Upside-down kingdom

Christian author Ann Voskamp lives in Ontario, Canada, with her farmer-husband Darryl and seven children, whom she homeschools. Her first book, One Thousand Gifts, was a bestseller. Six years later comes a second, The Broken Way. Here are edited excerpts of the conversation we had in New York City just before the U.S. presidential election.

What’s it like to go on a book tour about brokenness at the end of a divisive U.S. presidential campaign? The cultural narrative right now is fractured. We’re called to be ministers of reconciliation. The gospel tells us we’ll know we are Christians by our love, which doesn’t mean agreement with someone. God says it’s sacrifice. God so loved, He gave His only Son. Love is sacrifice, so how do we love in this world? It means we live surrendered, sacrificial lives.

People sense systems are broken, dreams and hopes are being crushed. We see anger because so much is at stake—and when the stakes are highest, kindness matters the greatest. We can start a revolution of unity that allows redemption and resurrection to arise from broken places.

You have a blog with a big following. Have you interacted with people online about divisive issues? As a Canadian, I’ve wanted to respect the American family having a discussion, and privately have a lot of conversations with American friends. I want to understand better, because behind sometimes the rhetoric and fears are kernels of truth.

The church at large is having a discussion: Do we want power or do we believe that it’s upside-down? Do we want the brokenness of living crucified? That transforms culture. We won’t sell our soul for power. We’ll trust in the sovereign will of God in these things. What do we need to repent of? Where there are deep fears, find those fears and break those idols. Live in a posture of repentance. Martin Luther says repentance is as we walk through the Christian life, not a one-time act as we come to the cross. As an evangelical community, we have a lot to repent of. That posture gives us credibility to speak into the larger conversation.

Your family has developed a close relationship with a Syrian refugee family. How did that come about? March 2015 I went to Iraq. I sat in shipping containers with women who had been on Mount Sinjar, escaping ISIS. They had to choose—we only have two arms, which of your children can you carry? Busted me in deep ways. I believe we are Esthers called for such a time as this. We live in the West. I counted in One Thousand Gifts how we’ve been given grace upon grace upon grace.

If you’re given the grace, you break your bread and give it, you risk it all for those outside the gate. If Esther didn’t risk where she was—the Jews may be saved by some other means, but you and your family will die. If we don’t risk what we have, we may be the walking dead.

I told that story and people responded. Almost a million dollars raised in just over a week, to try to help these refugees. Initially, there’s deep caring. But then through my blog, through my Facebook community, the greater church at large—I saw so much fear. What if they’re terrorists? We would be letting ISIS into our country.

Our son Malachi kept saying: “They don’t let missionaries into a lot of these countries in the Middle East. If refugees come here, we could share the gospel with them.” A child shall lead us, right? If we model fear, our kids grow up fearful and protectionist. It came very organically around our table where we decided, greater is He who is in us than he who is in the world. Perfect love casts out fear.

In Canada we’re allowed to go ahead and privately sponsor a refugee family, so about 12 different couples from our church came alongside us, raised the funds. Our [Syrian] family has only been with us 3½ weeks. They got to the Toronto airport and thought the Canadian government would support them for four days in a hotel. Then they were on their own. We said, “Oh, no, we have a house rented for you, completely furnished, with beds and clothes for the kids.”

To bring them into a house—they stood there and cried. My husband this week spoke to them: “You are always welcome at our church.” They said, “Oh no, we want to come and work for the families of the church, to thank them.” We said, “No, that’s not what it’s about at all. You’re welcome at our table. You belong with us.”

Our theology is best expressed in hospitality—not necessarily how well you cook a meal, but how well you open your doors, live with an open hand to those who need to know of an upside-down kingdom that’s revolutionary and transformative and that literally saves.

Zooming out of world affairs … how is your son Malachi? He was diagnosed last Jan. 2 with Type 1 diabetes. He’d lost 20 pounds. So gaunt and so sick and we didn’t know what was wrong. Finally figured out, “Ah, Malachi needs insulin to stay alive.” He just celebrated his 14th birthday, came to the table that evening, took out his pen to inject himself, and said, “You realize, if it wasn’t for insulin I’d be dead right now?”

We adopted Shiloh from China in April, and she had open-heart surgery in August. I don’t know why the Lord gave Malachi Type 1 diabetes—but he believes the Lord gave him it so Shiloh never thinks she’s the only broken person in our family. After the surgery Shiloh needed blood thinners, and some had to come through a needle. They said at my training session, “It’s just like an insulin needle. Do you know anything about insulin needles?” Oh, do I know about insulin needles.

When you worked on this book, were you writing in that cabin at night as you did with One Thousand Gifts? That last month was only writing in the cabin. In the backside of the wilderness we don’t have a Panera or a Starbucks, but I have a 10-by-10 cabin and two barn doors that open wide. The kids can come and go. I’m close to home, to the sky and the dirt, the quiet life, and the stillness.

Was the process different this time? It was slower because I was afraid. After One Thousand Gifts, I bear scars and wounds, so I wrote slower, tried to be more careful. Not very brave sometimes, paralyzed a lot of times. The narrative in culture and in my own heart was, “How do I escape brokenness, how do I escape suffering?” In the world, if I won’t turn away from suffering and brokenness, ultimately that means I’m not turning away from Christ. Christ is in the broken and hurting places where it looks like all ashes. Ashes are never the last line of any of God’s stories. Abundance, resurrection, redemption always are.