Rockin’ and Rulin’: Mothers Who’ve Shaped the World

You might see a lot of this title in the coming year.  I’ve had a bit of an epiphany and of course, epiphanies were meant to be blogged about

Since I read the first chapter of the biography of D.L. Moody to my children, I’ve been in the most pensive mood, mulling over what I read about Moody’s mother.  I was impressed by Moody’s influence when I read his biography as a child; But now, his mother amuses me more because I attribute so much of his success to her.

If we are to be mothers who desire to live lives worthy of the calling of Christ, devoted to bringing up godly children, determined to love fiercely as wives, committed to fighting in the battle that rages against the family, then by all means let us look back and glean from those who have done it so well.

That is what the “Rockin’ & Rulin’” series will be about when you see the title.  (Taken, of course, from the quote:  “The hand that rocks the cradle rules the world.”)

One word describes Betsy Moody:  PLUCK.  And yet the word scarcely touches her.

Over the next few days (weeks?) I’m going to be posting excerpts about this incredible woman of faith and tenacity.

To begin this series about Betsy Holton Moody, I leave you with this:

“To rule a household [alone] of seven sturdy boys and two girls, the oldest twelve years old, required no ordinary tact and sound judgment, but so discreet was this loyal mother that to the very end she made “home” the most loved place on earth to her family, and so trained her children as to make them a blessing to society.”

Mother-Forgiveness

There are deeply stabbing lessons of motherhood….

This one hit me in a split second.  In one instance I refused the apology.  Not completely refused, but a “I’m still very upset with you and you apologize for the same thing over and over and over, and I just want to see change instead of another apol—”

Heart sank.  I was spouting the very words I hoped I would never hear my Father say.  And I feel sure I will not.

Stopped mid-sentence…tears streaming down both our faces.

“No…

I’m so sorry.  I beg God to forgive me for the same things over and over and–by His grace–I will continue to forgive you over and over as long as I live.”

Relief broke across the face…relief that could only come after such a terrifying thought that Mother had “met her forgiveness quota.”

Perhaps you are encouraged.

All’s Not Hair in Love and War

It took me 5 children to realize that I might need to say it out loud:  “You are not allowed to cut yours or anyone else’s hair”.

You must hear it from the start…

I have had hair woes my whole life. Too thin, too fine, too–not what I wanted it to be. I deal with it.

I married a man with thick, jet black hair, but several of our first girls inherited my hair. Life is still good.

Enter Mallie.

This child was born with a shock of full, fuzzy, black hair. It was comical…me, the fair-skinned blond lady holding this dark-skinned baby with…this HAIR.

I loved it from the start.  And it grew and was so thick and so long and so wavy and so…everything I had always wanted in hair.  And despite the torture of combing out tangles from this thick-maned three-year old, I loved it long (notice that was past tense).

Not braided, it had grown to her waist.

And then…

That tangle I couldn’t get out.  It came out of nowhere and so I had to do it–I cut it up almost to her chin.  I almost cried, but that would have been silly.

So we got used to her cute new haircut.

And then…

Enter Brooks–the 5-year-old that didn’t get the memo.

“She told me to”.  That was the best he could come up with.   (Didn’t Adam say that?)

So here’s the really good part…this happened on the same day I posted about teaching our children forgiveness. God does love a good, “let’s see what ya got?” doesn’t He?

Maybe I loved Mallie’s hair too much…

It’s even worse in the back.

I left it hacked up for 2 days before I could get the nerve to cut it.  And since we don’t have a sharp pair of scissors in the house, I grabbed the little red pair, the same pair Brooks used.

“I wanted hair like Avi.” I get sad every time I look at it.

A good reminder for all of us that:

Forgiveness is mandatory…no matter the mess we have to deal with.

Hair grows back.

There are consequences to our actions.

I need to remember to tell my other 5-year-olds about the hair thing.

We probably do things that leaves God shaking his head and saying, “What was she thinking?!” and He loves us anyway.

So what did I say besides “I’m so glad my son doesn’t show promise for Cosmetology”?

“Well, there’s only one thing left to do….blog about it.”

What Does a Stay-at-Home Mom Do All Day?

Quite honestly, I don’t like the term “stay-at-home mom”.  It testifies to the fact that there are moms who don’t stay at home and I wish it didn’t have to be so.

But there’s an enormous gulf now between “have to work” and “want to work”.  The gulf was a complicated build, and now we can’t even remember the “norm”, when women stayed at home because, well, there was a household to run and  important lives who depended on her, and it didn’t matter that they couldn’t afford new socks–it was her job to darn them so they didn’t have to.

No, our generation doesn’t remember because they were told another story.  They were told that women were home because they *had* to be, (not because it best served their families) and that one little word touches a rebellious chord in us and we jump on the band wagon to “save women from oppression”.  We think “stay” is a derogatory word and though all good sense said that a healthy family needs someone devoted to nurturing it, we passed up the job.

That’s not really what the post is about, but I can never just start in the middle

So now women, some of whom are entertaining the thoughts of coming back home (more and more exhausted working women are getting tired of the “have-it-all” lie and realize home comes closer to anything that offers “all”), don’t know about the art and profession of making a home and are asking, “but what do I do?”

Which strikes a veteran SAHM as comical, because she knows that tasks and opportunities alike present themselves faster than she can ever keep up.

And because readership of this blog makes up a widely-varied audience, I thought it timely to go back-to-basics for a moment and visit the question, “What does a stay-at-home mom do all day?” That is, what does a woman wishing to follow a Proverbs 31 model do?

Remember though...a list of what she “could” do is not the same as what she “should” do. Each woman is in a different season of life, some seasons allowing for greater opportunities than others.  Some are merely surviving with the basics during a busy season; others are finding time to flourish in their gifts and abilities.  But we could all study to be more efficient and become a better home-builders.

• She studies to provide at least somewhat healthy, somewhat economical meals for her family.  This can be a time-consuming job, but there are books written solely on the art of cooking and the incredible ministry found in entertaining your family and friends through the hospitality of the kitchen.  Study it!  (Another word about the ministry of hospitality soon!)  Just in the area of health alone, America is experiencing an epidemic of illness, largely from consuming so much pre-packaged food, a choice usually necessary to maintain the over-booked lives we live.

• If the Lord has given her children, she pours herself into their training, nurturing and developing.  Another full time job almost by itself.  If not, there are a myriad of “mothering” and ministering opportunities sorely in need of a servant-minded woman.

• She helps her husband.  This varies widely from home to home.  But much like an administrative assistant, she can be a “crown to her husband” instead of forcing him to hire another woman for that role.  This is where “the heart of her husband safely trusts her” as she runs a household and “he has no lack of gain”.

• She studies to keep her marriage happy.  The dearth of happy marriages–of marriages at all–is staggering.  Good marriages don’t just happen.  If they aren’t tended, they’ll wilt.

• She studies to save money, to make her home a warm, inviting place, to treat minor illnesses, to repair things, to make things, to plant things, to be busy with her hands.  Books are written–there is no end to this art.

• She engages in meaningful conversation with her children.  An often underrated, but vitally important job in their education–homeschooled or not.

• She “reaches”.  (“She reaches her hand to the needy”. Proverbs 31)  Whether this be the meeting of a physical need for the poor, or a need of a fellow believer, needs abound.  Many needs could be met in the form of an encouraging card, phone call or visit.  It’s just a suggestion, but maybe Prozac has largely filled our lack of availability to hurting women.

• She earns money.  Home industries are easier than ever to begin.  Saving money and making money are doable activities for the SAHM.

• She mentors other moms.

• She takes care of extended family members.  Nursing homes are new.

And I shall close for now, because I have lots of things to do today   Help me, each one of you, where you are, resurrect the art of homemaking.  We need homes…they’re actually pretty rare.

Love Covers…

Even though I’m in a hurry, I prop on my full buggy and motion her, with her three items in hand, to go in front of me…it’s only treating her the way I want to be treated.  But then, the hasty shuffle past me, and never a grateful glance.

A short response from someone I love…

a perceived wound…

A thousand small injustices a day have only the power we give them…will I nurse my wound, blame, wear my feelings in a vulnerable place, or will I give others the benefit of the doubt?

“Who knows what that woman may be dealing with:  a terminally ill child she is hurrying back home to nurse?  Financial burdens larger than life?  An abusive husband?” I choose to ask myself.

“Love covers over an offense”.

I’m only just learning, at 37 years old, to look over offenses.  And I’m still very bad at it.  At least the thought occurs to me, and I’m praying earnestly that those thoughts would grow into more follow through.

As a mom, I find a hundred love-lessons like these to teach a day.  If we can cultivate a heart of looking over offenses in our children, imagine how we put them ahead!  Would you agree that this one character trait or flaw, whichever it is, is the source of so much violence, family turmoil and broken homes?  Think about the trail of disaster left in the wake of one of these tragedies when, who knows, had one party only had a mother walking beside him every day, spurring him to true Love, shaping a heart that is able to let an offense go, the whole chain of events may have never existed.

Left alone, the misery of self-centeredness–(for that is the vice that causes us to be quickly offended) will eat them alive.  But with careful pruning, day by day we speak into their lives…“Love keeps no record of wrongs”, and they are transformed by that truth. “Maybe your sister just needs a gentle word…”

Do I model it for them?   Do my children learn from the way I speak of others to cover offenses?  (This is a real question I’m asking myself right now as I write.)  What about my reactions to my husband or in-laws?

Thinking the best of people, letting things go, covering up offenses…this is the stuff of Christian love.  Are we big enough?

Mothering: Train Against the Grain

The older I get, the more I realize how “against the grain” living the Christian life is.  Against the culture’s grain, and even against the grain of my flesh.

We have to constantly weigh our own thoughts, feelings and tendencies against the wisdom of Scripture.  In truth, we must ultimately fall more in love with our Savior, and less in love with ourselves, with the approval of men, and with what the world calls happiness.

As I was reading the passage in Matthew–the most bone-chilling words in all of the Bible–this morning about the Judgement and the sign of Jesus’ “knowing” us, I was reminded so powerfully about my job to live out and to teach my children about the most important thing on earth…

SERVING.  It’s the sum total of the gospel.

But we like to think of serving in a neat little, do-able package.  Like when we do a good deed, or remember to put someone first every now and then.  But when serving crosses over into interference or inconvenience, that’s where we draw the unconscious line.

Jesus-serving is not always pretty and sparkly.  It’s grimy and it involves being used up. I think of Mother Teresa as probably the most incredible example in all of mankind of this kind of serving.

Where we “can’t afford” to serve too much, discussing our plight over a Starbucks latte, she was content to own the clothes on her back and walk everywhere she went.

Where we are just “too tired” to give anymore, she wore a weathered face that publicly shouted her willingness to give beyond exhaustion.

And I can’t help but think of motherhood as I’m so often prone to add up all the hours of sleep I’ve missed, or the lack of silence, or the raw fact that just going places in this season in life can be stressful since 5 of my children only own one of any pair of shoes. (Think of it–whining because I can’t find matching shoes!  Realistically, we could go to the thrift store once a week and buy a practically new pair for a couple of bucks.  It’s a luxury the majority of the world can’t even fathom!)

As a mother, do I delight in the “being used up” part?  When Jesus said,

“I was hungry and you fed me; sick and you visited Me; thirsty and you gave Me drink:….in as much as you did it unto the least of these, you did it unto Me.”

Do I really serve my “hungry, thirsty, sick” children as I would serve the Lord?  Am I dying to self out of love for Him or because “this is just what I have to do”?

(Sharp, stabbing pains in my heart just now.)

So first I have to get myself thinking right.  Then, it’s off to impress on these little hearts the full meaning of finding one’s life by losing it.  So when we hear those ideas that tantalize our flesh–”You need more time for *you*…Don’t burden your children with work…do what makes you happy”, let the words of our Savior drown out all the lies.

“If any man would come after Me, let him deny himself, take up his cross and follow Me.”