I began [blogging] because I have this handicap - I can't figure out my life or see God clearly unless I untangle my life again with words.
Ann VoskampThe gift list is thinking upon His goodness – and this, this pleases Him most! And most profits my own soul and I am beginning, only beginning, to know it. If clinging to His goodness is the highest form of prayer, then this seeing His goodness with a pen, with a shutter, with a word of thanks, these really are the most sacred acts conceivable. The ones anyone can conceive, anywhere, in the midst of anything. Eucharisteo takes us into His love.
Ann VoskampThe prayers we weave into the matching of socks, the stirring of oatmeal, the reading of stories, they survive fire.
Ann VoskampThe message of Christmas is not that we can make peace. Or that we can make love, make light, make gifts, or make this world save itself. The message of Christmas is that this world’s a mess and we can never save ourselves from ourselves and we need a Messiah.
Ann VoskampWe're not giving what we're called to give, unless that giving affects how we live - affects what we put on our plate and where we make our home and hang our hat and what kind of threads we've got to have on our back. Surplus Giving is the leftover you can afford to give; Sacrificial Giving is the love gift that changes how you live - because the love of Christ has changed you. God doesn't want your leftovers. God wants your love overtures, your first-overs, because He is your first love.
Ann VoskampThe whole of the life -- even the hard -- is made up of the minute parts, and if I miss the infinitesimals, I miss the whole. These are new language lessons, and I live them out. There is a way to live the big of giving thanks in all things. It is this: to give thanks in this one small thing. The moments will add up.
Ann VoskampSatan's sin becomes the first sin of all humanity: the sin of ingratitude. Adam and Eve are, simply, painfully ungrateful for what God gave.
Ann VoskampSimplicity is never a matter of circumstances; simplicity is a matter of focus. So in the midst of educating and parenting our children, we can't necessarily go ahead and make everything fit into neat, controllable, simple schedules. But the point is, simplicity is: how do we keep our eyes fixed and focused on Christ, no matter where we are?
Ann VoskampGratitude is at the center of a life of faith. It sounds to simple to be true, but isn't that the sign of all deep truth: so simple we're tempted to dismiss it, and so hard, it is exactly what God uses to change our hard lives.
Ann VoskampI have to seek God beauty. Because isn't my internal circuitry wired to seek out something worthy of worship? . True Beauty worship, worship of Creator Beauty Himself. God is present in all moments, but I do not deify the wind in the pines, the snow falling on the hemlocks, the moon over harvested wheat. Pantheism, seeing the natural world as divine, is a very different thing than seeing divine God present in all things . Nature is not God but God revealing the weight of Himself, all His glory, through the looking glass of nature.
Ann VoskampLearning slowly to not be so reactionary while inserting verbal gratitude into stressful situations is almost like being healed of mental blindness.
Ann VoskampHow long does it take your soul to realize that your life is full? The slower the living, the greater the sense of fullness and satisfaction.
Ann VoskampThanksgiving-giving thanks in everything-prepares the way that God might show us His fullest salvation in Christ.
Ann VoskampAt the last, this is what will determine a fulfilling, meaningful life, a life that, behind all the facades, every one of us longs to live: gratitude for the blessings that expresses itself by becoming the blessing.
Ann VoskampWe all get to choose where we set up the stage of our lives - before the Crowds, the Court, the Congregation, the Critics (inner or otherwise)-- or the Cross of Christ. All except One will assess your performance. Only One will accept you before your performance ... Only in Jesus is there 100% acceptance before even 1% performance.
Ann VoskampWhat if I gave thanks in the trouble, for the trouble, because the trouble is a gift that causes me to turn? What if I loved God not for His goods but for His love itself that is goodness enough?
Ann VoskampIn naming that which is right before me, that which I'd otherwise miss, the invisible becomes visible.
Ann VoskampGoing ahead in the midst of the stressful circumstances and giving thanks in that moment - you can't simultaneously feel stress and gratitude at the same time. So as a parent, to go ahead and start to give thanks to God resets the whole family.
Ann VoskampGiving thanks is that: making the canyon of pain into a megaphone to proclaim the ultimate goodness of God when Satan and all the world would sneer at us to recant.
Ann VoskampGod’s purposes are not for me to understand His plans: His plan is for me to understand Who He is.
Ann VoskampUnbeknownst to me, two readers of the posts, both published authors, contacted their agent, Bill Jensen, within 24 hours of each other, encouraging him to drop me a line. Which he did. He shared his extensive publishing background with me, and prayerfully offered to work out a proposal and to see if God opened any publishing doors? I never get over the unexpected ways of God.
Ann VoskampSatan’s sin becomes the first sin of all humanity: the sin of ingratitude. Adam and Eve are, simply, painfully, ungrateful for what God gave. Isn’t that the catalyst of all my sins? Our fall was, has always been, and always will be, that we aren’t satisfied in God and what He gives. We hunger for something more, something other.
Ann Voskamp