Faith – Page 2

Categories: Faith

Unseen Footprints

The crash of your thunder was in the whirlwind; your lightnings lighted up the world; the earth trembled and shook.

Your way was through the sea, your path through the great waters; YET YOUR FOOTPRINTS WERE UNSEEN.

This passage in Psalm 77 hit me like BAM.

If you feel like you’re going through something as striking and suffocating as an overwhelming ocean wave, remember that He is with you even though his footprints go unseen.

He will make a way and a path for you because that’s what he does. He parts those seas and leads his people.

Unseen footprints doesn’t mean the footprints aren’t there, it just means they aren’t seen. He is ALWAYS with us.

Categories: Emotions, Faith, Motherhood

I Will Fail My Kids

Today was a day to not write down in the books. It’s a day I would want to forget and pray doesn’t leave emotional scars on my daughter.

I battle with anger. And as an extreme introvert who is daily pushed to extroverted limits I have never experienced in my life, with constant noise and uncontrolled volume levels and daily nonstop requests and demands on my time – I often feel maxed beyond what I mentally feel I can handle.

Then enter in anger – anger that rages most strongly when I’m at depleted fatigued states. By God’s strength I’ve been able to keep (mostly) calm as we weather the storms in our house but there are many many times I do not handle myself well.

Today I did not handle myself well and I yelled and was aggressive and slammed doors and I was so ashamed and embarrassed for how I treated my sweet girl who was in tears by the end due to my behavior. We’ve since talked things out and I through tears asked her to forgive me, but I have been left with the feeling of being a bad mom all day.

And I sat with that thought for hours and I felt God bring me through the fog of that lie. Bad mom. Why do we use that term? What does it even mean or define?

The truth is my identity and worth are NOT based on how I perform or love as a mom. My identity and worth are in Jesus ALONE. Nothing else. I will have days where my sin shines so bright it’s terrifying, and days where my sin is quieter and appears more ‘put together’ even though it’s not, and other days I will experience true freedom and growth in my tangle with sin and anger.

The truth is I WILL fail my kids. But that doesn’t equal a bad mom. It equals a mom who is a broken human in a fallen world desperately needing Jesus.

I am not a bad mom, and neither are you. Instead, we are the moms God has planned and designed us to be, and he WILL fulfill his purposes for us (Psalm 57:2), brokenness, redemption and all.

Categories: Emotions, Faith

Back to Life

I was stopped in my tracks today by reading about a girl who was professed dead and moments later was awoken back to life.

“While he was saying these things to them, behold a ruler came in and knelt before him, saying, ‘My daughter has just died, but come and lay your hand on her, and she will live.’ And Jesus rose and followed him, with his disciples…And when Jesus came to the ruler’s house and saw the flute players and the crowd making a commotion, he said, ‘Go away, for the girl is not dead but sleeping.’ And they laughed at him. But when the crowd had been put outside, he went in and took her by the hand, and the girl arose.”

What caught me off guard today was how I so personally resonate with this story.

If I’m honest, the past months have had me feeling dead. Between all the family changes and family heartaches – between raising three little kids and feeling so hormonally ‘off’ from weaning – most days I’ve pushed through to get through. Feeling dead but still walking around getting things done.

I love how Jesus is seen proclaiming this girl is NOT dead but is sleeping, and he powerfully grabs her by the hand and wakes her up back to LIFE.

For those of you walking around ‘dead’ like me, I pray you experience the power of Jesus calling you to life – deeply speaking to your heart that you are NOT dead but that you’ve been sleeping and he has the ABILITY and DESIRE to wake you from whatever funk or dark cloud you’ve been living in. Here’s to freedom!