Winners, honoring extraordinary originality
these reunions? never get old
oh my heart: the ripple of YES
so who knew? Postcard From Patagonia: Creating a National Park
cheering: this company is turning scrap wood to create toy guitars for sick children around the world
Color Under the Lights: Representation in Film
Want to raise kids who can share the Good News? Start here.
when you need the truth sung right into the depths of your soul
thank you, Scott Sauls… The “Major Defect” in C.S. Lewis (and Me)
so much love here: this barber is offering more than a simple hair cut and shave #BeTheGift #TheBrokenWay
Whatever My Lot: Embracing the Day God Has Made
a very special friendship, for so many reasons
“You have to keep living the life that you’ve been give…and be grateful for the things that you do have…”
destination: happiness
WHAT A STORY: from drug addict to CEO, a company of second chances
Photo: Isaac Ogila
Photo: Isaac Ogila
Photo: Isaac Ogila
this hero right here? You’ve got to come meet her…so many tears at this
Beyond grateful for the saving work of Compassion International
When you are going through a lot: don’t miss this right here
October is coming!
Easy, doable ideas for *the whole family* to Give It Forward Today — to be the G.I.F.T. Love is a verb and that verb is give. For God so loved the world — HE GAVE. You only have one life — to love well.
And just for you, when you grab the “Be the Gift” book? Your farm girl here will immediately email you your own gift of THE WHOLE 12 MONTH *Intentional* Acts of Givenness #BeTheGIFT Calendar link to download and print from home!
Love is a verb and that verb is give. For God so loved the world — HE GAVE. You only have one life — to love well.
Pick up #BeTheGIFT — Then receive your own #BeTheGIFT printable calendar by letting us know you picked up a copy of “Be the Gift” here
Love is a verb and that verb is give. For God so loved the world — HE GAVE. You only have one life — to love well.
Pick up Be The Gift & live the life you’ve longed to
Philippians 4:1 // Part 3 // What Crown Will Christians Receive? thank you, John Piper
on repeat this week: In Christ Alone
You don’t have someone who merely stands up for you,
You have someone who laid down His life for you,
So He could stand up forever for you in heaven, always sticking up for you & staring down the lying prosecutor of your soul.
You can keep getting up,
because Jesus is sticking up for you.
You can keep going,
Because Jesus is staying with you & He’s not going anywhere.
You can hope,
Because Jesus is your help.
“The One who died for us…is in the presence of God at this very moment sticking up for us. Do you think anyone is going to be able to drive a wedge between us & Christ’s love for us? Absolutely nothing can get between us & God’s love because of the way that Jesus our Master has embraced us.”
Romans 8:34 MSG
[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.
September 27, 2019
How To Forgive When Your Wound is Still Open
Sarah Mae is woman who comes from a divorced family, with an alcoholic, verbally and emotionally abusive mother, who was pregnant at 16, was pressured into having an abortion, found false security and veneer love through boyfriends and sex and who met Jesus powerfully through the tender, persistent wooing of God. Meeting Him changed everything. It’s a grace to welcome Sarah to the farm’s front porch today…
She broke me.
But He found me.
And after He bound up my wounds
He taught me how to love her.
Because she was broken too.
My fingers trace the shape of the cheap pink Daisy razor sitting on the side of the tub. I wonder, can you slit your wrists with a cheap razor?
Goosebumps form on my arms.
My foot reaches up and turns the handle of the facet, pushing it all the way to the red line, but only a cool stream comes out.
I hear the scooping of ice cubes and the sound of them hitting her glass. The vodka comes next.
My insides tighten and the feeling of steel moves up my shoulders and down my arms.
Her words from earlier loop in my brain. I drink, so what, you need to get over it.
“People always ask me how I forgave my alcoholic mother.”
So what.
Get over it.
I feel it again, the fire that’s trapped under my skin, that burns through my body; I don’t know how to get it out of me.
I look at the razor again. Could I do it—could I slice the life out of myself?
How much would it hurt? How much would it hurt her? My mind drifts off into a fantasy where mom finds me limp and blue and slouched in red water.
She realizes what she’s done, how much she’s destroyed, and she tries to wake me up but it’s too late. Now her insides burn.
The fantasy dissipates, and I slide further into the water, which barely covers my shoulders.
What I want more than sliced arteries is for her to tell me she loves me.
I want her to hold me in her arms as though I was her little girl again; I want her to rub my arms and stroke my hair and tell me everything is going to be okay. The fire seethes.
My fist wraps tightly around the razor and I yell out,
“Maybe I’ll kill myself!”
Joy Prouty
Joy Prouty
Joy Prouty
Joy Prouty
Joy Prouty
Joy ProutyA split-second of hope fills me, like maybe my insecure, needy declaration will wake her up and she’ll run to me and we’ll have that real talk and we’ll cry and hug and prove talk show endings really do happen.
“Go ahead. I dare you.”
I release the razor and I sob into the lukewarm water.
She wins.
********************
People always ask me how I forgave my alcoholic mother.
“One of the most significant things we can do if we are struggling with forgiveness and pain in relationship, is to mourn.”
How do you forgive someone who wounded you so deeply, who carelessly brushed aside your pain, who caused such destruction?
And even more specifically, how do you forgive them when your wounds are still open, when they show no remorse, when you are so dang tangled up with them you’re not sure how on earth to get untangled?
Here’s what I know:
One of the most significant things we can do if we are struggling with forgiveness and pain in relationship, is to mourn.
I first learned how to mourn after I took myself and my mother issues to a woman named Melanie, a counselor that was recommend to me.
We sat down in her small office and I smiled nervously because maybe it was dumb that I was there. At some point I told her my mom didn’t send me a birthday card, and I know it’s dumb, but I’m really sad about it.
We talk, and by “we” I mean “me” and it turns out there is a load of sorrow and despondency right underneath my skin.
I’m flat-out sad, down to the bone, cry me a river, sad.
And also, I’m pretty ticked off.
My mom abandoned her role as mother, and she chose her alcohol over her children and she is a mean, offensive, unedited, stubborn, word I will not use here. And another also, I want to be held.
Will I ever have a mother like that, like the kind that holds their daughters and carries their hearts?
That’s mushy, I know, but this is where I’m at.
Mush and ache and anger and desperate for physical affection.
Here is what I want to hear Melanie tell me: Yes, it’s possible to have those things, maybe not with your mom, but maybe another woman will fill that role. Maybe another woman will adopt you as her own and take you in and nurture you and give you all that your heart has been longing for.
Melanie did not say those words. Instead she said this:
You have to mourn the loss of a mother.
I don’t know how long I stared at Melanie before the tears tumbled out. I would have to release her as my mom, grieve her as though she died.
Because the reality is, I don’t have her. I don’t have the mom my daughter heart longs for. Waiting for her to be something she’s not is just keeping the wound open.
It’s time to begin to let it heal.
We mourn because it is the process of accepting reality and letting go of expectations that we may have pinned our hopes on.
And here is how we begin to do that:
We Acknowledge It
We were created to live with Him in a garden, and yet we awake every morning in the desert of a fallen world. Michael Card, A Sacred Sorrow.
When there is nothing else to do, when the pain is too much, when prayers don’t get answered the way we had hoped, we lament.
Over 1/3 of the Psalms are filled with psalms of lament, raw, honest emotions with no pretense, with a literal meaning of, “to tear the hair and beat the breast.”
Lament was not something to be hidden or ashamed of. When we lament, we allow space for the expression of deep, guttural pain.
Part of our healing comes through lament, acknowledging our pain and the truth of it.
The worst thing we can do is dam up our feelings. When we have trauma, when bad things happen, and we have to function, sometimes we compartmentalize. We don’t deal with it, we stuff it down and wall up. Doing this separates us from our emotions. We stuff through denial, busyness, all sorts of ways.
But all this stuffing is just our attempt to avoid lament, our God-given expression of grief.
“Part of our healing comes through lament, acknowledging our pain and the truth of it.”
When we do this, when we stuff it down, eventually our stuffing begins to develop cracks and emotions come out. We try to put fingers in the holes, but that inevitably breaks, and many times in ways we don’t like. Some people bottle up their whole lives and live half-dead.
This quote (often attributed to Ben Franklin but not sourced) says it best: “A man dies at 24 and is buried at 64.”
We develop anxiety in feeling our emotions and we try to control life so we don’t have to feel them.
Anxiety says, “I can’t handle it.”
The truth is, whatever the pain, it won’t destroy us, and “this too shall pass.” If we really can’t handle it, that’s when we should seek out a counselor.
We Find What Brings Healing to Our Own Individual Heart
What works for me might not work for you. You have to figure out what brings release and healing to your own heart.
Some people process by sitting and crying, talking to friends and family, some through journaling, doing art, running, music, and so on. There are a variety of ways.
One thing that’s important regardless: use the things that bring you peace and joy to help you process your feelings.
For me, I had to feel it all and then write.
I wrote my heartache into poems and it helped me to process and release the pain.
We Take Time
Two weeks after a loss is usually when the crash happens. This is why community and funerals are so important.
Anything you can unload off your plate during this time is wise. Call friends to help you. Understand that people want to know how to help.
When emotions come up, feel them, observe them, let them naturally dissipate.
Be honest in processing reality. “Lord, is there something you want to say to me about this?” (My friend Amy said her mom’s friend says, “Come here pain. What do you want to teach me?”)
For some of us, the crash happens 5, 15, 20 years into the unresolved grief. The same thing holds true: Be honest. Let the pain do its work. Let the feelings come.
The important thing is not stuffing it, but vulnerably facing it and walking through it. The healing comes through the pain.
“God hears your cry and He cares for you.”
And this healing, this despair to joy, this rescue, it’s always a miracle and it’s always a surprise.
God is good and kind, and He is “the God of hope” (Romans 15:13).
I don’t know what your heartache is today, what wound or secret or tangled up relationship you’re facing, but I know that this:
God hears your cry and He cares for you.
Your pain grieves His heart, so much so that He holds your tears in a bottle, knowing, remembering each hurt, each injustice, each lament (Psalm 56:8).
And He tenderly holds them all and He fights for you, always working for your good.
It’s not over.
If you’ve ever wondered how you could forgive someone who wounded you so deeply, who carelessly brushed aside your pain, who caused such destruction, or more specifically, when your wounds are still open, when they show no remorse, when you are so dang tangled up with them you’re not sure how on earth to get untangled, then you are who Sarah Mae has written for.
The Complicated Heart is the story of how Sarah learned to love and forgive her alcoholic mother, but more, it’s for those of you need to know how to have hope when the dark invades.
This is the story of how even in great darkness light finds a way in, comforts us when we can’t see, and leads us out into the fullness of day where redemption and freedom and healing are waiting for us. There is victory and hope and joy despite the pain.
[ Our humble thanks to B&H for their partnership in today’s devotion ]
September 25, 2019
The Enemy’s Biggest Mistake: Discounting Women
Jess Connolly is a life-speaker and-truth teller who is passionate about using her words, her time, and anything else God has given her to encourage women to use what they’ve got for His glory and the good of others. She coaches ordinary women in varying seasons to let their obedience lead to abundance when it’s met with God’s power and capacity. Her newest book, You Are the Girl For the Job, is a power-packed work of encouragement that will put your eyes on Jesus and get your feet moving as a worshipful response. It’s a grace to welcome Jess to the farm’s front porch today…
Where is God when injustice strikes?
Human tragedy and social injustice are not new, yet every time a tragedy strikes anew in someone’s life, I believe the devastating pain of others deserves our grief.
When we are forced to confront extreme inequality and oppression, we wonder, “Where is God?”
In these moments of questioning I take comfort in this snapshot of the Bible’s story: the underweaving and working of God’s rescue plan.
The book of Exodus tells us that God was fully engaged, using humans as the catalysts, the agents of change, that resulted in rescue.
God was broken, devastated over the sin that would lead people to annihilate one another, over the breaking of His chosen people.
Where is God in the midst of oppression?
I believe He’s often working miracles on behalf of His people—miracles we couldn’t dream of or see, and He is also stirring, calling, and equipping His people to meet the needs and fight for justice on behalf of their fellow humans.
Our Father was not and is not inactive in times of injustice, but rather He is carefully and intentionally using His favorite tool to activate justice: His people.
Joy Prouty
Joy Prouty
We may feel like we’re the ones doing all the work, assuming He is quietly sitting by, when truly, He’s the author of justice and we’re made in His image—made able by Him to do His work and love His people.
No, God’s not idle—He is just working a plan that allows us to be a part of the rescue.
“No, God’s not idle—He is just working a plan that allows us to be a part of the rescue.”
And this is the kind of plan we find in the book of Exodus—the story of the Israelites, the story of Moses.
Moses was born in the midst of extreme oppression and injustice, during the season when Pharaoh was forcing midwives to kill babies at the brink of birth or to throw them into the Nile River. Specifically, they were killing all the male babies, since in their patriarchal culture, women carried no threat.
As we walk a little further into Moses’ story, there’s one important observation we can make along the way.
Patriarchy and sexism and the enemy of our souls may discount women, but God never did and never does.
In fact, He invited many women to rise to the occasion and be His coworkers in the fight against injustice in this story.
Pharaoh ordered that all the baby boys be killed, but he made the fatal error of discounting the power of God amongst the women who would rise up and fight against Him.
The midwives fought by disobeying his law, Moses’ mother fought by hiding her son, Moses’ sister fought by strategizing his rescue, and God even used Pharaoh’s daughter’s gift of mercy to save the man who would come to represent God’s power over Egypt.
Big mistake, Pharaoh. Big mistake, Satan.
Culture can discount women, but our God never will.
“Culture can discount women, but our God never will.”
In Moses’ case – God uses multiple ordinary women to enact not only his rescue, but ultimately the freedom of the Israelite people.
Our Father used his mother to birth him in the midst of peril, the midwives to keep him alive in holy rebellion, his sister Miriam to hide him and watch him in the Nile, and even Pharaoh’s daughter to raise him in a place of notable repute.
Where is God when His people are hurting? Where is God when abuse and persecution are leaning in on all sides?
He is executing rescue operations, using ordinary people at every step.
We call them the heroes, and we perceive them to be special when, in all actuality, they’re just fallible and feeble individuals like us.
Sometimes their willingness, however reluctant, makes them seem majestic in our eyes—it makes them seem otherworldly and untouchable.
But it has always been Him, always God, beckoning and calling and equipping normal—even those of us who are reluctant – to practice simple obedience so that the rescue plan can have human hands on it.
Make no mistake: God can work through the supernatural.
He can work through the wind and the waves, and He can make the rocks cry out or make the animals talk if we stay silent.
But He chooses to use those who are made in His image, the flesh and blood and fallible kids that He loves to partner with as He fights injustice and oppression.
“Make no mistake that if we’re still in the midst of rescue, He is still in the process of setting things right.”
Make no mistake that He wants to use you—you—to fight the darkness that lives both within and outside of your comfortable boundaries.
Make no mistake that if we’re still in the midst of rescue, He is still in the process of setting things right.
Let’s not make the mistake of missing it because our eyes are focused on ourselves, or because we’re overwhelmed by the size of the fight, or because we’re waiting for a hero to do the work for us.
God has placed you where you’re at, on purpose, for the good of others and His glory.
He’s given you what you need to serve and love and join in the rescue plan.
You are the girl for the job because He is mighty in you.
And that’s a truth that no one—man or otherwise—can discount.
Jess Connolly is a gal who wants to leave her generation more in awe of God than she found it. She loves His Word, the church, color, community, and coffee. She and her husband planted Bright City Church in Charleston, SC, where they live with their four wild and wonderful kiddos and an extremely extroverted dog.
You believe (or want to believe) God has called you and given you purpose, but where do you start? How do you get from feeling stuck to making a move? If this sounds familiar, bestselling author Jess Connolly has a message for you: You Are the Girl for the Job. This book is the biblically-based, gospel-centered pep talk that women need right now.
Let You Are the Girl for the Job be your jumpstart into confident, purposed living, as Jess walks you through the six steps she has used to coach and encourage women for years: set your focus, take stock of the story that has shaped you, face your fear, catch the vision, make a plan, and finally, make your move–all in the bold belief that God has called you to every step of the journey.
In exchange for ordering two copies, you get free access to Jess’ fall coaching series with a host of other gifts! Learn more here.
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