We have decorated our home for Christmas. I love it. I enjoy creating our home into a space of beauty and sparkles with handmade items by the kids, my Willow Tree Nativity, the Santa that slowly moves his arms and ofcourse our bratty elf Markle Fisby.
Eli and I were admiring his Gingerbread house he made during his last December at St. Johns School. Its so neat....with a cardboard milk carton as it base and each little gumdrop in its place, a pretzel chimney, a chewy ring for a wreath and a candy cane at the door. Precious! All held together by glue, so it would last years.
We had such a long day yesterday. Started the morning at the tree farm picking out tree our and playing tree farm tag in the mud (it rained the whole day before, thank goodness for mud boots). Then Zahavah and I enjoyed a tea party, decorated our tree in the afternoon and spent the evening enjoying Christmas in the Heart of Charleston. Busy, busy, day.
As Brett and I were rounding up the children for bed. I noticed Z was chomping on something. I said, "Z whats in your mouth?" She was hesitant to tell me, but we have been "driving home" how important it is to always tell the truth. Z confessed, "its a candy off that Gingerbread house!" (insert jaw drop and chuckle here) Me: "Z THAT house isn't like the ones we made last year with icing, that house was made with glue, its not for eating, its just for decoration! Go spit that out and brush your teeth again." It was one of those many moments that I love as a mommy...cute and innocent.
But it makes me wonder...how many things in our life are we tempted to enjoy that were NOT meant for us. What do you need to spit out of your life?
Tree Farm
Wonderful tea party
Christmas in the Heart of Charleston
Notice the candy cane at the door is missing...chomp chomp!
I'm not gonna lie, I'm too transparent for that anyways...being a stay at home mom of four and homeschooling two of them is HARD. (yes, I'm very aware of the Super Moms out there that have 5+++ kids and homeschool all of them...they are AMAZING)! Don't compare, that's Satan's work.
Last night as I walked into Bible Study, I was blunt...I THINK THEY WANT TO KILL ME, FINISH ME OFF! I walked straight to our study room and laid flat on the floor. I was having a moment.
It was a long exhausting two hours from 4-6pm, the Golden Hours for meltdowns, bickering, fights. Push Mommy to her limits and then push some more. They push every button I have (even those I didn't realize I had). They all want a drink of water at the sametime from the frig that is right in front of the stove...where I am trying to cook. They all want to listen to Christmas songs on my iphone right next to the stove (no not at the kitchen table, its too far from ME). They run the circle in our home like a track (do you have a circle?), they are LOUD. They want into the snack drawer even though I'm COOKING! I know, I know....I'll miss these days.
Back to Bible Study...we are studying James. You know JAMES 1...Count it all JOY, whenever you face trials, the testing of your faith produces PERSEVERANCE (paraphrase). Yep that James. Our challenge from the week prior was to pick one of three (darn, I can't remember all three) but mine was to be SLOW TO ANGER. I wish I could say that I have persevered and mastered it. But I'm sad to say I have not! Not even close!
I'm still convinced beyond a shadow of a doubt that God is using my children to prune me. My children bring out my absolute best....I am called a fun Mom, the bestest Mommy ever, and I make the bestest treats, buy the bestest foods, have fun crafts and tons of kisses, hugs and tickles! But my worst also comes out. I'm a yeller, even when I'm not mad. I hate it. Its a deep rooted, rotten ugly root that not only needs yanked out, but I need some serious repellent so it doesn't come back, maybe even a plastic barrier would help...right over my mouth! GOD IS FAITHFUL!
And as much as I could sit in this place of UGH and just hate this character flaw, I don't. I'm sure that is what Satan would LOVE. For me to just accept it and carry on as if it has no impact. That is a lie!!! A load of crap! It does have lasting effects. My short temper and my loud voice do hurt. I am working on it, everyday. I don't accept it. I truly do hate it. I want to be slow to anger, slow to respond, quick to hear, quick to kiss and hug, quick to apologize and quick to forgive as well. And I'm sure that is what God wants me to do too.
My children are amazing, I want to even say PERFECT (but I won't because you know....every parents in the world will be leaving comments about how their children are perfect and I'm psycho, I maybe but that's besides the point)! My children are quick to forgive! They are precious. We (Brett & I) are very transparent with them. We want them to know yelling is wrong and not as God desires a family to be...and they do know. They (crazy as it sounds) call us out when we are raising our voice. They know our goals (we all have goals in our home, but that's another post)
The most BEAUTIFUL PRECIOUS thing about my absolute worst is (yes, there is something beautiful about it). God is right there. Meeting me right at that moment, never a minute late. All I really need to do it stop and give it all to him. Its not mine to carry anyways. Matthew 11:28 says, "Come to me, all you who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest." That scripture is so comforting. He doesn't give up on me! He wants to be my strength when I am weak! There is always hope for my failures when Jesus Christ is my Light. Never a day late, never a dollar short, his love never runs out on me!
God called us to homeschool quite awhile ago. I was disobedient and well my hubby just wasn't on board...so it was easy for me to continue in disobedience. You can read all about that whole experience a few blog posts back...all about hubby's heart change, kid's last day of public school etc. This post is about a little slice of confirmation God gave me today. I don't know about you but I LOVE a little "job well done," "I notice you," etc from the Lord. My husband aside, I have very little support and encouragement in my life when it comes to my kids and family (although the Lord is changing that)!!!! We started homeschooling on Valentines Day this year! That's our anniversary homeschool date! During that week Brett & Eli came up with the name "Frey Family Jedi Academy" because my son was over the top in love with Star Wars at the time (still is)...thanks to an awesome garage sale where we acquired a couple boxes of vintage Star Wars toys! My son has read every Star Wars book he could get his hands on since! I should seriously give that man a thank you note! I know some people (even homeschoolers) think its odd to call our homeschooling an academy, maybe it is, but for us its adding spice and fun. Well today we opened our AMAZING Apologia Bible book and BOOYAH they use Star Wars in the lesson. No really they did!!!! This conservative wonderful Bible Curriculum used something my son LOVES to teach a message about God! This post isn't about if Star Wars is fit for a seven year old to indulge in, this post is about how AWESOME God is to give this Momma a little bit of "See I knew it all before you even started!" "I will guide you through this, I know its hard, but I got you covered." He knows the plans he has for us, plans to prosper us, not to harm us, plans to give us HOPE AND A FUTURE! (para Jeremiah 29:11).
Love the Lord through obedience, trust him to guide you with your portion. He is faithful, he will show himself to you! He is (my children are learning the characteristics of God this week)...Omnipotent, Omnipresent, omniscient, eternal, and holy (also perfect spelling words!) Trust him, He is THE FORCE!
I dropped Silas off at preschool, where he goes to get speech help when the teacher informed me that my Si had been really rude the day before. My Si?! Really? (Sense the sarcasm) We had already been experiencing some changes since school started...oh please tell me I'm not the only parent whose child changes when school goes back in session! HaHa! Really it doesn't even take school back in session for children to pick up behaviors. That craziness can happen from going to Wal-Mart, visiting a park or Heavens to Betsy (unsolvable origin...just FYI encase you were starting to google it) Church!
The teacher kindly informed me that she realizes he has picked this behavior up at school and even knows which child he is morphing into. Bye bye tender hearted sweet boy, welcome rude little I-want-my-own-way rotten child!! What!?! You called your child rotten, I call it like it is!
Here is where the rubber meets the road for me...I expect my child to pick up on all the characteristics of other children...the good and the bad. Its unfortunate that its mostly bad that comes home. sigh. In my opinion that's really not the issue.
The issue is...we live in a society of ill mannered bratty rottten kids!
Judgemental?! Perhaps. People judge us by our children! They even judge our children! They may or may not avoid us based upon our children. They judge how we parent or should I say...don't parent! And many of us can say..."oh I don't judge." "Been there done that, I know how you feel." "I'm sure they are doing their best." Blah blah blah, deny it, but we have all done it!
I often find myself not thinking of the child as much, (although someone SHOULD as my Great Grandmother would say "yank a knot in his tail.") My thoughts are more for Mom and Dad. What is going on Mom and Dad? Do you need help? Have you lost control? Are you beyond exhausted? Clueless how to parent? To me those are legit questions to parents with OOC kids (out of control kids). Side note: different than ADD kids! Or at least I think so.
Which makes me think back to my Great Grandmother. She would talk about the close knit community in which she raised her daughter. Rebellion wasn't tolerated at home, the neighbors house, school or church. The community helped raise children. It was definitely a more stern society. We have come a long way from that. We are no longer a community helping each other, but rather sitting back, judging and doing nothing. I know, I don't want it to be true either. I want those who need help to ask for it. I wish I trusted my neighbor enough to call my child out on his behavior. To believe others care about the heart of my child, but they don't.
The good news is...I do! And the good news is that God trusts me to care for my children. I care enough about my child (and other children sometimes) that I take the time to TRAIN THEM IN THE WAY THEY SHOULD GO. (Proverbs 22:6). Am I an expert, absolutely not! (I read lots of books, pray a lot and ask loads of questions to mothers who have raised well-behaved God-fearing children) Do my children rebel? Yes Are they perfect? Not by a long shot. Are we together learning patience, forgiveness, respect, obedience, mercy, and grace? Yes! Am I strict? Yes! Do I expect children to obey their parents? Yes! Do I hope parents will step up to the plate and train their children? Yes (although I think I understand why many don't....Part 2)
Children left to themselves bring shame to their mother (paraphrased Proverbs 29:15...read it, there is more there to help us learn to parent). We are entrusted with much (what could be more important than the souls of our children?) and much is expected. God is expecting much from us!!!! (Luke 12:48 para.) Parenting is a hard job. Its not for the weak. He does give us the strength each day to endure the path that is before us. (see 2 Cor 12:9)
God uses it all for his glory, even when our children grow up and turn to their own way (Part 3 perhaps). I really don't have it all figured out, I work hard at it EVERYDAY.
Let's encourage each other to work hard at training our children.
Its been almost a month since I have posted anything here. I would like to say its because life has been so smooth and busy. The busy would be 100% true and well the smooth 100% false! (Did you hear the teacher in me come out?) Its really been insane, that I can't even remember back a month to start with the craziness. We had two birthday parties in August (I have to look through the pics on my computer to remember...I'm too young for this to be happening already), Brett's Mom and Bob visited and then later his brother along w/ our niece and nephew...so fun! Eli was sick with that nasty respiratory virus, I ran two 5K races within a week of each other (haven't ran much since high school...let's not go there), signed up for another Color Run in a couple weeks to do w/ our Classical Conversations homeschool family, went to my first Major League Baseball game w/ Brett, Zahavah and Eli! And this month we started back to homeschooling. And I garage sale'd some through all that. All that sounds peachy and wonderful and fun...and IT IS, but....the enemy is alive and pecking (like a rooster, chicken whichever of those evil birds you prefer). And I have been feelin it, from about every angle of life. Its to be expected when your Pastor decides to preach on TOUGH STUFF. Tough stuff is gonna happen. And it has been since before he started the series! We also knew we would be under attack because my husband spent 72 hours on A Walk to Emmaus. I have found myself in unrelenting spiritual battles. Still happening today. I rejoice that God has been faithful. He DOES NOT promise a life free danger or hardship. It was interesting last week when our small group leader said, "I don't want to sign up for a life of Job!" And I thought...but haven't we already? Haven't we already signed up for that by proclaiming our Salvation in Jesus Christ!!!!! I didn't say that out loud, but I did think it.
Today my friend Pam Hudson spoke on stage with Pastor Scott because she has been fighting cancer for five years (I HATE cancer)...some tough stuff you bring on, and some finds you all on its own and Pam lives daily with HARD tough stuff that she didn't go looking for. I know a Mom who lives with HARD tough stuff daily too, as two (YES TWO) of her children have a terminal incurable disease. These ladies lead tough lives I'm clueless about, they have my daily prayers.
There is tough stuff we kinda sign up for too. When we step out of our comfortable little box into the great unknown through OBEDIENCE, we can meet tough stuff face to face. I think that is where satan likes to show up...in our unchartered, unfamiliar places. Homeschooling was a lot like that for me...a move out of total obedience and yet God is using it to shine light in all the places of my life that need refined. I struggle and I do not enjoy it everyday, but I'm honest about it. So many people ask, "So, how is homeschooling going?" I'm not sure they are asking because they really want the truth or just asking to be nice, but I tell them the truth. God is refining me!
He will use whatever we let Him. Its called surrendering. In the big picture my tough stuff isn't tough compared to many, but it doesn't change the fact that it's still my stuff that God is using. We all have stories. (rabbit trail)...I was just telling my husband how hard it is for me sometimes to look around and see the pain and suffering of people. I see it, I can feel it, everyone has a story and a hurt. I understand why drug use, addiction and suicide is on the rise...people are suffering without hope!
In all our tough stuff, we as believers are promised an eternal life FREE OF pain and suffering. God wants to use our stuff to mold us into HIS image. He also wants to shine His glory through us. Proclaim His faithfulness in our lives. He wants to BE IN the trenches with us. I don't know about you, but I tend to want to run, no BOLT from my tough stuff. I don't like it. I don't like pain...physical or mental (I suffer mostly from mental, I know, har har) and I don't like those around me to suffer. In my rare but occasionally busy co-dependent self I want to fix and help, fix and help and help get you back in your happy hole. But really...what GLORY does God get in that?
God, Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference. Living one day at a time; enjoying one moment at a time; accepting hardship as a pathway to peace; taking, as Jesus did, this sinful world as it is, not as I would have it; trusting that You will make all things right (new) if I surrender to Your will; so that I may be reasonably happy in this life and supremely happy with You forever in the next. Amen. -Reinhold Niebuhr
Most people stop at "difference", I did too til I knew there was more! And the more is SO MUCH MORE. Its important! Those lines are the ones I find myself repeating more often, like...
living one moment at a time...
I so often find myself not living in THE MOMENT. I'm either beating myself up over the past or living in the past hurt. Or I am so focused on the WHOLE day, week, month planning that I ignore the PRESENT (which is a gift, remember!)
...accepting hardships as a pathway to peace...
oh boy...diapers can be a hardship...really they can be! Rebellion in your child. A detached family of origin, finances, addiction, death of a spouse or child...God works through all of that pain and suffering for HIS GLORY. Keep reading the prayer...
HE WILL MAKE ALL THINGS RIGHT (NEW)...IF I SURRENDER TO HIS WILL.
This where I land and think hmmmmm...new. New doesn't mean fixed, comfortable, managable in the present, the rest of the prayer indicates new as in eternity and that makes the most sense, that lines up with the book of Revelation.
Sometimes life is hard when the new isn't instant. When the pain lingers. When the hurts and betrayals resurface reminding us again to accept that hardship as a pathway to peace. That pathway is, well exactly that...a path meant to walk through to heal. I'm not going to lie, its not easy, its painful. But our Hope is in Jesus Christ alone and he does promise to make all things new AND he promises to walk that pathway with you! Keep walking. Grab a cup of coffee and your Bible God is always ready and waiting to walk through life with you. Have a blessed day!
NIV Revelation 21:5 "He who was seated on the throne said, "I am making everything new!" Then he said, "Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true." NASB Deut 31:8 "The LORD is the one who goes ahead of you; He will be with you. He will not fail you or forsake you. Do not fear or be dismayed."
The moment I wake up my mind is spinning 100+ mph (or whatever, I don't lay there for an hour...seriously like my kids would ever allow that!). The typical morning is I need to do this and that oh and scrub the tubs today and change bed sheets, and teach teach teach (that has to be a top priority as a homeschooling family...I cannot forget that one; don't worry, I never FORGET). Then pinterest (let's just stay off social media today b/c I have too much to do today. Oh and I should take the kids to the library and then maybe the park. Perhaps DQ for breakfast, wait lunch. I should reach out to my BFF, I miss her! Oh and I have to memorize all the Bible Scriptures to sign language for CC and and and and. That's just a watered down sample of my ADD mind at 5:30am.
And then....I read something so simple, yet so profound!
"There is hard work in surrendering to God. Being a follower of Christ is all about getting to know the heart of God and having a close relationship. The best part is, this relationship is the only one we take into heaven. So I must choose to get to know Jesus. If I don't, the end of my life could look like this: I walk slowly up to the pearly gates and wait while someone checks to see if my name is in the BOOK. I then walk forward to shake Jesus' hand, but I walk slowly because I don't know him that well. For me, getting to know Him better means that I'll run through the pearly gates, jump into the Lord's lap, give him a big hug AND FINISH THE CONVERSATION WE STARTED THAT MORNING." -Meg Wilson (emphasis added)
Simple, yet so profound. I don't do that! Obviously, read that messy 1st paragraph. And so I woke up one morning and said, "HI GOD." I think I ever chuckled a bit. How silly of me not to run to the creator FIRST thing every morning! Don't get me wrong I pray with my husband before he leaves for work, so we do pray in the "morning." But I'm not giving God the very first part of my day, my thoughts, my life, my day! So I have started...
"HI GOD! Its so hard! Thank you for my wonderful blessings. Please give me the strength for the day for all you have created me to be."
He promised he would...give me that strength and he also said Have ARelaxed Day. I love you, we got this together.
Philippians 4:13 "I can do all things through Him who strengthens me."
