Tag: Faith

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exerpt from “Streams In The Desert”

The summer showers are falling. The poet stands by the window watching them. They are beating and buffeting the earth with their fierce downpour. But the poet sees in his imaginings more than the showers which are falling before his eyes. He sees myriads of lovely flowers which shall be soon breaking forth from the watered earth, filling it with matchless beauty and fragrance. And so he sings:

It isn’t raining rain for me, it’s raining daffodils;
In every dimpling drop I see wild flowers upon the hills.
A cloud of gray engulfs the day, and overwhelms the town;
It isn’t raining rain for me: it’s raining roses down.

Perchance some one of God’s chastened children is even now saying, “O God, it is raining hard for me tonight. Testings are raining upon me which seem beyond my power to endure. Disappointments are raining fast, to the utter defeat of all my chosen plans. Bereavements are raining into my life which are making my shrinking heart quiver in its intensity of suffering. The rain of affliction is surely beating down upon my soul these days.”

Withal, friend, you are mistaken. It isn’t raining rain for you. It’s raining blessing. For, if you will but believe your Father’s Word, under that b eating rain are springing up spiritual flowers of such fragrance and beauty as never before grew in that stormless, unchastened life of yours.

You indeed see the rain. But do you see also the flowers? You are pained by the testings. But God sees the sweet flower of faith which is upspringing in your life under those very trials.

You shrink from the suffering. But God sees the tender compassion for other sufferers which is finding birth in your soul.

Your heart winces under the sore bereavement. But God sees the deepening and enriching which that sorrow has brought to you.

It isn’t raining afflictions for you. It is raining tenderness, love, compassion, patience, and a thousand other flowers and fruits of the blessed Spirit, which are bringing into your life such a spiritual enrichment as all the fullness of worldly prosperity and ease as never able to beget in your innermost soul.

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Not In Vain!

Not in vain, the tedious toil, On an unresponsive soil,
Travail, tears in secret shed, Over hopes that lay as dead.
All in vain, thy faint heart cries. Not in vain, thy Lord replies:
Nothing is to good to be; Then believe, believe to see.

Did thy labor turn to dust? Suff’ring – did it eat like rust
Till the blade that once was keen, As a blunted tool is seen?
Dust and rust thy life’s reward? Slay the thought; believe thy Lord!
When thy soul is in distress, Think upon His faithfulness.

Though there be not fig nor vine, In thy stall there be no kine,
Flock be cut off from the fold, Not a single lamb be told,
And thy olive berry fall Yielding no sweet oil at all,
Pulse-seed wither in the pod – Still do thou rejoice in God.

But consider, was it vain, All the travail on the plain?
For the bud is on the bough; It is green where thou didst plow.
Listen, tramp of little feet, Call of little lambs that bleat;
Hearken to it. Verily, Nothing is too good to be.

~Amy Carmichael~

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Many mothers apply this beautiful poem to the toil of motherhood.

I personally apply it to my toil in search of motherhood. A large part of me desperately wants to give up. It is too hard to keep trying to have children, keep losing them to early death, and now to have doctor after doctor give me news that this may well just be the story of my life (especially without some drastic interventions). “It is in vain,” I often hear my brain telling myself, “Give up now while you still have a chance and before the ridicule gets any heavier.”

But, like it or not, God has called us to a particular path — and apparently it just includes more drastic interventions than I ever dreamed would be necessary. God continues to give wisdom when we seek it: to us as we use our weak selves to ram down the doors of Heaven and beseech our Father with frequent & fervent prayers, to my parents who are helping us seek godly wisdom & wise counselors, specifically to my father who is most actively pounding down physical doors to attain the golden gift of wisdom. And since God is leading us, it is not in vain. Most certainly not. Whatever His purposes are, they are most definitely not vain.

And so this poem, in all its striking beauty and truth, brings me to hiccups of tears every time I read it.

My life is not in vain.
My womb is not in vain.
My childrens’ lives (no matter how short on earth) are not in vain.
Our prayers are not in vain.
Our desires are not in vain.
The research, the consultations, the tests are not in vain.
The medical treatments are not in vain.
Not a single shot, pill, blood draw, or infusion is in vain.
These myriads of “little deaths” that I am called to die for my family are not in vain.

And this, my friends, is good news for this tired, broken mama. Good news, indeed.

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Saturday May 22, 2010

Isaiah 45:5-7
I am the LORD, and there is no other,
besides Me there is no God;
I equip you, though you do not know Me,
that people may know, from the rising of the sun
and from the west, that there is none besides Me;
I am the LORD, and there is no other.
I form light and create darkness,
I make well-being and create calamity,
I am the LORD, who does all these things.

Calamity. In my home. Where we grieve the death of our youngest baby.
And calamity. In the home of my friend. Where she grieves the death of her baby girl today too.
We stand with them in their grief.
We weep together for the deaths of our covenant children.
Perplexed at the calamities around us.
Certain that God is good, and equally as certain that He is terrible.

Psalm 6:2-3
Be gracious to me, O LORD, for I am languishing;
heal me, O LORD, for my bones are troubled.
My soul also is greatly troubled.
But you, O LORD— how long?
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Thursday May 20, 2010

Dear brothers and sisters,

I cannot tell you how much I detest writing these things. May God be gracious.
On Monday we learned that the child Melissa and I were expecting has gone to join five siblings in the loving arms of our Lord. God is good and faithful, even when our eyes of flesh fail to see it through the tears of grief. Please be in prayer for us. We feel like we have gone 6 rounds with a prize fighter. It is very hard to look ahead with any hope and in times like this faith does not come easy. Pray that God would supply grace for our every need. Pray that God would mend our broken hearts and carry us forward in peace. Pray that we would mourn the loss of another child in righteousness and that we would flee from the temptations to doubt, fear or let bitterness and anger taint our hearts. Pray that God would show His strength in our weakness.

We have named our baby Victory Athanasius, which means “victory of the immortal”. Christ has defeated sin and death. He is our first-fruits; our guarantee of eternal life. Our baby has put on immortality and is reveling in the victory bought by our Lord Jesus Christ. Christ has triumphed, and our child wears the white robes of His righteousness now and forever more.

“When the perishable puts on the imperishable, and the mortal puts on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is written:

‘Death is swallowed up in victory.’ ‘O death, where is your victory?
O death, where is your sting?’

The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.” (1 Cor. 15:54-56)

May God grant His perfect grace and peace. To Him be the glory, even in the unrelenting tears.

Steven

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Monday May 10, 2010


I found so much Truth in the pages penned in this book.

So without further ado, here are my favored

excerpts & quotes from

A Grief Observed

by C. S. Lewis

No one ever told me that grief felt so like fear. I am not afraid, but the sensation is like being afraid. The same fluttering in the stomach, the same restlessness, the yawning. I keep on swallowing. (p. 1)

There are moments, most unexpectedly, when something inside me tries to assure me that I don’t really mind so much, not so very much, after all… Then comes a sudden jab of red-hot memory and all this “commonsense” vanishes like an ant in the mouth of a furnace. (p. 2)

And no one ever told me about the laziness of grief. Except at my job—where the machine seems to run on much as usual—I loathe the slightest effort. Not only writing but even reading a letter is too much. (p. 3)

Part of every misery is, so to speak, the misery’s shadow or reflection: the fact that you don’t merely suffer but have to keep on thinking about the fact that you suffer. I not only live each endless day in grief, but live each day thinking about living each day in grief. (p. 9)

I must have some drug, and reading isn’t a strong enough drug now. By writing it all down (all?—no: one thought in a hundred) I believe I get a little outside it [grief]. (p. 10)

Her absence is like the sky, spread over everything. (p. 11)

One never meets just Cancer, or War, or Unhappiness (or Happiness). One only meets each hour or moment that comes. All manner of ups and downs. Many bad spots in our best times, many good ones in our worst. (p. 13)

What pitiable cant to say, “She will live forever in my memory!” Live? That is exactly what she won’t do. (p. 22)

You never know how much you really believe anything until its truth or falsehood becomes a matter of life and death to you. (p. 25)

Talk to me about the truth of religion and I’ll listen gladly. Talk to me about the duty of religion and I’ll listen submissively. But don’t come talking to me about the consolations of religion or I shall suspect that you don’t understand. (p. 28)

And poor C. quotes to me, “Do not mourn like those that have no hope.” It astonished me, the way we are invited to apply to ourselves words so obviously addressed to our betters. What St. Paul says can comfort only those who love God better than the dead, and the dead better than themselves. If a mother is mourning not for what she has lost but for what her dead child has lost, it is a comfort to believe that the child has not lost the end for which it was created. And it is a comfort to believe that she herself, in losing her chief or only natural happiness, has not lost a great thing, that she may still hope to “glorify God and enjoy Him forever.” A comfort to the God-aimed, eternal spirit within her. But not to her motherhood. The specifically maternal happiness must be written off. Never, in any place or time, will she have her son on her knees, or bathe him, or tell him a story, or plan for his future, or see her grandchild. (p. 30)

Aren’t all these notes the senseless writhings of a man who won’t accept the fact that there is nothing we can do with suffering except to suffer it? Who still thinks there is some device (if only he could find it) which will make pain not to be pain. It’s doesn’t really matter whether you grip the arms of the dentist’s chair or let your hands lie in your lap. The drill drills on. (p. 38)

And grief still feels like fear. Perhaps, more strictly, like suspense. Or like waiting; just hanging about waiting for something to happen. It gives life a permanently provisional feeling. It doesn’t seem worth starting anything. (p. 38)

I hear a clock strike and some quality it always had before has gone out of the sound. What’s wrong with the world to make it so flat, shabby, worn-out looking? Then I remember. (p. 40)

This is one of the things I’m afraid of. The agonies, the mad midnight moments, must, in the course of nature, die away. But what will follow? Just this apathy, this dead flatness? Will there come a time when I no longer ask why the world is like a mean street, because I shall take the squalor as normal? Does grief finally subside into boredom tinged by faint nausea? (p. 41)

What do people mean when they say, “I am not afraid of God because I know He is good”? Have they never even been to the dentist? (p. 51)

The time when there is nothing at all in your soul except a cry for help may be just the time when God can’t give it: you are like the drowning man who can’t be helped because he clutches and grabs. Perhaps your own reiterated cries deafen you to the voice you hoped to hear. (p. 53)

I think I am beginning to understand why grief feels like suspense. It comes from the frustration of so many impulses that had become habitual. Thought after thought, feeling after feeling, action after action, had H. for their object. Now their target is gone. I keep on through habit fitting an arrow to the string; then I remember and have to lay the bow down. So many roads lead thought to H. I set out on one of them. But now there’s an impassable frontier-post across it. So many roads once; now to many culs de sac. (p. 55)

When you have learned to do quadratics and enjoy doing them you will not be set them much longer. The teacher moves you on. (p. 57)

God has not been trying an experiment on my faith or love in order to find out their quality. He knew it already. It was I who didn’t. In this trial He makes us occupy the dock, the witness box, and the bench all at once. He always knew that my temple was a house of cards. His only way of making me realize the fact was to knock it down. (p. 61)

Getting over it so soon? But the words are ambiguous. To say the patient is getting over it after an operation for appendicitis is one thing; after he’s had his leg off it is quite another. After that operation either the wounded stump heals or the man dies. If it heals, the fierce, continuous pain will stop. Presently he’ll get back his strength and be able to stump about on his wooden leg. He has “got over it.” But he will probably have recurrent pains in the stump all his life, and perhaps pretty bad ones; and he will always be a one-legged man. There will be hardly any moment when he forgets it. Bathing, dressing, sitting down and getting up again, even lying in bed, will all be different. His whole way of life will be changed. All sorts of pleasures and activities that he once took for granted will have to be simply written off. Duties too. At present I am learning to get about on crutches. Perhaps I shall presently be given a wooden leg. But I shall never be a biped again. (p. 61)

Still, there’s no denying that in some sense I “feel better,” and with that comes at once a sort of shame, and a feeling that one is under a sort of obligation to cherish and foment and prolong one’s unhappiness. (p. 62)

Tonight all the hells of young grief have opened again; the mad words, the bitter resentment, the fluttering in the stomach, the nightmare unreality, the wallowed-in tears. For in grief nothing “stays put.” One keeps on emerging from a phase, but it always recurs. Round and round. Everything repeats. Am I going in circles, or dare I hope I am on a spiral? But if a spiral, am I going up or down it? (p. 66)

How often—will it be for always?—how often will the vast emptiness astonish me like a complete novelty and make me say, “I never realized my loss till this moment”? The same leg is cut off time after time. The first plunge of the knife into the flesh is felt again and again. (p. 67)

I thought I could describe a state; make a map of sorrow. Sorrow, however, turns out to be not a state but a process. It needs not a map but a history, and if I don’t stop writing that history at some quite arbitrary point, there’s no reason why I should ever stop. There is something new to be chronicled every day. Grief is like a long valley, a winding valley where any bend may reveal a totally new landscape. As I’ve already noted, not every bend does. Sometimes the surprise is the opposite one; you are presented with exactly the same sort of country you thought you had left behind miles ago. That is when you wonder whether the valley isn’t a circular trench. But it isn’t. There are partial recurrences, but the sequence doesn’t repeat. (p. 68)

I was wrong to say the stump was recovering from the pain of the amputation. I was deceived because it has so many ways to hurt me that I discover them only one by one. (p. 71)

Turned to God, my mind no longer meets that locked door; turned to H., it no longer meets that vacuum—nor all that fuss about my mental image of her. My jottings show something of the [grieving] process, but not so much as I’d hoped. Perhaps both changes were really not observable. There was no sudden, striking, and emotional transition. Like the warming of a room or the coming of daylight. When you first notice them they have already been going on for some time. (p. 71)

Am I, for instance, just sidling back to God because I know that if there’s any road to H., it runs through Him? But then of course I know perfectly well that He can’t be used as a road. If you’re approaching Him not as the goal but as a road, not as the end but as a means, you’re not really approaching Him at all. (p. 79)

When I lay these questions before God I get no answers. But a rather special sort of “No answer.” It is not the locked door. It is more like a silent, certainly not uncompassionate, gaze. As though He shook His head not in refusal but waiving the question. Like, “Peace, child; you don’t understand.” (p. 81)

There is also, whatever it means, the resurrection of the body. We cannot understand. The best is perhaps what we understand least. (p. 89)

How wicked it would be, if we could, to call the dead back! She said not to me but to the chaplain, “I am at peace with God.” She smiled, but not at me. (p. 89)

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Sunday May 9, 2010

Psalm 113
Praise the LORD! Praise, O servants of the LORD,
praise the name of the LORD!

Blessed be the name of the LORD
from this time forth and forevermore!
From the rising of the sun to its setting,
the name of the LORD is to be praised!

The LORD is high above all nations,
and His glory above the heavens!
Who is like the LORD our God,
who is seated on high,
who looks far down
on the heavens and the earth?
He raises the poor from the dust
and lifts the needy from the ash heap,
to make them sit with princes,
with the princes of his people.
He gives the barren woman a home,
making her the joyous mother of children.
Praise the LORD!

I have learned that Mother’s Day is beautiful and bittersweet. The sweetness is lovely and fresh. But the bitter side of it comes from losing my children. From not being able to hold them. I know so many people who have lost their mothers or lost their child(ren) or who have broken relationships with their mother or child(ren). These are people for whom Mother’s Day is especially difficult. And I know women who are infertile; women who desperately desire to be mothers, but who struggle to conceive precious babies. I know unmarried women who desire nothing more than to be married, so they can devote their lives to serving a husband and children.

Who knew that silly little Hallmark holidays could bring such pain and anguish into peoples’ lives? Well, I do.

Did you know that Mother’s Day was created originally by a woman who was not a mother, in order to honor her deceased (and bereaved) mother?? Here’s the story behind it. Interesting how the holiday has changed over the years, but also interesting to see where it originated.

Anyway… my husband bought me some beautiful lilies, made me breakfast in bed, and has the table all set because my brother’s family and my parents are coming over for dinner after church ~ and the gentlemen are making the meal! How delightful. 🙂
Today I get to hold my sweet little boy on my lap. And I get to caress my sweet seventh baby from the closeness of my womb. And I have the beautiful knowledge that five of my covenant children are rejoicing in Heaven, all because they went from the comfort of my womb to the peace of God’s mansions. I get to visit with them in worship in about two hours ~ where my husband and I will sit in the heavenlies with our seven descendants yet again.

So I am prayerful and thankful and joyful!!
And eager to worship this morning with that attitude. Bittersweet or not. 🙂

HAPPY MOTHER’S DAY to my mother, my mother-in-law, my sisters-in-law, and my friends.
May the Lord bless you in these beautiful & difficult efforts.
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Tuesday May 4, 2010

I finished reading Womanly Dominion during my infusion today, and wanted to share some bits with you all.

The Lord bless you!

Excerpts from Womanly Dominion: More Than a Gentle and Quiet Spirit

By Mark Chanski

The false stereotype of a Christian woman being a helpless and frail mouse, who passively shades herself under the parasol of her soft femininity, and adoringly waits for her husband to do all the heavy lifting, is shattered by the Scriptures. (p 13)

[H]er jewelry is not only the necklace of “a gentle and quiet spirit,” but also the bracelets of “strength and dignity.” (p 13)

“Men and women alike” are both called to subdue and rule in the various spheres of their lives. (p 15)

It’s absolutely and wonderfully true that women are rightly designated in the Bible the “weaker vessel” (1 Peter 3:7) who are to display a “gentle and quiet spirit, which is precious in the sight of God” (1 Peter 3:4). But such soft and tender qualities do not tell the whole story. There’s much more to the challenging mission assigned to the godly woman by her Maker, Redeemer, and Lord. (p 15)

Womanly dominion is a blessed virtue, as urgently needed in our day as manly dominion. (p 21)

Godly women, made in the image of God, must repeatedly remind themselves, “Play your position!” They must loyally resolve to stay at their God-assigned posts, to the glory of God, despite the shouts from the misguided cultural sidelines. (p 22)

[E]very image-bearing man and woman is obligated to imitate his/her Maker in his own miniature world. Each is assigned a lifelong plot of wild earth that he/she is to stake out, cut down, plow up, plant, and harvest. We must aggressively subdue, and not passively loiter. (p 29)

[A] woman is to dominate aggressively her environment, rather than allow her environment to dominate her. (p 31)

Children are introduced not merely as a preferential option but as a holy obligation. (p 32)

Fruitfulness varies in its manifestation among different plants. A fruitful grape-vine will sport many, many clusters of grapes. On the other hand, a productive pumpkin vine may only generate four or five pumpkins. A farmer is very thankful if a single cornstalk produces two ears! Fruitfulness will vary from womb to womb, family to family. Revelation, providence, liberty and wisdom must be conscientiously blended. (p 32)

God’s procreation mandate assigns to man and woman the sacred obligation to make the earth swarm and teem with image-bearing creatures. (p 33)

God’s fetching glory for Himself is the chief purpose for mankind and womankind. (p 33)

What is the mightiest strategy for influencing the world unto God-glorifying good? It was unveiled in the Garden of Eden. “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it.” Women of dominion who give their lives to the bearing and nurturing of God-fearing offspring are the power brokers of the earth. The hand that rocks the cradle is the hand that rules the world! (p 37)

Procreation summons a woman to an extraordinarily God-glorifying enterprise; and godly women of dominion have a peculiar eye toward it. How can she effectively subdue and rule the earth? She can best accomplish it by taking seriously her creation mandate. (p 38)

For a woman who rejects the mind of the world and puts on the mind of Christ, it is counted a great honor to follow in the submissive footsteps of the servant-hearted Son of God. (p 40)

Sure, [women of dominion] will encounter pain and thorns and thistles in the process. Sure, they’ll need to exercise Herculean discipline and self-denial. But the wonderful final-day revelation will leave them with no regrets. (p 47)

[L]adies, consider yourselves warned. The Liar takes a special pleasure in whispering into your pretty ears. You are darling targets for his dart-like wiles. (p 48)

[The enemy] detests a woman on a mission, subduing and ruling her life to the glory of god with a dominion mindset. Such mighty women are a great threat to his dark kingdom. So he continuously slithers across your path, and with subtlety, persuades you to reject your positional loyalty and your win-it tenacity. (p 49)

Women of dominion trample serpents under their feet (Psalm 91:13). (p 52)

Consider the excellent wife of Proverbs 31. Her most striking trait is the fact that she is so utterly selfless. (Proverbs 31:12, 13, 14, 15, 27)… And what does such selfless, servant-hearted, help-meeting get her? Is she oppressed and abused? To the contrary, her husband is crazy about her! He’s convinced she’s one in a million, “…worth is far above jewels. The heart of her husband trusts in her.” And he tells her so: “Her husband…praises her…” (31:28). He brags about her to his friends… His children honor and praise her… (p 55)

Stay-at-home mothers may be underpaid, but they’re certainly not underchallenged! (p 59)

Peter does highlight a specific strength in Sarah, namely, her subduing and ruling over her fears. This is a fundamental battle for any woman. Panic attacks are a common affliction in stressful times. Sarah is a heroine worthy of imitation, for instead of fretting and surrendering, she managed to “hope in God” and “do what is right without being frightened by fear.” (p 64)

What fearful heart piercings loving mothers must endure! They pour their hearts into their children. Then they must helplessly watch, sometimes from tear-drenched pillows, their darlings run the gauntlet of a wicked and cruel world. Godly mothering isn’t for cowards! The same is true for godly wifing. (p 65)

Fear is the most strangling emotion known to man or woman. (p 73)

We must be men and women of dominion, boldly making decisions on the basis of our duty, obligation, and opportunity, not on the basis of our fears and insecurities. (p 74)

There’s a time for a woman to resignedly sit back and wait for the Lord to change her husband’s mind. And there’s a time for a woman to assertively rise up and take matters into her own hands. Abigail knew how to tell time. (p 77)

Abigail also knew how to remain sweet. A besetting sin of many women is sharp-tongued argumentativeness. (p 77)

Furthermore, understand that it’s not only Nabals who need Abigails. Davids need them, too. Men “after God’s own heart” often need their women to step in front of them when they’re charging down a mountainside to do something they may later regret. (p 78)

Faithful and loving counsel is a stock element of a God-honoring marriage. An Abigail-like wife is woman enough to deliver it. A David-like husband is man enough to receive it. (p 79)

What mission could be more meaningful than being an excellent wife alongside a mighty man of God? (p 82)

Practical womanly dominion without devotional womanly dominion can easily deteriorate into atheistic enterprising. (88)

Such atheistic enterprising is the very thing we do if we put our hands to the daily plow without taking time to pray and plead for the help of God to establish the work of our hands. (p 88)

Devotional consistency requires practical creativity. (p 88)

Be definition, motherhood is that dignified and strenuous life vocation taken up by a woman who has resolved to give herself fully to the task of nurturing godly children from a godly home environment. (p 98)

[S]tay-at-home mothering did not culturally evolve from the influence of heavy-handed men; it was sovereignly ordained by the decree of our good heavenly Father. (p 99)

Mothering is a profoundly sanctifying vocation which cultivates the graces of love, patience, kindness, gentleness, faithfulness, self control, selflessness, humility, dependence, prayerfulness, and joy as none other. (p 101)

Motherhood is an honorable and sacred vocation. The King of Heaven has specially appointed the mother to accomplish a noble and lofty mission. Though some shrill voices in our dimwitted society may belittle her occupation, she should press on in her duties with her head held high. She’s about the King’s business. (p 101)

How does a married woman with children forge a noble reputation in God’s eyes? She hammers it out on the anvil of sacrificial mothering. She gives herself wholly to the sacred mission of nurturing God-fearing children, from a spiritually healthy home environment. (p 102)

The cream, and not the dregs, of her energies and time are to be poured into her loving her husband and children from her household headquarters. (p 103)

A homemaking mother is not merely a conservative and anachronistic option, but a God-ordained and sacredly instituted vocation. (p 105)

Homemaking motherhood is no refuge for the inept woman who can’t cut it in the real world. Rather, stay-at-home mothering is the ultimate profession for the elite of her gender. (p 108)

Those motherly hands are molding characters which will become men and women who will turn the world upside down either for good or for evil. Now that’s a job that counts. (p 108)

What could bring more joy to an aging woman than to have her children rise up and call her blessed by their walking in the faith? What could bring more joy to a glorified woman than seeing around the heavenly throne a multigenerational crowd of her maternal influence? (p 122)

It requires great courage, strength, resourcefulness, savvy, wisdom, and heroism to rear up children to the glory of God. (p 123)

Not only is the unborn child the most unprotected and endangered species on earth, but our born children are suffering gross neglect upon their arrival into the world. (p 124)

Because of a dedicated mother’s exceeding value to the good of society and the kingdom of God, the forces of darkness have aimed their big guns against her. (p 124)

Your mission, dear mother, is not to make your children happy, but to prepare them for eternity. (p 127)

A woman of dominion will strive to maintain an orderly household. An overgrown yard, ransacked rooms, and a sink stacked high with dirty dishes do not glorify the God who loves things being “done properly and in an orderly manner” (1 Corinthians 14:40; also numerous Proverbs). (p 139)

Let go of your right to personal leisure. (p 140)

I’ve not be commissioned at this stage in my life to enjoy leisure, but to be a father. My goal is not to raise low-maintenance children, but lion-hearted ones. (p 141)

Motherhood is much like Savior-hood. The Lord Jesus needed rest and a vacation but was compelled to do otherwise. (p 141)

Resolve to raise your boys to be men. (p 144)

Train your sons to face obstacles head on, work hard through thorns and thistles, and “find a way” to get jobs done. They need to become bread-winning providers in a cursed world. (p 144)

Mothers must lionize their sons by dignifying them with their respect. (p 145)

Cloak your son with a big jacket of respect in his childhood, and he’ll seek to grow into it in his manhood. (p 145)

Are we directing and equipping our daughters to be godly helpmeets and mothers or independent career women who loathe wifehood and mother hood? It’s very possible to unwittingly do the latter by haphazardly sending them into the heavy current of today’s educational system and youth culture. (p 147)

I desperately need a wife who is well-educated, well-read, precise thinking, culturally aware, financially shrewd, and theologically mature. Such a wife is a potent force of inestimable value in the lives of her husband and children. (p 149)

A college education can go a long way in training a young woman to be an excellent helpmeet and mother. But she needs her mother continuously at her elbow. (p 149)

Ultimately, it’s God’s sovereign grace, and not a mother’s faithful diligence, that saves and sanctifies her children. (p 150)

Hannah’s wonderful experience inspires ladies to believe that the Lord peculiarly cups His ear to motherly women who cry out to Him with wet eyes and distressed hearts (1 Samuel 1:9-11, 27). God remarkably responds to such pleading women. (p 152)

Biblical love isn’t primarily a feeling or an emotion. It’s fundamentally not a noun, but a verb. (1 Corinthians 13:4-7) Love is not a sentiment, but an action. It’s not something you feel, but something you do. (p 163)

Men love to be perceived as heroes and dragon slayers. We love to rescue damsels and be admired for our chivalrous feats. (p 169)

Yes, we men are easily captivated by our brides’ looking beautifully feminine and acting flirtatiously sweet. Did I say flirtatious? That is an important variable, too. (p 174)

[David the psalmist] was emboldened like a lion, not by convincing himself that his fears would probably never materialize. They might! Rather he calmed his soul by meditating on the covenant love of his God. (p 184)

When put to shaking by the hobgoblins, dragons, and dreads of the black valley, the Psalmist doesn’t flee into the fantasy of denial, but boldly ventures down to confront them. “I fear no evil.” (p 185)

Experience with God’s faithful shepherding in dark valleys makes the most delicate of women, as bold as lions. (p 191)

[An empty nester] remains a mother to her grown children who are slugging-it-out in the trenches of young family life and a grandmother to a newly hatching generation. An available and servant-hearted mom and grandma is an incalculable windfall. Furthermore, the church of Christ can be mightily empowered by older women who pour their time, energies, and wisdom into the ministries of their local congregations. (p 225)

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Sunday April 25, 2010

Our quiver has grown again, by the grace of our loving Father. Little Seven is now growing inside my womb. Please pray with us that this baby would be nurtured and kept safe from all harm. Please pray that Seven, who belongs to the Lord, would grow up into a godly man or woman for the Kingdom of God. Please pray that this tiny redhead would be a vital olive shoot around our table for years to come.

Please pray for us to believe in God’s promises; to wait for Him; to be strong in Him; and to have courage.

PSALM 27:13-14

I believe that I shall look upon the goodness of the LORD
in the land of the living!
Wait for the LORD;
be strong, and let your heart take courage;
wait for the LORD!

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Saturday April 24, 2010

Steven and I were very blessed to attend a conference at one of our sister churches, about raising our children to face the future, full of faith and unafraid. The speakers were Doug and Nancy Wilson. The sessions were incredibly encouraging and convicting. What a blessing!! Lots of talking about loving our children, educating them, and disciplining them rightly. It was so excellent.
I’ve typed out some of my bullet-point notes, and hope you may glean some blessings from these as well. I may elaborate more on a couple of these points in the near future. Although, really, you should just order the cds of the conference to get the full measure of blessing. 🙂

  • The promises of God for the Kingdom are fulfilled over the course of generations, but more to the point, they are fulfilled by generations.
  • Proper eschatology gives us an arc of time, so we know where we are and where we are going. Since God’s promises are fulfilled over time, Christian child-rearing and education are intimately related to eschatology.
  • God is the Master Storyteller.
  • Comedies tend to culminate in a wedding — so does the Bible.
  • Covenantal mercy (i.e. in Psalm 103) is not a reward for being a perfect parent.
  • These promises are given to us by grace.
  • Generational connectedness = history.
  • You are  bringing up eternal beings.
  • Repetition in parenting does not mean you’re failing! God repeats Himself all the time! (Have you ever read Proverbs?)
  • In contrast to our feeble existence, the mercy of the Lord is not feeble. (Psalm 103:13-17)
  • Child rearing is generational training.
  • Things we do now matter forever.
  • God set eternity in our hearts; we are supposed to get the big picture.
  • One of the ways God grows us up into maturity is having us raise others up into maturity.
  • Are you training your progeny to be leaders or followers?
  • You want loyalty from your kids, not cookie cutter response.
  • The Law doesn’t grow you into maturity (alone) — grace does.
  • Respond to your kids the way God responds to you.
  • Over time sin matures; obedience matures; righteousness matures.
  • Young children thrive in an environment of strict, loving, predictable, and enforced discipline.
  • The only way your covenantal influence will extend over generations is if your biblical standards are internalized.
  • You don’t just want your kids to follow the standard, you want your kids to understand and love the standard.
  • All your parental efforts must themselves be ground in God’s grace, appropriated through faith.
  • You can extend grace to your children because you are a non-stop recipient of it (Eph 2:8-9).
  • If you don’t have a solid grasp of God’s sovereignty, you will parent in fear.
  • Godly Christian parenting looks an awful lot like hard work. But take into account God‘s strength and His enabling grace.
  • Grace accumulates, grace multiplies, grace grows richer & deeper.
  • It is grace to grow accustomed to grace.
  • The Scriptures are all of grace. The world around us is all grace. The breath in your lungs is grace, and the warmth of your feet right now is grace. The children around your table are grace. Receive them as grace, and give to them as grace.
  • Faith the size of a mustard seed in the right object (God) is enough — enormous faith in the wrong object (anything else), however, will not get you anywhere but disaster.
  • When your faith is weak, don’t take it out and look at it — it will grow weaker. Look to Christ. Look outside yourself and your circumstances.
  • Pray with big faith in your big God; don’t use escape hatches in your prayers (i.e. “if it be Your will.”) This is not praying with big enough faith. Ask big of Him.
  • When you’re motivated to discipline, you aren’t qualified; and when you’re qualified, you frequently aren’t motivated.
  • Motivation to discipline must come from another source than annoyance (i.e. your own obedience to God’s commands, and an overwhelming love for your children).
  • Grace is an everlasting waterfall with no top, no bottom, no sides, no front, and no back.
  • What is the thing that makes life hard? A misunderstanding of grace.
  • Psalm 127’s reference to children as arrows is not cutesy — it shows us that children are weapons. They go with us against the gates of Hell.
  • You want to bring up children who will stand with you in the gate.
  • Having more weapons (children) is not the point — having excellent weapons is.
  • Academic work is preparation for life, and preparation for life is a character issue.
  • The most difficult sins to see are the ones you thought were your virtues.
  • You need to raise kids with three qualities in mind: Loyalty, Courage, and Content.
  • Hard teaching produces soft hearts; soft teaching produces hard hearts.
  • School is boot camp — not the war.
  • You must shape and steer your child’s soul and spirit, not break it.
  • Love your children to pieces — this secures their loyalty.
  • Put them in situations where they can fail — and teach them what to do when they fail, how to get back up.
  • Courage is secured by sending your kids out.
  • Courage is not a separate virtue, but the testing point of all the virtues.
  • One of the principal glories of education is learning how to throw down with biblical standards and in biblical ways.
  • Mothers must put on honor, strength, integrity, and courage in order to smile at the future. (Proverbs 31:25)
  • Worry is not limited to motherhood. As women, it is our tendency. We must have faith instead of fear.
  • God suits our afflictions to the needs of our souls.
  • God is going to give us tests over the material He is teaching us. But His tests are all open book!
  • God loves to bless us in our children and grandchildren. (Psalm 112:1-2)
  • We give our children to God even before they are conceived, and we continue to give them to God.
  • Our children are to grow up knowing who they are. Not only blood family, but church community. Who are their people?
  • As far as your earthly ministry goes with your husband, your central and first priority is always your kids.
  • Emphasize to your children that they come first (not before the marriage relationship, but before other relationships, before the laundry, before your hobbies, before your perfect house, before your perfect schedule). Let them know they are your priority.
  • We are raising up the next generation, and that is so much bigger than we can see.
  • We must view our home as an oasis for our husband and children. It must have an aroma of grace and fresh bread.
  • We want our children to grow up in a place that is friendly to them.
  • A worrisome mother will either become repellent to her children, or just plain ruin them.
  • Be mindful not to instill fearfulness into others. Encourage instead.
  • Doubts and fears don’t have answers.
  • Learn to distinguish between the voices of the Devil and the Holy Spirit.
  • Get to know your vulnerabilities so you can control them.
  • Pray preventatively. Strengthen the walls that are weak in your city.
  • Dress yourself in submission to God and to your husband.
  • Do not engage fear. Ignore it. Don’t let it in when it comes knocking — it’s hard to evict once you let it in.
  • God never gives us commands without the means to do them.
  • Leave your children an inheritance of joy: memories, stories, integrity, Sabbath tables, laughter, forgiveness, humility, grace, etc.
  • The duties of a godly parent are profound and challenging.
  • Parenting is completely dependent on the grace of God (like everything else).
  • Parents should love mercy.
  • Mercy is principled, tough, courageous; not lazy, slack, or relative. Mercy is mercy!
  • You can correct your kid because you love him too much to let him grow up that way (the right reason), or you can correct your kid because you’re annoyed and have a headache (the wrong reason).
  • When we stumble or offend little ones, we are refusing to let mercy triumph over judgment. (James 2:13)
  • Faithful parents = full of faith parents.
  • Christ is the fulfillment of all the promises in the Bible. His coming fulfilled God’s faithfulness to generations.
  • Promises to parents are based on the unchanging character of God.
  • Psalm 102:25-27 doesn’t tell us what God can do, but what He will do. This is based squarely on His unchanging character.
  • Parents should always desire to be like God in their relationship to their children. But when we think to apply this, we gravitate to what we think God is like instead of what God reveals Himself to be like.
  • Keep life simple. Keep the rules simple and easy to memorize.
  • Don’t multiply opportunities for disobedience.
  • Reduce the number of commands you issue by about 90%, and then enforce all those commands. Don’t exasperate your children. Remember their frame.
  • A parent who disciplines effectively is refusing to allow his child to make himself unlovely.
  • Discipline is corrective, and it is applied for the sake of the one receiving it. It is not punitive, and it is not rendered for the sake of the one giving it.
  • Discipline, rightly understood, is not an exception to the rule of delighting in your children, it is a principal expression of it.
  • All who love, discipline (Proverbs 13:24). But it does not follow from this that all who discipline, love. A child must grow up in, be surrounded by, and be nourished in, the love of God revealed for His people in the Word Incarnate and the Word revealed. This is the context in which godly child-rearing occurs, and outside of which it cannot occur.
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Thursday April 22, 2010

Psalm 6

To the choirmaster: with stringed instruments; according to The Sheminith. A Psalm of David.

O LORD, rebuke me not in Your anger,
   nor discipline me in Your wrath.
(My God and Father, be merciful to me. Disciple me according to Your grace, and deal gently with my heart. I feel so vulnerable and weak, but I desire to seek after You and Your kingdom.)
Be gracious to me, O LORD, for I am languishing;
    heal me, O LORD, for my bones are troubled.
My soul also is greatly troubled.
(Please, Lord, yes, be gracious. Languishing means feeling weak and feeble; Lord, my heart and my spirit feel that way. Even my hands and body begin to feel it. Like David, I too am troubled down to my marrow. I seek Your healing, both physically and spiritually.)
   But You, O LORD— how long?
(My Lord and King, it feels like You tarry. Please make haste!)

Turn, O LORD, deliver my life;
   save me for the sake of Your steadfast love.
(Save me from grief, save me from sorrow, save me from Satan’s wiles. Turn the direction of my heart, my longing, my life toward You and conform my will to Yours. For the sake of You and Your kingdom, please do these things, but also for my good, dear Lord, as Your daughter upon her knees.)
For in death there is no remembrance of You;
   in Sheol who will give You praise?
(Give me remembrance of Your mercy, and give me strength to praise You wherever I go.)

I am weary with my moaning;
   every night I flood my bed with tears;
   I drench my couch with my weeping.
(It seems as though I should be properly dehydrated like a raisin by now. I am so tired of crying myself to sleep, and awaking in the morning to terrible dreams that simply bring tears afresh. Grief and sorrow are wearing. Physically and emotionally tiring. Please give me strength, for the tears keep coming.)
My eye wastes away because of grief;
   it grows weak because of all my foes.
(My eye, my discernment, my seer of beauty – it fades. Grief makes it hard to discern, hard to see the beauty. I want to discern rightly according to Your will, and I want to see the beauties of Your hand all around me. But My foes feel too strong: Satan attacks when he knows my armor is weakened. He is wiley and cunning. He sends pangs into my heart when I do not desire the arrows or stings. These foes must be fought! Dear God, enable me.)

Depart from me, all you workers of evil,
(Yes, Lord, enable me to banish Satan and his army!)
   for the LORD has heard the sound of my weeping.
(Oh Father, listen to my cry; do not turn me aside!)
The LORD has heard my plea;
   the LORD accepts my prayer.
(Thank You, my King, for the assurance that my pleas and prayers do not fall upon deaf ears. Thank you for hearing me and accepting me.)
All my enemies shall be ashamed and greatly troubled;
   they shall turn back and be put to shame in a moment.
(Oh Lord, this is victory indeed! My enemies of Satan, sin, and death shall fall into their own snares! You have overcome them all! When You but speak the word, they shall crumble and disintegrate, and oh how glorious! Put them to shame. Trample them under Your feet. You have conquered sin and death. Satan is thrown from his throne. Comfort my heart with this knowledge. And bring it to mind when I feel my enemies overtaking me. They have no power over me. I am Yours.)