Convictions

Have you ever wondered why your parents allowed certain things that you would never allow your own children to do? Or vice verse: why you would allow your children certain privileges that your parents would have never dreamed of allowing you to do. I am positive that my parents loved me as much as I love my own children. I am positive that my parents wanted to give me better than they had growing up, as I would like to do for my children. My sister and I have this conversation frequently. We have come to believe that the difference lies in convictions.

I grew up in a Christian home where we attended church all the time. I watched my parents attend prayer meetings, try to read their Bibles regularly, and try to raise us up "right". I believe for the most part they did a great job. But I know I never learned how to live a Spirit-filled life in Christ as a child. I think they tried hard, but I think there were some convictions missing in their lives,and subsequently, they were missing in my life. That is, until I chose to get my own convictions.

Convictions like:

• giving my children a godly education.
• courting versus dating.
• everything in my life has spiritual implications. (All things, good or bad, affect my spiritual walk, no matter how inconsequential they may seem.)

Shawn and I have chosen to home school our children. This decision was not one that was made overnight, nor was it one that everyone in our family agreed with. This was a conviction that we had from the Lord. I will never tell you that your family needs to home school. That is between you and God, not you and me.

Deuteronomy 6:6-9 says, "These commands that I give you today are to be upon your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. Write them on the door frames of your houses and on your gates."

How can we talk to our children about them when we were only spending about 4 hours a day with them and 3 of those hours were filled with homework and bath time? We did send our oldest daughter to school for a couple of years, but our conviction from the Lord was that she would be better off learning about Him from us. I found out quickly that my daughter was much more influenced by the school children than they were influenced by her. And I don't think anyone could argue that the public school district was going to teach my child about God's love and Jesus Christ's Deity!

The burden I have on my heart for each of my children to know Jesus Christ as their personal Lord and Savior and to have a vibrant, growing, love relationship with Him! Did you hear what I said? I have a burden. I don't just want them to, or think they need to. My heart is heavy with the weight of my responsibility to introduce them to Him. When they were in my womb I started praying for the salvation of their souls, and have not stopped. I am jealous for the opportunity to be the one to lead them to Christ. I try my best to teach them every day the Good News of the Gospel so they know that they sin, that Christ died for that sin and was raised back to life to conquer that sin.

Two of mine have accepted His gift of forgiveness. For them, my burden has changed to teach them how to love Jesus more today than they did yesterday. I strive to be an example to them of what a vibrant follower of Christ is. To show them how to rely on His strength when we are weak and how to find His Truth for the problems we face are daily goals. I do not live a passive faith in front of them. We constantly talk about self control over our actions and our words and our thoughts. I strive to teach them that sin can begin and end if we control our thoughts and make them obedient to Christ (2 Cor. 10:5).

I pray you can see that this decision was not haphazardly made. A public school teacher or school mates will not teach my children how to do these things. It is my burden for a reason: God gave me a conviction. I'd love to hear your thoughts! I plan to write about the other points soon.

Learning...

What am I learning from the Lord right now?

I am learning that introspection doesn't have to be a bad thing. It can be helpful and releasing! I can actually look inside myself and see Him, not my version of my own self-worth.

I am learning that He loves me and forgives me completely. No sin is greater than He is able to forgive! All we have to do is ask.

I recently lost a baby and have been struggling to see myself as a creation of great worth to Him. Thinking that if I was a good mom, God would've let me have that child and the others that I've lost. God knows what He's doing though. You see, I began that pregnancy just as I started a Bible study on "Search for Significance" by Robert S. McGee. That was no accident. Abba knew that I'd need to know my worth in His eyes as He beholds me covered by the blood of Christ. I've been able to dig down deep and see what my Lord sees in me.

What does He see, you ask? He sees someone made in His image, "fearfully & wonderfully made," forgiven by His grace and glorified by His redemption!

I wonder, what have you been learning from the Lord?

Grace's Baptism

The joys of motherhood are many, but only birth can compare to the experience of leading a child to the Lord! I has this great opportunity on August 30th. Now, I give you the baptism!

This is my middle daughter, Grace, with my husband, Shawn in the baptismal waters. He had to help her swim to the red crate she's standing on! The water was up to her neck. We all got tickled, and I wish I had shot video instead of still photos.

Here she's coming back up out of the water. I am so proud of her! She is showing the world now that she is in Christ she has been raised from death to life to walk in His fullness!

On a lighter note, Abigail, our younger daughter, asked, "Grace, why come you were up there holdin' your nose and when you come up, your hair was all wet?" Grace replied, "Because I went under the water. That's what happens when you get baptized. One day you'll get baptized too, Sweetheart." And then they hugged! How precious is that!?!?!?!

God is soooo Good!...All the Time!

Abigail's Funnies

I wanted to share a few stories about Abigail. We were at my dad's house last Sunday eating lunch. My sister, Beth, was there. All the nieces and nephews call her "Becca". The conversations go something like this:

Beth: Abigail, I just love your freckles!

Abigail: Those are not freckles, Aunt Becca! They are just my polk-a-dots. I got one right there, and one right there, and one right there!

Later, Abigail and her oldest sister, Cara, were picking on each other. Abigail touches Cara on the shoulder with her index finger and says, "Caaarrrraaaa, I'm touching you!" And Cara is very aggravated by this! Next, Abigail touches Aunt Becca's leg with her toes.

Abigail: AAuuunnnttt Beeecccccaaaaa, I'm touching you!

Beth (who used to get furious with me, her little sister, when I did this): Abigail, why are you being ugly?

Abigail: I just like to be ug-a-ly!

Accountability

I am currently doing a Bible study by Chuck Lawless titled "Putting on the Full Armor of God". I have been a believer for 23 years and I haven't done a whole lot of studying on the armor. I've always known it was there, but I never gave it much thought, other than simply praying that the Lord would help me to wear it and use it.

I would liken my experience to a soldier signing up for the Army, filling out all the paperwork and skipping Basic Training to go straight into battle. I believe that most of the Christian population could agree and sympathize with my view on this! When were you trained to be a believer? I "got saved", "got baptized", and went to church my whole childhood. I guess they thought that attendance counted as discipleship.

Please don't misunderstand me. These things are very, very important! I would be so far from where I am if I had not been actively involved in the life of my local church during my growing-up years. I gained lots of enrichment from the teachers and pastors I've studied under.

But I also know how much heart-ache I could have saved myself and Abba if someone had come along beside me and taught me the importance of accountability. I haven't sought out proper accountability in my life. This is something I am working on doing and something I am trying to teach my children as they grow up in the Lord. Right now, I am their main accountability source, but as they get older, we will seek out peers or older believers that, with the Lord's guidance, will be mentors/accountability partners.

I plan to share more about this study I'm working on, but for now, I'll just ask: Who is your accountability partner? Do you think it's important to have one? What character qualities do you think are important in an accountability partner? I'd love to see your thoughts.

Salvation in No Other Name!

It must be every Christian mother's prayer that their child come to know the grace of Christ and accept His gift of salvation. I have been so blessed in my life to be able to lead my oldest daughter to salvation in Christ. I've always said that I am jealous of that experience with my children. In fact, last spring when I saw that Grace, my second child, was getting close to understanding about accepting Christ, I went and talked to her teachers at church. I asked that if she started the process and I was anywhere in the building for them to please find me because I wanted to be there. I'll be honest and tell you that I prefer to be the one leading them, but if I couldn't do that, I wanted to at least be in the room!

Some people ask me, "Isn't the important thing that they get saved? It shouldn't matter who leads them." Well, that may be easy for some people to say. They haven't invested all the time into teaching my children that I have. From the time they were born it's been me who tells them about Jesus and their sin and the need for Him to be their Savior. My children did not learn these concepts at church, but in the back seat of my car, and at the grocery store, and on our living room floor, and around our kitchen table! My child's Sunday school teacher hasn't been the one to answer 1,001 questions about the topic. It's been me and my husband! So no, in the grand scheme of things, maybe it doesn't matter WHO leads them, as long as they gain salvation, but I covet the experience! And I don't feel convicted of being sinful over this. I want me or Shawn to be the one to lead them, because we've been the ones to teach them.

So you can only imagine how ecstatic I was when we were reviewing AWANA verses on Sunday afternoon, August 30, 2009. Grace is six years old and in the SPARKS club. Each letter of the word SPARKS has a word and verse they have to learn. The acrostic goes like this:

S IS FOR SAVIOR 1 John 4:14
P IS FOR POWER Psalm 147:5
A IS FOR ACCORDING TO THE SCRIPTURE 1 Corinthians 15:3
R IS FOR ROSE AGAIN 1 Corinthians 15:4
K IS FOR KEEP James 2:10
S IS FOR SAVED Acts 16:31

After quoting each letter, what it stands for, and verse, I would ask Grace to tell me what the verse meant. We had gone through S, P, A, & R. We were on K when I asked what the verse meant and she said, "I have no idea!" James 2:10 states, "For whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point; He is guilty of all."

I started explaining about the law, and what it meant to "keep the whole law". We talked about the Ten Commandments and how the verse says if you break one of them, you've broken all of them. I explained that in Old Testament times that a person who did not keep the whole law had to offer a sacrifice for payment of their sins. We discussed how in today's times, we don't offer sacrifices because Jesus , who kept the whole law, offered himself as the sacrifice. All we have to do is choose to accept the gift of His sacrifice for our sin.

I asked Grace if all this was making sense to her when she hung her head and remained silent. I asked what was wrong when she said with tears, "I know I'm not going to heaven because I've lied!" At this point, we went to her bedroom to talk, and the rest is history!

Grace trusted Jesus Christ as the sacrifice for her sin. She has a home in heaven now. She understands that her sin is paid in full, and now she needs to try to live for Jesus. The highlight of any mother's life!!!! Being able to lead her children to faith in our Lord!

Two down, Two to go! I'd love to hear your comments!

Looking After the Interests of Others

I think I am learning more and more why God chose to set His ultimate creation in family units. I knew all along that the purpose of the husband-wife relationship was to demonstrate Abba's desire to have a love relationship with us as our Sacrifice. As I relate to my husband and strive to put aside selfishness in my marriage relationship, for Shawn's benefit, it makes me value the sacrifice Christ made to be my Redeemer.



As a parent, I am learning how God relates to us as His children. This past weekend I witnessed something in my children I was shocked to overhear. There was intense anger and venom in the words coming from my two oldest daughters. I immediately summarized that this, of course, was because I had failed as a parent to teach them properly how to love and relate to one another with words of love, right? Well, I must admit I was a little deflated that they could speak to one another like this and I did feel a little like a bad mom. After all, aren't our children's reactions a direct result of our teachings/examples?



Upon hearing the interaction I was almost speechless. Please note I was almost speechless. Truthfully, I had to hold my tongue because I wanted to say so much! I promptly told them to hug, kiss, apologize, and tell the other "I love you." (This is parenting according to Euna, my mother. I cannot tell you how many times my sisters had to do this!) Then I told them to go to their respective "corners", think about their actions, and that they would be grounded. I hadn't figured out from what yet, but grounded they would be.



As I prayed about how to handle this situation, I pondered quietly while trying to listen to the Holy Spirit's prompting. I figured this would be a good time to contemplate how the Lord relates to us a Father, Abba, Daddy... He loves us so much. I wonder how much I disappoint Him with my spiteful speech about other children that belong to Him? How many times has He had to look into this heart of mine and be heart-broken over the depth of anger and sin He sees in me? Knowing I've let Him down in the same way my own children had revealed their hearts to me, I prayed harder for how to handle the situation in a way that would honor Him and teach them to try to change these behaviors.



I am NOT going to try to tell you that God revealed anything new to me in parenting and that all parents everywhere should try this and it will be guaranteed to work! I am going to tell you that after seeking guidance, I knew peace. I knew that He still loves me even though I mess up. I knew that no matter how my children might disappoint me, I still love them.

The next morning, the three of us sat down to talk about it. I read Philippians 2:3-4 to them. It says, "Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but humility consider others better than yourselves. Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others." We discussed the meaning of these verses, and how no matter what the "reasons" for their anger toward one another, the truth was: it all boiled down to selfishness. When we don't get what we want, we get angry. When the other person doesn't do or say what we want, we get angry. It all boils down to selfishness, looking out for our own interests, not the interests of others.

I went on to ground them from several things for one week. Nothing too severe, but I'm seeing a change in attitudes! Praise you, Jesus, for working in my children's lives. Your Spirit is affective even in the smallest of people. Thank you for being the God of family, the God of children and the God of marriage.