Susannah Wesley is da bomb.

There is an oft-quoted story about Susannah Wesley that says that in the midst of her many children she would throw the apron over her head and spend time in quiet with Jesus.

Susanna Wesley is probably best known for being the mother of Charles and John Wesley, and many people consider her the Mother of Methodism.

Confession: I am not Susannah Wesley (though I deeply admire her; what an amazing woman!).

Nor did God create me to be her. But, I came under condemnation feeling that I needed alone time and when it was difficult to really connect with God with screaming (or even well-behaving sitting on their blankets playing quietly) children around me.

I think I was under the illusion that I couldn't have time alone. I felt myself shriveling. So, in case it's helpful for you, here's a couple of things I have done the in the past year to help me get the alone time I so desperately need to internally process and connect with Jesus (and my husband).

1. We put the kids to bed earlier. Most nights our kids are in their room by 7:30. Sometimes we have them read to themselves and be quiet. Sometimes, we let them play. We go in later and turn off the light around 8:30. This lets my husband and I have some time to unwind and catch up before it gets too late, and it also lets our children have time to either exercise creativity playing games or stretch their imagination reading books. They love this! And it helps us do #2, which is...

2. We get up earlier. When I get up is irrelevant, because my schedule is different than yours, but last year I decided that it was so important to me to have time alone before anyone woke up that I was going to set back the clock until I had enough time to spend with the Lord, plan, and exercise before my kids woke up. I can't tell you how much this has helped me! I sure am not Susannah Wesley, but I am getting what I need.

Disclaimer: some of you are in a season of life that it seems impossible to do all of that. My advice to you is to do what you think God is asking you to do (for your specific situation). Please don't feel condemnation if you're nursing a baby through the night! AND please don't feel like you have to be me if you're more like wonderful Susannah!

I also wanted to refer you to a wonderful website Inspired to Action, which is really encouraging for practical things like this!

What are some things you have done that have helped you get sanity in the little years? I'd love to hear what you have to say! If you have any practical tips for us, don't be stingy! We want to hear them!

Feeding Kids Bigger Portions

Over the coming months, I hope to introduce you to friends of mine who are also finding joy in the blink of raising children.

My first guest blogger is my great friend Carrie (see her blog here, and she's coming out with a book soon, too!). She lives with her husband and five children in China. One of the things I admire most about them is that they are always asking the question "what's it gonna take?", living a life of difficult decision making and joyful sacrifice, and passing it onto those around them. They they make it all look easy, and its because they flow out of a deep conviction of who is Lord over their lives. That challenges me so much. Oh, and she's darn funny, too! This is the first of many guest posts I hope to have from her.

(aren't they cute?)

So, without further adieu...



What does it really mean to be a Christian parent?

Does Christian parenting mean that we choose our names from the original Greek or that we put Chris Tomlin music on our pregnant wombs?

Does it mean that we say a two-line prayer before dinner and paint our nurseries like a Noah's ark petting zoo?

I think our calling as a Christian parent is hard, complicated, and full of satisfaction. What a privilege that the Lord has given us as parents!

Here is just one of the many ways to separate us as Christian parents, instead of just nice moral ones:

Find ways to intentionally build Scripture into our days.

Deuteronomy 6:4-7 is going to encourage us to love the Lord with all our heart, soul and might. And we are to teach these things diligently to our children. Loving the Lord is not something our kids learn simply by proximity of Christian parents or a good children's program at church. We have to instruct our kids in the ways of the Lord. This will require a lot of work on our part. If, as Deuteronomy 6 says, we are to talk about the Lord when we sit in our house and walk along the way, then we have to give our children the raw materials to be able to talk about.

The Jesus Story Book Bible is a great beginning story Bible to get your kids to understand that the whole of the Bible is about Jesus. From beginning to end, Jesus is being announced as King. And don't just assume that because there is a cute picture of Jesus simultaneously petting a lamb and a child on the cover of a children's storybook Bible that the theology is great. So many children's Bibles jack up the stories and make them very man-centered. Do your homework and stick with the kid's Bibles that actually keep God central. This is an important foundation in building a solid theological foundation in kids.

The Desiring God children's curriculum will help you as a family begin to talk about theology. While there are lots of good children's ministries out there, we find that most don't assume your kids can handle theology. We have found that kids can actually handle the bigger truths of God with relative ease when it's communicate at their level. This curriculum does a fantastic job of just that. We talked about the omniscience and sovereignty of God with our 4 year old. It gives our kids a chance to move beyond David and Goliath and sink deep into a rich understanding of God. Choose a night a week for a family time of worship. Go through this together. Sing, pray, confess and plead to the Lord together.

The Westminster Catechism for kids is a series of questions and answers for our kids to set in their hearts. Basic fundamentals like "Who Made You?" and your child would reply with "God."

Seeds of Worship is a series of worship albums of Scripture that don't make me want to pound someone when my kids want to listen to them over and over again. I love hearing my kids sing Ephesians and John as they run through the house wearing only a feather boa and their underwear.

Memorize Scripture together. Desiring God has Fighter verses that will give you plenty to work through. Make it fun by giving them characters that move through an enchanted forest each time they get a verse done. At the end, go get ice cream or tell them you'll do a cartwheel. Or maybe that your husband will sing John Denver at breakfast.

Will people look at you strange when your child is singing, "Who is the chief end of man? The chief end of man is to glorify God!" in Target? Probably. But people find it cute when a four-year old sings "All the Single Ladies." We need to start redeeming the minds and hearts of our children at a young age. Sometimes we have people who give us a hard time about the amount of Scripture we try to build into our kids. When Dt. 6 uses the word "diligently," I see no other way around it. The world is offering my littles a buffet of temptations and I need to remind them that the Word of the Lord is the only thing that will feed their souls. They aren't going to learn this on their own. It is our responsibility as parents to breathe this into them. These are the children the Lord has entrusted to us for a time. It's only for a season. A very brief season.

Let's take this season back from what the world is offering them and give it to the Lord so that He can write His promises into their souls.

A Change is as Good as a Rest

I have heard that in the UK there's a common saying that goes like this: "A change is as good as a rest."

Today we're visiting friends who live half-a-day's drive from us. We've laughed and cried; we've been out all day with our crazy kids climbing mountains and playing in waterfalls; we've stayed up late catching up after the kids are all in bed and gotten up early to spend time with the Lord. All of that makes me really sleepy, but again I am reminded that sometimes what I need is not sleep, but rest.

Sometimes in the middle of parenting and work and relationships, we're so weary that doing anything that takes energy just seems not worth it. I'm tired and overwhelmed, but sometimes just getting out and getting some perspective is even more renewing than getting sleep.

What do you think? How do you find rest in the middle of parenting? Living overseas? Doing "ministry"?

Bible Memory

Here's a link to a great Bible memory system (with review included). We've been using this for the past month or two with the kids, and its been really great to help me not to have to think about what I am supposed to do each day!

Thanks Tara, for the idea!

Stephanie

Filling your tank

Hey, so if you've never read Leading on Empty by Wayne Cordeiro, I highly recommend it, especially if you are weary or tired, your family is involved in ministry, or you are learning how to rest.

I had been hearing about this talk for a long time, but I could never find it. Usually they sell their talks, but they decided to allow this one to be a free download because of its popularity.

Here's a free download of a talk entitled "Dead Leader Running" he gave at a Willow Creek Leadership Summit that kind of summarizes the message of his book.

What he says has been hugely beneficial for us!

Enjoy!

the freedom of one word.

One of the most important lessons I have learned about child-training is that we have to teach our children to understand and respond to “No.” It’s the foundation of teaching them to obey.

Right now I am re-training and conditioning my children to understand this: no means no. And there are consequences if they don’t obey. After not obeying “no” the first time, they hear it again accompanied with pain, to teach them that lack of obedience brings consequences.

Its so important for them to be able to understand that one word. Its powerful. It protects them. When my kids understand what my “no” means, it brings them freedom to do things that would be dangerous for other kids. I don’t have to be afraid of meltdowns or accidents in public, because I can be confident that whatever I say, they will do.

Right now I am reading a book about hearing the voice of God, and in it the author makes the observation, if you cannot hear a ‘no,’ you will have a hard time hearing God at all or believing that what you think you heard is in fact from God. Without understanding God, you will never be confident that you heard when he tells you “yes.”

And I am reminded again that its just as important for me as an adult to understand and respond to “no.” Sometimes the “no” is more powerful than a “yes.”

When I am flooded with needs inside our house and requests from the outside of doing, serving, seeing, and visiting, its easy to be overwhelmed. My own desires and feelings of responsibility creep in and muddy the waters. I have to understand the language of God when he says, “No.” Otherwise, I get distracted and sunk by good things. Hurt. Or worse.

I never thought that a “No” would bring so much freedom, and now I have more vision than ever in training my children.

Crossroads

Its easy for me as I read about the Israelites in the Old Testament to think how stupid they were, how foolish for not being faithful to the One who not only led them out of slavery, but provided for their every need, took them to a fruitful land, and defeated their enemies at every turn. They listened to those around them more than the Faithful One, and they were distracted and led away from the path. Its easy to forget how swayed I am by the people around me. Even in my relationships with believers, I have to be wise. I have to depend on God to guide me. You never know what He's going to say. Sometimes He surprises.

Decisions are also scary, because, get this: we might do the wrong thing. So we are paralyzed, gathering information, trying to hear more from God, waiting for the dream, the writing on the wall, or the prophet to pick you out of the crowd.

But, whatever we do, we are making decisions. Savings, college funds, discipleship: one day we will reap the consequences of our decisions, good or bad. Our job is not to blindly go with the flow, but to continually keep our eyes open, and make those decisions in faith. Every decision has opportunity costs. We choose one thing, we opt out of something else. Every decision is an opportunity to draw into Him.

If we don't, then we tread a dangerous path of default. It doesn’t mean we trust God more, it just means we are like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind and opinions of man.

Default is still a decision.

If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given him. But let him ask in faith, with no doubting, for the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea that is driven and tossed by the wind. For that person must not suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord; he is a double-minded man, unstable in all he does. -James 1: 5-8

Am I a doubter, Lord?

The path that God has for me is only for me (Thank you, Lord!). The freedom of knowing God is that out of relationship comes wisdom. He gives generously to all without finding fault. Even in your faults, he gives it generously. Lavishly. The wisdom of God. Its free to all who ask in faith. And when we walk in faith, we are free from the judgment of others.

You know what else is the wisdom of God? The Gospel. So, don’t be surprised if God asks you to do things that are foolish-sounding. We need ears and eyes to see the kingdom of another place, a heavenly one. We might not know all the implications of our decisions, but we know this: God works to the good of all who love him and are called together according to his purpose. He works all things to your good—-he can turn even poor decisions into grace.

Whatever decisions you have made, there is always redemption. There’s always a way back to the path. God loves you so much that he uses such discipline along the way to bring you closer to his heart.

Mercy is new every morning. Even for the exiled Israelites, there were new mercies every morning. Even in deep mourning, his mercies are new. He has mercy on us because he knows what we’re made of: dirt.

Today I am glad that all of this isn’t dependent on me. Today I remember how He's led me thus far, and in His loving-kindness he's always turned me back to the right path when I have strayed.

Be at rest once more, O my soul, for the LORD has been good to you. -Psalm 116:7

Today, I will step out again in faith. I will make decisions, and I will commit to walking forward in all that God has for me.

how to get booted from the pity party

Every once in a while, our family has to make difficult decisions, and they usually consist of two options: 1) a comfortable safe option or 2) a crazy scary option in which we have to step out in faith and be caught in his arms or we will die.

Invariably, we choose stepping out. Its just who we are.

So, the second I take my eyes of Jesus, I get discouraged. I start saying things to myself like:
“Why do other people get to do ….. while I have to….?”
“Why does God always tell us to do the difficult thing?”
“When am I going to just be comfortable?”

Literally, that happened to me this morning. The enemy frequently comes in this way to discourage me and tell me that I am not going to make it. Sometimes I believe it, though its less now than it used to be.

So, in honor of Him who makes all things possible, who holds us together by the power of his word, and who created the universe by speaking; to Him who is able to do abundantly more than we could ever ask or imagine; its to his glory and to the shame of the enemy that I write today.

When I hear the voice of the enemy tempting me to worry or fear, here are my weapons:
1. I list the ways that he has been gracious to me and think about how the situation I am in can bring glory to him.
2. I thank him for his grace.
3. I remember the ways he has delivered me before.
4. I think about his character; namely, that he is good and has good plans for my life even if they seem difficult now. (Ok, these things are repetitive and could be written as thankfulness, but I need to think through everything!)
5. I read Hebrews 11.

I am always transformed when I meditate on the fact that I was made for another world, a heavenly country, a place where one day all will be right. With that in mind, I can gladly lay down my desires in life and take up his. He is coming back for me. He will rescue me and take me home with him, and my mission here in life is to help as many people to go with me as possible. I can gladly obey and spend myself for the joy set before me. I take up my weapons and fight for heavenly realities. The darkness clears. I can’t ever get there without faith. By faith I take on joy and thankfulness, and I move forward. I take courage that there have been many before me who have died in faith.

These all died in faith, not having received the things promised, but having seen them and greeted them from afar, and having acknowledged that they were strangers and exiles on the earth. For people who speak thus make it clear that they are seeking a homeland. If they had been thinking of that land from which they had gone out, they would have had opportunity to return. But as it is, they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared for them a city. Hebrews 11:13-16 (ESV)

Right now, I also have to give a shout out to Ann Voskamp and her book A Thousand Gifts.. The fight for joy is truly real, and a real weapon is thankfulness. Her book is definitely in my top ten books I have read. Maybe someday I will figure out what those books actually are.

In what ways does the try to discourage you? How do you fight back when you’re discouraged?