Motherhood II

What can reduce an otherwise ”all-together” mom to tears in a matter of seconds?  What do the majority of mothers all over the world have in common, regardless of our skin color or socioeconomic status?  What do we, as moms, allow the Enemy to use to stunt our progress, steal our joy, and sidetrack us from our mission?  GUILT!

I’d venture to guess that guilt is one of the most common emotions that moms feel.  Whether you stay at home with your children or you are out in the workforce, I’d bet my last dollar that you have certainly felt guilt for what you are or are not doing for your children.  In fact, for me personally, labor was a cakewalk compared to this guilt that I fight!

So what does this guilt look like?  What kinds of things does it say to us?

“You haven’t spent enough time with your children today.”

“You should be doing more for your kids in this (fill in the blank) area.”

“You are so far from the Proverbs 31 woman!”

“You have failed.  If only you had _____.”

“You’re not a good enough mom!  Look at all those moms that do it better!”

I’m sure that no one can relate to these “voices.”  (Sarcasm)  Now, I recognize that not all guilt is false guilt, or accusations from the Enemy.  Sometimes, the Holy Spirit will prick our consciences to alert us to behavior that is selfish or harmful to our children.  This is His way of asking us to reflect on those behaviors and possibly change them or sacrifice our selfish desires in some way.  That is between you and the Lord to discuss.  An easy way to remember it is this: the Holy Spirit convicts us when we are stepping outside of God’s plan for our lives (and it is based on love), but it is Satan who condemns (based on hate).  The guilt that condemns is the kind that I am talking about here.  This guilt assaults moms who are already sacrificing, already molding and shaping their children’s hearts with God’s wisdom, already spending quality time with their kids, and already doing their utmost in the ministry of raising godly children.  Above and beyond that, this guilt tends to grab hold of us and tries to (1) undermine the work we are already doing with our children and/or (2) tire us by getting us to do more and more and more to make up for perceived deficits.  Both responses render us ineffective. 

So what can we do?

1.  Ask God to examine our hearts and our priorities.  Ask Him whether He is telling us something through the work of the Holy Spirit and His Word (“All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness.” 2 Timothy 3:16) or whether Satan is accusing us (Revelation 12:10 calls the Enemy the “accuser of our brothers, who accuses them before our God day and night.“). 

2.  Fight fire with fire.  Fight the guilt from the Enemy with the promises and declarations from the Word of God.

Romans 8:1 “Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” 

3.  Connect and fellowship with other believers, and share your feelings and struggles.  It is when we struggle all alone with these feelings of guilt that they become overwhelming and start to destroy–chipping away at our Christ-esteem, undermining our parenting, and infecting our marriages.  First and foremost, share them with God.  Then find other godly moms with whom you feel safe and let them know you are struggling.  Not only will they help to show you a more biblical perspective, but they will often times clear away the web of deception for you and help you to see that you are not nearly the failure that your emotions (and the Enemy) would have you believe. 

Now, I don’t know about you, but I’m going to go hug my son, tell him that I love him, and then stand on the Truth of God’s Word as I do my best, with the Holy Spirit’s leading, to train him up in the way he should go (Proverbs 22:6).  As moms, let’s refuse to allow Satan to cripple us with false guilt anymore.

Note:  This is Part II of a series of posts on motherhood.  Check out Part I here, in the Parenting Section of Standing on Truth.

Why Does Disagreeing Have to be So Hateful?

“Ah, yes, whatever happened to that plucky little cult, Christianity?  Oh, that’s right, they’re 80% of the American people, and have taken over all three branches of government, country music, public schools, the bestseller list, and until recently, Katie Holmes.  You know, Christians, I don’t mind that you’re part of a dress-up cult that hates sex and worships magic but the paranoia, that does scare me.”  Bill Maher

Is it just me or has anyone else noticed how vile, vicious and hateful society as a whole is getting towards Christians, conservatives, and anyone espousing traditional values?  We only have to turn on the news for 5 minutes before we see yet another example of these attacks.  Last week, it was Anderson Cooper, CNN and a handful of other media sources that not only attempted to discredit 250,000 protesters and their support of smaller government, but came right out and insulted them (us) with crude sexual jokes unbecoming and unfitting for mainstream media journalists.  This week, the claws have come out against Carrie Prejean, Miss California who stood up for traditional marriage at the Miss USA pagent.  Since when did having a different opinion (an opinion, by the way, that is still held by the majority of Americans) call for vicious and hateful name-calling?  Here are some more:

“We are a nation that is unenlightened because of religion.  I do believe that.  I think that religion stops people from thinking.  I think it justifies crazies.  I think flying planes into a building was a faith-based initiative.  I think religion is a neurological disorder.”  Bill Maher

 ”I have a theory that you can’t find any saints anymore because of psychotropic medication.  I think that [in] the old days, the saints were hearing voices and they didn’t have any Thorazine to calm them down.  Now that we have all of this medication available to us, you can’t find a saint anymore.  In the old days it used to be you heard voices.  You can’t do that anymore.”  Joy Behar

 Or what about Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez calling President Bush “the devil” back in 2006?  Or Janeane Garofalo, longtime hater of conservatives, who said this about last week’s Tea Parties:

“Let’s be very honest about what this is about.  It’s not about bashing Democrats, it’s not about taxes, they have no idea what the Boston tea party was about, they don’t know their history at all.  This is about hating a black man in the White House.  This is racism straight up.”  Janeane Garofalo

Ms. Garofalo then went on to join the classiest of all entertainers to already go this route, and threw the sexual innuendo in there, which I will not quote. 

So we’ve seen so far that we cannot have traditional values, uphold Christ as our Savior, or vote conservatively in the polls or we will be publicly ridiculed on mainstream television by “professional” journalists, potentially lose the Miss USA pagent, be called a racist (completely unfounded–there was nothing racist about those tea parties), be crudely referred to in sexual terms, and told we have a neurological disorder in need of psychotropic medication.  And I’m just getting warmed up.

Air America host, Mike Malloy, called those attending the Conservative Political Action Conference in 2006 “neo-nazis.”  Al Franken, our new senator from Minnesota (God help us!), frequently hits conservatives below the belt and uses blasphemous language about Jesus as he mocks Christians. 

Now, to be fair, I have heard comments from some conservatives (I can think of two commends offhand) that I completely separate myself from and believe they fall into the category of “hateful,” but these are fewer and farther between than what we, unarguably, see on the left.  Even Juan Williams, Emmy Award winner and NPR Senior Correspondent, says that “the far left is extremely harsh and punishing when you don’t say exactly what they want you to say.”

This is America, the land of free speech and freedom of religion.  In the name of the god of the left wing, “tolerance,” we are slaughtering our freedoms and becoming more hateful and divisive a country by the day.  My prayer is that my passion never causes me to compromise my values.  But I also pray that in my defense of God’s Truth, I never abandon my commitment to follow God’s command to love Him and others above all else.  That is the mark of a Christian–love for God and love for others.  And if we abandon that in the culture today–if we fail to show God’s love in the face of this persecution or if we stoop to the level of the persecutions that are heaped upon us–then we are, in effect, taking our hands off and watching this world and the people in it become even more lost than they already are.

“Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.  The second is this:  ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’  There is no commandment greater than these” (Mark 12:30-31).

“This is the message you heard from the beginning:  We should love one another.  Do not be like Cain, who belonged to the evil one and murdered his brother.  And why did he murder him?  Because his own actions were evil and his brother’s were righteous.  Do not be surprisesd, my brothers, if the world hates you.  We know that we have passed from death to life, because we love our brothers.  Anyone who does not love remains in death.  Anyone who hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life in him” (1 John 3:11-15). 

Using My Voice Felt Good: The Tax Day Tea Parties

Last night, my family and I made our way to one of the hundreds of Tax Day Tea Party protests taking place around the United States.  We joined several thousand Republicans, Democrats, and Independents at the Dallas City Hall.  Mark Davis, EmCee of the evening and “host of the most popular local talk show in Dallas/Fort Worth,” rallied the crowd in his usual way–with humor and passion.  Then he received a call from conservative blogger and author Michelle Malkin (which we all listened in on) who reved up the crowd even more. 

I am proud to be an American.  I was proud, last night, to exercise my voice in a peaceful and constitutional way.  I am proud that I brought my son with me for his first protest, showing him that personal values are worth standing up for.  And I share many of the sentiments that I saw on signs and t-shirts all over, and that I heard from other Americans who love this country and are concerned about the socialist direction it is sharply taking. 

“Stop this administration from bankrupting the future of our country” (Governor Rick Perry).

“Read my teleprompter–no more bailouts!”

 

 

 

 

 

 

“Foreclose the White House”

“The only thing we like small in Texas is the government.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

“Spread my work ethic, not my wealth.”

“Keep your public hands off my privates!”

 

 

 

 

 

 

“Protect the unborn–and their bank accounts.”

And a gentleman from England spoke from his heart about the dangers and ineffectiveness of socialism, and warned us of continuing down this road that is undoubtedly headed there.  “Where, on planet Earth, has socialism ever worked?” he asked.  “The spending by this administration is under the guise of ’solving’ the economic crisis–make no mistake about it.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I’m sure, by now, you have heard that the Department of Homeland Security is on the lookout for any terrorist threats from “right-wing extremists.“  I am so outraged at this absurdity that I’m not sure I can even write about it.  Are you pro-life?  You are now a “right-wing extremist.”  Are you against illegal immigration?  You are now a “right-wing extremist.”  (Actually, the report tries to say we are against immigration, which we are not.  They conveniently leave out the word “illegal.”  Intentional?)  And the one that makes me furiuos–are you a military veteran?  Well, you are now a potential threat to our country, according to the DHS.

Not only that, but of course, race has been injected again where, in most cases, there is no racial issue.  “The economic downturn and the election of the first African American president present unique drivers for right-wing radicalization and recruitment,” the DHS report says.  Feel free to read the full report here.  Let me be clear, again.  We object in no way, shape, or form to the fact that President Obama is African American.  We object to his policies, values, and where he is taking this country that we love!

With regards to the accuracy or bias of the media reporting on these tea parties, let’s examine it.  I found nothing on today’s front webpage from CNN or MSNBC regarding the tea parties across the nation.  Even on a local news channel last night, when they covered the thousands at the Dallas Tea Party, they also covered the 10 or 12 people in protest of our protest and gave them air time.  Was that small attendance really newsworthy? 

But the two most offensive and infuriating things about the media’s coverage?  One, the “barely concealed sexual references,” written about here.  To dismiss a very large group of Americans protesting at the grassroots level is one thing, but to throw in sexual references and downright crude sexual jokes at our expense (see Anderson Cooper, for one) is not only beyond reporting, but far beyond decency in journalism. 

The second most infuriating coverage is from a CNN reporter who did not conceal her liberal bias in the slightest.  This video is unappropriately titled “CNN Reporter Harrassed at Chicage Tea Party.”  As you will see, it was not the reporter who was harrassed at all.  Now, keep in mind that reporters are to report, not opine.  And even the news achor afterwards shows bias.

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I remember thinking as I was sitting at Dallas City Hall with thousands of others how peaceful and “family-friendly” (reference to video) this protest was.  The police officers patroling the event were not restraining people or calming anyone down.  They were smiling and strolling around.  How many protests do you remember seeing on television during the Bush administration’s terms that involved violence and plenty of non-family-friendly content?  More than you can count?

Here is an excellent article by Michelle Malkin for further reading, and I’ll close by saying this.  We don’t all have to be protesters.  We don’t all have to be bloggers, blogging about the government or politics.  But can I challenge all of us who profess to be born-again Christians to really examine what the Bible says about Truth, pass everything that we hear from the world and our leaders through a “Biblical-grid,” and then stand on that Truth without apology, using your voice to whatever decibel level you are comfortable with and is respectful.  I am not ashamed to want smaller government.  I am not ashamed to be a conservative.  And I am not ashamed to love Jesus. . .all of these things are under increased attack as we get closer to the end of days. . .and all of these things are bound to bring us more persecution in the years to come.  Stand firm!

Motherhood

A friend of mine just had her first child. . .a beautiful son.  As I was looking over the pictures they posted of this young child of God and future tender warrior for the Lord, my thoughts drifted to our own similar photographs 4 years ago–the surgery room, blue scrubs, proud Daddy gazing lovingly into his own “flesh of my flesh,” Mommy drugged and happy, and baby, cold and confused, but soon to begin exploring the world hungrily.

I think I was more scared of labor than I was of bringing our son home and raising him.  That quickly changed and although I realized that motherhood is all of the wonderful things I had heard it would be, times one hundred (truly), it was also more overwhelming and unnerving than I was ever told it would be.  I know I’m not alone in feeling these things.  But does it ever seem like all we see are the mothers that make being vomited on and dealing with whining all day look like something glamorous and part of their deepest desires?  Maybe it’s something internal that tells us that we are “supposed to be” a certain way.  Maybe the pressure we put on ourselves should be talked about more.  I’ll start.  And I commit to talking about these things on a regular basis here in the Parenting section of this blog.  I invite you to join me.

“Unfulfilled Something”:  I’ll admit it.  The first few months to a year was tough.  As much as I loved my time at home with Joshua, there were moments when I felt so unfulfilled, I was ashamed of myself.  Motherhood is “supposed to be” the career that meets all of your heart’s longings, right?  Well, motherhood is also very monotonous, and it’s very easy to find yourself wanting to scream in boredom or cry from the lack of adult conversation.  But somehow admitting these feelings is a no-no to us.  Why?  Does giving them a voice make it too real?  Does it make us feel guilt?  (We will touch on guilt in subsequent blogs.)  I know for myself, I felt like I was being an ingrate to have any complaints or selfish to wonder if there was more to my life than diapers, Elmo, and the two-minute shower. 

Then I came across an excellent quote from an anonymous source:

“God is calling me to the high position of mothering and I am choosing to die a thousand small deaths to myself every single day while at the same time falling more in love with [my children].  I choose to say “yes” to God and follow His lead into the hidden life of a stay-at-home mom.  God is meeting me there.  In the hidden-ness I am discovering the holy.”

And this quote from G.K. Chesterton:

“To be Queen Elizabeth within a definite area, deciding sales, banquets, labors, and holidays; to be Whitely within a certain area, providing toys, boots, sheet cakes, and books; to be Aristotle within a certain area, teaching morals, manners, theology, and hygiene; I can understand how this might exhaust the mind, but I cannot imagine how it could narrow it.  How can it be a large career to tell other people’s children about the Rule of Three, and a small career to tell one’s own children about the universe?  How can it be broad to be the same thing to everyone, and narrow to be everything to someone?  No, a woman’s function is laborious, but because it is gigantic, not because it is minute.”

And I read a book called The Mission of Motherhood: Touching Your Child’s Heart for Eternity.  Excellent book!

And I prayed.

And after some time of dying to myself and being reinvigorated with the knowledge that God has given me the privilege of raising this child who will become, in large part, who his Daddy and I teach him to be, I realized that my feelings were normal, but they didn’t have to consume me, define me, or taint the profoundness of this career to which I am committed.  I was on the right track, regardless of how my flesh felt at those times, and continues to feel at times, and it will get better.  Our reward as mothers–that fulfilled feeling, if you will–does not always immediately follow a hard day’s work.  Many times it is years later, but even when our children don’t see the good we pour into their lives, God sees, and he is pleased.

Easter

In an attempt to bring about a teachable moment with my 4 year old son, I told him that Easter was this weekend, and tested him to see if he remembered what Easter was all about.

“Yeah,” he said, “Candy.”  Strike one.

“No, not candy, honey.”

“Ummm, finding eggs?” He tried again.  Strike two.

Suppressing my laughter (or tears) by this point, he finally said, “Loving Jesus” on his third attempt.  After trying to convince myself that I wasn’t a failure as a mother because my child did not spout a memorized Bible passage on the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ to me at that opportune time, I proceeded to tell him why Easter was so wonderful.

The temptation by the culture these days is to narrow down the truth of Jesus’ life, death and resurrection to a historical timeline of facts, and then that’s all.  Yes, we can believe that Jesus lived, died for our sins, and rose from the grave, but somehow these facts never make their way to our hearts.  We keep them at a distance, acknowledging that they are true, but never taking the next step to experiencing the life changing power of Jesus Christ.  Instead we place our full confidence in the things of this world.  But as Steven Curtis Chapman once sang, “There is more to this life than living and dying, more than just trying to make it through the day.”  Today, let’s truly experience what Jesus did for us on that Easter morning.

He is risen.  “But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed.  We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way; and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all” (Isaiah 53:5-6).  Good Friday reminds us about the gruesome death that Jesus endured on our behalf.  Knowing the state of our souls, Jesus died under intense scrutiny, ridicule and torture.  But the story does not end there.  Three days later, He rose again.  That Easter morning, an angel said those beautiful words, “He is not here; he has risen, just as he said.  Come and see the place where he lay” (Matthew 28:6). 

We are redeemed.  The plan of redemption has been set and carried out.  The word “redeem” literally means to “buy out of.”  Jesus bought us out of slavery to sin and we can be set free when we accept this gift of grace.  This has been done for us, because of God’s great love, not due to any works of our own.  And it is purely by faith that we receive it.  But so many times, we negate his act of mercy and grace by narrowing it down to rules and works.  Galatians 2:21 says that this is ”to repudiate God’s grace” (MSG).  Let us always remember that what Christ did on the cross for us and His offer of eternal life is not anything that we can earn.

Will we receive?  Let us resolve today to not so easily dismiss Jesus as just a historical figure.  As we celebrate today with food, family and friends, let us also remember that there is more to this life–there is a spiritual dimension to our lives and the Lord Jesus wants us to experience and worship Him in His entire splendor.  J.P. Moreland, Ph.D. says in Lee Strobel’s The Case for Christ, “The experiential test is, ‘He’s still alive, and I can find out by relating to him.’  If you were on a jury and heard enough evidence to convince you of someone’s guilt, it wouldn’t make sense to stop short of the final step of convicting him.  And for people to accept the evidence for the resurrection of Jesus and not take the final step of testing it experientially would be to miss where the evidence is ultimately pointing.”  Do you experience the power of the resurrection of Jesus in your life?  Have you taken that next step, beyond acknowledging the facts of Jesus’ act of love for us, to make it personal and truly experience Him in your everyday life?

Lord, thank you for your love, mercy and sacrifice on that cross.  Thank you for dying for my sins.  I believe that you established victory over death when you rose from the grave.  On this Easter weekend, I ask you to come into my heart and into my life.  Fill me with your peace and change me.  Make my life a testimony of your grace.  In Jesus’ name, Amen.

Happy Easter to everyone!

The Good Thing About a Cold. . .

For the past several days, I have been sloped over a steam inhaler and swallowing large quantities of Vitamin C.  What I thought was allergies in my son and I turned out to be a cold, hopefully our last of the season.  But if anything good can come from being in bed when you’d rather not be, and left with daytime television (which is horrible for the most part), is that if you are a lover of books, as I am, you have some free time to read.  I got through much of an excellent book that I’d like to recommend here.

Idols of the Heart:  Learning to Long for God Alone by Elyse Fitzpatrick

I was in the bookstore about a month ago and I sincerely asked the Lord to direct me to a book that He knew I needed.  I was feeling unsettled about some things and this book was the one He led me to.  This book is excellent at pointing out where we’ve turned our natural, human desires into idols.  Many people dismiss idolatry as only something people in biblical days did when they bowed down to a golden calf.  “Idols aren’t just stone statues,” Fitzpatrick says, “idols are the thoughts, desires, longings, and expectations that we worship in the place of the true God.  Idols cause us to ignore the true God in search of what we think we need” (pg 23).

“We create images out of our thoughts of our highest good or happiness.  And whether we’re aware of it or not, those images are the driving forces in our lives.  They direct our worship, either toward or away from God.  They tell us what we should cherish more than Him” (pg. 87).

Idols of the Heart walks you through identifying your idols and helps you to recover the Lord Jesus as first in your life, thoughts, and desires.  It is an excellent read and I highly recommend it for anyone’s Christian growth.

Fellow Writers, Can You Relate?

You paralyze my hand at its fingertips.

You flood my mind with thoughts

of wandering far.

You tell me to reject the expressiveness

and creativity that knocks on my door.

You pull the paper from me

causing ink to leave its laughter

in a dwindling dose of intensity.

You compose your mockery

from my lack of composition

and torment me through

to the very core that craves your death.

Be far from me, for you are

poison to my pen

and a parasite in my mind!

Oh, Writer’s Block.

Tax Day Tea Party

December 16, 1773–Boston Tea Party

April 15, 2009–Nationwide Tax Day Tea Party

This tax day, let’s be a part of history.  More importantly, let’s make our cumulative voices heard as we peacefully protest all the spending and bailouts imposed by this administration.  The idea for this Tax Day Tea Party began at the beginning of this year, with one man’s rant “to expose the bankrupt liberal agenda of the White House Administration and Congress, specifically, the flawed ‘Stimulus Bill’ and pork filled budget,” and led to an estimated 30,000 protesting across the country in February.  And now, on April 15th, there will be a larger and even more organized grassroots effort to protest how our tax dollars are being spent, and you can join in!  Some of the conservative radio and television talk show hosts are lending their names and passion behind this project by talking about it and/or attending it–Sean Hannity, Newt Gingrich, Glenn Beck, Michelle Malkin, just to name a few.

Click here to read the full story and all the details, as well as locate where to meet other like-minded protesters in a city near you on April 15th.  Together, let’s make our voices heard and do our part in protecting the future for our children and grandchildren!

Dramatic Depiction of Spiritual Warfare

This drama below may be the most moving depiction I have ever seen of the war that is waged for our earthly and eternal lives, between Satan (the Deceiver) and the Lover of our souls (the Lord God) who stops at nothing to woo us to Him. In what ways is Satan using worldly things to draw you away from the Lord?

“Satan does exist–our broken society testifies to his reality.  Those who ignore him do so at their own peril.  This is also true of Christians because we are all at war with him.  Spiritual warfare is personal; Satan crafts specific attacks for each individual.  Though he cannot steal a believer’s spirit from God, he can and does harass us physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually.  Every ambush and frontal attack is meant to defeat our witness so we can’t live a victorious Christ-centered life.”  (Dr. Charles Stanley, In Touch Ministries)