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I am switching this blog over to WordPress, so here is the link. All new posts will be there instead of here on Blogger.

Phone a Friend

Here is a blog post that encourages us to do something that I am pretty sure we don not do enough - seek out others for accountability and prayer in our day-to-day life situations.  Just a good reminder to me for the next time I am tempted to lose my temper and respond in impatience and exasperation towards my children. 

I am so very thankful for the wonderful Christian friends the Lord has brought into my life. He has been kind to grow friendships that are an integral part of His work to make me more like Him.

Recently, I used one of my “phone a friends” in a now humorous situation. But at the time it was a bit stressful. My youngest and her hair again…here’s what happened.

Read the entire post here.  

Yelling at My Kids

And here's a very helpful article on how real personal change takes place in our hearts and lives.  . 

An essential part of our growth and change as a child of God is coming to understand how God uses our daily struggles to bring about change in our hearts and our lives. In the midst of our struggles, we don’t naturally connect the ways we think, feel, and act with our ultimate destination of life in heaven with Christ. It takes the work of the Holy Spirit to help us bridge the gap and connect our struggles to our future in eternity.

Positive personal change takes place when our dream of change lines up with God’s purposes for change. Keeping eternity in view as we go about our daily lives gives us a broader perspective and gives us hope for change in the midst of our difficult situations and relationships.

This article gives a very practical example of how a person can look critically at her own behavior, then with the help of the Holy Spirit, change that behavior for the glory of God.

Read the rest here.  

Do You Love Your Spouse?

 Here is a blog post on a chapter from Paul David Tripp's new book on marriage, What Did You Expect? Redeeming the Realities of Marriage.  Wow!  May the Lord help me to be more like Christ! 

What is love?

Love is willing self-sacrifice for the good of another that does not require reciprocation or that the person being loved is deserving.

He then brings out several points of what this looks like in day-to-day life.  Very helpful!   I have been meaning to get the book and think this may spur me on to do so.

Where Do You Live?

Today, my husband and two year old son almost got hit by a car.  They were walking in the crosswalk at our local Target when a car sped right in front of them.  After pulling our son behind him, my husband was close enough to the car as it passed to slap it with his arm.  When he told me about it, my first instinct was to grab my son and hold him close and look at both of them with new eyes.  Our whole lives could have been drastically changed in an instant this morning.  It started out as such an ordinary day and could have ended so differently, but for God's grace to our family.

Here are thoughts I have had since then:

It started me thinking about God's grace to us every day.  We have taught our son the catechism question and answer:

Q. Why should you glorify God?  A. Because He made me and takes care of me.  

But how often do we take God's taking care of us for granted and not even think about it?  If my husband had not told me about their morning,  I probably wouldn't have even thought of this day as any different than any other day.  And what about all those other days, when I am not even aware of how He has, in His mercy, taken care of me?  The cars that didn't hit us, the things that didn't happen, the temptations that He steered us away from...  I pray that today will serve as a reminder to me to give thanks always and to glorify my God because he made me and takes care of me!

This incident also got me to thinking about my priorities.  Earlier this afternoon, I was praying for the Lord to help me to love my husband more, to serve him joyfully and delight in him now, willingly laying down my life for him while the Lord has given him to me.  The same with my son.  There may be times when he really frustrates me or I am just tired of having to be consistent and persevere with him, but I only have him for this time for so long.  Not that I need to live in daily fear of those I love being taken from me (that is not faith!), but it makes me ask the question, "Where am I living?"  Am I living only in this world, with the busyness of daily life and the temptation to indulge myself instead of serving others, or am I living with eyes towards eternity? 
This life is only temporary; its real purpose is to prepare us to be with the Lord for eternity.  Am I living with eyes of faith, seeing eternity in everything I do, from housework to serving my husband to disciplining or teaching my son, to playing with my children....  Am I choosing the "best" over the "good" when options present themselves?  Am I remembering that my training of my children is to fit them for heaven and not just for this world (which should lend itself to much more patience, gentleness, perseverance,...)?  Am I desiring, in all these things, to be made fit for heaven and for those around me to be made so also?  I pray that I may not be distracted by life and so miss the joy of what is real, both now and for eternity! 

Encouragement for Imperfect Parents

It is so easy to build up idealized views of parenting, wanting things to be all hunky dory like in the Anne books or others.  Then, when reality hits, like as soon as your first child is born, where do you go?  It's easy to become discouraged that things aren't working right, that this isn't the way it's supposed to be, and to worry that your children are doomed to have you as a parent.  To that end, here is a post I read this morning that reminded me of what is true and where my hope lies. 

I remember awaiting the arrival of our first child. I had plans for the type of dad I would be, the type of child he would be, and what our relationship would look like. I had faith for it…I had confidence in it. …then he was born!  Read the rest here. 

Seeking Your Child's Heart

We are realizing that we are entering a new stage of parenting with our older children, ages 6 and 7.  We are moving past  the more "simple" goal of immediate, cheerful, thorough obedience and moving further into their hearts.  Our goal is more to win their hearts now, to build relationship with them, to help them grow in character and in ability to choose the right over the wrong and the "best" over the "good."  To that end, here is an article by C. J. Mahaney on dealing with idols in your child's heart that is helpful in showing you how this can be done.

So I want to do two things. I want to try to introduce my son to a study that isn’t correction specific to an occasion. I want to study the heart, I want to study anger, I want to study idolatry, unrelated to an occasion where I am bringing discipline, so that the study hopefully can have the most effect. I want to engage in a study from Scripture. I want to choose age-appropriate material. I want to choose appropriate passages. And then my study with my son is supplemented by stories from my life, because I do the same thing. I don’t cry anymore like a child but I know how to cry in adult ways. I want my child to know that no matter what the category, I can identify. Read the entire article here. 

Family Devotions with Children

Here are some books and other tools that we have found to be useful in our family devotions with our kids, ages 7, 6, 3, and 4 mos.

Bible Reading

• The Jesus Storybook Bible (Sally Lloyd-Jones)
• The Big Picture Story Bible (David Helm)
• The Child's Story Bible (Catherine Vos)
• The Read Aloud Bible Stories series  (Ella Lindvall) (when our oldest were younger)
• Currently we are reading the "real" Bible with them, with passages from the Old and New Testaments.  

Catechism Memorization

• The Gospel for Children (Leuzarder)-  A catechism that goes through God, the Bible, sin, Jesus, Repentance and Faith, Counting the Costs with picture prompts.  This is our second time through with our older ones, and we will probably work on it with our  3 year old in the next year or so. 
• A children's catechism that is a mixture of A Catechism for Young Children and My First Book of Questions and Answers by Carine Mackenzie

Scripture Memory

• We work on the verses the kids bring home from Sunday school, as well as other verses that we feel are applicable at certain times. 

Other

• Wise Words for Moms (Ginger Plowman) - this was helpful in discussing how scripture applies and what it looks like in different situations. 

Music

• My husband usually plays and has us sing through a set of 2-3 hymns and songs, especially ones that we might be singing the following Sunday, to familiarize the kids with the words and tune ahead of time.  We most always end with a "dance" song for the kids.  :)  Our kids really look forward to this time! 

For the Young Mother

Here is a very encouraging article I read tonight about ministry, guilt and seasons of life as a young mother. 

Guilt is a young mother’s habitual shadow. It has a nasty way of soaking through many of her efforts at nurturing, serving and loving others. “Am I doing enough for my children? For others? What do they think of me? What does God think of me?” Read the rest here. 

Lessons Learned in the Garden

• Prepare the soil ahead of time, hard work as it is! It is much easier to plant in well-tilled and tended soil. As I learned today, it is also much easier to pull weeds out of well-loosened soil! It made me stop to pray that God would make my heart soft so that it might not only produce much healthy fruit, but also so that it would be that much easier to attack and weed out sin.
• Tending your garden in small daily amounts is a lot easier and much more effective than attacking it in marathon spurts here and there, which are tiresome and leave much too much time in between for weeds to grow! Slow and steady really does seem the best process. The more regular time I spend in the Word and in prayer, the more I will know the Lord and hopefully grow in delighting in Him. This, in turn, will keep my heart soft and help me identify and repent of sin much earlier in the process.
• Good weed prevention is key - mulch, weed barriers, etc., because once seedlings pop up, unless you are very familiar with what you have planted, you won't know the difference between wanted and unwanted ones and will have to wait until they are more full-grown to distinguish between the two. Hence, more work later and more time for the weeds to steal food and sunlight from the plants you are cultivating. I need to be daily repenting of sin, laying my heart before the Lord and asking Him to open my eyes. I also need to be daily delighting in Him, which will serve to wean me from my sinful habits and desires. It is much easier to deal with sin in its infant stages than to wait until it has conceived and borne bad fruit.

Just some thoughts as I was weeding today. May the Lord give me grace to delight in dependence upon Him, to repent daily of my sinful heart, and to rejoice more and more in His amazing work on my behalf! May He be glorified by the fruit I bear!

Is It OK for Mothers to Work Full-time Outside of the Home?

Here is an interview with John Piper, who was asked "Is it OK for mothers to work full-time outside of the home?"  Notwithstanding that there are always extreme circumstances, I encourage women to consider the blessing and great calling they have to motherhood and homemaking!  It is definitely the most fulfilling vocation I have ever had, using and developing all of my gifts and abilities to the extreme!  Everything I learned or developed in school or jobs is now put to the ultimate test! 

Having said it can be, I want to discourage it because mothering and homemaking are huge and glorious jobs. What children need at age one, five, six, fourteen, eighteen is simply amazing, and so is what those needs call forth from a woman's creativity and heart and mind, personally for each one of these little ones that are coming along.  Read the entire interview answer here. 

Teaching Money Management to Kids (and yourself!)

I have begun going through several resources on money management with the girls.  One if from Larry Burkett and another is from Dave Ramsey.  We just began "commission" charts and will be making the first week's payouts later today.  It is all very challenging and exciting for them (and me!).  Here is another article I ran across this afternoon that encourages me to press on in this very important training work. 

Randy Alcorn gives 10 tips for training your children to manage money:

1. Give your children something greater than money - your time.
2. Use life's teachable moments to train your children.
3. Take a field trip to a junkyard.
4. Teach your children to link money with labor.
5. Teach your children how to save.
6. Get your children started on the lifetime adventure of giving. 
7. Provide your children with financial planning tools.
8. Teach your children how to say "no."
9. Show your children how family finances work.
10. Never underestimate the power of your example.
Read the article here.

Getting Messy

Here is a good post on something I struggle with as a parent (and a control-freak!) - involving the kids in my chores or daily household activities, when it seems like it would be so much easier just to do them myself.

Lesson learned…when you involve your kids, things can get messy really fast! Of course, I say that tongue in cheek. But if you are like me, there can be the ongoing temptation to just “do it yourself” with regard to the home. It’s much easier and more effective to cook, clean, do laundry and manage keeping the house running ourselves. Our sense of accomplishment can be easily tied to what we can check off our lists, and incorporating our children into the mix just isn’t very efficient. Read the rest here.

Learning to Pray

As I was driving home from the store today, with a slight headache (after a week of headaches) and thinking about everything I had to do when I got home (unload the groceries, feed the baby, prepare the meat to freeze it, clean the house, sew the girls' dresses, make lunch,...), I found myself going down my usual path of becoming more and more negative and worked up about "me" and my needs.   I could predict my attitude towards my family when I got home if I continued in this vein, and it would not be pretty or God-glorifying.  However, I also happened to be listening to our new Seeds Scripture Memory CD, and the song that was playing was Philippians 4:6-7 :

Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.  And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

And there it was!  The solution to my growing anxiety.  You would think, after all of these years, that I would naturally flee to prayer all the time.  After all, Paul says to pray continually.  But, sad to say, I think I am just beginning to catch on.  I have no need to be anxious. About anything!  I can at any time go to the Lord of the universe, the Creator and Sustainer of all, my Redeemer, and lay my anxiety before Him.  And He gives peace!  He will guard my heart and my mind!  Novel idea, right? 
But it is a novel idea for me.  I don't need to confine my prayer times to my morning Bible reading time.  Or to church prayer meeting time.  Or to family devotion time.  I can pray all day long!  When I face a temptation to be anxious, I can pray right then!  I don't have to wait until I can get alone and make my prayer list and organize everything neatly.  I can cry out right now!  When I have a headache and know that I will be extra tempted to be exasperated and short with my children, I can confess my weakness and ask for a heart of mercy and patience towards them.  When my children disobey and I am tempted to respond in anger, I can confess my sin and ask for a heart of love for them.  When I am amazed at something He has done in our family - a new skill, a display of selflessness and sacrifice, a beautiful smile or unexpected love note - I can pray and thank Him for His goodness and wonderfully abundant gifts.  I can pray all day long! 
In the station of life that I am in right now - with a 3 month old and three other children needing me all day long - I don't always have the time or alertness to spend much time in prayer and reading in the mornings.  But I can pray all day long!  What a mercy that God is always available and that He loves to give good gifts to men!  And what mercy that He faithfully leads me along and continues to teach me such truths.  I just wanted to share this in the hopes that it might encourage someone else to not be anxious about anything.....

Successful Parenting

My friend posted a link to this article by Ed Welch of CCEF today, and I found it very helpful in thinking through my methods and goals in parenting. 

Everyone who has children thinks about the question: How can I be an effective or even successful parent? I have yet to meet a parent who simply wanted to pass children off into the next stage of life with basic physical health in tact but nothing more. Read the rest here. 

How the Gospel Works

Elyse Fitzpatrick gives an excellent explanation f the gospel and how it should work itself out in our mundane, daily lives (even in grocery shopping!). 

Let’s face it, no one reads a blog like this unless he (or she!) is deeply interested in and committed to growing in their own personal piety and helping others do the same. Because we love the Lord, we all want to grow into men and women who reflect His life more perfectly. For us, the question isn’t: “Should we seek to grow in holiness?” but rather, “How do we grow in holiness?” Further, most of us would answer the “How?”  question in this way, “We grow in holiness through the gospel.” And while that’s the right answer, the possibility exists that it’s not specific enough to be of real help. And so, we talk about the gospel, we want to point others to the gospel, but perhaps we’re not seeing how the specifics of the gospel connect to our daily struggles with unbelief and idolatry…our sin. So let’s take a moment to consider exactly how the individual truths of the gospel change us. Read the rest here. 

Time

Here is a good post on marriage, reminding us that we only have so much time and so had better be purposeful with it! 

Rich or poor, we are all allotted equal doses of time.  For each of us, we have 168 hours a week to spend.  That works out to 10,080 minutes.  There is no favoritism…no ways to earn more or deals to make that give us less.  We all stand on equal footing.  It seems like a lot, no?  No!
Remove about a third of them for sleep and you have about 112 hours left.  Take away about another 22 hours for eating and you’ve got just under 13 hours each day left.  Now, factor in driving to work, work, and driving home from work.  Add to that church events and Community Group.  Add to that baseball practice and dance lessons…you see where I’m going.  Time is precious and there are many, many things in our lives begging for more.  Yet, just like dollars, we have a limited supply.  And unlike dollars, we can’t even run into debt on our time.  There is a hard stop at 168 hours a week. Read the rest here. 

Summer Ideas for Parents

Now that summer is upon us, here is a post from one of the pastors at Covenant Fellowship near us with some great thoughts on how to be purposeful with your kids this summer.

School is coming to an end and the summer awaits.  Without school, much of their daily schedule has become open.  How ought we fill that during a summer?  The answers to that question are endless and varied according to each family.  Here are just a few ideas on constructive and fun uses of time this summer:

He lists the following areas:

• Relational education
• Elective education
• Home Projects
• Bible study
• Fun

Read here for the entire article and some great suggestions.

Just For Fun

And here's a video we have found to be very helpful in explaining men and women and the differences between us. 

Book Recommendations: Creative Counterpart by Linda Dillow

This book was one recommended to me 12 years ago when Matt and I were ready to be married in a few months.  It is one that I return to again and again every few years to "brush up" on what it means to be a godly woman and wife and to take inventory on how I am doing and where I need to grow.  Linda Dillow addresses what a woman's role really is to be and who we are created to be in Christ.

She defines a "creative counterpart" as

"...more than just a helper.  She is a woman who, having chosen (or having found herself in) the vocation of wife and mother, decides to learn and grow in all the areas of this role and to work as hard as if she were aiming for the presidency of a corporation.  Functioning as a professional in all areas of marriage is the essence of being a creative counterpart." (15, Nelson Publishers 1986)

She then goes on to describe how we can press on to function as a professional in all of these areas, including the areas of our relationship with God as primary, then secondarily as a wife to our husbands.  Dillow addresses common concerns and struggles that we, as women, face and goes on to exhort us to love our husbands while giving practical examples and applications.

Book Recommendations: Parenting

Here are several books that I have read or am in process of reading on parenting.  Again, I will add reviews and quotes when possible:

General Parenting Material:

• Shepherding a Child's Heart by Tedd Tripp
• Age of Opportunity by Paul Tripp
• Parenting in the Pew by Robbie Castleman
• Don't Make Me Count to Three by Ginger Plowman
• The Young Peacemaker by Corlette Sande
• Treasuring God in Our Traditions by Noel Piper
• Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood edited by John Piper and Wayne Grudem *I have not finished this one yet, but it is a great resource.

Parenting Girls:

• Girl Talk: Mother-Daughter Conversations on Biblical Womanhood by Carolyn Mahaney and Nicole Mahaney Whitacre
• All of the books I post under womanhood or femininity are applicable here, too!

Parenting Boys:

• Bringing Up Boys by James Dobson
• Future Men by Douglas Wilson
• Manly Dominion by Mark Chanski *I have not read this one yet, but it was recommended to me for this purpose. 

Book Recommendations: Marriage and Womanhood

I am going to post books that I have found helpful as I have time.  I will try to go back and add brief reviews and quotes as I have time (which is limited at the moment), but I wanted to get these lists up as a start.

These are books that I have found helpful in encouraging me in my role as a wife and woman in general:

• Creative Counterpart by Linda Dillow
• Feminine Appeal by Carolyn Mahaney
• Lies Women Believe: And the Truth That Sets Them Free by Nancy Leigh DeMoss
• God's Design for Women by Sharon James
• Radical Womanhood by Carolyn McCulley
• A Woman After God's Own Heart by Elizabeth George
• Womanly Dominion by Mark Chanski
• Intimacy Ignited: Conversations Couple to Couple by Linda Dillow and Lorraine Pintus 
• When Sinners Say "I Do" by Dave Harvey 
• The Peasant Princess sermon series on Song of Solomon by Mark Driscoll

Here are biographical books that have also been an encouragement to me:

• More Love to Thee: The Life and Letters of Elizabeth Prentiss by George Lewis Prentiss
• Marriage to a Difficult Man: The Uncommon Union of Jonathan and Sarah Edwards by Elizabeth Dodds
• My Heart in His Hands: Ann Judson of Burma, A Life, with Selections from Her Memoir and Letters by Sharon James

Goals

My desire for this blog is to have a place to share articles, books, advice, passages, etc. that have encouraged me in my walk as a wife and mother. We are all running the race towards the goal of finishing well in Christ, and we need each other as our "great cloud of witnesses" to encourage, exhort, support one another towards that goal. So, here is my feeble attempt towards not only helping myself, but hopefully encouraging others.

Raising Obedient Children

Here's a good post on raising obedient children.