Ann Voskamp's Blog, page 96
August 17, 2019
A new way to look at the things that matter
Jessica Turner is a veritable expert in looking for pockets of time & for ways to love well: She works full-time in marketing, writes regularly on her lifestyle blog, mothers her three beautiful young children, yet still finds time each day for using her gifts in life-giving ways. Jessica has been a kindred friend for more than eight years — she’s taught me so much about giving with joy & loving upside down & deeply — and it’s a humble joy to learn from her needful journey of Stretched Too Thin: How Working Moms Can Lose the Guilt, Work Smarter, and Thrive, which released in paperback this week. I’ve listened to the audio book and found Jessica’s narration to be a lovely, encouraging listen. This book is a five-star read for any of us who have jobs beyond taking care of our families and homes. (Don’t miss the information at the bottom of this post on how to get the audiobook + some other gifts free this week!) It’s an honor to cheer her on and a grace to welcome Jessica to the farm’s front porch today….
We’ve all heard the analogy that “life is a juggling act” or “we’re juggling a lot of balls.”
My whole life I have always imagined those balls to all be the red rubber balls you see clowns juggling at the circus.
“What are your glass balls? What are the things in your life that, if they shattered, would be devastating?”
But that idea was turned on its head after I conducted a survey of 2,000 working moms two years ago.
And one of those working moms shared these wise words:
The best advice I was ever given was to imagine that my life was a juggling act. Only some of my balls are glass and some rubber. I can drop the rubber balls and pick them up later and they aren’t any different. However, if I drop a glass ball, they are broken forever—no matter how hard you try to fix it. The key then is to determine which balls are your glass balls.
In my book, Stretched Too Thin: How Working Moms Can Lose the Guilt, Work Smarter, and Thrive, I ask readers, what are your glass balls? What are the things in your life that, if they shattered, would be devastating?
This way of thinking has transformed my life as a working mom.
You see, when you look at life through this lens, your priorities become as clear as those glass balls.
In my life, people are the glass balls—including me. I know that I have to take care of myself so that I can be there for my loved ones.
My own glass ball cannot crack. Because if I let myself “crack” I am not able to live out my other responsibilities and passions. I will be unable to live out the fullest version of who God has called me to do.
“I know that I have to take care of myself so that I can be there for my loved ones.”
Then, I have the glass ball that represents my marriage and my husband, Matthew. He is my best friend, and our relationship is the most important one in my life. It is not a relationship that should be neglected or dropped like a rubber ball.
My children are more glass balls. My years with them at home are fleeting. I must do all I can to pour into their lives and love them well. For those balls to shatter would be devastating.
But my house? Total rubber ball. I can figure that out if things get dropped. No major cracks will happen if the laundry waits one more day or the dishes stay in the sink.
A tougher one for some working moms to swallow is that work is also a rubber ball, though we often treat it like a glass ball.
Now, I am not saying that you should neglect your job or not respect the value it brings to your life.
But, as a colleague once said to me, “We are all replaceable.”
Those words have never left me.
“I have learned to hold my job loosely, knowing that as much as I love it and take pride in it, my work does not define me.”
And though I feel called to work, I still recognize my work’s place in my life. On my death bed, my work won’t matter to me.
All that will matter are the people surrounding me and those who I loved well.
If you are a working mom who often feels stretched too thin, chances are you are trying to juggle all those balls as every single one is glass.
Or you are dropping balls that are at risk of cracking – like your own self-care.
Remember, Jesus’s words to love our neighbors as ourselves.
That means, we can only love others to the degree we are loving/taking care of ourselves.
If you aren’t taking care of yourself, you can’t take care of anyone else well either.
I promise, there is a better way.
“You can thrive as a working mom, having a life that is rich in relationships and happiness.”
You don’t have to continue to live stretched too thin — exhausted, stressed, frustrated, and drained.
You can thrive as a working mom, having a life that is rich in relationships and happiness.
You can live better.
So fight for it.
Live boldly and passionately.
Pursue your dreams and love your family well.
Jessica Turner is the author of Stretched Too Thin: How Working Moms Can Lose the Guilt, Work Smarter, and Thrive, a book for every working mom who has wondered, is there a better way? As a working mom myself, Jessica has been a dear friend and source of encouragement in this way. I can tell you first-hand that this is a resource written for all of us who struggle to navigate home and work.
Stretched Too Thin shows readers how to work and parent guilt-free, set achievable goals, discover more flexibility, establish clear work boundaries, develop home management solutions, become more efficient and less stressed, prioritize self-care, invest in your marriage and cultivate deeper friendships.
It is an uplifting and empowering book and a must-buy for working moms. FREE GIFT INFORMATION: When you purchase it this week, visit StretchedTooThinBook.com to get $260 in free gifts plus the audio book (read by Jessica), the ebook of My Fringe Hours, and a 10-day video course.
Photos of Jessica by Melissa Morgan Photography
August 16, 2019
What to Try When Passion Wanes
Our culture constantly bombards us with unrealistic expectations of romance and sexual intimacy. However, Sharon Jaynes doesn’t think the problem is that the culture focuses on sex too much, but that it values sex too little. Sex is meant to be so much more than a physical act of carnal urges. It was created to be a sacred union between a husband and wife, designed by a holy, ingenious, and immensely generous God. Join us here as Sharon takes a deep breath and shares about intimacy as God intended, even though she admits to blushing all the way through. It’s a grace to welcome Sharon to the farm’s front porch today…
It was time to clean out my attic, at least some of it.
I pulled out several pieces of furniture to take to a consignment store, three lamps to take to a non-profit thrift shop, and many items that went straight to the trash.
In one corner sat memorabilia we’d saved from Steve’s parents’ attic years ago. That’s when I saw it.
“Why does the monotony of the matrimony cause what we thought was our soulmate to become more of a roommate?”
Tucked under a dusty old wing chair hid a tattered box. I pulled back the musty flaps and slid out what appeared to be a letter.
I lifted the frail envelope and unfolded sacred words from my husband’s dad, Bruce, to his then girlfriend, Mary Ellen.
More than 500 letters written over two and a half years stowed away in a cardboard box …until now. I pulled out the fragile treasures one by one and read intimate words of sacred love from a man head-over-heels with his high school sweetheart.
The letters began as a soldier writing to the girl back home who had stolen his heart—one that he pursued with pen and ink. And then about a third of the way through, the letters changed. The envelopes were no longer addressed to Mary Ellen Boone, but to Mary Ellen Jaynes.
And for 65 years they were an inseparable matched set.
I held the letters in my hands and wondered, how did Steve’s parents do it? How did they keep the passion of their early years strong during the waxing and waning of emotions for over half a century? How did their grip of arthritics hands seem just as intimately strong as the kid’s sixty-five years before?
Why does the monotony of the matrimony cause what we thought was our soulmate to become more of a roommate? That certainly isn’t God’s intention.
God didn’t fashion the intricacies of man and woman for intimacy and then leave them to figure it all out on their own.
He painted a picture in the words of story—The Song of Solomon. And when we have the kind of passion that makes a marriage sing, I believe God cheers.
The Song of Solomon is much like those letters I found stowed away in my attic. It starts out with a bang as the Shulammite woman declares, “Kiss me and kiss me again, for your love is sweeter than wine!” (1:2 NLT).
“Yes, passion will ebb and flow, but it’s up to us to recognize when the low tides of intimacy threaten to ground the boat on the sandbar of apathy.”
Throughout their story we see growing desire, passionate lovemaking, a waning of excitement, and the stirring of it up again. As with my in-laws, there’s the intertwining of souls that only comes with the passing of time and shared experience. Reading it is as if we’re on tiptoes, peering into their windows and privy to some of their most intimate moments, even their honeymoon…and its beautiful.
And even though some of the words in the Song leave me slack-jawed and blushing like leaves in fall, I realize that God made sure the explicit picture of romance and sexual intimacy is in the Bible for a reason.
Yes, passion will ebb and flow, but it’s up to us to recognize when the low tides of intimacy threaten to ground the boat on the sandbar of apathy.
It’s as if He’s saying, this is how it’s done.
The Shulammite was a wise woman who took deliberate action to make her marriage sing with intimacy that was purposeful and playful. I envision her sauntering up to her husband as he’s overseeing the fields. She whispers in his ear, and her warm breath teases his neck. Tempting him. Flirting with him still.
Come, my beloved, let us go to the countryside,
let us spend the night in the villages….
there I will give you my love.
The mandrakes send out their fragrance,
and at our door is every delicacy,
both new and old,
that I have stored up for you, my beloved. (Song of Solomon 7:11-13 NIV)
And God whispers to us through her words, this is one of the secrets to lifelong love. Pull away. Be intentional. Leave nothing to chance.
Ten years ago, my mother-in-law’s beloved left this earth, and she was devastated. Like a candlestick made to be part of a pair whose mate had gone missing, her light was exponentially dimmer without her Bruce.
In the following months, Mary Ellen walked with the limp of a woman missing half of herself.
Her forced smile looked pained. It was difficult to watch as two intertwined souls became a single strand.
Four grown children and their spouses, plus a slew of grandchildren and great-grandchildren, took extra care to let her know that she was loved and needed, but it was never enough.
Six months after Bruce took his last breath, Mary Ellen joined him. I could almost hear her whispers as he came for her…
Listen! My beloved!
Look! Here he comes,
leaping across the mountains,
bounding over the hills…
My beloved spoke and said to me,
“Arise, my darling,
my beautiful one, come with me. (Song of Solomon 2:10 NIV)
And she did.
I think of Mom Jaynes when I hear a sister tell me her marriage is on the brink of divorce.
“The marriage of two imperfect people is the perfect recipe for God’s glory to manifest itself to a longing world.”
I think of how she would have loved to pick Bruce’s dirty socks off the bedroom floor one more time.
How she would have given anything to hear him blowing his nose too loud in front of company.
How she would have happily ironed his shirts yet again.
How she would have loved to hear his snoring rather than the silence of the night.
How she would much rather cook a meal for two than heat up a bowl of soup for one.
What would she say to those women who teeter on the brink of divorce, who huff in frustration, who turn their backs to their husband’s reaching hand in the night?
I think she would hold their gaze with a knowing look. Grasp their hands with an urgent plea.
I think she would tell them that marriage is worth fighting for.
It’s worth the hurt and the healing. The ups and the downs. The irritations and the celebrations.
I think she’d tell them that the big picture of marriage is created with the brush strokes of tiny moments—that both the dark and the vibrant hues are necessary for depth and beauty to emerge.
That the marriage of two imperfect people is the perfect recipe for God’s glory to manifest itself to a longing world.
That the legacy of a lifetime is too precious to toss away. Work at it. Give it all you’ve got. Start over as many times as you have to, as long as it’s with the same man. The best marriage you will ever have is the one you have right now.
“It’s about a covenant with the God who intertwines two souls with the thread of His presence.”
She would remind us that marriage isn’t all about you and me. It’s about glorifying God. It’s about sacrifice.
It is about caring for the needs of someone else above your own.
It is about believing in the impossible when your hope is all but gone.
It’s about asking God to give you wisdom and then having the courage to change when He reveals the problem is you.
It’s about a covenant with the God who intertwines two souls with the thread of His presence.
I think she would say to forgive quickly and completely.
Don’t waste one day on bitterness or resentment.
Because time is precious and fleeting, and when it’s gone, it’s gone. All you have is today.
Sharon Jaynes is an international speaker, Bible teacher, and author of twenty-four books. She is the past radio co-host and Vice President of Proverbs 31 Ministries, and current writes for their daily devotions. Sharon is also the co-founder of Girlfriends in God, a ministry that seeks to cross generational, denomination, and racial boundaries for Christ. S
Lovestruck takes a daring look at God’s design for romance, marriage, and sexual intimacy based on the Song of Solomon. It takes us back to the Bible’s beautiful picture of romantic love in the Song of Solomon—a picture that is explicit but no illicit, sensual but not sordid, daring but not dirty.
It is as if reader gets to stand on tiptoes and peer into the lives of a bedazzled couple’s most intimate moments…and its beautiful. Sharon shows that true sexual intimacy as God intended it, is so much more than a physical act, it is the intertwining of two souls through sharing and time.
Women in every stage of a relationship will discover the secrets to pursuing and maintaining intimacy that makes God cheer! When we see the sacred blessings of sexual intimacy in marriage and understand God’s original intent, we find the freedom to enjoy and explore one of the Father’s most magnificent gifts.
[ Our humble thanks to Thomas Nelson for their partnership in today’s devotion ]
August 15, 2019
About the Statue of Jesus on the shores of His Hometown & the Longstanding Biblical Charge
J
ust on the edge of Jesus’ own hometown, there stands this statue and no one would be surprised if you almost missed it— I nearly walked blithely right by it.
“The exposed feet of the homeless guy bears nail wounds.”
Because the statue isn’t any lofty, neo-classical crowned figure, isn’t any robed goddess with arm stretched out as a beacon of light, isn’t a patinated icon of particular optimism.
Face and hands shrouded under this blanket pulled around him tight, the figure seems nameless — until you see his bare and uncovered feet that the blanket can’t reach.
The exposed feet of the homeless guy bears nail wounds.
The nameless man is the homeless Jesus.
I had wanted to touch His feet.
“If the Son of Man didn’t have a place to lay His head, was He standing sufficiently on His own two feet to welcome to our table?”
I had wanted to reach out and cover His feet, somehow offer the God Man some kind of shelter. To somehow warm the sojourner who pulled a thin cover up over Himself with the cold reality that: “Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.”
The life of Jesus is the life of a homeless wanderer.
I’d stood there, struck that the statue to honour the God of the universe right outside His hometown depicts a Man who had no home. The guy who came to grant us liberty — and welcome us Home — was in reality homeless.
If Jesus qualified as homeless, is there something shamefully disqualifying about needing a home and the help of community?
If the Son of Man didn’t have a place to lay His head, was He was standing sufficiently on His own two feet to welcome to our table?
Do those who believe in His all-sufficient grace support welcoming only those who are self-sufficient?
A couple of hundred feet away, in the centre of Jesus’s hometown of Capernaum, St. Peter’s Church rises above an archeological dig that discovered a first century church — what is now regarded as the “first church in the world.”
“To grow deaf & blind to the plight of the afflicted is to commit the gravest injustice. To rise to aid the down-trodden has always been the choice of the greatest.”
Just beyond the church — I could hear it — the waves of the Sea of Galilee lap endlessly, begging to be heard here at the feet of the first church… here at the feet of the Homeless Christ.
If some statues stand as a symbol for an idea — maybe in Jesus’ hometown, this statue of the Homeless Jesus laying down on a park bench is about the laying down of our lives to embrace the idea of welcoming in.
Maybe the Father of Exiles, the Exiled Man Himself, is asking us to see His presence amongst the exiles, to wake and see His face amongst the desperate wanderers of the world, to hear the aching cry of “Why is there no safe place for Me?”
To grow deaf and blind to the plight of the afflicted is to commit the gravest injustice.
To rise to aid the down-trodden has always been the choice of the greatest.
Making one’s own interests always first is a way to end up eternally last.
“Give Me your tired who can’t find a place to lay their head, your direly poor who are struggling to stand on their two feet, so they can know the love of those who are the hands & feet of Jesus, who never refuses those treated like refuse. Give Me those who need someone to stand with them, because it is the standing together that makes the Kingdom stronger, so why not make the table longer?”
I had knelt down right there by the the homeless depiction of Christ with his bare and scarred feet exposed to the elements. I’d looked across to the world’s very first church that stands on the teeming shore of Jesus’ hometown.
Can the world still hear the heartbeat of the Homeless God Man under the sheet, hear the welcome of His Church:
“Give Me your tired who can’t find a place to lay their head,
your direly poor who are struggling to stand on their two feet,
so they can know the love of those who are the hands and feet
of Jesus, who never refuses those treated like refuse.
Give Me your huddled and homeless because who of us isn’t on the shore of eternity, yearning to help as many break free into the hope of forever?
Give Me those who need someone to stand with them,
because it is the standing together that makes the Kingdom stronger
so why not make the table longer?
Give Me those who believe
there is a beacon of possibility that still blazes bright only because
it’s hospitably open to the oxygen of opportunity beyond itself,
only because it believes that if it shutters itself closed under a basket,
it will wane away in the dark.
Send Me those seeking a roof for their wounds, courage for their crises, hope for their hunger,
Send these, the homeless, trauma-tost to Me,
Because I am the rising Light, I am the open door!”
Before I could bring myself to leave the Homeless Jesus, before reluctantly walking out of Jesus’ hometown carrying with me Jesus’ mandate of liberty and hospitality, something in me opened wider, something like a Biblical charge that I couldn’t blithely ignore:
“As you did it to one of the least of My brothers and sisters, you did it to Me.”
Related: About Where We’re All From & Refugees & Where We Are All Headed
August 12, 2019
When you’re feeling stuck in the ever-repeating messy moments
God made this world of light and darkness, summer and winter, life and death. What does He intend to teach us in these ever-repeating cycles and seasons? Seamlessly weaving biblical truths into everyday life, Catherine McNiel will help you discover an unbelievable reality: God meets and transforms you in the mess and abundance of every moment. It’s a grace to welcome Catherine to the farm’s front porch today….
guest post by Catherine McNiel
I step outside to call my children: Time to stop playing and get in the car! Ten minutes ago, I sent them out, washed and dressed, so I could finalize the last-minute details for today’s family party.
A rookie mistake, obviously.
“Why are we on earth if not to dive right in?”
As they streak past me, I notice that something has gone very, very wrong.
My darling daughter’s face, neck, hands, and sundress are streaked with raspberry juice.
And my son—oh my abundant-life son—has covered his entire head with mud. Literally the only thing I can see are his bright and shinning eyes.
I scream for everyone to stop.
They freeze, caked hands clutching door handles. Texting my parents to apologize for what I’m confident will be a lengthy delay, I gingerly place a child under each arm and head for the shower.
I can’t be mad. I can’t be anything other than shaking with laughter.
What is summer if not dripping with delights, imploring us to get our hands dirty, inviting us to immerse our faces in the abundance and relish the richness of it all?
Why are we on earth if not to dive right in? My children were merely flourishing, answering the call of life as they were made to do.
Joy Prouty
Joy Prouty
Joy Prouty
Here is the wild paradox of creation: God ordered the world out of chaos, but the verdancy of life results in a whole new kind of chaos.
“Life exists only inside messy, colliding relationships.”
Clearly, God’s purpose in organizing a formless void into millipedes, jellyfish, hedgehogs, and poison ivy was not so we could sit restfully in a meditative state.
We stubbornly hope that life will leave us more or less alone in peace and quiet, that the forces of nature and human nature will be straightforward and controllable, bending to our own dictation.
But life exists only inside messy, colliding relationships. From the sperm and the egg, the bee and the pollen, life is about crashing into each other—for better or for worse (and most of the time, a good bit of both).
We celebrate that God made order and form out of emptiness, but there’s another angle to consider.
God had an eternity of time in which He alone existed, in triune unity.
Can you imagine the harmony? Why mess that up with a garden?
I can exhibit a great deal of love, peace, and self-control when I’m in a room by myself, as long as you don’t introduce anyone else into the picture.
What was it like when God and God alone reigned in the vacuum of unformed reality?
But this peace and quiet, this overflowing of goodness and righteousness was not, apparently, the ambiance God was going for. While it may sound heavenly to me, harmonious solitude is not what our Creator pronounced good.
“We’d like to think that real goodness, Godliness even, lies in the silence, the solitude, the ordered, clean, and controlled.”
God decided to mix things up in a major way.
The Creator is a Gardener. Like my son, He gets His hands dirty.
The story told in Genesis 2 depicts God planting purposely, beginning a world swarming with life. Into this story, God adds a human, living alone in God’s presence.
Again, I wonder: Why mess this up? So nice, just the two of them in paradise.
Yet in God’s creative scheme, one is not enough for the collisions necessary for abundance. God creates a second human—and still, the resulting chaos isn’t enough.
He orders the two to increase, to multiply, to make more and more and more life. More noise, more chaos, more crashing and colliding, more cacophony.
It seems that God thrives and rejoices in the pandemonium of living things bumping constantly against each other—and believes that we do too.
Anyone who has attempted living both alone and in a crowded household knows that much fulfillment come out of relationships, but also a great deal of clamor and crazy. We flourish through jumping into the crazy, by surrounding ourselves with creation and burgeoning abundance.
This isn’t how we want to picture goodness, most of us.
“God is present not only in prayer and meditation rooms but also in the dense fertility of life crashing everywhere.”
We don’t like the constant jostling and treading on feet, don’t want to be tripped up by crowds, nibbled by gnats, bombarded by smells, harangued by noise.
We’d like to think that real goodness, Godliness even, lies in the silence, the solitude, the ordered, clean, and controlled.
But our Creator doesn’t seem to agree.
Everything about what He made is alive, teeming and swarming and crawling and howling.
The only alternative to abundance is death.
Life is where He is.
In the towering storms and bubbling brooks, in the crying babies and chatty neighbors, in the watermelon juice dribbling off our chins, in the scuttling chipmunks and soaring dolphins.
This crazy, abundant, bombardment of sights and smells and sounds is where He delights, where He hangs out, where we can find Him.
God is present not only in prayer and meditation rooms but also in the dense fertility of life crashing everywhere.
Catherine McNiel is a writer and speaker who seeks to open eyes to God’s creative, redemptive work in each day—while caring for three kids, two jobs, and one enormous garden. Catherine is the author of All Shall Be Well and Long Days of Small Things: Motherhood as a Spiritual Discipline, which was an ECPA finalist for New Author. She’s on the lookout for wisdom, beauty, and iced coffee.
The sacred work of creation and redemption is going on all around us—but we are often too busy to notice. All Shall Be Well is about walking barefoot on dew-drenched grass, caring for children and aging parents, and crunching through fallen leaves. It is a book about living life from its imperceptible beginnings through to its full vibrancy and continuing courageously on toward certain decline. About accepting both the flower and the thorn, the gift and the loss.
All Shall Be Well takes the message of creation and redemption out of stained glass cathedrals and textbooks and into our common experience of spring and summer, autumn and winter. Catherine intertwines reality with theology, awakening the reader to the truth of God declared all around us. Seamlessly weaving Bible passages into stories of real life, Catherine kindles belief in an unbelievable reality: that God does His creative, redemptive work in the mud and mortar of each mundane moment . . . and He is always, always making things new.
[ Our humble thanks to NavPress for their partnership in today’s devotion ]
August 10, 2019
Only the Good Stuff: Multivitamins for Your Weekend [08.10.19]
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:
Kyle Fredrickson
Kyle Fredrickson
Kyle Fredrickson
his travels inspire me to get outside and enjoy the gift of the life a little bit more…
this right here? yes, yes yes!
so did you know? come see how the ‘I Spy’ books are made
His mission: Meet 10,000 people, one at a time, for an hour at a time.
“It has faced me with the finiteness of life…my biggest takeaway is to have more gratitude. Every week, I hear stories of hardship — someone whose parent recently passed away from cancer or someone who had to drop out of school to pay off student loans.”
He spent his career studying a frog. Then he discovered its true identity.
Here Are 50 Of The Best Entries From The #Small2019 Photography Contest
How scientists colorize photos of space
you’ve got to meet him:
he’s fostered more than 50 young men in the last 12 years
“The Mr. Bryant approach is I love you regardless,” he said. “You could become a brain surgeon or you could be a bathroom cleaner — it doesn’t matter. Once you come into my home and you’ve been with me and you’ve been here, you’re my kid for life. That’s my approach. You’ll always have a bed to come to, a shower to take — you’ll always be able to come home. This is home.”
can you even?!!?
Fox Carolina News
many tears: this story right here? is LOVE #BeTheGift #TheBrokenWay
We have a lot in common. But we don’t always notice it…
Kristina Makeeva
Kristina Makeeva
Kristina Makeeva
glory: the deepest and oldest lake on earth (and no, it’s not even winter here!)
breathtakingly beautiful
On Becoming More Christian, Not Less, In Our Politics thank you, Scott Sauls
let’s go!?! anyone else wanna stay here?!
Ben Adams
Ben Adams
Ben Adams
“I tried to kill my mentor. This amazing miracle stopped me.”
Beyond grateful for the saving work of Compassion International
…for no other reason, than just to be kind
My Walmart, My Neighbors, My God
because yeah, we all need a friend
this right here… how to overcome trauma and own your story
what a story here – what a family #BeTheGift #TheBrokenWay
Why ‘Let Go and Let God’ Is My Lifeline
Trusting in the Lord has made my life both easier and harder.
So looking forward to this on Friday, October 11!
Home For The Holidays – a Mercy House Global Webcast event!
The holidays beckon us home. Whether we celebrate with friends, family or both, our homes can hold more than guests: they can tell stories of justice and empowerment.
Join us for a night of worship, discussion about justice, and fair trade product.
it would be a grace to have you!
August is here!
Maybe this month, we all just need the gift of Joy… a bit of Hope? To stand together — FOR each other — knowing that an act of kindness, giving it forward, can be more powerful than any sword in starting movements that move us all toward Love.
Dare with us? Let’s start a bit of a kindness revolution, a giving, generous, caring, broken and given and transforming revolution? A 365 day GIFT list, a list of Giving It Forward Today…
Could there be a more beautiful way to live your one life? Dare with us — to take a daring path to the abundant life!
We could all together kinda start a little movement of Giving It Forward, choosing to #BeTheGIFT, living broken & given like bread out into a world down right hungry for love right now.
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 Be The Gift & live the life you’ve longed to
on repeat this week: I Know
…Peace. The world needs some brave people to pray for peace today. Peace around dinner tables & around the corner & around the world.
“And the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall guard your hearts & your thoughts in Christ Jesus.” Phil.4:7
Pray for a peace that passes understanding —
and pray for an understanding that brings peace.
Peace isn’t the absence of the dark. Peace is the assurance of God’s presence in the midst of the dark.
[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.
August 7, 2019
When You Don’t Belong – and why that’s Okay
Is there any feeling more aching than wondering where we really belong? The struggle to find our place and our people is one Kristen Strong has known many times over her years as a military wife, writer, and mother of three. She also knows that other people’s stories can be traveling companions to our own belonging places as we often find something of ourselves within them. She’s captured many stories and much wisdom in her book Back Roads to Belonging: Unexpected Paths to Finding Your Place and Your People. It’s a grace to welcome Kristen to the farm’s front porch today…
I remember that rainy February day when my good friend, the one with much older kids, swung by for a visit when the house looked like we’d been livin’ large and cleanin’ little.
And if you defined “livin’ large” as surviving a houseful of sick little people, then living large was what we had been doing.
“My mouth shut, and the walls of my heart thickened, because that’s what happens when you get a little too real with unsafe people.”
Answering the doorbell, I shrugged off the state of the house, knowing my friend was no stranger to this stage of life.
As I walked toward the door, I looked down at my baby girl asleep in my arms, body warm and worn out from a persistent virus.
I opened the door with one hand and quietly welcomed my friend inside. We moved to the sofa and I cleared off the boys’ collection of dinosaurs so we could sit. We chatted quietly for five minutes or so until James and Ethan, finally fever-free, ran hollering into the room.
I made my most desperate mom face and shushed them something fierce, pointing to their sleeping sister. The baby woke, and I sighed, exasperated.
Swaying with my baby in my arms, I risked a see-through heart and confessed, “You know, some days with little ones are just so hard.” I smoothed hair out of my daughter’s eyes, blind to my friend’s forthcoming response.
“Well, you’re the one who decided to have kids. What did you expect?”
I stared at her as her words ricocheted off the walls and hit my heart. That’ll teach me to be vulnerable, I said to myself.
My mouth shut, and the walls of my heart thickened, because that’s what happens when you get a little too real with unsafe people.
Instead of giving you understanding and support, they give you the bricks and cement to fashion a false exterior that looks like I’m fine! and Everything’s great! and Nope, I don’t need any help at all.
I held my sick baby girl close to my hurting heart. My friend left but her words lingered, and I was left wondering what to do with them.
Joy Prouty
Thinking back on that encounter, close to fifteen years later, I want to wrap my arms around my younger self and say, The only thing to do is to toss her words away and know they do not belong near you. The only thing to do is know that, at least when it comes to sharing parenting struggles, this woman does not belong in your confidence. On that front, you don’t belong with her.
“As important as it is for us to know where we do belong, it’s important for us to know where we do not.”
As important as it is for us to know where we do belong, it’s important for us to know where we do not.
There are simply some places not meant for us.
If a particular relationship continually hands us more sabotage than support, then let’s look ourselves square in our beautiful eyes and tell ourselves: “You don’t belong there.”
This doesn’t mean we only surround ourselves with people who live and think just like us. No one will agree with us on everything, and we need to have people in our lives who can lovingly set us straight with painful truth.
In the end, those words—hard to hear though they may be—are for us. They move us closer to reflecting the character of Jesus.
Motive is what makes all the difference.
We might get a little off-track and need someone to kindly help us find our way on the right road again. But no one should run us off it into the ditch.
A long time ago, the Lord gave me a visual of this, an image of our hearts reflecting the Old Testament tabernacle. It represented God’s house, the tented palace where he dwelled in the midst of the Israelites.
“And just as we need to be careful of whom we allow access to our heart, we need to be careful to not take it personally when others don’t allow us access to theirs.”
The tabernacle consisted of three primary areas: the outer courtyard, the Holy Place, and the inner Holy of Holies. God was enthroned on what was known as the Ark of the Covenant in the Holy of Holies, also called the Most Holy Place.
Only the high priest could enter into the Holy of Holies. The farther within the tabernacle one moved, the more restricted the access became.
Here’s the parallel: in our hearts, the entrance, or outer courtyard, is the place where many can come.
Other parts are more holy places where people who are for us may cross the threshold.
And just as the Holy of Holies was just for the high priest and the Lord, there may be parts of your story, past and present, best shared with God alone.
As the One who knows you better than any person on earth, He will be the only one who speaks to you from a place of flawless for-you truth.
He will always advise you with your best in mind, even if that means suggesting boundaries around you so others can’t get the access to you they want.
And just as we need to be careful of whom we allow access to our heart, we need to be careful to not take it personally when others don’t allow us access to theirs.
Likely it’s not because we’ve been careless with their heart. (If we have, Lord, forgive us, and may we consider whether or not we need to apologize to that person as well.) Instead, it’s likely because they have limited bandwidth and must tend to who and what the Lord directs is most important.
We may look toward another who is inside someone else’s inner place and think, It should be me, not her.
When you boil it down, God has called the other person there, not you and not me, and it’s His best for us to be elsewhere.
We can be happy for how God is working in her life while simultaneously being assured He’s working the same way in ours.
“We can trust Him to place us with those who will feed, honor, love, and serve us best as we reciprocate those actions to others.”
As we struggle to hang on to hope for finding where we belong, we can absolutely believe that God hasn’t saved His worst for us.
We can trust Him to place us with those who will feed, honor, love, and serve us best as we reciprocate those actions to others.
If you are on the outside somewhere, God is simultaneously calling you on the inside somewhere else.
Remember, there’s always room at the table God picks out for you.
And so perhaps it’s time we committed to not spending large amounts of time bemoaning why we’re not at another table.
Perhaps it’s time we refuse to feel guilty for having a boundary so those who wound us remain on the other side of our heart’s rooms.
If we’re going to hide, may it be in the all-compassionate, ever-faithful Jesus Christ—our completely safe place.
“There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus” (Romans 8:1 NIV).
Kristen Strong, author of Girl Meets Change, writes as a friend offering meaningful encouragement for each season of life so you can see it with more hope and less worry. She and her US Air Force veteran husband, David, have three children. Together this military family zigzagged across the country (and one ocean) several times before settling in Colorado Springs, Colorado.
Kristen knows better than most that at one time or another, shifting seasons in family, friendships, employment, and communities will bring each of us face-to-face with the feeling of being on the outside looking in. Because we are made for connection, this will often lead us down one of two roads. Either we will hop on the popular but crowded highway that asks us to do whatever it takes to get noticed, or we’ll stand still, paralyzed by the fear that we’re not important, loveable, or worth other people’s time and attention.
In her new book Back Roads to Belonging: Unexpected Paths to Finding Your Place and Your People, Kristen walks beside you along the less traveled but more satisfying third way—the back road way—to belonging: remaining in Christ and relaxing into the unique role God has for you.
[ Our humble thanks to Baker for their partnership in today’s devotion ]
August 5, 2019
What We Need Now: The Domino Effect of Small Acts of Love
Waiting for absolute certainty from God before making decisions may seem uber-spiritual, but it can lead to a life of intense stress, paralyzing fear, and crushing regret – just the opposite of the freedom granted to those living a Christ-filled life. This was the aha moment for Mike Donehey. Then he learned to see God as the plan, not simply the formula to the plan. It’s a grace to welcome Mike to the farm’s front porch today…
It took me way too long to figure out that I should marry my wife, Kelly.
To some, we were still married quite young. I was twenty-seven and she was twenty-six when we finally said, “I do.”
“I mean, love knows no boundaries, but there were some things I couldn’t live with.”
We dated for three and a half years though. And looking back, I think we dated precisely three years and three months too long.
She was beautiful and funny; she loved God, her friends, puppies, mountains, and the elderly. She was perfect.
Yet, I just couldn’t bring myself to pop the question.
On paper, she was flawless, but what if she was tricking me? I was a theater major in college, so I knew a thing or two about pretending.
What if we got a few days into the honeymoon, and she removed the mask? What if underneath all that kindness and warmth, she was actually a tyrannical mutant?
I mean, love knows no boundaries, but there were some things I couldn’t live with. Wasn’t marriage about finding a perfect person for you?
I needed to be absolutely certain. I didn’t want an ounce of guesswork when it came to who I would be with for the rest of my life.
In case you’re not familiar with the story, in the book of Exodus, we’re told that God parted the Red Sea before the fleeing Israelites made it to the water’s edge. Pharaoh’s army thundered ominously behind, but God’s chosen people walked across the mighty river on dry land.
There’s wasn’t even a drop on them.
In the book of Joshua, God also miraculously parted the Jordan River for the people, but that time, it was different.
In this story, God doesn’t make it quite so easy for His people. This time, some of them were going to have to get their feet wet.
The priests carrying the Ark of the Covenant had to march straight into the unknown waters like Indiana Jones had to leap from the lion’s head. Once they felt the cold reality of the river’s current hit their sandaled feet, that’s when God moved the waters.
Marrying Kelly was my jumping in the Jordan moment. I never heard a no from God, so I just kept taking the next step.
“I went with what I knew, instead of letting what I didn’t know paralyze me.”
Before I knew it, the river had receded and I was dancing in the Promised Land. It was scary, uncomfortable, and euphoric. But it’s what God had to demand of me to expose my fears.
Why does God do this?
Why does He let me stand and watch some decisions part before me like the Red Sea, but then other times forces me to follow Him into the Jordan’s unknowns?
I don’t have all the answers.
But I do know that once I stopped asking God what I was supposed to do with my life and simply started asking how and why I was supposed to live my life, the seas of doubt began to part.
In other words, I went with what I knew, instead of letting what I didn’t know paralyze me.
This is essential. It’s what marks our lives with faith.
Instead of sitting stagnant at the water’s edge, waiting for the miracle, we get up. We start working with what we do know.
The next time you’re standing terrified on the shores of indecision, ask yourself what you know you should be doing.
“It’s amazing the domino effect small acts of love can put into motion.”
It could be as simple as giving thanks.
It could be as demanding as selling off some possessions and giving the proceeds to the poor.
It could be as impossible as forgiving someone before they even apologize.
I don’t know where you need to start, but start with what you know. It’s amazing the domino effect small acts of love can put into motion.
When it came to marrying my wife, I realized I needed to stop worrying if Kelly was the one and start worrying about how I would treat her if she were.
I quickly surmised that dragging her along while I weighed all my other options was hardly the most loving thing I could do.
Running across the bridge that day, I came to the hard realization I would have to take the first steps of faithfulness toward her if I wanted to know find out if she’d be faithful to me.
Choosing her was not only something I had to do that day, it’s something I’ve had to commit to doing every day since.
I desperately wish more couples understood this. Love is action. It’s a perpetual yes.
“God loves it when we move in faith.”
After all, I know a lot of guys who begged God for an answer about who they should marry, and then it seems they stopped asking Him how they should love that girl every day since they received the answer they were looking for.
God loves it when we move in faith.
He loves when we don’t have all the answers but we act as though we trust that He does.
So whether you’re waiting or wading forward, take heart.
He has more plans for you than you have for yourself.
And even better, He’s the only one who tells the waters which way to run.
Mike Donehey is the lead singer, songwriter, and guitarist for the Christian contemporary band Tenth Avenue North. Since 2000, he has been sharing the truth of the gospel in front of millions of people through song and speaking.
“Perhaps God isn’t giving me the plan because He wants to be the plan.”
This was the aha moment for Mike Donehey after years of wrestling with his obsession to know God’s specific plans for his life and the inspiration for Finding God’s Life for My Will. Mike came to the realization that waiting for absolute certainty from God before making decisions may seem uber-spiritual, but it can lead to a life of intense stress, paralyzing fear, and crushing regret – just the opposite of the freedom granted to those living a Christ-filled life.
With Mike’s signature humor and relentless hunger for God, Finding God’s Life for My Will shows that discovering the Father’s purpose and plan for our lives is not the shell game that we all too often make it out to be. If you’re unsure what to do next, take heart and accept the ultimate invitation: learn to see God as the plan, not simply the formula to the plan.
[ Our humble thanks to Waterbrook for their partnership in today’s devotion ]
August 3, 2019
Only the Good Stuff: Multivitamins for Your Weekend [08.03.19]
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:
Meg Loeks
Meg Loeks
Meg Loeks
can you even?!!? her photos take my breath away – time and time again
just too beautiful not to share…
now how fun is this?!?
I mean — I can’t get enough of these. Scroll these — and then go hug someone.
Life is a rare & beautiful thing.
here’s one creative way to pass the time on a delayed flight
so what do you think? this country is ending standardized testing for children because “Learning Is Not a Competition”
maybe hold on to something before watching this one?!!
“Hiiiiii! THIS is how texting has changed grammar & the way we communicate”
some friendships are so special — and kinda hard to describe
she celebrated her 110th this week! And was giving credit to her faith in God for her life
so who knew? how they’re building skyscrapers in the southern hemisphere
in awe: NASA Releases Incredible Photo of International Space Station Passing Across the Sun
soup that’s been simmering for 45 years?! yup. you must come see
she faced her dyslexia by dressing up and reading to children in a hospital
Three years later, not only is she more self-assured about reading, but she also has gotten 15 others to volunteer with her as princesses and superheroes and read to sick children.
he’s always been challenged to do things — that others said he’d never be able to do…
THIS, this, this! A mom spontaneously buys 1,500 pairs of shoes for kids in need
…and as a result, local businesses, churches and residents have stepped up to plan a back-to-school event with other donated items. #BeTheGift #TheBrokenWay
because at times? we all crave to have someone to talk to
never, ever give up:
Car mechanic shifts gears; becomes a doctor at age 47 (!!)
and helps address shortage of black doctors
glory, glory, glory
J. Sangma
J. Sangma
J. Sangma
this one was eye opening: Who Makes the Most Popular Drink in the World?
Thanks to Compassion International sponsors, this cycle of child labor is being broken
behind the scenes with Kathie Lee Gifford
“Don’t let anybody make you feel less than the child of God that you are…”
he shares some good words here: “don’t allow your past to hold you back…”
many tears: please don’t miss this one…
Post of the week from these parts here
… so, if every day is day one, if every day we get to begin again, if every day is the first day (of the rest of our life), (or the first day back to school) — can we slip these 5 secrets into your hand, for your fresh start and beginning again:
5 Secrets for Every Beginning, Every First Day (Back to School)
So looking forward to this on Friday, October 11!
Home For The Holidays – a Mercy House Global Webcast event!
The holidays beckon us home. Whether we celebrate with friends, family or both, our homes can hold more than guests: they can tell stories of justice and empowerment.
Join us for a night of worship, discussion about justice, and fair trade product.
it would be a grace to have you!
August is here!
Maybe in this new month, we all just need the gift of Joy… a bit of Hope? To stand together — FOR each other — knowing that an act of kindness, giving it forward, can be more powerful than any sword in starting movements that move us all toward Love.
Dare with us? Let’s start a bit of a kindness revolution, a giving, generous, caring, broken and given and transforming revolution? A 365 day GIFT list, a list of Giving It Forward Today…
Could there be a more beautiful way to live your one life? Dare with us — to take a daring path to the abundant life!
We could all together kinda start a little movement of Giving It Forward, choosing to #BeTheGIFT, living broken & given like bread out into a world down right hungry for love right now.
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 Be The Gift & live the life you’ve longed to
Should Someone Imitate Your Life?
Philippians 3:17
on repeat this week: Fighting for me
Before the day overwhelms you, come close & feel His love over all of you. Let His love words shape your world today.
“Take to heart all these words… *it’s your life*” Deu.32:47
It’s a quieting truth: Reading His Word is not about getting Him to love you…
but about getting yourself to the place where you can hear Him tell you He loves you.
Start in that place today, the place where you open His Word & hear Him tell you He loves you.
Don’t try to face the day, until you’ve sought the face of God.
[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.
August 2, 2019
When you realize you’re living a life beyond control
Most of us long to be in control—of our schedule, our relationships, and our future. Newlywed Laura Story thought she had control over the life ahead of her. After all, she followed Jesus and had a promising new job as a worship leader. Why would God not want to fulfill her dreams? But when Laura and her husband, Martin, faced a brain tumor, infertility, and a son’s birth defect, she realized she’d been looking for a happiness that comes from circumstances, rather than a deeper joy that comes from God. Again and again, Laura had to surrender her vision for her life so she could embrace God’s vision. She learned that even in the midst of shattered dreams, God’s plan brought greater joy than she could have imagined. A few years ago, I had the privilege of speaking at a women’s retreat and shared the platform with Laura. We discovered very quickly we were kindred spirits. It’s a grace to welcome Laura to the farm’s front porch today…
I
can’t say that the weeks between the diagnosis and Timothy’s arrival were easy. They weren’t.
“It’s just not helpful—at all—to meditate on what we fear or dread.”
While I made a conscious decision to trust God and surrender my expectations to Him, I also did what anyone in similar circumstances would: I searched the internet for information about cleft lip and palate and clicked through picture after picture of babies born with it.
Let me tell you, friend, my heart sank. That little exercise did nothing to decrease my anxiety.
I don’t recommend doing this or the other fruitless thing I did at first: imagining all the picture-perfect new baby photos of friends on social media or the “March babies” bulletin board in our church’s nursery.
It’s just not helpful—at all—to meditate on what we fear or dread.
Instead, God tells us to consider Him, to immerse ourselves in His Word, and to meditate on His truth.
@laurastorymusic – Instagram
@laurastorymusic – Instagram
@laurastorymusic – Instagram
I remembered a lesson from Psalm 1 I’d shared not too long ago with some new moms in our church, and now it really seemed perfect for me. It begins like this:
“It’s not wrong, I had told them, to want to be favored, fortunate, blessed. But it is wrong to expect the world to deliver those things to us.”
Blessed is the one
who does not walk in step with the wicked
or stand in the way that sinners take or sit in the company of mockers,
but whose delight is in the law of the Lord,
and who meditates on his law day and night.
That person is like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season
and whose leaf does not wither—
whatever they do prospers. (Ps. 1:1–3 NIV)
It’s not wrong, I had told them, to want to be favored, fortunate, blessed.
But it is wrong to expect the world to deliver those things to us.
Instead, our blessedness or happiness comes from considering what God says about Himself and this world.
Meditating on this makes us strong, like fruit-bearing trees planted by fresh streams.
When we’re rooted in God and in His Word, we’re positioning ourselves for a blessed life, regardless of our circumstances.
And what is it, exactly, that rooted trees “do”? Nothing! They simply stay put, right where they are, their deep roots soaking in all that’s needed for a good and fruitful life.
“You and I just need to remain rooted in God,” I told them. “None of us is planted here by chance. No matter what, our assignment is to remain in Him, to receive what we need from Him, to be still and trust Him. He’s going to do the rest.”
The biggest problem with being a teacher is that sometimes you have to swallow your own lessons whole, like I had to swallow that one. I absolutely believed it when I’d said it to them. No doubt about it.
How could I believe it any less now, when it applied so specifically to me?
Before this last pregnancy, I’d started the practice of getting up very early each morning and sitting quietly on the sofa with my Bible and a cup of coffee, drinking in the words I knew I needed more than anything—even more than a few minutes of extra sleep.
Honestly, this practice probably began less out of deep, spiritual commitment than from a desperate desire not to do bodily harm to my children before the day was done!
My record in keeping this appointment has not been perfect by any means. I miss plenty of mornings.
But over time my kids have gotten used to seeing me there, alone and quiet. I figure if they ever ask, I’ll just say, “Mommy needs time with Jesus or she will implode.” Because Mommy does!
Now, waiting for Timothy’s arrival, I needed that time more than ever.
Because the challenges don’t stop coming, even when you’ve done this life of faith thing for a long time.
They bombard you, like C. S. Lewis said: “The very moment you wake up each morning. All your wishes and hopes for the day rush at you like wild animals. And the first job each morning consists simply in shoving them all back; in listening to that other voice, taking that other point of view, letting that other larger, stronger, quieter life come flowing in. And so on, all day.”
“When we’re rooted in God and in His Word, we’re positioning ourselves for a blessed life, regardless of our circumstances.“
I need that “stronger, quieter life” like I need air.
I tend to think of every hardship or challenge as a complication in my “normal,” chilled-out state.
But these things aren’t complications, really. They’re just content. They’re normal life, actually.
We live in a world broken by sin. Bad things happen. They even happen to “good” people, and they always will.
But for those of us who follow Jesus, our challenges and heartbreaks are not the last word. The world doesn’t offer that. Only Jesus does.
Every dark place on the landscape of our lives is a place where we can realistically hope to see God’s goodness and glory break through. That’s just how He rolls.
In the past, Martin and I have both had a tendency to see his disability as an inconvenience rather than as a tool in God’s hand—a way for His glory to be displayed. But God has kept on doing good things we could never have planned or realized through this unique, unwanted circumstance.
We have more compassionate, empathetic children, I’m sure, than we might have otherwise had.
We’ve had to slow down at times and take life at a less accelerated pace, and that has allowed us to see and enjoy things we might have otherwise missed.
We’ve had to rely on others to help us through logistical challenges because Martin can’t drive.
But even that complicating circumstance has allowed us to build true friendships and invest more in the lives of others here in our Atlanta community. We’re not waiting to go somewhere else now. We’re home.
“Who is in control? God is. He has my good in mind, and He is 100 percent ready to display His glory in and through my weakness.”
I’m not really much of a why person. I’ve discovered that knowing why a thing happens or doesn’t happen doesn’t change much.
But since the Monday afternoon of that ultrasound and the hard news about our baby boy, I’ve become more focused than ever on what and who.
What do I know is true?
I am extravagantly loved.
And I am not in control. Not even a little.
Who is in control? God is.
He has my good in mind, and He is 100 percent ready to display His glory in and through my weakness.
My only job is to trust Him. To surrender.
Laura Story is a Bible teacher, worship leader, singer/songwriter, and bestselling author. Her songs – which have won Grammys, Billboard Music Awards and Dove Awards include “Blessings”, “Mighty to Save” and Chris Tomlin’s “Indescribable.” Blessings was certified GOLD in 2011 and inspired her first devotional book What If Your Blessings Come Through Raindrops. Her second book When God Doesn’t Fix It serves as a reminder that despite questions or circumstances, He is the ultimate author of our story.
In her new book, I Give Up: The Secret Joy of a Surrendered Life, Laura explores: how to delight in God’s gifts no matter your circumstances, why waiting on God is a daily decision, the strength we find from meditating on God’s Word, why surrendering to God leads to reconciliation with others, and how the things we consider to be losses are ways for God to display His glory.
As Laura writes, she no longer wants to be in control of her life. She wants to be rooted in the God who is in control. Discover a deeper life of worship, a fuller life of joy, and a freer life of true surrender as you open your hands to God. And give up.
[ Our humble thanks to Thomas Nelson for their partnership in today’s devotion ]
July 31, 2019
5 Secrets for Every Beginning, Every First Day (Back to School)
So, yeah, you can find yourself on the First Day of School, standing at the kitchen sink right under the clock ticking loud –
ticking just like your own heart pounding down —
and the faucet’s dripping slow and steady, and you can stand there really wondering.
Because after a parent makes a kid, what they do is wonder if the kid will ever make it.
“Because after a parent makes a kid, what they do is wonder if the kid will ever make it.”
If the kid who can’t ever find both shoes at the same time and who belly thumps his brother for breathing too breathy on a Tuesday morning will make it further than the local penitentiary…
If the teen who regularly sleeps blithely through an alarm clock set to sound like a F5 tornado bearing down will ever make it further than the local coffee shop….
And if the son scavenging through the fridge every five minutes, who weeps over cleaning off the table, and claims anything green and leafy was never intended for human consumption, will ever make it further than the line at the local drive-through.
Strange how that is and how you finally come to it: You take a child by the hand, but who they ultimately become is never in your hands.
You can breathe.
You can blow it and you can be focused and you can be committed and you can botch it and you can do that all before 9 in the morning.
And the truth can come like a something brewing rich and right and warming, the Truth about the First Day Back to School, about the First Day of Anything, and every day is the first day, Every Day is Always Day One.
“Your Father is bigger than your failures, your flesh and your faults.”
Your sin can’t separate you (or your child) from Christ.
Your Father is bigger than your failures, your flesh and your faults.
And your strengths can’t save you (or your child) in Christ.
Your ego, your excellence and your efforts won’t ever be big enough to be a Savior.
Your sins aren’t enough to keep your child from God and your strengths aren’t enough to get your child to God.
Your sins aren’t enough to keep you from God and your strengths aren’t enough to get you to God.
Your sins aren’t enough to destroy your life and your strengths aren’t enough to determine your life.
Your sins aren’t enough to separate you – and your strengths aren’t enough to save you.
That’s the bottom line: Your sins aren’t enough and your strengths aren’t enough. You are not enough — for this parenting gig, this marriage relationship, this school year, this work project.
Write it on the wall, ink it on some skin, because Christ wrote it with His blood:
Grace is the only thing that is ever enough.
“Grace is the only thing that ever makes a way.”
Because the thing is – every sin and every strength always falls short. Every sin and every strength is always both in need of exactly the same thing: the grace of God.
Grace is the only thing that ever makes a way.
You find yourself praying it at the sink, at the desk, at the door:
Life 101 is Parenting 101: You can’t control outcomes — you can only model how to become.
Because Life isn’t about controlling things – but about letting God control you. Parenting isn’t about controlling kids – but about letting God control you. Parenting isn’t as much about raising the kids — but about laying yourself right down.
You only parent as well as you know your Father.
You only live as well as Christ lives in you.
“You only parent as well as you know your Father.”
So the First Day comes and there is this bravery that lets you hold on and lets you let go, and there is trust that has you believing and be living it, and there is this:
Grace is always enough when nothing else is.
So you can stand at the sink, right under the clock ticking loud – ticking just like your own heart pounding down — with the faucet’s dripping slow and steady, and you can stand there and see it happen on the face of the clock –
how Grace pushes back those hands of time and gives you forever and always more than enough.
How all the bouquets of fresh yellow pencils start writing new stories today.
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.
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