Jul 18, 2018 | Activism, Charity, Children, Current affairs
My youngest asks allot of questions. His quirky, inquisitive randomness is a great insight into how his 9 year old mind works. Of course, these often present a teachable moment, case in point:
“Mom, I have a question..if you’re a policeman and you just got takeaways, can you put your lights and sirens on to go home faster so your food doesn’t get cold?”
I am sure he wanted a simple yes or no, but me being me, he got a mini tutorial on integrity, privilege, power and Mandela day. It went something like this:
Power is a big responsibility: Just like having access to lights and sirens when you’re a policeman.
With great power comes great responsibility – as Uncle Ben repeated to Peter Parker. (Spiderman quote, BOOM! This mom is off to a great start!)
What you do with your power directly relates to your level of integrity. The policeman has the position and privilege of serving people along with the power to do it, but when he decides to use his sirens for personal gain, he is considering himself above others, his own good as higher than the greater good. A good metaphor for what has happened in SA? I think yes.
Whatever power, position, and privilege we get given in life must be used for the good of others:
In the words of Spock (by this time I was on a roll!)
“Logic clearly dictates that the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few”.
We are yet to have a party in power that displays this kind of integrity. Because despite the hard-won power, privilege and position, those who gained it has for the most part considered their wants needs and desires as more important as the call of their office and the needs of the masses. And I dare say, they are not the only ones. As we the people have the power to vote and the right to protest, these powerful privileges have by and large not been used in line with our call to Ubuntu. Nowadays I dare say protest action is simply mimicking giant temper tantrums that serve a few to the detriment of the many (think Eskom strike action and it’s the direct link to higher electricity prices for everyone. Think school protests that literally rob the innocent of their right to the very education you’re are striking over. Thankfully and tragically these are examples my 9-year-old and 10-year-old actually “get”)
I have no illusions about my 1% life. Neither do my kids. We have the privilege conversation allot. We talk about the poor allot. We talk about what we can do to make a difference and being socially responsible, allot. But this Mandela day, what I want my boys to know is that what he did can’t have all been for nothing. As I show them the footage of Tata Mandela being released, a day marked in my memory as a girl, I want them to know that there is a lot of work to be done still and we, the regular South Africans, whether you are the 1% or the 90%, have each our own power, position and privilege to enable us to make sure it wasn’t all for nothing.
We have the power to make our voice heard: We can vote. This is a democratic superpower (superpowers are things boys understand!) that we are to use wisely and with eyes wide open.
In view of our beautiful democracy and the hard won right to vote, if leaders who lack morality, integrity and responsibility remain leaders, then the problem is not the leaders.
We have the privilege of freedom: Freedom to access education (yes, I realize not everyone has the access they should have or the quality they deserve, but don’t negate the good news stories of motivated individuals who took this privilege seriously and rose above the challenges in the education system. And don’t negate your own ability to influence the system, for the good of the many, something I consider to be the responsibility of the “few”.) We have the freedom to engage with our government, freedom to engage in healthy debate, freedom to live out our convictions without fear of persecution. Not all countries have this.
We each have a unique position of influence: My housekeeper wanted to be a teacher. Thanks to apartheid-era “Bantu” education she never got the chance. But she has not let that stop her from using her influence in her community to find an outlet for her teaching passion. She teaches sewing and crocheting and focusses that on young women in the community so as to create an opportunity for ministry and relationship. She takes her influence and her position seriously in her community and I learn so much from her.
As a 1%”er” I don’t’ have to wait for a wage bill to pay an employee a living wage, I just need to educate myself and listen to my conscience. As a suburban mom I don’t have to start an NGO to help someone in need, I just need to step outside my door and be a bit proactive. As someone with access to the internet and thriving relationships, I don’t have to print a billboard to inspire a fellow mom to live with intention and meaning, I just need to post something or have coffee with someone. I think you get where I am going with this.
We have the most amazing country! Seriously, what’s not to love? Check out this cool article on 100 Best Things to do in South Africa if you need some SA inspiration. Now is not the time for giving up, but ramping up!
May we as South Africans resist being mere branches in the flow of negativity about our country, and instead be kindling that sparks action and ignites hope. May we as South Africans take our power, privilege and position seriously. We don’t need more protesters, protagonists, patronisers and problem-pointer-outers! We need more boots-on-the-ground, BHAG Believing, brave ones who refuse to stop moving forward. So I told my boys, don’t be fence-sitters, naysayers, complainers! Be dreamers, believers and doers. And may that not just be a Mandela day thing, but an everyday thing!
Jun 8, 2018 | Bible, Children, Christianity, Discipline, Faith, Family, God, Parenting
When did ordinary become a bad word? Was it when social media started making even a grilled-cheese-sandwich dinner look “extra”ordinary? (Thank you Amaro filter!) Instagram feeds full of “Don’t let average describe your life” #mondaymotivation has all of us drinking the cool-aid, and unwittingly buying into a side order of perpetual dissatisfaction with it! Is that not why we have a generation of unmotivated, deeply depressed millennials? Simon Sinek (you’ve seen the Youtube video right?) describes millennials as people who want to make an impact, but who want to reach the summit of impact without climbing the mountain required to reach it (a problem by the way, that he lays squarely at the feet of failed parenting strategies. That and unfettered access to technology. Ouch!). I for one think the argument is legit. Because ask anyone, ask Steve Jobs, ask Billy Graham or whoever you view as someone who has done something extraordinary and they will tell you that 99.9% of the steps taken to reach anywhere or anything extraordinary in life are unbelievably ordinary.
So this is what I told my boys about being ordinary…
That it takes courage to be ordinary: If you asked my kids what my husband has achieved in his life, they are likely to be vague about the longevity of his business and his acumen on a mountain bike and with a calculator. But they will be able to tell you in detail about the after work ping-pong matches, the daily swimming pool maintenance and the conversations around the dinner table that their dad was present for. Sure, it’s an ordinary middle-class life but I can tell you right now, that there is nothing ordinary about dads going home daily and diligently to see their families instead of staying late for just a few more emails or just another drink. Nothing ordinary about saying yes to cleaning the pool or killing the spider or hanging the picture on a Saturday and no to becoming better at golf or entering Ironman or whatever other bucket list item will take them away from their families for more hours. Those are the thousand small deny-thyself moments that declares something about where someone’s heart is at. Ordinary is hard because it’s unseen, un “post” worthy, unremarkable. Like the laundry pile and the admin file and the go the extra mile of any messy mom life!
Ordinary is all the seeds of surrender and submission and all the hard and unpopular
choices that build a life God rewards. There is nothing ordinary about faithfulness. It might not be glamorous but is sure is rare.
That we shouldn’t value achievement over discipline: My kids have the amazing privilege of having world record holder Peter Williams as a swimming coach. At our recent club awards ceremony, we were struck by the fact that swimmers received recognition both for points scored/records broken in races and for characteristics and attitudes displayed during training. It spoke to their coach’s conviction that coaches are daily called to the deep purpose of character building and that they are doing more than preparing kids for races, they are in a thousand laps and a thousand ways preparing kids for life. Because the truth is that how you train builds your character, and how you win tests that character.
It’s not what we do once in a while that shapes us, its the consistent habits and behaviors of every day. Having goals is great, but who will you become on the way? Saul had many achievements, but David was a man after God’s own heart. The loud flash of achievement might be what the world honours, but the small daily grind of discipline and service is what God’ honours. If my kids won every medal out there but did not have love or the guts to show up for the everyday ordinary of their own lives, I couldn’t be more of a failure as a parent!
Everyone wants to be special, shine in a moment. But the truth is that it’s the mosaic of unremarkable events that make up days and years that end up making a person.
That obscurity is not the enemy: We live in a world where the humblebrag has been cultivated into a fine art, with everything from how many books we read to how well we rode or ran a portion on Strava (even if we stuck to our Bible reading plan) being broadcast to the world. My kids know that a portion of my day job deals with industries built on celebrity and fame. And it’s normal for kids of a certain age and stage to gravitate towards careers and talents that would get them noticed, like playing a sport for your country or gaining recognition as a musician (both ideas that I actively, maybe obsessively discourage. And no I don’t feel guilty about it. I flipped that switch years ago).
I have noticed that as parents we spend an inordinate amount of time trying to get our kids to aim for a definition of special that has been shaped by the world. Instead I hope to show them that God makes us all in a very particular way to tell His story to the world, and this has nothing to do with fame and celebrity. Every pot for a purpose (2 Tim 2 v 20)! Some people are charismatic leaders who bring out the best in others. But it takes equal if not more courage to be ordinary and do the ordinary things and respond to the most ordinary of callings with extraordinary passion.
If we can guard against comparison and a world-shaped-view of value and worth we will stop being so uncomfortable with obscurity.
That each day counts, not just the big days: The message of Scripture is not that only the big days, big things, big people count.
“So here’s what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for him. Don’t become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You’ll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what he wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you.” Rom 12 v 1-2 MSG
God calls us to number all of our days (Ps 90 v 12), even if they are not stand-out, red letter days. Because He knows, you are what you repeatedly do. He knows, the ordinary is where the true story lies, where the true you is crafted and revealed.
“The only way to live a truly remarkable life is not to get everyone to notice you but to leave noticeable marks of his love everywhere you go- Anne Voskamp.
Wise people know that their present will one day be their past and it will show up in their future. This is why the Apostle Paul calls us to “ redeem the time” (Eph 5 v 16). A quiet, ordinary life, unknown to the world, can still be one of much fruitfulness and joy to God. That fruitfulness grows in the realisation that nothing God does in our lives is ever wasted. Most of the time we don’t have to be awesome, we just have to be obedient.
May 20, 2018 | Balance, Christianity, Discipline, Faith, Fear, God, Work
For me, it usually starts with an overly ambitious to-do list and the Sunday night blues. My approach to the one: dogged white knuckle determination to conquer. My approach to the other? Red wine. And popcorn. Together.
Neither of the approaches is particularly successful and usually, by mid-week, there is panic, rushing, yelling, and the feeling like everything is spinning out of control. But there is no need to reach for a productivity book or download yet another to do list app (Yessss, I see you!)! Believe me, that is about as useful to me as watching a youtube clip on calibrating your oven temperature (yes, apparently that’s a thing). Here is my ninja action plan when I feel the to-do-list tsunami heading my way on a Monday:
Ask the difficult questions: Are you overcommitted? If the answer is yes, the next question is why? Is it FOMO? Do you equal worth to productivity (shamefaced as I write this!). Ok, so here is the reality check: Time is a finite thing, we are not able to create more of it and in fact, God deemed the amount we got to be sufficient. So if you are constantly trying to fit more into your day ask yourself why that is? Lack of discipline in what you say yes or no to? Does busyness help you hide from a calling God has given you or a truth you’d like to avoid? Ride the elevator all the way to the bottom floor where your heart/ your ego is pulling the strings and gain some insight into those brutal motivations. Without that no productivity strategy or mantra will help you change.
Stop kidding yourself about what is achievable and learn to prioritize: Just because you wrote it down doesn’t mean it’s achievable! #truthbomb. I know, you are only writing it down because it gives you a sense of control right? I know because I do it too. Learn to prioritize. Our overconnected world with pings and notifications make it seem like everything belongs in the urgent & important box and that it all requires your immediate attention. It doesn’t. If prioritization is hard for you, ask a friend or your husband or accountability partner to help you. Nothing focusses your priorities like sharing your very-ridiculous-God-complex-to-do-list with someone and getting a once-removed perspective (once they stop laughing in your face!) on what truly are the important things to accomplish in a day!
Check your truth: Our to-do list, our children’s schedule, our expectations of ourselves, just like every other action and conviction in our lives, stems from what we believe. Have you ever measured the truth your actions are based on, against the truth of God’s word? We may say with our mouths certain things that we believe, but based on the fruit that I see in my life and the lives of 99.9% of woman I know, what we actually believe is that we can and should have it all, do it all, be the be-all-and-end-all for everyone, and do it in a Pinterest perfect way that also seems effortless in order to gain the admiration from the outside world. Have you checked any of those convictions against what God actually says? If it’s true that we live according to what we believe, then maybe it’s time for a new belief?
Shorten your list: Stop sneering I am serious. There is a huge school of thought dedicated to the idea of a 3 item to-do list, a TODAY list if you will, that helps you prioritise (i.e identify what’s most important), focus (i.e not waste time on trivial to do’s just for the sake of the sense of achievement you get when you crossed it off the list) and gives you a sense of accomplishment at the end of the day because it’s supremely achievable and speaks to more long-term goals. A shorter list will revolutionize your productivity whether you are a stay at home mom, and exec, or someone who works from home or part-time because it clarifies and simplifies every day’s priorities.
Guard your peace: Like it’s a cash in transit van in the UAE. Like it’s the last glass of bubbly at a kiddies party. Busyness is one of the ways the devil can consistently distract us from God’s fingerprints in our lives.
There is a constant concatenation of spiritual events manifesting in your everyday life that you could miss if you don’t lay down your plans and pick up the light yoke offered by the One who is actually in charge here.
Honey listen, it’s not the circumstances that are overwhelming, everyone is busy. It’s the perspective that we should be getting to everything, the conviction that we should be making it look easy and have it all under control, that is the thing that truly wears women out. It’s the lies we believe that we use as a jump-off point that is the thing that actually snookers us.
If we release our desire to control it all and do it all and be it all, repent of the idea that we actually can and should, the fear we experience in being overwhelmed and the frustration we experience every time even the smallest thing threaten the precarious balance of our schedule, will go away.
Between being a time management expert, a fitness guru and clean food aficionado, a work-life balance genius and actually having it all the expectation of women today is ridiculous. Because with every new idea or strategy about what we should do or be, comes the accusation and implication of what we are not. So we find ourselves in a constant cycle of shame for which there truly is no basis. I hope this coming week you will be able to make a decision of the will to resist being overwhelmed by clinging more tightly to the truth about who God is than the lies about who you are supposed to be according to the world.
Apr 18, 2018 | Activism, Charity, Children, Christianity, Church, Discipleship, Faith, Family, God, Grace
Do you give to beggars?
We pass 7 traffic lights between our house and school, and 7 beggars, 8 if you count the toddler accompanying the woman at the entrance to our local mall. Sadly, in South Africa, this is disturbingly commonplace. And just like you are suddenly more aware of how crooked your handwriting is when the teacher is looking over your shoulder, you are suddenly more aware of how crooked your society is when your kids are in the back of the car. Asking you hard questions.
Stats SA’s poverty report shows that 30 million South Africans live in poverty out of a population of approximately 58 million people. If these numbers alone don’t confront our hearts, then the daily confrontation with the poor among us definitely should.
But how do we teach and model to our kids the right way to interact with the socio-economic needs of our nation? Is it really to just randomly hand out money or food at every street corner? I don’t think so.
“She sets her heart upon a nation and takes it as her own, carrying it within her. She labors there to plant the living vines.” (Prov 31 v 16 TPT)
So here is what I’ve told the boys:
We MUST give, and we must give with joy:
Our privileges and yes, our blessings too, are in our lives for the sake of others, not just for our own sake. We are blessed in order to bless! Our giving is not benevolence for the sake of assuaging our conscience or giving ourselves a (usually public by way of Facebook) pat on the back. According to God’s word, our giving is an act of both obedience (Heb 13 v 16) in response to God’s goodness, but also a joyful opportunity (Rom 12 v 7-8) in response to God’s love.
“God has given us two hands, one to receive with and the other to give with” – Billy Graham.
If we consider where God placed us, and what He placed in our hands, how could we not give? I have written before how I’ve tackled what I call the “burden of
privilege” with my boys, so that they can deal rightly, carefully, generously, and intentionally with the privileges that are a part of their lives.
We must be intentional and obedient in our giving:
As believers, our giving takes 2 forms. As citizens of South Africa, both my husband and I honor God by paying our taxes. A portion of our taxes goes towards social grants. More than 17 million South Africans receive social grants, which is our governments’ way of bringing to fruition Section 24 through 29 of our country’s impressive Bill of Rights, which focuses on the socio-economic rights of citizens, including the right to social security. The social grant system is a verifiable, standardized system of care, and the grants available include the child support grant, older person’s grant, disability grant, foster child grant, war veterans grant etc. So already, by merely following the laws of this land, (and God’s command Mark 12v17), we are already taking care of the poor. All people may not be able to make all the choices I have the privilege of making, but in a welfare state, they at least have some protection offered by law.
The second way we respond to the poor is by our tithes and offerings, where we commit our first fruits to our church and it’s various ministries, including it’s outreach to the poor. At my church, as I am sure it is the case at yours,
our social outreach is by way of focussed, intentional initiatives that take a long-term, holistic view of caring for the poor in both a physical and a spiritual way.
We must give to help, not to hurt:
According to a study done by Solidariteit, 90% of beggars in the Twane area use the money they obtain exclusively for drugs/ addictive substances. They make an average of R500 a day. The fact is that when we give money to someone on the street, we are often under the wrong impression that this money will go towards really helping, towards actual material needs such as shelter, food or clothing. But for the most part, this is not the case. Even the clothes and food we give gets bartered and sold. And in our thoughtless giving, we seldom realize the damage we do.
In my city women begging with one or 2 kids in tow is also commonplace. Very often, these kids are “on loan” and not even their real children. In the case of these scenarios, the damage we do in our “giving” is actually far worse and far-reaching. At my local mall there is a woman and a child begging on a daily basis. She keeps showing up with the toddler in tow because suburban housewives with their Woolies packets and their pampered guilt continue to happily part with a few bills on the way home from the mall.
They are under the wrong impression that they are making a difference, but they are in fact just keeping things the same, or making them worse.
By giving in that situation not only are we thoughtlessly enabling an adult to (ab)use a child for monetary gain (there’s a name for that you know! It’s slavery), but we are actually funding the long-term neglect and abuse of the child as a means to make money (and yes, there is a name for that too..it’s human trafficking). We are cooperating in depriving that child of his/ her basic rights as underpinned by our constitution to be educated, protected from exploitation and to be safe, keeping that innocent out of school and enslaved, likely having a shocking long-term impact on his/her development. The adult has a vested interest in keeping the child on the street, out of any early childhood development centre (of which many free or funded ones are available in poorer areas) or school (where a parent can apply for exception from school fees) because she knows if she is there with the child, motorists and passers-by are more likely to give than if she was there without the child.
So what to do? I have engaged (together with the boys) where it’s been possible especially with women and children in these situations, supplying walk-in centre information for organisations such as
MES, which does amazing work especially in inner city environments, and who have the facilities and infrastructure to help with paperwork for Grants, who have Early Childhood Development Centres, Employment programs, Shelters and the like. Instead of arming yourself with small change, arm yourself with information about reputable non-profits or charities that are active in your area. Most soup kitchens and feeding points also have referral and ministry systems in place that go beyond “bread alone” for those in need.
So here is a key question: Does what I give and how I give it keep people enslaved, or provide a way out for them?
We can’t help everyone, but we can help someone:
Having worked at an NGO for 4 years, this is a very hard reality for me to stand in. And it’s a struggle to not become overwhelmed by the needs around us. We can’t help everyone. That’s the bad news. The good news is that, especially if you are a South African, you don’t have to go very far for an opportunity to make a difference. In our neighborhood, at our school, in our kitchens, and on our street corners we are every day presented with multiple opportunities to have an impact, be an everyday radical, to leave things and people, better than we found them. And in all of those encounters, we get to reflect Jesus to the world. In all of these encounters God is always asking, “who can I send?”
If we feel like we should change the world, maybe we will be too overwhelmed to do anything. But if we see how we are uniquely placed to change things for one person, maybe we will be inspired enough to do something. As a family, we recently signed up as sponsors for 2 kids via
Compassion International. It an amazing opportunity to expose the boys to what it takes to break the cycle of poverty and how we can play a role (however small) what holistic care looks like, and by helping 2 boys not dissimilar to my 2, the journey is both relatable, practical and impactful.
Key question: are the people I encounter/ in my sphere of influence, better off or worse off because of me?
We must acknowledge the humanity in every person:
Even though the boys now know that we don’t hand out money to beggars, I try to model to them that we also make a point to greet every person that we encounter on our travels. Regardless of how far we have all fallen, we remain image bearers, and when we acknowledge a beggar by greeting them and making eye contact with them we are doing more than being polite, we are acknowledging our shared humanity, our shared brokenness, and fallenness. It’s both a restorative act as well as an affirmation of value. Their fall from grace might look different from mine, but fallen is fallen isn’t it? And our need for Jesus is the same. Because the gospel informs us that we are all poor. Of course it’s different types of poverty, physical, emotional, spiritual, but in each of those settings, our need for Jesus is the same. we are all in need of God’s grace and above all His deliverance, salvation, restoration and sanctification. Poverty is not the thing that separates us from the people we aim to help, it is, in fact, the one true leveler and the one thing we have in common.
We must continue to sow small seeds because many “ones” soon become “thousands”:
Acts of kindness are cumulative, and with our actions, we choose what we put out into the world. Whether we will thoughtlessly join the streams of negativity and hopelessness, or courageously resist, not allowing ourselves to become fatigued in doing good (Gal 6 v 9) is a choice. To help the boys choose to be a part of the solution, the good in the world, we use the
Game for Humanity cards, the school version (there is an adult version as well). Have you heard of these? Every week the boys take a card with an act of goodness on it, for example:
- Help with recycling at your school
- Make a hungry child a sandwich
- Help someone with their homework
Once they fulfill the action on the card they pass it on to another student, ideally the one they assisted, and so they spread good, one person at a time. It is a great way for them to see that they have control over their ability to infuse their environment with positivity, or the alternative, and to act responsibly within their little circle of influence to build on the cumulative effects of kindness and good deeds.
It’s tough out there. Doing good things takes a lot of bravery. But we don’t have to reinvent the wheels of response, opportunities are all around us. We are called to continue to choose empathy, even if it doesn’t come naturally because that is what Jesus did. I hope to raise children who are more deeply aware of the context they grow up in, of where they have been planted and why, certainly more so than I was as a white middle-class kid in South Africa. I don’t know if I will get this right but these types of conversations are a start.
This blog is an except from my talk about being and raising everyday radicals. For more on talks click here
Mar 19, 2018 | Bible, Children, Christianity, Discipleship, Discipline, Faith, Family, God, Grace, Parenting, Tips, Toddlers
There are more than 3 things. Obviously. Like, that a certain time of the day – the time that was previously referred to as happy hour – would now be referred to as unhappy hour. And that someone else’s bathroom, sleeping and eating habits would be dominating my conversations for the foreseeable future (and that I would see absolutely nothing wrong with that!). While I was pregnant with my firstborn, I read all the books. I knew about sleep training and pureed organic veggies. But there where soul challenges that I was about to encounter on my journey into parenthood that no one ever told me about.
(This blog is an abbreviated version of a talk called The 10 things I wish someone had told me about being a Mom – for more info on booking a talk or workshop please click here)
I have only been a mom for 11 years. According to Malcolm Gladwell that makes me an expert. But he’s wrong. I am categorically not one! But let’s face it, as moms, we really just need all the help we can get, and if you are reading this that means you agree with me on one thing – This parenting thing is flat out hard! It’s by far the hardest thing I’ve done and I grew up with 3 brothers and I am South African and I’ve competed in an International Beauty pageant! I will take on 12 competitive blonds with perfect teeth over an 11-year-old boy on a mission any day of the week!
So here are a few thing that I wish someone had given me a heads up about:
THAT IT WOULD SHAKE THE FOUNDATIONS OF MY IDENTITY AS A PERSON:
When I became a stay at home mom, I dreaded the “So, what do you do?” Question in social settings. I felt unjustified telling people I was a stay-at-home mom. It used to be so easy to talk about the career I was so proud of, and the awkwardness I felt at this new role in my life made me realize how much of my worth and identity I found in what I did for a living.
Woman are meaning makers and meaning-seekers, and when we become moms no one highlights to us the risk that we may now exchange one wrong source of meaning and identity for another. That we may very well go from being defined by our work an achievements to being defined by our home and our kids (and their achievements). That we may go from performance reviews and bonuses to the bar for our lives being Proverbs 31 (oh my goodness can you even imagine!) and the definition of our worth as our kids and their achievements! Can you imagine living under the pressure of having the justify your mom’s entire existence with every school report, or good night’s sleep! Is it any wonder even our kids our stressed!
But God never intended for us to bank our identity on the role of a dice, on the changing landscape of our roles or our seasons. Because then every word spoken in criticism of that becomes the definition of who we are, then our (absolutely inevitable) mistakes and failures (and that of our kids) are not learning opportunities or life happening, but a declaration of who we are, failures, as moms, as people. No, God’s anchor for our identity is the unchanging conviction that He holds about us, and His unalterable word over us.
Because the gospel says that we are who we are not because of what we do or achieve but because of what Christ did and achieved.
When we are in Christ, that is the final word over us.
Then our mistakes or failings will never be the defining story of our lives because grace means that we have never really blown it.
Then all that ever needed to be achieved is finished and that is a work us moms can rest in, not strive for.
Then whatever our accomplishments, achievements, and successes become a reflection of His grace and glory in our lives.
Living this truth as the anchor of who we are testifies much more greatly to our kids than striving for achievement!
THAT WE ALL LIVE BY A DEFINITION OF SUCCESS, WHETHER WE KNOW IT OR NOT
When my eldest was in Gr R they once filled in one of those cute forms for Mothers day, they go something like this:
My moms name is ___________
Her favourite Color is _______________
Together we like to _______________
But it was my son’s answer to one question that really stopped me in my tracks, literally. Where it said My mom says (Fill in the blank) a lot, he wrote HURRY UP. Jip, it was right there in black and white, “My moms says hurry up allot”.
As a mom, I defined how good the day was by how much I had gotten done. For me, productivity has always been the ultimate measure of success. Don’t be lazy, don’t slow down, do do do, go go go! If at the end of the day, the To Do list had lots of little red tick marks on it, then it was a good day. Conversely, if a kid got sick or the car broke down or I locked myself out of the house (jip, it’s happened!) then, the day, and by definition, I – was a failure.
Whether we know it or not, our definition of success, what we deem to be the ultimate measure of “good and enough” in our lives, is what drives our decision making, what we say yer or not to, what our schedule looks like (and our kids schedules) how we spend our money and our time. Comfort, status, being liked, all of these things could be our definition of success, the thing that cracks the whip in our lives so to speak, without us even knowing it.
The challenging thing about becoming a parent is that you are no longer preaching the sermon, you are living it, and they are watching.
So I had to ask myself, what am I reflecting to my boys about what I believe true success is, and I was forced to come up with a new definition of success.
So let me ask you this. If someone were to look at your life, your schedule and your bank account, what do you think they would say your definition of success was? Because it’s this definition that is messaging to our kids what we deem to be most important.
THAT THE DAYS ARE LONG BUT THE YEARS ARE SHORT
I didn’t say this, but since I heard it I tell everyone. Because I wish someone had told me!
Because we kind of all journey through life the way kids journey to the coast, always asking “Are we there yet”. In Highschool we just want to finnish and be a grownup, at Varsity we just want a real job and be independent, when we start out work we just want to reach the top and earn money and success, when we are dating we just want to get married, when we get married we just want to have kids, and then when we have kids and the shole adulting and parenting thing is suddenly very real and very scary and if we are honest, something that we would sometimes very much like to run away from! we’re like, oh my word this is so not fun! And we look longingly at older couples with older kids sitting placidly at restaurants enjoying a quiet meal (while our toddler picks gum up off the floor under the table and we are wondering if there is a changing station in the restrooms!) and we ask ourselves, when is this going to be over?
But now that my boys are 9 and 11, I can’t help but wonder, did I make the most of that time, those tough, early years? DID I see it as a shaping, refining, satisfying blessing God intends it to be or was I just white-knuckling it to get it over with!
Embrace the discipline of the moment instead of the distraction of your iPhone. God has given our children to us so we can teach them, but I have learned more and more, that He has also given them to us to teach us!
Embrace the mundane of the menial so you can find it’s meaning. Because wisdom is a treasure
Be present with your kids so you can make Christ present with them, because in every circumstance we are His witnesses, testifying to our kids what it means to follow Him in every circumstance.
Running on empty – that is how I sometimes feel as a mom. I get to the end of the day and feel like I have nothing left, like in every area, with every offering, I am lacking. Ok, so be honest, sometimes I also feel like that at the beginning of the day. Like my only hope is to just try harder, like trying harder is my slogan, my motto, my anchor. Like I am starting off from a place of lack. But that’s a lie. According to the God’s word, I have a promise not of lack, but of abundance! A promise that says I will be equipped for the Godly work of mothering with more than what I need, “that He is able to make every grace overflow, abound to us, so that in every way – always having everything we need – we can excel in excel in every good work” (2 Cor 9 v 8)
And is that not what we are busy with as moms? The good word, the work of raising the next generation of Christ followers (please
Lord!), the work of raising someones’ future husband or wife! It is the abundance for thís that Paul employs the Greek word Perisseuo for, to describe just how much grace we will receive – grace in excess, beyond average, to surpass/ overflow/ have leftover! And with every sunrise, it’s new, there’s more! Yes, please!
Make extravagant grace your slogan Momma, your motto, your anchor! I am praying for you!
