Dear Birth Mother Feb. 21, 2017

Dear Birth Mother,

Today is my oldest son’s 22nd birthday. As all moms do, I think back to the day he was born. What a wonderful blessing from God.You were prayed for and loved long before you were conceived. He is such a wonderful young man who loves God and is secure in who he is! He is a blessing to so many.

All children are gifts from god, but there is something special about the gift of adoption. I look at my four children, from four different birth mothers and I can see how God put us together. My children look more alike than many biological siblings!

Today I want to thank all birth mothers and birth fathers out there. You will probably never know the joy you have brought to others.Abortion is easy, adoption is hard. But you loved enough to give. By giving a child life you gave hope and joy to many who would other wise not know what it is to be a parent. Only those who have longed for a baby know what a special gift this is.

To the four special birth mother’s who were part of our adoptions I would like to say, we love you!

I want to thank you for being part of God’s plan to make me a mom, the biggest blessing of my life! Their are not enough words to describe the extraordinary gift you have given us!

To those thinking about adopting, do it! I am working on a book about our adoption experiences. Adoption  is the most wonderful thing a person can experience from all sides. What a blessing to love and be loved! Trust God to give you children.

Just as some pregnancies end in miscarriage, some adoptions fall through. Both bring heartaches. But look at how most pregnancies/adoptions turn out! The overflowing bliss of parenthood is mine. Thank you God, Thank you birth parents!

A Magnifying glass and a Mirror 2-17-17

I am not a fan of television evangelists. I am also not a morning person. Last week I had to be up very early one morning to head to a doctor's appointment.While my husband went cheerfully off to milk the cow (he IS a morning person) I flipped on the TV to try to get myself awake.

 Some  young preacher, who I had never heard of was on. He was taking about things we focus on. He was doing an object lesson which appealed to the teacher in me. He had a magnifying glass and was talking about how we can make things bigger than they are. Yep, we do that! At least I do.

 We dwell on things, we point out others sins, we make a big deal of little things. We especially magnify faults of others! Then he took out a mirror, Uh OH. We are not as quick to examine ourselves and our faults! This certainly was a good lesson! We need to spend more time looking in the mirror.

As we work with our children, our family, our friends and all those round us, lets not be too quick to magnify their faults. We nee to encourage the positive. My youngest son who has ADHD   responds so much better to positive reinforcement. Pointing out the good  helps him work on his problem areas without total frustration and meltdowns. Being patient and loving with him helps keep him calm and moving in the right direction.

 It is a challenge many days for me not to get very frustrated and magnify all his little quirks in a negative way. But God made him who he is and he is so talented in many areas. We all have weak areas and do we really need others holding up a magnifying glass and showing them to us constantly? No, what we need is prayer and support to become what God wants us to be.

So the next time we want to look at others in an unloving way, maybe we should look in the mirror instead. Please pray for me as I try to do this in my life. I want to encourage not discourage.

Feb.9th, 2017 PRONE TO WANDER

PRONE TO WANDER

It is so easy to get discouraged. I tend to be an optimist, the glass is half FULL! But days come when it is so easy to fall prey to discouragement and self pity. I hate self pity, but I am only human. Yesterday was one of those days.I love the Lord and I love my family. I am so thankful for all the blessings I have. I don’t like to complain and spend a lot in our home school teaching about it! The Isrealites are mentioned often at our home school table.

Many of you know that I have been having repeated health problems over the last couple of years. I generally try not to let these hurdles get me down. I feel guilty when I hear of others who have it so much worse. I am thankful for the Holy Spirit reminding me that God is in control even when my heart is prone to wander from the God I love, O for grace to trust Him more!

The hymn describes it:

Come thou fount of every blessing
Tune my heart to sing Thy grace

Streams of mercy never ceasing
Call for songs of loudest praise

teach me some melodious sonnet
Sung by flaming tongues above
praise the Mount I'm fixed upon it
Mount of Thy redeeming love

Here I raise my Ebenezer
Hither by Thy help I come
and I hope by Thy good pleasure
Safely to arrive at home

Jesus, sought me when a stranger
Wondering from the fold of God
He, to rescue me from danger
Interposed His precious blood

So to grace, how great a debtor
Daily I'm constrained to be
And let Thy goodness like a fetter
Bind my wandering heart to Thee

Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it
Prone to leave the God I love
Here's my heart, Lord, take and seal it
Seal it for Thy courts above
Here's my heart, Lord, take and seal it
Seal it for Thy courts above

So when you get discouraged know that it is okay, but don’t stay there too long. Tis so sweet to trust in JESUS!

What are we teaching them? 2-3-17

WHAT ARE YOU TEACHING THEM?

As a home school mom I am always thinking of ways to teach my children. God tells us to teach them by the way….

Duet. 6:5-7 

5And thou shalt love the LORD thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might. 6And these words, which I command thee this day, shall be in thine heart: 7And thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up .

The important things we teach our children are not necessarily math,reading history, etc. I have always joked that we are too busy “doing school” to learn anything. It is true as people in general that we are “too busy”.

We have been talking a lot in this blog about what is important, what is precious, and to not take them for granted. We are not promised tomorrow.

So what are we teaching them? They may be our children or grandchildren, or the neighbors children, or our church children. You might be thinking that you aren’t “TEACHING” any one, but you are! The way we live our lives teaches many things about us to many people. We teach by example. I have heard it said that we may be the only “Bible” some people see. In other words, our actions and words may be the only look at Christ that some people see. That is a scary thought!! Many times what my kids and others see in me is not Christlike! The people we deal with day to day see us in our struggles, sickness, bad moods and all.

When we think no one is looking someone is! And it is not always your three year old who tells on you at the grocery checkout! Once, many years ago, a neighbor came to us to see if anything was wrong. They knew we went to church on Sunday and Wednesdays and had not seen us leave the house all week. Our family had had the flu that week and indeed did not go anywhere. Little did we know that our neighbors were “watching” us. Apparently we were teaching them something through our actions, even though we were not aware of it.

We often think about the example we are to those that are close to us. But people that we are not even aware of watch us. Of course God knows our true motives and our heart desires, but others only know what we tell them, in words or ACTIONS.

As that homeschooling mom who is always trying to get another lesson done, I need to step back and remember what is really important. Kindness, compassion, seeing other’s needs are some of the things we need to teach. We may not get that long division lesson done that we prepared, we may not get the house spotless (we definitely won’t get that done here LOL) but we can stop and take a moment to teach a lesson of the heart. I say this to myself as much as to anyone. I am a lover of lesson plans and organization! It rarely works out like I planned, but that’s okay. As long as it works out as God has planned, I know we’ll be okay!

So love Jesus, put on your rose colored glasses, tell them you love them, and praise God.