Lauren Gaskill Inspires

Reminders to Find Sacred Rest in God {+ Seven Free Printables!}

May 8, 2017 • 7 Comments

I can make chocolate chip cookies in my sleep. I’m a seasoned chef who knows how to make almost any kind of ethnic cuisine. I could swim five miles right here and now if you asked me to. But rest? I’ve never been good at rest.

I can count on one hand how many successful naps I’ve taken in my life, and I rarely clock more than seven hours of shut eye a night.

As I write this post to you on a sunny Saturday morning, my husband is still asleep. I, on the other hand, woke up four hours ago. I’ve already exercised, driven to the store, made breakfast for both of us (his smoothie is in the freezer), and sent out an email newsletter.

I love the rush I feel when I check something off my to-do list (fellow checklist lovers, can I get an amen?!). I aim for efficiency in everything I do. I relish in productivity.

But at what cost?

This is a question I’ve been asking myself a lot lately, and I’d love to challenge you to ask yourself the same question today.

Not making time to rest in God comes with a cost.

When we don’t make rest a priority, we don’t just put our spiritual health at risk. Our physical health, relationships and work life are all affected by rest. And when we don’t get enough of it — whether that be physical, spiritual or both — eventually, we will burn out. I’ve seen this play out in my life, and the lives of many I love.

God calls us to more rest and less stress. More being and less doing.

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So, today I’m saying enough is enough. I want more rest and less stress. More being and less doing. More freedom and less obligation.

We cannot be everything to everyone and do everything that needs to be done under the sun.

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When we run to God and seek His rest, Psalm 91:4 promises us: “He will cover you with his feathers, and under his wings you will find refuge; his faithfulness will be your shield and rampart.”

So will we make time for rest? Will we stop making excuses and finally give ourselves permission to take a step back so we can recharge and find refuge in the shadows of our King’s wings?

In the shadow of His wings, our souls can find refuge.

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I’ve created seven quote graphics (scroll up for the first!) to encourage you to rest in God throughout the week. You can even print them off by simply clicking on the photo for a downloadable version. My hope is for all of us to start making rest a daily habit. Even if it’s just 10 minutes, a little goes a long way. Set aside your computer and phone, turn off all distractions and lean in to hear what God might have to say to you in that moment. Pray with me:

We commit our rest to you, dear Father. Do with it what you will, and give us the peace we need to put our agendas down and simply rest in you. Speak to us, Lord. We are yours, and we are listening.

Learning How to Persevere Like Jesus

March 27, 2017 • 10 Comments

How do we persevere like Jesus? We allow God to be our strength and do the impossible in and through us. Read more from my latest post for iBelieve.com.

“You’ve almost got it, Lily!” I cheered, putting on my best coaching face. “All you need to do is keep those feet together and remember to kick from the hips, OK?”

The 9-year-old watched as I demonstrated the butterfly kick one more time.

“Yeah! Got it, coach!” she shouted and smiled.

One, two, three deep breaths she took before pushing off the wall. But her enthusiasm and focus weren’t enough to correct her stroke. She was still kicking with her feet apart, and she knew it.

“Coach, I don’t think I’m cut out to swim butterfly. I’m just not any good at it, and it’s really, really hard,” she said after touching the wall.

“Oh, Lily, that’s not true. Your stroke is looking so much better than when you first joined the team,” I reassured her. “I know you’re going to be a great butterflyer someday. It’s just going to take a little bit of time, patience and perseverance,” I reassured her.

But my pep talk only made her brow furrow further.

Her frustration reminded me of the struggles I faced when I first learned how to swim. Let’s just say if you watched my swim lesson tapes, you’d never believe I was a record-setting sprinter in high school. As a matter of fact, I vividly remember my mom asking me if I was sure I wanted to join the swim team when I brought home the flyer in sixth grade.

I’m not a swimmer anymore, but if I’m honest, sometimes my disease makes me feel like I’m not cut out to be or do much of anything.

It’s hard to persevere when the task before us feels too great to overcome.

Maybe you’re in (or have been in) a situation where you want to throw in the towel. You’ve tried everything and you still haven’t been able to conquer the mountain that’s in front of you.

When we reach a crossroads in trials of endurance, we have a decision to make. Do we stay the course or do we let things go? Do we stand and fight or do we raise our white flag in surrender?

In these moments, our first step is to pray — to take our requests, thoughts and fears before God and ask Him to help us make sense of our situation. We can run to Him and know that we are heard and that He will speak to us, because, as Scripture tells us in Luke 11:9, when we faithfully ask for something in prayer, God promises He will answer. The response might not come overnight or be as clear as we want it to be, but I believe that the Holy Spirit does speak to us in a matter of time.

I don’t know what your situation is. Maybe you’re trying to be the light in a family of unbelievers. Maybe you’re working tirelessly to get that job you’ve always wanted. Maybe you’re longing to catch the attention of the cute guy at work or school. But whatever hard thing you’re facing, this I know for sure:

If God has called you to it, He will help you get through it.

If God has called you to it, He will help you get through it.

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Please join me over at iBelieve.com to read the rest of this post.

35 Self-Care Ideas to Show Yourself Some Love | #365LoveWellProject

March 13, 2017 • 23 Comments

When I started the #365LoveWellProject, my main focus was on loving God and loving others better. But after a winter full of stress and activity, including three sinus infections, surgery, increased work demands and signing with a book agent, here’s what I’ve come to realize: we can’t love God or others well if we’re not taking good care of ourselves.

Today’s post was inspired by this realization, and my hope is it will move us to make more space for self-care in our lives.

We don’t need an excuse to treat ourselves to a daily dose of self-care. All we need is a desire and drive to start taking better care of ourselves.

If we believe what the Bible says is true — that our bodies are holy temples (1 Corinthians 6:19-20) and that rest is a vital part of life (Exodus 34:21) — then we cannot afford to neglect our wellbeing. Our spiritual health will suffer if we ignore taking care of the body and soul that God entrusted us with.

We can’t love God or others well if we’re not taking good care of ourselves.

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The key to maintaining good spiritual health is living intentionally — organizing our schedules in a way that honors both God, others and ourselves.

Today, let’s explore some ways we can start taking better care of ourselves with these 35 self-care ideas.

Don’t feel like you have to do all of these in the next week or even month. Do whatever works for you, when it works for you. The goal is to get us thinking more about how we can nourish our own lives in the way we work to nourish others. In this way, we will be better equipped to meet the needs of others, because we will have first tended the gardens of our own soul.

Pray. Pray. Pray. Commit to spending time with God daily and being in His Word.
Take deep breaths throughout the day. If you’re wondering why I have this listed as number two and why it’s so important, head over to my friend Heather’s blog to learn more. There is power in the way we breathe!
Keep a gratitude journal.
Go for a walk outside.
Write yourself a love letter. Stop thinking about all the things you aren’t and celebrate the wonderfully and fearfully made person that you are.
Smile more. It just might change your perspective on something.
Practice your passions. What do you love to do but haven’t had time to do lately? Go do that thing now.
Give yourself permission to clear your schedule and do absolutely nothing. The world won’t end, I promise.
Learn how to say no.
Spend quality time with loved ones.
Treat yourself to take out. My top picks: Thai, Indian, pizza or anything Mediterranean.
Fill your house with sweet smells by baking a sweet treat. Need a few ideas? Here’s five of my favorite dessert recipes, straight from my old food blog: Coconut Flour Chocolate Chip Cookie Bars, Lemon Bars and Peanut Butter Brownies. (If you don’t feel like baking, you could always light a Yankee Candle Sugar Cookie Candle instead.)
Paint your nails or go get them done.
Take a warm shower, dry off and moisturize your body from head to toe.
Give yourself a massage with relaxing essential oils or go to a masseuse.
Get your hair and makeup done just because, then spend a night out on the town with your love or some friends.
Take a bubble bath and listen to music or the latest Finding Joy Podcast episodes.
Invigorate your face with a homemade mask (recipe is from my friend Amanda of Heartbeet Kitchen).
Snuggle with your pet.
Buy yourself flowers.
Eat and sleep well.
Turn off all electronics at least one hour before bedtime.
Stay hydrated.
Laugh.
Take a nap. (Or at least lie down, close your eyes and try to clear your mind.)
Put on your favorite song and dance around the room like no one’s watching.
Play a fun game.
Catch up on pleasure reading.
Listen to uplifting praise and worship music throughout the day.
Stop devoting time to things that make you feel bad.
Plan something to look forward to — a girls night out, a staycation or a getaway.
Serve others any way that you can. Hold the door, carry groceries or buy the person’s coffee behind you.
Let go and let God.
Make your life a little easier: cut back on housework if you can, buy pre-chopped vegetables and preassembled meals if you need to.
Look in the mirror and remind yourself, “I am a child of the risen King.”

5 Tips to Help You Read the Bible In a Year

February 27, 2017 • 3 Comments

It may be March, but it’s never too late to make a new resolution! How about resolving to read the entire Bible in a year? Here’s how.

I carefully lowered the steaming cup of chocolate chai from my mouth, not believing what my ears were hearing. I tried to swallow the sip of tea I’d just taken but nearly choked as I tried to process what my podcast guest had just said.

Lord, is she really talking about reading the Bible in a year?

I couldn’t believe it. Not because I thought it was impossible. Not because I thought it was something only old people did. But because this woman was the third person in a week who had brought it up and encouraged me to do the same.

As a writer, speaker and podcast host, I have the blessed privilege of getting to know a lot of amazing women who champion different causes for the kingdom. But what’s more wonderful than connecting with these sisters is the fact that God often speaks to me through the interactions we have.

So, when over the course of a week three of these sisters recently brought up reading the Bible in a year … let’s just say God had my attention. The first and second time someone brought it up, I thought nothing of it. I shrugged the idea off as something I didn’t have time for. But when the third woman started talking about it, I knew God was trying to tell me something.

After we finished recording the podcast that day, I immediately started praying about reading the Bible in a year. Is this something you really want me to do, Lord? How can I make time for this on top of all of the other commitments I already have?

Almost immediately, I could hear Him say: You can always make time for me.

The more I prayed, the more I felt God calling me to ask my husband to join me in reading the Bible the whole way through.

“What do you think, love,” I asked my husband that night at dinner.

He looked up from his plate with excitement in his eyes. “I actually think that’s a great idea. We just have to figure out a way to do it that works for us.”

I wish I could tell you that we began our Bible reading plan that night and have stuck to it every night since. I wish I could tell you we have this whole “how to read the bible in a year” thing figured out. We don’t. But we’re getting there, and we’re learning by trial and error how to do it well.

And so, today I want to encourage you with some tips I’ve learned from our first attempt to read the Bible the whole way through.

Please join me over at iBelieve.com to read the rest of this post.

A Prayer for When You Need An Attitude Adjustment

February 13, 2017 • 10 Comments

“Snowball fight!”

The kids cheered and giggled as they rounded the corner of the apartment hallway near me. Like most winter days I was walking my dog inside, trying to stay warm and away from the big frozen ice cube that had become the world outside.

Within seconds the kids ran past me — snow pants, mittens, hats and all — and burst through the door, where their winter wonderland adventure could finally begin.

They smiled and laughed as they catapulted white blobs into the air.

I looked at them and furrowed my forehead, feeling dazed and confused. As an adult, there’s something about seeing children play in the snow that makes it hard for me to believe I ever reacted to winter in the same way.

Because here’s the honest truth: I don’t like winter anymore.

When we moved to Minnesota back in 2014, I put on a brave face and feebly embraced it. In my mind, if we were going to be true Minnesotans, I had to at least make an effort. I drove to the second-hand sports store and bought some hockey gear and snow boots. I let my hockey-playing honey re-teach me how to skate. I agreed to a two-hour, outdoor engagement photo shoot in February (he proposed to me on an icy lake in January).

I was all in. And then, suddenly I wasn’t.

I don’t know when it happened, but somewhere along the way I became a winter Grinch. I actually teared up when the first snowfall hit this year. And they weren’t tears of joy.

When I stepped outside, my thoughts immediately grew as cold as the temperatures outside.

So what’s a girl to do when she can’t seem to focus on anything but the negatives in life? She gets an attitude adjustment.

As much as I’d like to sit around and complain about winter, I know focusing on the negatives won’t get me anywhere.

I have to have a different perspective.

Maybe you’ve been in a situation where you can’t see anything but the negatives, too. It doesn’t have to be a disdain for winter, but the irritation is the same … that feeling of discontentment, despair and wanting things to be different than they actually are.

I think we all can learn a lesson from the kids who were having a snowball fight outside my apartment complex. And the lesson is this: Life is often what we make it.

Proverbs 4:23 tells us, “Guard your heart above all else, for it determines the course of your life.”

Guarding our heart means we have to first guard our mind. Because what the mind thinks influences how the heart feels. If our thoughts are cold and bitter, then you can guarantee our hearts will eventually grow cold and bitter, too.

Life is not just what we make it, but what we choose to focus on.

If you’re like me, it’s tempting to cop an attitude, complain or be negative when life doesn’t go your way.

But we don’t have to complain or focus on the negatives, because we’ve been given a choice. And that choice is to instead turn our eyes whatever is true, noble, right, pure, lovely and admirable (Philippians 4:8).

It’s the choice we make when we need to have a better perspective (or a total attitude adjustment).

I wrote about Philippians 4:8 in an article for iBelieve.com a few months ago, but today I want to talk about what it looks like to practically apply that verse to our lives.

Instead of being all “Bah! Humbug!” about something, we can use Philippians 4:8 to help us shift our thoughts and change our perspective.

Here’s what the exercise looks like (I’ll use my disdain for winter as an example): Just take the components of Philippians 4:8 and write out a positive thing to focus on for each category.

WHATEVER IS …
TRUE: Winter won’t last forever and soon I’ll be outside again.
NOBLE: Winter is an opportunity for me to be reminded of how amazing my husband is. He drops me off nearly everywhere we go!
RIGHT: Winter is a time to grow even closer to God, because more time inside means more chances to read the Word.
PURE: I might not like snow, but it’s a beautiful reminder of what Jesus did for us on the cross — He washed our sins white as snow!
LOVELY:The weather outside is frightful, but with my space heater the weather inside is perfect for writing.
ADMIRABLE: Winter brings with it my two favorite holidays.

And suddenly, winter doesn’t seem all that bad!

This is how we give ourselves a better perspective and an overall attitude adjustment. This is how we keep our hearts from growing cold and bitter. I hope this exercise encourages you, and I hope you’ll make it a part of your daily life.

We can feel negative emotions, but we don’t have to become a slave to them.

Pray with me: Lord, I confess that sometimes I choose to focus on the negatives, instead of focusing on what you’ve called me to focus on. Help me take the words of Philippians 4:8 to heart. In every moment of every day, help me focus on whatever is true, noble, right, pure, lovely and admirable, so that my attitude may reflect and honor you. As I practice shifting my perspective, keep my heart from growing cold or bitter. Teach me to remember that I am not a slave to my negative emotions. Because of your Spirit, I can tell those emotions to be removed and turn my eyes to the things of you, instead. In Jesus’ name, amen.

2017 Reader Survey Results

February 6, 2017 • 4 Comments

In order to better love and serve you this year, I created a short reader survey to help inform the content I create as I continue to follow God’s call on my life to write and speak for Him.

Because I still have a full-time job outside of ministry, one of the things that I am always thinking about is balance. How can I honor God with my time and serve Him while also making space for the people and things I love? How can I organize my days to devote more time to what God has called me to do? What should I be devoting time to in the first place? These are the questions I ask myself on a routine basis.

I’ve been blogging for years, but I just relaunched my site last October. Since that time, I’ve been really wrestling with how often to post here on the blog. Many of you know I am in the process of getting my first book published, I have a podcast and I speak at events, too. Having all of these passions while having a full-time job and a family can pull my heart in a lot of different directions.

So I’ve been praying about how often I should be posting to the blog. God, should I post once a week instead of twice a week? Or should I keep doing what I’m doing since it’s working so well? In January, I felt God nudging me to trust Him and dial down to one blog post a week. That was before I sent out the survey.

As if confirmation straight from God wasn’t enough, He also used you guys to confirm what I was feeling in my heart — that one blog post a week is just fine. (See below image from the survey results.) Even though this freaks me out a bit, I know that because this is what God is asking me to do the world will not end. My readership will not tank just because I’m only posting to the blog once a week. And it will free up a little bit more time for me to create books and products that can inspire and encourage you!

Dialing down to one post a week will also give my soul more space to breathe. And ya’ll … If there’s one thing I’m sure of, it’s that our souls need time and space to breathe. But we have to be willing to give them the space. We have to be willing to let things go from time to time. We have to trust that God is in control and in the end, He will take care of every little thing, regardless of what we do, so long as we are following His leading.

God will take care of us, regardless of what we do, so long as we’re following after Him.

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Here are a few more highlights from the survey:

To those of you who took the survey — thank you! It means the world to me that you would be willing to take a few minutes out of your day to give me feedback. I hope you understand and celebrate my decision to dial down to one blog post a week, and I also hope you’re excited about what that means for other things that are in store for my ministry this year!

A note about this week: I will still have two posts for this week because I have a new podcast episode coming out on Wednesday. Starting next week, however, the posts will be on Mondays — that includes podcasts posts, which I will now be combining with a blog post so that those of you who don’t listen to the show but prefer to just read the blog have something to look forward to, too! Contact me if you have any questions.

Bless you, dear friends. I can’t wait to release the next project I’m working on. Stay tuned!

XOXO, Lauren

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Not making time to rest in God comes with a cost.

Today, let’s explore some ways we can start taking better care of ourselves with these 35 self-care ideas.

Life is not just what we make it, but what we choose to focus on.