Identity

Where do we find our identity? 

The simple answer is obviously in Christ. 

But life is not simple. 

So often in our busy days of teaching and cleaning and correcting and chauffeuring and shopping and cooking and bathing (did I cover everything? :D) we lose ourselves. Somewhere, somehow, we get this idea in our head of the way things ought to be and we think this isn't it.  We sit down at the end of the day and it hits us that we have failed our children. Our teenager really isn't interested in taking that missions trip. Grade schooler #1 is forever hitting his brother in frustration.  Said brother complains and whines incessantly. We forget to go over the verse for Sunday School with our preschooler. Our 3yo cannot communicate verbally and so cannot move up from the nursery to Sunday School. And don't even get me started on the trips to the dentist where you cannot hide the fact that you never remember to floss their teeth (see, I knew I  had forgotten something in that list). All these things seem to work against our ability to remember in whom our identity lies. 

We are children of The King. 

Not just any king, but the Creator of everything. 

He calls us to leave behind our earthly ideas of perfect children imparted to us by books, our own notions, and even our parents. He knows they will not be perfect and He does not judge the way the the world judges us. He takes our seemingly feeble attempts at raising our children and HE makes something of it. 

My pastor likes to talk about Marathoner Faith. Faith that's in it for the long haul. Parenting is like that marathon of Faith. If we remember that our identity is in the One who gave us these children to raise for Him we will have the strength to run this race. 

21 Days of Prayer for Our Sons Link-Up

I've been writing about each day of the 21 Days of Prayer for Our Sons, but for this link-up I'm just going to write about the event & prayer in general.


I love prayer. It's the most incredible gift. Think about it. The God who created all promises to hear us and answer according to what He, who knows everything, says is best for us. There's no man-made god who promises that. Sure, sometimes our God says, "no," but that's because he knows that there's something better down the road.

I prayed for another child through years of secondary infertility and God always said "no." Finally God said (or so I imagine) "OK, she's ready for the child I have planned for her. The child that will help her learn to fight instead of letting other people dictate her life." ;)


I've learned a lot about prayer over the years. The most important thing is that prayer is not a way to boss God around. He's not our cosmic butler. And when we pray we can't just tell Him what to do. We must submit as even Christ submitted and said "Nevertheless, not my will but thine be done.". That's a painful prayer to pray. I've prayed it under daunting circumstances and can definitely see how Christ could have sweat blood.


I've learned, too, that prayer is powerful to change...me. I've been so pleasantly surprised over the past year. What actually started as a prayer for my son, has radically changed me. What a blessing it's been to see my own heart of stone softened by God's hand. All because I started praying for someone else. Now I can pray for others more readily. It has started me down the path of healing from past hurts. It has made me able to, while not condoning the sins of those who hurt me or my children, forgive them and realize that the pain they inflicted was born of their need of a Savior and a need to submit themselves to Him entirely.


So, as we moms pray through this month, may we find our own selves radically altered at the end. Ready to live completely different lives in the service of our God and King. Then our boys will be able to see how a changed heart, obedience, and submission to God can affect them for good.

Five Minute Friday: Real

Are you "real?" 

When the world suggests that we be "real," they actually mean, "do/say whatever you want, d*** the consequences." 

As Christians we need to be a different kind of real. 

We should not be concerned with getting out all that's inside us, but really loving others, really reaching out. 

We live in a real world, with real people, who are really possibly going to spend a real eternity in a real place called Hell. 

How will they hear the truth if we won't speak it? 

Why would they listen to us if we won't love them? 

Real Christianity hurts. 

It's painful. 

Our hearts break when those we love reject what we are trying to say to them. 

But that shouldn't stop us from being real. 

Only real people will be able to impact this really evil time for Christ. 

Be real.

Obedience and Submission to Authority--Days 2 & 3 of 21 Days of Prayer for our Sons

I did actually write something up yesterday but I didn't like it much and was too tired to change it by the time we got home from AWANA. Since obedience and submission both stick in the craw of a red-neck, I guess I'm not too far off putting them together in one post. :)

In all seriousness, we red-necks just simply cannot stand to be told what to do. We don't like the government doing it, and, unfortunately, we don't even like God doing it. Like many people, we ignore the parts of scripture that bother us and enjoy the parts we feel benefit us.

After spending most of my life doing that, God has finally brought me to a place where I realize that not only is it wrong, it's extremely detrimental to my children. Over the past year we have actually been learning to submit together. It hasn't been easy, but lately it's been better. 

It's amazing to watch God work and change people's hearts, especially when those hearts belong to your children. They aren't perfect, and I remind them that I know they never will be, but that God forgives them. 

Our children do need to learn to obey and submit or they will have a hard time in life (trust me, btdt). Sometimes we get so caught up in making them perfect in the eyes of those watching, family members, church leaders, teachers, etc., that we forget that, while the reality is that people will judge us based on our children's actions, we should not so much worry about what others think, but whether our children are truly submitting and being obedient, or just doing it because they have to. We don't want them to be sitting down on the outside while standing on the inside.

Yesterday one of the moms at the 21 Days of Prayer high school FB page talked about how she had made bad decisions when she went off on her own because her parents weren't there to lecture her. I really liked her idea that we need to help our children understand that their disobedience is not so much against us as it is against God. I can really see how this can help prepare them to make right choices on their own when Mom & Dad aren't around. Our children's decisions in life should be based, not on experience, but what God's word tells us.

I think the best part of this advice is that it is a constant reminder to me as a parent that these children are not mine. God has entrusted them to me to raise for Him. Like Hannah with little Samuel, one day I will have to release them and go home where all I can do then is pray for them. Wouldn't it be better to start that now than wait until the time comes? Then I can more than "hope" they will do OK, I can trust them to do the right thing. I think I might sleep better at night. :)

Heart Change--Day 1 of 21 Days of Prayer for Our Sons

While I don't know if I'll blog every day, I had a few seconds and hadn't blogged in a while so...:D

When I read through the list of things we'd be praying for each day, this, more than any of the others, stuck with me. Obviously, none of the others matter, or can happen at all, without this, but that's not the reason. The reason is, well, to be honest, I wasn't raised that way. I love my grandparents very much, and do not doubt their salvation, but to them being a Christian was sometimes akin to being an American, it was just something you were. Being a Christian wasn't something that radically altered your day-to-day living. It didn't really change the way you looked at the world (that was politics) and it didn't change the way you treated others (that was rearing, and we were rednecks).

After I was saved, or returned to the Lord, or whatever you want to call what happened to me when I was 19, I knew there was more. I saw it in the people at my church. I heard it from the pulpit. There was something else. Unfortunately, like an addict, I stayed around the people who had influenced me prior to this point and their version of Christianity was similar to my grandparents', so I never truly kicked my bad habits.

This continued into my marriage, into my parenting, and right on down the line until about 3 years ago. It was then that things began to happen that forced me to see that I was in great error. After that I began to pray for change. And, not surprisingly, change happened.

As I wrote earlier, this experience is why I signed up for this round of the 21 Days of Prayer for Our Sons. I have seen God work amazing things and I know that as we pray through this month for our sons even more amazing things will happen. We serve a great and powerful God who can even change the heart of a stubborn, willful, etc., woman after 40 years. If He can do that, He can do it in my kids too. :)