Discipline as the Lord does

"No father chastens always: your Lord hates the rod as much as you do; he only cares to use it for that reason which should make you willing to receive it, namely, that it works your lasting good." Morning and Evening, Spurgeon

My hope and prayer is that I may discipline Aiden as the Lord disciplines us. Each time I discipline Aiden I want it to be with the intention of working his lasting good. And his lasting good is for him to come to know and love Jesus as his Lord and personal Savior. I often fail at this by disciplining out of frustration or anger or impatience. I need to learn to hate the rod (or time outs or whatever form(s) of discipline are used) so that in the times when it is used I am only using it to point him to Christ and the Father's discipline of us.

A bit of humor

Through one of my favorite blogs, 22 words, I discovered that one of Sean's friends has a blog that is absolutely hilarious. You should check it out, www.tendigitlumber.com!

Helpful Mommy Tips

I have recently discovered two VERY useful "Mommy tools" and I thought I would share them with my blog readers.

#1- Printable weekly planners and/or printable meal planners. Sean and I have started writing out a family schedule and being able to print a weekly planner has been great! Just google "printable weekly planners" and you will get a lot of options. Personally, I like this simple one.

#2- Thomas the Tank Engine Series 1984 on YouTube! I don't let Aiden watch videos very often and I don't like the fact that kids videos are 45 minutes long or more. Thankfully, I found the entire TTE series on YouTube. These videos are great because they are only 5-6 minutes long and the older series were written by a Christian. There may be more series of other shows but I've just found this one so far.

If you have any helpful mommy tips of your own, please share!

"I know I got life, matter fact better man, I know I got Christ"

My soul was rocked today in church. The hectic schedule I have had for the last couple of weeks has left my spirit feeling weak and dry. Unfortunately, in all the things to get done, places to go, plans to make I have spent very little time focused on Christ. When Christ is your center and you are not focusing on Him, nothing else goes right. Spiritually I have barely been making it lately. Last night God lead me to my Morning and Evening devotional by Charles Spurgeon and to this week's fighter verse, James 4:7-8b. Those two things greatly encouraged me and I prayed that God would refresh my spirit. As He always does, God answered in a big way. The music today in church was exactly what I needed to hear. Before the first song was finished I could feel my soul drinking once again of the living waters.

But God did not stop there. Lecrae, a Christian rap artist, gave a special performance at our church this morning. He performed his song, "Don't Waste Your Life," which is based off of John Piper's book by the same title. The lyrics of this song brought me to tears. Seeing that God has taken rap music (which so often is full of sinful ideas) and made it his own was amazing. God has truly given Lecrae an incredible gift.

Finally, the sermon was exactly what I needed to hear. A powerful, insightful proclamation of the gospel, true to God's word! (I will put the link up for the sermon sometime Monday, Lord willing.) What an amazing answer to prayer! Thank you, Jesus, thank you!

"Don't Waste Your Life" Lecrae

Single Moms, Pt. 1

I've only attempted one other series on this blog and it did not last very long. In spite of that, I am going to try to do another series. The topic of this series is very close to my heart as I have been a single mom for 2 1/2 years. During this time, God has blessed me abundantly with friends (and strangers) who have been incredible supporters and encouragers. I thought I would put together a series of things that we can do to be a blessing to single mothers and also to help others understand what it is like to be a single mom.

Next Sunday, May 10th, is Mother's Day. Although like most holidays, Mother's Day has become quite commercialized it is still great to have a day to celebrate and appreciate mothers. Especially in families where there are young children, the responsibility for planning the Mother's Day activities tends to be the husband's job. So, in families with a single mom, nothing may be planned for Mother's Day.

This is were we come in. Do something kind, special, etc. for the single moms in your life! Here are some ideas of what you can do:

• Write a card
• Give her a quick phone call
• Invite her and her kids to lunch, dinner, dessert, etc.
  
• Bring a meal
• Arrange to help her kids make her something special
  
• Even something as small as wishing her a "Happy Mother's Day" in church will make a big impression!

Most of these suggestions can also be done throughout the year to encourage single moms.



Disclaimer- I am in no way trying to make someone feel like they have to do these things. The purpose of this post is to give ideas to people who want to reach out to single moms in some way.

What it means to be a parent

This quote from Tedd Tripp's Shepherding a Child's Heart summarizes my beliefs about what it means to be a parent:

“You must regard parenting as one of your most important tasks while you have children at home. This is your calling…There is nothing more important. You have only a brief season of life to invest yourself in this task. You have only one opportunity to do it. You cannot go back and do it over.

You live in a culture in which there are opportunities for you to do things unheard of in history. You are presented daily with scores of opportunities. There is more than you could ever do. [But] to do this job of parenting well, it must be a primary task. It is your primary calling.”

This would be my recommendation for anyone looking for a book on biblical parenting.

It is about Christ

What is the most important part of a wedding? In going into the planning of the wedding I knew the answer to this question. The answer is Christ, taking him out of the focus takes the entire significance out of the event.

I know that nonbelievers do not see Him as the most important part but I assumed that they saw the vows or the marriage as the most important. I am learning that this is not the case. What the wedding looks like, what food is served, how the food is served, etc., ad nausem. These are the things that are central in some people's minds. A wedding becomes all about appearances. This saddens me. I should add, this sentiment/this world view is not unique to unbelievers, there are professing Christians who feel the same way.

Before we even got engaged, Sean and I had discussed how important it was to us that his wedding and my wedding (no matter who we married) be as Christ-exalting as they could be. This remains the heart of our thinking as we now plan our wedding. There are nonbelievers in both of our families and we want to display the Truth of marriage in the best way we can. Even our wedding can be a testimony of God's grace, love and mercy. We want to step back from the world's belief that you must have the most expensive everything to have a good wedding. We want to be good stewards of the money God is loaning us, not only with regard to our wedding but also in our future together.

Now don't misunderstand me, I am not saying that a Christ-honoring wedding means being cheap. A wedding is a very important celebration, as is the reception. Jesus even saw fit to turn water into wine at the wedding in Cana, his first miraculous sign (see John 2). What I am saying is that every decision made and every penny spent should be done with the mindset of honoring and exalting Christ. That is what the heart of a marriage must be and a wedding is the beginning of a marriage. A marriage is a picture of Christ and the church so a wedding can be likened to the moment of salvation, the moment when the imperfect bride is joined to Christ forever. Celebrate this moment, praise Him, worship Him!