Grace

I had this gut-wrenchingly convicting thought last night as we were getting ready for bed: "what if my husband hit me or yelled at me when I did something wrong?" I would probably live in fear of disappointing him. I think we all probably have a natural fear of disappointing our spouses, but this type of fear is different. A fear that would cause me to shrink and be constantly anxious and worried about impending punishment.

And then I thought, "is this how my kids feel?" Whoa man. I don't know if that's how they feel, but in my mind, I can imagine how they would feel this way. I also know that I am prone to this slippery slope of "I am the worst mother ever, how could my kids, my husband, or God possibly love me?" And I could easily slip down that slope into a pit of self-hate, regret, shame, etc (been there, done that...late 2006/early 2007 was not my best year).

I've always been ...thoughtful I guess you could say, about my parenting choices. Having grown up in an abusive household, I have wanted to be really careful not to inflict misery upon my children (and husband) the way my mother did. But finding the "right" something...the perfect fit...has always escaped me. I've known what was wrong, sometimes not until I've tried it for a while-intentionally or not, but I still haven't ever found what was right. Ideologically I fit best in Attachment Parenting with a Christian perspective. But I've still always felt like that needs some tweaking.

Recently I've heard the term "Grace Based Parenting" floating around, and I am going to read more on it. But I think this might be it. "Grace" is a word my wise husband uses a LOT. And I'm really thankful for that. It's like the message of grace needs to be pounded into my brain...or at least the application of it. Grace is what I want to extend to my children because God (and my husband) extend grace to me-often. Really, really often.

This thought has been swirling inside my head since last night, with the potential to cause a panic attack, but this morning's reading helped clear things up for me, thank God!

"There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love."
+I John 4:18

Perfect love drives out fear...what a beautiful thing. I don't want to use fear to get my children to obey. "I'm going to put this toy in the fridge if you do that again!" "I'm going to spank you!" I want to get to their heart. I think, for me at least, threatening them is a lazy way to parent. I just want the conflict to end and I don't want to spend any more time on the issue because let's face it, it happens about 2385656389 times a day. But I want to talk to them, and they need me to talk to them. I want to understand what is going on in their minds and hearts. I want to be slow to react. I want to use the uneasy feeling I've been experiencing to grow, change, and revolutionize instead of swirling into a vortex of self-hate and non-improvement. I also want to encourage grace extension in my children. I hear conflict and screaming among my children, and while I know to an extent that it's human sin-nature, I also know that I am very much culpable. My children react to stress and conflict the way they do because they've seen me react to it the same way all these years.

So here is to God and His grace. Here is to praying more for my relationship with my children and for their hearts. Here is to becoming more like the Mom that God designed me to be.

The Bond

From the moment I was set to become a parent, I felt a strong calling from the Lord to seek His thoughts and His ways in my attachment to my children. I pored over my Bible, highlighting verse after verse that spoke of God's lovingkindness and His response to our calls. I saw how attached to us God is, and purposed to try and create a similar attachment between my children and me. I wanted to make sure that they had a solid bond with me from the start, and I wanted to continue to develop that bond as they matured and grew to be the people that God created them to be.

Over the years I have been frustrated on more than one occasion when I see the Church pushing for separation of mom and baby. As far as I'm concerned, a mom and baby are nearly inseparable. It's a mistake to be a Christian organization that purposes to separate mother and young child. We are unknowingly succumbing to an insidious attack by Satan on the precious bond of mother and child. Even little things like purposing or suggesting, (and some groups even demand!) a separation perpetuates the myth that success, ministry, study, rest, enjoyment, and personal growth aren't possible unless we as mothers forsake our God-given duty to our blessings. We treat our blessing as curses. We lament the labor and trials of the early years, and we limit our child-bearing time to a small window of our adult life. We rush through the early years two or three times so we can get on with our lives and our service.

And the children also suffer because they are sequestered from interacting with the adult Christian world. They fulfill our muddled perception of them because they aren't given the chance to interact with us regularly. And we forget that they are children and will behave childishly. They will disrupt. They will make certain tasks more difficult to complete in what we think is a timely fashion. But they will also  bless. They will uplift. They will challenge, and if we persevere, we will grow. And they will grow.

We are doing God a disservice by treating children as some burden to be shuffled off, and we're perpetuating the myth that kids get in the way of success-even success for God, enjoyment, growth, service, study, ministry, and even rest. We are lessening our impact because we are treating a blessing like a curse and when we limit our impact, we aren't realizing our full potential, strength, and development in Christ. Let's embrace these beautiful blessings, as challenging as they may be at times, and let God teach us how to serve Him with them.