Ann Voskamp Interview

Hi!  I came across this interview with Ann recently, and her words encouraged and challenged me greatly!!  If you haven't seen it, please take a few minutes, grab a cup of coffee, and watch it!

Here it is!

Enjoy!  :-)

Living Out Eucharisteo Before My Boys

I just finished chapter 8. I can't believe it myself (especially thinking of the way I devoured the first seven chapters so quickly!), but I got distracted and set the book aside for a bit. So, I re-read chapter seven and then moved on to chapter 8. As I read this morning, I kept thinking, "how did I possibly allow myself to set this book aside????".

Anyway, I loved reading about Ann's encounter with her son...the attempt to understand what was happening "under the toast". I have always had a deep need to understand the issues behind our boys' actions and reactions. In fact, this has caused some conflict along the way when my dear husband has felt that we should simply discipline or punish more quickly rather than talking through the situation. I will admit that there are times he has been right and I've been wrong...sometimes the consequence was clearly needed and should have been expected right away by the guilty boy. BUT I have seen God bring healing and understanding as we've opened up situations and looked at the deeper issues. As I read chapter eight, I felt God affirming that and also leading me to show these three boys how to really SEE God in their brothers, in their conflicts, in their dealings with each other.

I begin to wonder...do I model this? Do I really see God in their little faces? Of course, I want my answer to be yes AND in the moments when they are being so sweet and cute and "God-like" (or at least my interpretation of God-like), I can answer confidently that I see God in them. BUT do I see Him in their faces of disgust or bitterness? Do I see God when they are demanding their own way? Do I give thanks when I feel like a mother duck being pecked to death by her ducklings? Do I see God when they don't look the way I think God looks? Will I be thankful in the next little while when one of them wakes up before I am done with my alone time this morning?

I have some work to do. I want them to see Eucharisteo lived out before their eyes in all kinds of situations. My hope is that giving thanks and seeing joy will be as much a part of them as breathing.

a great day of hiking during spring break with my posse....

The Miracle Of The Hard Eucharisteo

I was feeling pretty good about the whole eucharisteo business, thinking to myself that I was getting to be an amateur Ann Voskamp of sorts. Look out world, maybe I’ll write a book. Ok probably not that, but maybe an interesting blog post at least.

Oh, but wait. Not so fast little missy.

I was sitting at my doctor’s office, enjoying a few minutes of peace while the kiddos were at home with the babysitter. (Side note: Nothing like looking forward to your annual gynecology visit because you know the waiting room will bring some sweet, uninterrupted reading time. I know you’ve all been there girls!)

Up on the table frocked in one of those lovely hospital gowns, I crack open chapter 5. Gulp. I read of her neighbor’s son being killed, her son undergoing a terrible injury, her memories of her mom holding her baby sister as she lay dying, and suddenly, I don’t feel like such an expert anymore.

It’s a little easier to be thankful for beautiful spring flowers in the middle of a busy day changing poopy diapers. This appeals to the writer/creative side of me. It’s romantic in a way.

I imagine the setting: Me, showered and with makeup on of course, busily cooking dinner, a little harried as I’m jumping over toys lying in the kitchen floor, sweetly reminding my children not to strangle each other, and yet, I’m stopping to lift up a thanksgiving prayer for the singing bird on the window sill. I’m channeling my best Ann Voskamp.

Did I mention this was all in my imagination? I can do this I think.

But now…. this? Mangled hands and dead children? I’m not so sure I’m signing up for this chapter. Please, oh please, don’t ask me to go there Lord.

The HARD eucharisteo. Our worst nightmare.

”Joy and pain, they are but two arteries of the one heart that pumps through all those who don’t numb themselves to really living.” Ann Voskamp, Chapter 5

Can we have the joy without the pain please?

I don’t think it works that way here on earth.

And so, the alternative is to skip them both. To live numb with a hard shell covering our hearts. “Nothing’s gonna hurt me. I’ve wised up to the way things work down here, and I’m going to cruise here in the middle. It’s safe here.”

I’ve lived life that way for a while, while I was in the depths of depression. I don’t recommend it. It’s not a good plan really.

And so, that leaves me with the hard eucharisteo.

“Every step I take forward in my life is a loss of something in my life and I live in the waiting: How and of what will I be emptied of today?” Ann Voskamp, Chapter 5

Gulp!

Can I trust that He is good when it is easy to give thanks AND when it’s hard?

“No scripture glasses to read what God is trying to write through a prodigal child? Scrawl my own quick editing on the half-finished story: failure. Satan’s tongue darts.

Not wearing a biblical lens to decipher the meaning of a doctor’s ominous diagnosis? Just read Satan’s slippery interpretation: cheated.

Not using anything to bend the light of this world so I can read my own messy days? Spray on another layer of graffiti: worthless.” Ann Voskamp, chapter 5

And this is why she is writing the book, and I am not. In this one chapter she has written what it took me years climbing out a pit of depression to learn. God’s word is the only thing that will keep my perspective. It is the only thing that will allow me to both soak up the joy and live through the pain. Without it I can’t experience both with any semblance of sanity.

I will never forget calling the parent’s of a 19 year old on Christmas Eve and telling them their son likely wouldn’t make it through the night. Then, after a long night of call, falling into my comfortable bed at home and waking up to celebrate Christmas with my healthy, happy family. The stark contrast was enough to drive me crazy.

So unfair. Satan whispered, “Why do you deserve to be happy when they are not.” Guilt. He then chased that with one of his favorite weapons: Fear. “Just wait. You’re next.”

“Without God’s word as a lens, the world warps.” Ann Voskamp, Chapter 5

So true. So true. It took me many years to learn that. Satan and our sin love to take the truth and twist it and whisper to our hearts, “This could be truth”. Only it’s not. And it takes His word to bring the perspective back.

His word says He is always good. His word says He loves me even on the days I snap at my children while writing a post about eucharisteo (it’s back to square one for me ladies).

His word says there will be a day when “He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.” Revelation 21:4

And it’s HARD. And I have to be reminded over and over.

This weekend I learned one of my 32 year old friend has invasive breast cancer. She’s got 2 young boys the same age as my kids. She is facing bilateral mastectomy, chemo, radiation. Sorrow comes heavily. Then a familiar whisper, “Why should you be happy when there is so much pain?” Then my old friend fear,”O Lord, don’t ask me to walk that road. I have children who need me.”

Can I believe God transfigures all the world?

“Darkness transfigures into light, bad transfigures into grace, empty transfigures into full. God wastes nothing-“makes everything work out according to His plan” (Ephesians 1:11). Ann Voskamp

Lord, let me brave enough to live the miracle that everything is eucharisteo. It is the only way to live.

And now let me leave you with some of my practicing everyday thankfulness (and an excuse to show some pictures of my kids. Sorry).

A daughter who matches the spring flowers

The season's first watermelon

and a 10 year old faithful friend!

Chapter Seven Thoughts

Chapter seven is one that I read and then read again, and then read again.  The convicting truth and precious grace of Ann's words bring clarity to many of the thoughts and frustrations that have seemed to have free reign in my mind.
Do I believe in the power of the pit?  Do I believe that anger and frustration will get me there?  I may say that I don't, but I am really the blasphemer.  God intends to use all of these moments that He gives me every day.  They are His moments....He has given them as a gift.  Why do I return the gift and basically say, "No thanks....try again....that was not what I wanted."  Oh, to see the moment by moment as gift.....the repetitive tasks that I accomplish one day, only to repeat them all again the next, to see these too as gift....to look through these moments and see His gift to me.  Why do I choose to wail like Hagar and not look up to see the well...full of living water?
To be the one responsible for the home, the education of my children, the nurturing of souls every day, and the plethora of other tasks that I tend to can be quite overwhelming when I think about it.  But with each chapter I am learning to slow...God is refining my heart, refining my focus, giving me a vision for ministry, filling me as I pour out.
I am practicing, and I am learning through this journey of Eucharisteo.  My relationships are deepening...with my children, my husband, and my God.  My daughter is journaling her own eucharisteo in Ann's 7 Gifts, Good and Perfect booklet.  We are practicing as a family through our own Trail to the Tree.

Thank you for sharing this journey...please feel free to post what God is revealing to you through these chapters.