…..and I promise they will, forgive them! We work so hard as moms to teach them, ” if you can’t say something nice, don’t say anything at all!”  Usually this is all directed at siblings or little friends and/or acquaintances, but one day I promise it will be directed at you!  It’s gonna hurt..A LOT!  Then you are going to blame yourself.  You are going to tell yourself, “i failed my kid”. , ” i didn’t do a good enough job.”   No matter their age!  Whether they are 3 or 13.

This was a journey I had to endure a lot over the last year.  Something that I have endured with each child as they test new waters.  As we teach them respect, love and kindness.  And each one has matured and moved past this phase. Well all except one.  One who doesn’t understand life the way most people do.  At the drop of a hat life can change from a happy  fun day to a dark storm brewing in the corner of a room just waiting to explode for no apparent reason at all.  And whoever is in his path may just be in the line of fire of his brutal tongue lashing.

One thing we learned right away was to show no emotion.  Emotion fed his anger and frustration so in a soft voice we would respond, ” there is nothing you could ever say or do could ever cause us not to love you.”

So he re-directed his speech.  To God.  Oh this hurt a thousand times worse!  Especially since this little guy had prayed to be saved at age four before all of this started!  I doubted his faith as he went through this emotional frustration.  I thought to myself , ” oh Lord please forgive this little guy, he has no idea what he is saying!”

One day in particular was awful as i sat there holding my screaming, thrashing child….i prayed for strength!  I prayed for courage.  I prayed for help.  I started to sing…..amazing grace grace how sweet the sound…. He fought even harder andI sang   louder.  All of a sudden he relaxed, all the tension relieved!  I prayed out loud.  When i was done with tears running down his red little face he looked at me and said, “mommy i am so sorry for all the things I said.  I didn’t mean them.   I don’t know why I said them.” I looked at him with tears in my eyes and said ” i forgive you buddy, but do you know who else you need to say sorry to?”  He looked down at his lap and said “God”. And without one single prompt his folded his hand and closed his eyes and prayed the most eloquent prayer of repentance I had ever heard…from anyone…ever!  Let alone a nearly 5 year old Autistic boy!  At that moment i knew God  knew and understood!

My doubts were all gone.  I had a new understanding of forgiveness!  God will never hold his words against him….and neither should I.  Somedays it’s harder than others.  I have to realize it’s not my failure.  He’s human.  He’s gonna have bad days!  He’s going to sin, for that matter so will  I.

So why not be that picture of Christ to all my kids…not just the one who struggles!  After all they will all struggle!

The neat thing is now he asks for Amazing Grace and for me to pray out loud! And in that I have helped my son!

i know that this season is difficult press forward…god will bless!

For more Dear Weary Mom posts. Head over to Hope for the Weary Mom.

Oh my dear weary friends I sit here on my couch this evening wondering what exactly happened to our summer.  We went from end of the school year activities, to our towns big celebration (which entailed weeks worth of float work and culminated in a parade). Then we went right into VBS. work, took a break for a week while hubby and the whole family went to an area christian kids camp and hubby did 3 nature adventure hikes for four days (we had a blast and Tornado got to do his first sleep away camp experience), then we got back in time for VBS to start.   Oh what fun that was as we transformed our church into Athens Greece and we took on characters!  After that I jumped right into  working on my daughters 7th birthday present!  (It was a lot. Of sewing but about 90 percent of it was finished on her birthday). And then when her birthday was all said and done, i sat back and said…what now?

I have roughly 2 1/2 weeks of summer vacation left and we have some fun things planned, but when I look back at the beginning of June two things flood my heart.

#1- i failed-  i didn’t reach any of my goals for this summer.   Did I accomplish things, of course but it wasn’t what I wan’t to.

#2 my kids didn’t have the best summer I had planned to give them

 

Then I stop say….”Girl you know better!   It’s not about what you want.  It’s about what God wants.  And as for the kids, they had a blast!  Running through the woods, playing in the kiddie pool, staying up late, trying new foods, finding frogs and salamanders, finishing the fence and having safe play outside.  They know nothing about the best summer ever, that you had planned for them!  ”

This was something that I did to the best of my ability.

I lived the 1 Corinthians 10:31 principle of doing all to the glory of God….and I will continue to do so for the next two and a half weeks!

And what if you didn’t?

Each day is a new slate, a new beginning so make a choice, you can make two.

Make the choice to accept God’s plans over your own AND to do whatever it is God. Has planned to the best of your ability!

Does all of this mean we shouldn’t make plans, no, no it doesn’t.  It means that if God has something else in mind, roll with it.  Don’t complain.  Usually in those plan B moments God plans on ministering to us or through us which results inblessings either   way!

So yes our summer is almost over and no it didn’t go as I had planned it, but it was a good one nonetheless and I thank the Lord for that!

 

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Dear Weary Mom,

Yeah you..I’ m talking to you..matter of fact I’m talking to all of you! Me too! This is going to serve as a reminder to myself as well.

I’m sure we have all heard of a call to arms, or a call to lay down arms but today I want to call all of you to lay down your ideals. Yes your ideals! They are holding you back, causing guilt, a sense of Failure, and discontent.

Ideals are rooted in perfection.
They may look something like this……

“My children will be potty trained just after they turn two”

“My home will always be in order when i go to bed at night”

“My children will sit quietly and read a book, while I talk on the phone”

“I will be calm and patient in every circumstance”

Do these sound familiar? I hope so! These were only a few of my ideals. I must confess that my ideals were a mile long when we got married.

Maybe your ideals were a large family, or a small family, or a family, but maybe that’s not what happened. Maybe you had a 5 year plan….with kids every two years BUT All of a sudden you find yourself 4 kiddos in 5 tears (GUILTY)

Maybe you had the ideals for your kids….they would talk by a certain age, walk by a certain age, read and write, college!

They are all things that we tuck into our head….some of them are dreams and goals, but at some point they move from just dreams and goals to ideals. And from there we somehow place our success and failure into whether or not our ideals are met.

Let’s be honest there is only one man and woman who had a shot at living the ideal, but they made a terrible choice.a choice that would affect every person born until Jesus, and every person after him! You see the ideal wasn’t good enough for Adam and Eve….and that is what we long for to have back (yeah it took me a while to wrap my brain around that one). I fight every day for the very thing adam and eve chose to give up.

That’s what the Israelites fought for in the Old Testament and it’s what the Pharisees demanded in the New Testament and it is what we lie to ourselves each and everyday for when we tell ourselves ” i can’t even get the dishes done, i have failed AGAIN”

This is where grace comes in….it’s not until God gave grace through Jesus that the ideal was met. Grace is perfection in Jesus. You won’t be perfect until you get to heaven. So Jesus gave you grace, you weren’t perfect before that, so embrace that grace to yourself, lay down the ideals that were unrealistic to begin with and live each day with one thing in mind…

In whatever you eat or whatever you drink or whatever you do , so ALL to the glory of God
1 Corinthians 10:31
(From memory. Emphasis added)

When this is your focus, those ideals seem to slip away and you know that you are doing your best…..and that’s all that God asks of you.

So today lay down those ideals….at the feet of Jesus, and live each moment to the glory of God!

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Dear Weary mom,

if your week has been anything like my week, it’s no wonder we are weary :). Unfortunately my weekend holds no hope of rest!

Tomorrow is graduation night for a couple of girls in our youth group,(and I wouldn’t miss this for the world! Those girls mean a lot to me) Saturday morning hubby has a funeral to do and two hours after said funeral, he has to be at church for a wedding he is doubg as well. then there is all of the Sunday activities. I love being a pastors wife, and it is my calling! But it’s no wonder we as moms get so weary…..notice how there wasn’t any family events in there! So add four kids to the mix…and a dog! WHEW. I am exhausted already.

there comes a point though that I find that I am reminding myself that someday i won’t have to do all these things. as we live these broken lives in a fallen world, there is no such thing as perfect peace and rest. How many times have you fallen into bed totally exhausted just to wake up a few short hours for any number of reasons.

1. A sick child
2. Insomnia–for who knows why!
3. Dreams/ nightmares
4. You hear a noise—or you THINK you heard a noise
5. Worry for some reason, they all vary depending on what’s going on in your life at the time.

And the list could go on and on and on, and it usually does. Butjust like my weekend is full and holds no hope of rest, neither does his world. But there will come a day dear friend where we will have PERFECT (yes i mean perfect as in FLAWLESS) peace and rest. We will no longer be weary moms!

ALL. Of those reasons I listed above, and ALL of your reasons you added to it, will NEVER happen again.

What joy that brings my heart….seriously. I feel at times this life will drag on for eternity, but it won’t. Every birthday and holiday is a reminder of just how fast time flies!

I hope that is an encouragement to you as it is to me. No I don’t want to rush through this amazing life God has given me. But on those super hard days, weeks, months, or yes even years, that one thought of one day reaching that perfect peace and God promises, makes me be able to face one more day!

I think that’s why God gives us a glimpse of what’s not going to be in heaven more than what is. We understand the hurts and pains of this life right now, and to not have to go through them someday is HOPE! As for what is going to be there….it’s far too hard for us to understand that because it’s nothing like we have ever seen!

So my dear friend yes this life is wearisome. Monotony is all around us….our schedules keep us hopping and exhausted, and our kids love us and drive us crazy all at the same time, but yet when all this seems to be dragging on we have hope of true perfect peace and rest. May you cling to that hope til you reach it, I know I will!

 

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