Motherhood-what IS my life

Today I read the most wonderful entry from The MOB Society. MOB stands for Mothers of Boys and they offer a perspective to mothering that is specific to the world of boys. They are unique creatures with special callings in life. Raising them to be men is a high calling for a mother and a family. I appreciate their time and encouragement when it comes to raising boys to love Jesus.

Today one of their contributing writers put into words what I often feel. She first quotes Sally Clarkson’s The Mission of Motherhood: Touching Your Child’s Heart for Eternity:

“As it is, after eighteen years of learning the truth of living sacrificially, I have found that embracing God’s call to motherhood once and for all has brought me great peace. Instead of seeing fusses and messes as irritations in my day, for instance, I am more likely to see them as opportunities to train my children to be peacemakers and to learn to be responsible for their own messes. Instead of resenting the interruptions in my schedule, I am more likely to accept them as divine appointments. More and more, I have learned to see my children through the eyes of God and to accept the stages of growth through which he has designed them to grow.”

She writes:

How can my children be an interruption to my life when they ARE my life?
The fresh love and perspective He is bringing through Sally’s words is truly changing our everyday life. I find myself wanting to linger reading just one more book before naps or bedtime. A simple day can become so special when I work with the boys on a new game or craft or Bible verse.

“There’s always something that can replace time with your kids, but you’ll never regret time with your kids.”

I love this reminder.  In a house full of boys and one wild and crazy boy-like girl I often fall victim to forgetting they ARE my life and each moment is a teachable opportunity.  To take a little longer to linger with them, exchange touch with them, express love to them, and when the going gets tough see it as a chance to ignite their hearts.  They are clay and God has placed me to be the molder for Him. 

Expanding Universe

It is almost more than I could ever imagine to understand or explain. God created geniuses for this kind of thing and that is not my design nor my calling in life. But, I think we are called to seek the massive complexity and majesty of God that we might be humbled with faith and riddled with peace in the utter expansiveness that is our God.

Have you ever considered the Universe?

This is just one galaxy in the universe. Sparkling with stars, planets, suns, moons, and intense design from our Creator.  Spiral genius stretched out across the sky to show just how GREAT our God is.


We know God made All things. "In the Beginning God created the HEAVENS and the EARTH."  He is beyond the Universe.  Incredible.  I recently watched a You Tube clip with top Cosmologists who can now look at the Universe with cameras and equipment far surpassing ever before.  They realize now that the Universe is stretching (just as God stated He stretched out the Universe) and it is so complex and particular that everything seems placed with design rather than random happenstance.  This from what seemed to be secular cosmologists although not confirmed, but they knew the universe could not be random.

I then read in On Guard that the chances of everything being right where it is with the precision of producing life on Earth is 10(10)power(123)power.  Penrose calculated this and it is so vast we could not even write it.  It is far beyond what they consider a mathematically impossible probability, which is 10(50)power.  This of course being only one reason life without God is impossible.


Then there is the Goldilocks zone in which our Planet experiences in order to produce life.  It is not too close nor too far but just rightly placed in distance from the sun as well as within our Milky Way Galaxy in order to produce and permit life.  We are placed within our galaxy in a specific place in order for us to see stellar constellations and Polaris (the North star) which act as navigation aids for man.  If the Earth were closer to the core of the galaxy there would be too much radiation and gravitational force from the black hole for life to exist. If it were on the outer edges of the spiral arm there would not be enough heavy elements to have formed our planet.  The Earth is the exact distance from the sun to maintain life.  Our sun is the exact size necessary for life here on Earth.  The Moon is the exact size (1/4 the size of the earth and the exact distance from the earth to create the exact right amount of gravitational pull necessary for the tides and ocean currents.   The moon's gravity is of the right strength to keep the earth's axis at a stable 23 degree angle while the earth's gravitational field is of the exact strength to keep the moon in its orbit.  The sun is 400 times bigger than the moon but also 400 times further away so they appear not only to be the same size but allow for the perfect solar eclipse. 
This type of explanation could go on for so long I couldn't possibly continue to write it all here!
There is much more to read about our amazing universe and defending the faith with precision starting with On Guard found at www.amazon.com.

The Light

Zoomed into the canvas the son lingers on the personal expression of His masterpiece.  He spoke it into existence, wove it together with His mighty hands, delicately placed it into position upon the Earth, calling all things perfectly to exist around it so it might reflect His beauty as it grows and flourishes.  It is not by mistake nor coincidence that this living thing resides in the place that nourishes it best.  That the light, temperature, rainfall, and seasons give way to its growth and beauty in a way it could not elsewhere on the planet is no accident.  It has been placed here, now, in this way, under this light, in these temperatures in order that it might grow.

Am I too, made in God's image, further delicately placed here?  Knit, formed, called, and found here and now that I might too be a reflection of His masterpiece. That the Son would linger on me, that His light would cast off my life onto the Earth around me.

Slowly panning outward we see that this perfectly placed green is not alone. He is accompanied by many others, too woven, placed, and called to do something specific for the world.  To give oxygen and life to our planet. Without them all we would fail to survive.  The light penetrates to the heart of this crowded place and allows all things to grow and flourish together.  We are singularly important, created, named but none of us without the necessity of the others. When called to do His bidding we work together as one. We have the ability to give life and breath to those around us.


From God's expansive, stretching perspective the light casts down into the creation, exposing it's beauty, and drawing out life, breath, and awe.  He says, "it's good".

Good

Good

Just a simple word and I want to live up to the expectation. I desire to be the leaf in the midst of the many, coming together, creating the Awe that God calls good.  To bring forth life, reflect the Son, and be called Good.  Just a single glance at this place and one cannot deny its incredibly complex design and its ultimate reflection of the Creator.

If I am placed here, now, amidst these others, called in this time, to His glory, to be called Good, and be a voice for the Son, causing others to say "awe" in His beauty....I surrender to the calling.  I lay my life before Him that those who love Him would be the breath for those who do not.  I am singularly important, designed special, but not without the need of those around me. Might we all give breath to the truth.



Gifts:

218. Air to breath

219. Delicate touches of creation

220. Complexity of life

221. Renewing love

222. Speaking truth

223. Cutting shapes for schooling kids

224. Singing Bible Verses

225. Squishy babies

226. Dedication

227. Faith that cannot be explained

228. A faith that surpasses all secular presuppositions

229. Making sense of Creation as God wrote it

230. Finding answers never before sought

231. Timing

232. Reflecting the Son (help me to do so)

233. God's strength in me (not my own)

234. The Son that penetrates all darkness

235. A Day for Love

Vulnerable

I prayed long and sought wholeheartedly the letting go and falling deep.  I remember hearing his voice for the first time and something inside jolted with the assurance and confirmation I could not yet decipher. It was only as the days past I realized the accuracy of my first inclination, God's nudging, my returning to thoughts of him. 

Our story isn't common.  We started with words. 

The writing and breathing of our deepest thoughts, questions, concerns, and directions. Our greatest loves and desires spoken through letters. Thousands of letters written by the glow of the screen. Lengthy calls in the late hours.  My thoughts always returning to him.

I wanted him. To be near to him. To feel him breathing on me. To brush against him. To connect. I wanted him to think I was something. Beautiful.  Was I? Was I enough for him? I put my whole self out there...I was vulnerable.

Here...6 years and five children later I shy from vulnerable.  I can't draw words to explain why.  I've closed some. I've been wounded from time to time and have wounded too I'm sure.  And in those wounds the scab of healing (although there is healing) has left my once vulnerable heart tighter than before. 

Where I once was willing to risk it all in order to captivate him I now protect.  I don't protect it all. I freely give up myself to him. Make it a priority to become one flesh.  Create life with him, five times over.  They are beautiful.  We make beautiful for whatever we are lacking in beauty ourselves.  They are the essence of beauty.

But I hold a little back.  I keep myself from truly letting it all go.  I struggle to let love just come, be, to settle and then rise into my life. Like the rising of dough or a fresh baked bread or cookies. 

Bread, the symbol of nourishment.  Could my love be like bread?  Could I nourish his soul?  It first needs stirring, kneading, and a bakers passion.  It must be placed into the oven where the warmth could burn but if done right creates something delicate and perfect.  Jesus is my bread. The bread I take to remember his perfect love.  Like the bread, my willingness to be vulnerable could be a symbol of this perfect love I've been given in the Bread of Life towards the man I love. The man God gave to me.

Unintentionally I keep myself busy, keeping his touch and his affections at bay.  I don't WANT this but I DO this.  This causes our once raw, crazy love to be left burning softly not flaming wildly as it could. Blessings, God's blessings stay adrift, just off the shore, waiting for my signal. 

My once passionate words now spoken as untimely jokes to lighten the mood from passion to playful.  Passion reveals vulnerability. I can't go there....why can't I go there?  Moving into him is where I want to be.

I love and must leave here in this journal Ann's words today.

How to Fall in Love Again in Four Minutes A Day

It only takes four minutes a day to move into a deeper heart place. It only takes four minutes a day to connect in soul intimacy; to breathe in oxygen for the other half of my heart. Don’t, and I too begin to suffocate, the death heave. I wish someone had told me this in the beginning.
::

Four Fixations

Four times a day think on love.
When I leave the marriage bed…
leave the front door…
when I return to front door….
return to marriage bed.
These are the four critical archways of time in our day. Touch or whisper a sweet nothing when passing through these gate points, and we walk into hours of closeness. Forever love fixates like fresh love.
::

Four Embraces

Four times a day, wrap up in the life partner. Embrace fully and hold each other’s eyes. That’s all.
Repeat four times daily.
The one flesh breathes best when the skin pores are close; connected.
::

Four Affirmations

Four times during the day, thank him. For working faithfully to provide, for hanging up his towel, for putting gas in the van, for making this heart skip a wild beat.

Look for the ways to thank him and watch how he moves closer.

I will set my mind to this.  Revealing my hearts true desire. Not masquerading it with expectations that crack and the distraction that separate. Making more time, drawing more near to him.  Creating the uncomfortable for me to create the Oneness that is US.

I want to be US. Lord help me to be US.  We are friends, parents, partners, life organizers, planners, preparing, trainers of children...I want US to also be vulnerable together. For the baking and the warming to rise into something delicate and perfect.

Standing shoulder to shoulder encourages and refreshes, standing toe to toe, skin to skin, eye to eye, letting hands wrap tight and speak words of beauty creates LOVE.  Father, help me to CREATE.

Multitude Monday

The fog is lifting in my quest to homeschool my children which before now was somewhat bogged down by the lack of clarity regarding which direction we would go and how it would all work. My oldest being only five turning 6 this summer I know the future holds much change, improvisation, and compromise; kinks we will certainly smooth as we go, I'm sure. Right?

 

My comfort zone lies in having a plan, a footprint to follow, and something tangible I can put my hands upon. I must often be reminded to the fact that life is not so perfectly drawn upon the canvas. It has curves, edges, texture, contrast and a unique blend of all things beautiful. Although I wouldn't often call them beautiful. But, that is why I am here.
Multitude Monday. To remember the gifts God has given to me. The blessings I cannot always see. The epic change that is our life, both here on Earth and the one we live with Christ. Growth, change, forming, molding, turning, and beginning anew...much like the life as a homeschooler I ought to plan to have.
I'm encouraged to be starting this journey with a dear friend. Someone I cherish, whose love for her children seems to sometimes pales mine in comparison (simply because I am so hard on myself). A gift. She is a gift to me, an encourager and confidant. I pray we might find our way, God's path for our little ones, that His love be our guide and our compass and His salvation the end to all our means.
So, I resolve, perfection is not possible no matter how hard I might attempt to plan, prepare, and train myself to be a homeschooling mother. Rather, I find joy and hope in the grace, mercy and flexibility of our Lord as Justin and I venture to put into place Deut. 6 with our home and bring our children up unto Him.
You still might find me planning, preparing, and organizing this adventure, but I rest in knowing all is well with my Soul no matter how the road turns.

GIFTS
201. Sisters in Christ to travel the sometimes weary road
202. Afternoon visits sharing hopes, dreams and joys
203. Long naps with the little one tucked beneath my arm
204. Training children to love God and obey parents
205. Quiet nights alone with Daddy
206. Mothers of boys to encourage the hearts of moms
207. Crisp winter morning, seldom seen here in Phoenix
208. Finding the purple between the Pink and the Blue (Love and Respect)
209. Two year old prayers, tucked between sheets, words too young to fully hear
210. Boys pretend playing
211. Planning and the grace that comes when plans change
212. Starting fresh
213. His mercies New each morning
214. Powerful effects of prayers, lifted high
215. 100 days to forming a new habit
216. And always working, bending, and building daddy
217. Finding something lost