Fear Not, I Will Strengthen You

It is easy to pray for things we need want.  When we are faced with circumstances or situations in which we don't see favorable, the prayers begin.  Often times we find ourselves discouraged or frustrated when the "answer" to that prayer doesn't turn out to be what we want, what we think is right/best, or what we may have prayed for.  I know I am guilty of this. Recently I found myself faced with a situation that I didn't like, a circumstance that was trying me physically, emotionally and even spiritually.  I lifted up countless prayers that seemed to go unanswered...or so I began to believe in despair.  The weakness of my flesh, my emotions, seemed to speak more "truth" to me than the promises found in his Word, and I was confused and discouraged.  Why hadn't God intervened yet? Why should I even continue to pray if He wasn't going to answer? I had let my flesh take over, and the sin within had begun to entangle it.

But God...oh how I love those two words!  But God, intervened, as He always does for His children; never letting us stray too far without gently bringing us back to Truth, aka reality, and covering us with His grace.  When I thought I could take it no longer, I was brought to this passage in Scripture:

"Fear not! I will strengthen you!" Isaiah 41:10  

The Lord spoke this Truth to my heart and continued to teach me through His Word a precious Truth I had forgotten.  No matter what circumstance or situation I find myself in, He will strengthen me through it.  I can and should pray for the desires of my heart, but I must pray "Thy Will Be Done", confident that whatever His will is, IS best, even if it means the way in which I expected the prayer to be answered was not what came to pass.  And in that circumstance, unfavorable as it may be, He promises to strengthen me, giving me just the grace I need to make it through.  

I love the apostle Paul's words in 2 Corinthians 12:9, "But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me." Paul was faced with a circumstance He prayed would be removed, but when his prayer wasn't answered the way in which he wanted or in which he thought would be best, He trusted in God's sovereignty and recognized that He was strengthening Him in his weakness.  He saw God's grace as sufficient. 

My prayer is that when I find myself with prayers answered differently then I may have thought they would have been answered, that I will rest in God's good faithfulness and remember to fear not, for He will strengthen me!

God, The "Perfect" Parent

There are many names in the Bible that we get to call God by, from Savior to Lord, the richness of each of His titles brings with it much meaning and depth into who He truly is.  However, I believe one of the most precious and powerful titles God gives himself and allows us to call Him by is "Abba, Father" (Romans 8, Galatians 4).  The reality of the Truth that we are HIS CHILDREN is profound.  And being a mother has given me a new glimpse into the vast love God the Father has for his children.  I have a new tangible example, in a small way, of the immensity of this love God has for his beloved. 

Because of this, I have come to realize that we have an example of a perfect parent to follow.  The way in which God cares for His children should in turn be reflected in how I care for my own children.  Although I will never be the "perfect" parent as He is, I have the promise that He equips and enables us to be faithful to our calling as parents.  We have been entrusted with precious "arrows" in which we are to train up in Him, prayerful that they will not only call us mom and dad, but will call God, their Father as well.

LOVE:
As I thought about how God parents His children, love kept coming up in every example throughout Scripture that I could find.  His love for us is sacrificial, deep, and perfect. "He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things? ...For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord." (Romans 8:23, 38-39)

As we parent our own children we are called to love them LIKE GOD loves His own children.  Are we willing to sacrifice ourselves to love our children?  Are we willing to love them extravagantly no matter what the cost to us?  We love them, in prayer that they would SEE HIS LOVE and come to know and experience that love for themselves.


INSTRUCTION:
From the creation of mankind, God has laid out His rules, or instructions.  These commands have been set in place to guide and direct us towards obedience in Him, and also to protect us from the perils of sin (and of course ourselves).  The phrase "Dad knows best" is true, when God is your Dad!  His instruction is always clear, wise, and profitable.  

As a parent we are called to instruct our children (in the Lord) as well.  We are to guide them, direct them, and point them toward obedience in Him.  We are to teach them ultimately to love Him, to fear Him. With the gift of a child comes great responsibility as we have been called to be faithful in training/instructing them.  But with the grace of our Lord, it is possible.  And it all begins with Deuteronomy 6:5 "Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength."

EXAMPLE:
Within Scripture we see the life of Christ, a perfect example of how we are to live our lives.  Just as Christ left a life worthy of imitating, we too should live a life that our kids would want to imitate.  I'm not talking about our hobbies and our employment necessary, but rather our character and our passion for the Lord.  We must lead by example.

SACRIFICE:
One word satisfies this...Jesus.  He was and is the absolute example of sacrifice.  His selfless love and willingness to give his life for us, His enemies, is dumbfounding.  1 John 3:16 "This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters."

As parents, we are going to continually be called to sacrifice...our time, our money, our bodies, etc.  Will we follow Christ, and show our children JESUS in the way we sacrifice? 

Despite our failings, daily, we can have confidence that as we seek His grace, power and equipping, He will be faithful to enable us to be the parent He desires us to be, a mere glimpse of the Father He is to us, His children.

Sacrifice

I suppose I was naive in my understanding of motherhood.  After all, I was the "queen" of babysitting/nannying, so I had it down...I knew everything, or so I thought.  I expected motherhood to be easy, I mean how hard could it really be to love on a cute little baby all day?!  Well, 4 months into this (actually 13 if you count those 40 weeks of pregnancy) and it is very different then what I had expected...absolutely amazing...but different.

I remember growing up, and watching my mom be a mom to both me and my brother.  I'd mimic her with my dolls and pretend I had a couple kids of my own.  I'd push my little dolls around in the stroller, change their diapers and their clothes, feed them, and hold them close.  Even at four or five I remember dreaming of being a mommy one day, I couldn't wait! As I watched my mom "mother", I only saw one aspect of motherhood.  It wasn't as if she hid the "hard" parts, but rather that the joy of the Lord, and the love she had for her family, was so tangible, and so great, that that was all that I could see.  I never realized how many sacrifices she really did make, in fact what I didn't see was that she had heeded the call to sacrifice herself for us, as unto the Lord.

Being a mother is a high calling, I would venture to say, that apart from being called to being a wife, it is the highest calling a woman can have.  And like with any calling, the Lord uses motherhood to reveal more of Himself to us as He refines us more into the image of His Son.

It all begins with pregnancy.  Again, I was naive.  I imagined myself with a cute little bump and that was it.  Well I was very wrong.  Being pregnant is HARD, at least it was for me.  There are physical and emotional changes that continually plague our bodies as pregnant women, and lets just say I was unprepared.  The call to sacrifice begins with pregnancy, as you are asked to lay down your body for the life of another....literally.  The Lord began to prepare me for motherhood the moment that the lines turned pink.  I was in for 9 months of sanctification in ways I had never experienced it before.

And then childbirth comes along, and no matter what people say to prepare you, how many books you read, or how you might imagine it; it is an experience that you have to go through to understand.  It probably is one of the most incredible things I have ever experienced, but lets be real, it is hard.  Painful contractions, pushing until you think you can't push anymore, and then the recovery....yet again, a call to sacrifice.

( On a side note: The moment you see that little face, your world changes, and you are more in love then you thought possible.  That moment, and that little bundle of joy is God's reward for those nine months of pain and sacrifice, and all the pushing and pain.  But it's not over...your call to sacrifice has just begun.)

In the past four months I have learned more about what it means to sacrifice than ever before: physically, emotionally, spiritually.  Motherhood is A CALL TO SACRIFICE, a call that continues on until you meet your Maker. But the reality is that being a Christian is a call to sacrifice.  Jesus Himself spoke of the denial of one self, the taking up of our cross, and following Him.  He exemplified sacrifice in everything he did and in His ultimate love gift on the cross, and His call AND command is the same for us, SACRIFICE! As a mom, the sacrifice may look different then others; it is that of our bodies during pregnancy, the sleepless nights, the endless diaper changes, the discipline, the messes, the homework...and the list goes on. 

 In Romans, Paul describes the Christian's command to sacrifice in chapter 12:1 “I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship.”  So whether we are a mommy or not, as a CHRISTIAN, we will be called to sacrifice in various forms.  The question is not will we have to sacrifice, but how.
 

Whatever your call to sacrifice may be, may we heed Paul's exhortation to present our bodies, OUR WHOLE SELF, as a sacrifice unto the Lord, knowing that our labor will not be in vain (1 Corinthians 15:58).

When I Am Weak, HE IS STRONG

I suppose I should change the title of my blog to something about being a mom because that is all I tend to be writing on lately.  This new calling in my life has been such a tool of sanctification and such a blessing.  I am amazed at how the Lord finds new things to teach me everyday.  Daily I have a front row seat to my own depravity.  Whether it is seen in my impatience, my lack of grace, my frustration, or my worry...I fail, every, single, day. 

Growing up in a Christian home was a blessing.  The Lord graciously spared me from a lot because of it, and for that I am thankful.  However, because of that, there has been a struggle throughout my Christian walk with my ability to see the depravity of my heart apart from Christ.  I have always seen my sin, but my pride has often gotten in the way and made me believe that because my sin isn't x, y, or z...I'm not as bad as Joe Smith down the street.  "How could someone do something so evil?" is a phrase that has often left my mouth.  The Lord, in His grace, is quick to remind me of my need for grace however, as He reveals sin to me often and I see my failure regularly.  Although I may not be doing those "terrible" sins, from my perspective, every sin that I commit is against a holy and perfect God who sacrificed His Son for even the smallest sin I let myself slip into.  A humbling reality to think about.

I'm not going to lie and say that I haven't been discouraged, because I have been, many times.  I have found myself wondering why I struggle so much with something, or how I can be so sinful.  I find myself begging God for grace and forgiveness throughout the day, and asking Him to strengthen me in so many areas.  But I have recently been encouraged by the fact that when I am faithless, weak, and failing, HE alone is faithful, strong, and victorious! 2 Corinthians 12:9 says, "But he said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me."

Therefore I CAN and MUST rejoice every single day knowing that no matter how many times I fail in my calling as a mom (often), He NEVER fails.  I have come to realize that I am going to fail my son, I already have.  I am going to sin against him, regularly; I am going to say the wrong things, not say the right things, do the wrongs things, or not to do the right things, etc.  I am a sinner, in desperate need of grace, and he will see that often.  Yet, God WILL use my weaknesses to show HIS strength, goodness, and power.  The Gospel will be on display through it all.  My prayer is that when I am weak, Brayden will see that HE IS STRONG!

Overwhelmed

Overwhelmed...it is the word that first comes to my mind when things aren't going well, or I'm having a rough day.  My emotions often get the best of me and the battle for Truth in my mind is like waging war.  In all honesty, I feel like I fail more times then I succeed.  I find myself letting those emotions rule my heart and my thoughts and let Truth get swallowed up by them.  Empty, broken, and depleted are words that often describe my feelings after I succumb to the overwhelming feeling.  And the truth is, as a believer, I should never feel this way.

I am currently reading a book called Loving the Little Years (highly recommend), and in it, Rachel (the author), talks about how she often used that very same word and decided she had to eradicate from her vocabulary.  Why? Because as a Christian, we should never be overwhelmed.  The definition of the word itself goes against everything a Christian is called to be.  Merriam Webster describes it as, "to overpower in thought or feeling".  That means, when I say I am overwhelmed, I am in essence saying that whatever it is that is overwhelming me has overpowered me.  Whether it be emotions, tasks, mothering, cleaning, to-do lists, you name it...none should ever overwhelm us as believers. How? He has given us His daily sufficient grace!  And it is that grace that equips and enables us to walk every moment of every day, in the good and the rough.

I was so encouraged and challenged by what Rachel has done, by removing that word and idea from her mind all together, that I too am seeking to do the same.  When I am tempted to believe that I am overwhelmed, I will remember Truth, and that I have just the grace I need, to get through it all, every moment of every day...until He calls me home.

3 Months, 3 Lessons

It has almost been three months since little Brayden was born, my how time flies!  I think I have learned more about myself in the last three months then I have in many many years.  When people told me being a mom would sanctify you, I never imagined how much.  God graciously eases you into that work of "mommy sanctification" during pregnancy and I am certain it won't end until I leave this earth. Being a mom is, aside from being a wife, the most wonderful privilege in the world, and yet at the same time, it is the hardest thing I have ever been called to.

In the past three months I have learned so many things, but I thought I would sum them up into three.

I Can't Do This Alone
Each day I am called to be a mom, is another day that I realize how dependent upon the Lord I truly am for EVERYTHING.  I need His daily sufficient and sustaining grace to empower me and enable me to fulfill this calling each moment.  When I try and do it "alone", I find myself discouraged and weak.  But the moment that I cry out to Jesus and ask for His help and His grace, I am renewed and empowered to press on, for His glory.

Every Day is a Gift
I've touched on this before, but I tend to look to the future often and not live in the moment.  Being a mom is a constant reminder that TODAY is a gift and TODAY is to be my focus.  Seeing Brayden's smile, or hearing his little coos are sweet reminders from the Lord to cherish the little things in life and to be thankful for today, for we aren't promised tomorrow.  May we be found having been faithful today.

Be Thankful, I'm Blessed
To know that I am a wife and a mom leaves me speechless at times.  It has been a prayer that I prayed for years that has been answered.  Desires that God put in my heart long ago have been fulfilled and I am beyond grateful.  I am called to daily reflect on God's goodness to me, and to be thankful, for I truly am blessed. 

I love my job :)!

Leading Little Ones to Jesus

I've never desired for the salvation of a single soul in my life as much as for my sons.  As I look down at his sweet little face, I am burdened with a deep need for constant prayer on behalf of His salvation.  And although I know that it is but the grace and mercy of God alone that can rescue Him, it is my fervent prayer and desire that I might be a tool in the Lord's hand to draw Him to the foot of the cross.

It is hard to look at your precious little baby and remember that within them lies the root of every sin; to see them as totally depraved.  But that is the Truth and the reality of what Scripture teaches.  They are conceived in, an born in iniquity.  Their hearts are full of wickedness and evil.  And apart from the grace of God, they will fulfill every desire of their flesh leading them to utter destruction.

But what do we do as parents?  Is there a guarantee that if I "train" my child up in the admonition and fear of the Lord that he or she will be saved?  Unfortunately no, that is not a promise. BUT it is a principle.  We serve a GOOD and faithful God who blesses His children far beyond comprehension.  He blesses obedience.  We can be certain that if we are obedient to His commands that are laid out for us as parents, that we can trust that in His sovereign plan everything will work out for our good and His glory.  And prayerfully that will include the salvation of our children.  His Word is clear...

THE GOAL OF PARENTING IS A CHILD'S SALVATION, THAT GOD WOULD CHANGE THEIR HEART!

Children MUST be made to obey because depravity exists.  Proverbs 29:15 says, "The rod and reproof give wisdom, and the child who gets his own way brings shame to his mother". "Discipline, correction, the rod is biblical.  The key is the children must be made to obey by suffering painful consequences when they don't.  They must be made to honor and respect their parents so that they're punished not only for disobedience but for disrespect, and dishonor.  Consequences for disobedience." (John MacArthur)  We do this because we are seeking to bring our kids to a place of righteousness.  We are desiring to guide their hearts to Christ.  Children must have an enforced conformity to God and His Truth in their heart and life.  You are to break their self-will, to show them the heinousness of their sin, and to teach them that that sin is an offense towards God.  And teach them that only our loving God is the one who can change their heart.  Every moment is a teachable moment, life is a classroom of grace towards Jesus.

I was recently listening to a sermon by John MacArthur (The Fulfilled Family: God's Pattern for Parents Part 1 and 2) and he gave some very practical and wise things to do found in the Word of God in Deuteronomy 6, a chapter on family instruction.  

Teach Your Child...

1. To Recognize God and His Sovereignty (Deuteronomy 6:4 “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might.")

2. Obedience to God and His Word (Deuteronomy 6:6 "And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. ")

3. To Follow Your Example of Christ (Deuteronomy 6:7 "You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise.")

4. By Continually, Constantly Reminding them of God, His Sovereignty, His Love, and to Love Him, to Fear Him, and to Follow your Example (Deuteronomy 6:8-9 "You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates." )

5. Warn them of the World (Deuteronomy 6:10-12 "And when the Lord your God brings you into the land that he swore to your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give you—with great and good cities that you did not build,  and houses full of all good things that you did not fill, and cisterns that you did not dig, and vineyards and olive trees that you did not plant—and when you eat and are full, then take care lest you forget theLord, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.")

Be faithful to these things, and stay on your knees knowing God is faithful.