Manna For Moms

Devotions for Moms Like You!

Devotions

So Bad

Megan Breedlove 2 Comments

Discipline is hard. Wouldn’t you agree?

It may even be the hardest part of rearing children. There are the times when you wonder if what your child did is really an offense, and if it even merits correction. There are other times when the action definitely deserves discipline, but it’s hard to figure out exactly what the consequences should be. Then, there are the occasions when you know exactly what your child deserves, but it breaks your heart to have to enforce it.

Discipline is challenging for other reasons, too. We all know we’re supposed to be consistent, but sometimes it’s really hard to get up off the couch and apply consistency when you’re exhausted from lack of sleep the night before. Or when you’ve tried to be consistent with your discipline, and it looks like you’re not making any progress, and then your child does the same thing you’ve told him not to do a thousand times already—do you apply the same consequence for the thousand-and-first time, hoping it works this time, or do you try something else?

When your child’s behavior is so bad, what do you do?

Two years ago, a friend of mine was struggling with a behavior of her daughter’s that was particularly difficult. My friend had tried everything she could think of. She was praying, she was disciplining consistently, she was seeking advice from others—and still, her daughter kept behaving the same way. My friend was exhausted and discouraged.

There may be times when a situation is so serious that more extreme measures have to be taken to protect the welfare of the family. But this was not one of those times. This was the kind of situation we’ve all found ourselves in, where we’re just plain exhausted. Where we begin to consider whether the battle is really worth it. Where we feel like giving up the fight.

I’m so glad God never gives up the fight where one of His children is concerned.

We’ve all sinned against Him far more often and more seriously than our children have sinned against us, yet God never washes His hands of us.

Yes, He may allow us to experience the consequences of our actions—which may include distance from Him—in order to get our attention and bring us to our senses. But He never walks away from us. He never decides that we’re so much trouble He’s not willing to deal with our problems anymore.

Praise Him that this is the truth! Because of His infinite love, mercy, and faithfulness, He sticks with us until the end, and not from a far distance, either, but still desiring to be intimately involved.

He still keeps trying, even when we continue to frustrate His efforts.

The next time we find ourselves running short on patience with our children, let’s take just a minute to remember that our children aren’t the only ones who frustrate their parents. We’ve frustrated our Parent, too.

Let’s confess our sins to God, and let’s cooperate with His parenting instead of resisting Him.

Then, let’s ask Him to help us show our children the same patience He has shown to us: a loving, redemptive patience that leads us into closer relationship with Him.

In our so doing, may He be glorified.

Joshua 1:5—As I was with Moses, so I will be with you; I will never leave you nor forsake you.

John 13:35—By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.

Helping Us

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It’s hard to believe Ellie has been potty-trained for four years now. It seems like just yesterday that I would get so excited when she got even a little trickle into the potty. “Good job!” I’d say, trying to strike the right balance between affirmation and not calling too much attention to the whole process.

My husband and I joked that Ellie should write a coffee table book, one of those oversized ones with pictures, called Potties of America, because she liked to check out the potty everywhere we went. It didn’t matter if she’d just successfully used the potty at Target; when we walked into Wal-Mart, she suddenly had to go again.

Potty training was going well. But every now and then, Ellie still needed a little help with clothes that were difficult to unfasten. I remember one time when my husband told Ellie to go potty, since we were about to leave the house. “But Daddy, I can’t get the button,” Ellie said.

So Daddy helped her manage the difficult fastening.

Maybe this scene seems insignificant, considering that similar ones happen in households across the world every day. But it illustrates a profound spiritual truth.

Just as Ellie’s daddy responded when she needed help in completing what he asked her to do, so our heavenly Father responds when we need His help in carrying out the services He asks of us.

We often hear the statement, “God won’t give you anything you can’t handle.”

I would amend that to say, “God won’t give you anything you can’t handle with His help.”

He most certainly does assign us tasks that are beyond—sometimes far beyond—our ability to complete on our own. But He always offers the help we need to be able to achieve what He’s required of us.

God will never charge us with accomplishing something with which He will not also help us. Can you imagine an earthly parent saying to her child, “It’s time for you to learn how to drive. Here are the keys. Good luck, because I won’t be with you. I hope you figure it out”?

Of course not. And if we, being evil, know how to come to our children’s aid, and are willing to do so, how much more does our heavenly Father desire to help us do what He asks of us?

Sometimes, as moms, as Christians, or as both, we get the idea that we shouldn’t need help, because we should be able to do everything by ourselves. Then, when we run into trouble, we spend far too much time trying on our own to force things to work out, when clearly the situation is beyond our capabilities.

The next time we encounter difficulties—and there will come a next time—let’s be quick to lay down our pride and our mistaken ideas that we have the ability to be independent. Let’s recognize and admit it when we need help.

For one thing, we were made to need our Creator, and it’s a mistake ever to think we can be independent. For another, when we show a watching world that we need Him, and that He is sufficient to make us fully capable, we bring Him glory.

And bringing Him glory is a far greater privilege than being able to say, “I did it myself.”

Matthew 7:11—If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him!

2 Samuel 22:30—With your help I can advance against a troop; with my God I can scale a wall.

Independence

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At two years old, my youngest child, Jessica, has entered her independent stage. I used to be able to help her do things like get into the van. Not anymore. “No! Do it myself!” she wails if I try to assist her.

There are many things Jessica wants to do by herself, but she’s not always able to do what she desires. It gets frustrating for me, having to watch her attempt something for herself that I could do for her ten times faster, and not be “allowed” to help her.

Sometimes, when Jessica realizes she can’t do something, she’ll ask for help. Other times, she won’t. She’ll just keep trying unsuccessfully, usually fussing about it.

Jessica’s not alone in wanting to be independent when she really needs help. You and I are the same way. Take mothering, for example. Often, we’re slow to ask for help because we think that we should be able to do it all—that if we would just try harder or better, we could do everything.

It’s bad enough when we try to mother without being willing to ask for or accept assistance from other mothers. It’s worse when we try to navigate life without help from God.

How many times have we called our friends or family first when we’re faced with a problem, instead of talking to God? How often have we found ourselves in the middle of a situation before we remembered to pray?

If you’re like me, the answer is “far too many times”.

We want to do things on our own because we can thus maintain the illusion of control, or because we want to believe that we’re ultra-capable and thereby give our self-esteem a boost.

But do you know what? We weren’t made to be independent of God.

Even when we think we’re independent, we’re not. When we think we’re accomplishing life without God’s help, we’re not. After all, who gave us our bodies that we use to accomplish things? Who gave us our mind, our personality, our skills?

Anything we accomplish is done with God’s help, even if we don’t specifically ask for it.

We may not know this, but God does. He’s well aware of our limitations because He created us. How ridiculous must it look to Him when He sees us thinking we’ve got it all together and don’t need His help?

Sometimes, as I do with Jessica, God stands back and watches, letting us come to the realization that we can’t do something on our own. I’ll bet it frustrates Him. But He knows we have to come face to face with our insufficiency so that we can realize we are merely creatures, and we need Him.

When God shows us we need His help, what do we do? Do we keep trying to do the task on our own, complaining, stressing about it and refusing to ask for help? Or do we humble ourselves and admit our need?

What are you and I facing right now in life wherein we need God’s help? (If our answer is “nothing”, we’re badly mistaken.) Have we admitted that we need help, or are we still struggling along on our own, struggling, complaining, and stressing?

May we be quick to acknowledge our limitations, let God take our burdens, and accept the help He offers.

1 Corinthians 4:7—What do you have that you did not receive? And if you did receive it, why do you boast as though you did not?

2 Chronicles 14:11— Then Asa called to the LORD his God and said, “Lord, there is no one like you to help the powerless against the mighty. Help us, O LORD our God, for we rely on you.”

PEEK-A-BOO!

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One of Jessica’s favorite games is peek-a-boo. She loves to cover her face with her little hands, fingers splayed apart, and say, “Where you go?”, indicating that I’m supposed to ask her that question.

“Where’s Jessica?” I say obligingly.

“I don’t know,” she says innocently, in a ‘hmm, I can’t imagine’ tone of voice.

“I don’t know, either,” I say.

Suddenly, Jessica pulls her hands away from her face, grinning. “Peek-a-boo!” she says delightedly.

Jessica finds this game so much fun chiefly because of her mistaken belief that when she can’t see me, I can’t see her, either. If she knew I could see her the whole time, it wouldn’t be nearly so much fun to try to hide from me.

We play a similar game with God. We act as if because we can’t see Him, He must not be able to see us, either. Or if He can, He isn’t looking.

Nothing could be further from the truth.

The Bible clearly teaches that God is intimately involved in our lives. He knows what we need before we ask, then fulfills our needs. He causes all things to work together for our good. He has numbered the very hairs of our head.

That hardly sounds like a God who isn’t really paying attention.

Failing to realize that God sees us and knows the thoughts and intentions of our heart every minute of every day can lead to either of two serious errors. The first is thinking, “God isn’t really paying much attention to me, so I can do what I want.” Friend, there will come a day of reckoning for all of us. Just because God has chosen to withhold consequences for now doesn’t mean He will do so forever. God isn’t letting us get away with anything, as if He were an earthly parent who is just so tired He decides not to enforce His law this particular time. Rather, He may be giving us a chance to repent before He has to step in and bring us to our senses.

The second error is thinking, “God isn’t really paying much attention to me because He doesn’t love me.”

Once again, we couldn’t be more wrong than to think this way. Over and over, the Bible teaches us that God is intimately acquainted with us and longs for a relationship with us. Jesus laments that He had wanted to gather Jerusalem into the folds of His love, but she wasn’t willing. The Psalms rejoice over and over in God’s full knowledge of us, because it reflects His love for us. Let’s not forget the clearest illustration of all—that God sacrificed His own Son to redeem us.

God loves us. He loves us, and He knows us. There’s no escaping that fact. Just because we can’t see Him physically doesn’t mean He can’t see us. All it means is that we walk by faith, not by sight. But one day, the faith will be sight. We’ll see Him face to face. We’ll look into His eyes and see the love that’s been there all along, that we’ve never fully comprehended.

O God, may You give us a glimpse of that now—of Your incredible love and complete knowledge of us. May we not play games of hiding from You, but may we rejoice in the relationship with You that You offer us through Your grace. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Jeremiah 1:5—“Before I formed you in the womb I knew you.”

Luke 12:6-7—Are not five sparrows sold for two pennies? Yet not one of them is forgotten by God. Indeed, the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Don’t be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows.

Psalm 139:1-4—O Lord, you have searched me and you know me. You know when I sit and when I rise; you perceive my thoughts from afar. You discern my going out and my lying down; you are familiar with all my ways. Before a word is on my tongue you know it completely, O Lord.

Bringing Them to the Father

Megan Breedlove No Comments

One of Jessica’s favorite activities is playing “bobbies” (her word for “babies”). We have several baby dolls, some doll-sized equipment, and a thousand little outfits and accessories. Jessica loves taking care of her dolls, doing all the things with them she knows mommies do with babies.

One day, Jessica and I were playing dolls in the playroom. We had a few dolls spread out around us, and we were taking care of them all. I put two of the smallest ones in the doll swing, which is not balanced very well, and swung them until they fell out.

“Waah! Waah!” I said, pretending they were crying.

Jessica reached toward them.

“Help us, Jessica!” I said, in my best baby doll voice.

Jessica picked up the babies and handed them to me without hesitation. She watched me as I comforted them and made them feel all better.

In the same way that Jessica handed me her babies, we, too, should bring our broken, hurting loved ones to our Father. Instinctively, Jessica knew that the best comfort for those babies was to be found in my arms. Likewise, we know that the greatest healing is to be found in the arms of our heavenly Father. Yet too often, we focus on offering our friends other things rather than bringing them to God. All of these things—our support, counseling, medication—are fine in and of themselves, and they may be the means through which God chooses to heal our loved one. But we make a critical mistake when we do these things to the exclusion of pointing our loved one to Jesus.

It’s wonderful to offer our empathy, but let us not forget also to remind our loved one how God feels.

It’s great to offer sympathy, but let’s not fail to gently correct or rebuke where that may be needed, and to point our loved one toward God’s righteous standard.

It’s healing to help our family and friends through their struggles on this earth, but may we never forget to remind them of heaven, where “there will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain”.

I’m not suggesting that we listen to someone’s pain and offer them a pat, religious answer, or a cliché. I’m suggesting that we do every bit of the kind of comforting and encouragement we are used to, but that we also offer them more. We bring them to God.

Of course, the ultimate “bringing to God” involves introducing someone to Him, to His love for them and their need of Him, and to His wonderful plan of salvation.

Providing comfort is part of the healing ministry of Christ’s church. It’s something we must do, because humanity needs it, and we’re commanded to do it. But even more important than comforting their souls is introducing them to the One Who can save their souls.

The next time someone comes to us for comfort, may we comfort them in a way that shows them God’s love.

But even more important, may we show them God Himself.

John 1:40-42—Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother, was one of the two who heard what John had said and who had followed Jesus. The first thing Andrew did was to find his brother Simon and tell him, “We have found the Messiah” (that is, the Christ). And he brought him to Jesus.

Mark 2:1-5—A few days later, when Jesus again entered Capernaum, the people heard that he had come home. So many gathered that there was no room left, not even outside the door, and he preached the word to them. Some men came, bringing to him a paralytic, carried by four of them. Since they could not get him to Jesus because of the crowd, they made an opening in the roof above Jesus and, after digging through it, lowered the mat the paralyzed man was lying on. When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic, “Son, your sins are forgiven.”

Forgiveness…Again

Megan Breedlove No Comments

My just-turned-two-year-old daughter, Jessica, enjoys dressing up. She likes to put on several necklaces from the dress-up closet, plus maybe a hat and a purse. She also seems to have particular ideas about which shoes she wants to wear, even when she’s just wearing regular clothes.

One of her favorite pairs of shoes is a black, slip-on shoe with a very low heel and pink flowers across the top of her foot. A few days ago, she was wearing them while walking around our kitchen. She came closer to me to check out what I was doing, and then she pushed herself in between me and the counter and went past me. In the process, she stepped on my foot.

“Ouch,” I said, because I wasn’t wearing any shoes, and she actually hurt me a little bit.

“Sorry, Mommy,” Jessica said.

“I forgive you,” I said. Again, I added mentally.

There are times in the course of our day when Jessica does something that hurts me, mainly because she is only two and doesn’t always realize when something she does will hurt someone. Because she is the extremely polite child that she is, she always says, “Sorry, Mommy.”

“I forgive you,” I always say. But lately, we had gone through this routine several times, because Jessica had accidentally done several minor things that caused me brief moments of pain or discomfort. I was tired of having to forgive yet again.

We should be very glad that God never gets tired of extending forgiveness to us. When we come before Him, repentant, asking His forgiveness, He always responds the same way: “I’ve already forgiven you,” He says. “My Son paid the price for your forgiveness when He died on the cross.”

One of Satan’s favorite deceptions is to try to make us think God doesn’t want to forgive us. How could God forgive you? he whispers in our ear. Look at what you did. Look at all the things you’ve done.

But you can’t out-sin God’s grace. No matter what you’ve done, no matter when, or why, or how many times, God can and will forgive you when you come to Him repentant.

Isn’t that amazing? Despite all the sins we committed before we became Christians, despite all the sins we committed afterward, and despite those we’ll commit in the future, God still loves us and still forgives us.

He doesn’t forgive us because we deserve it. He does so because of grace, because He loves us and has accepted His Son’s sacrifice as payment for our sins. You and I are already forgiven because Someone paid the price.

If you don’t know that Someone, or what He’s done for you, I encourage you to check out the “How to Know God” section of this website. Don’t wait to get acquainted with the One Who died so that you could truly live.

Those of us who do know that Someone should spend time meditating on the immensity of His incredible grace toward us. We should marvel at it. May we never take something so incredible for granted.

Instead, may we make our lives unceasing offering of gratitude for the amazing gift we’ve been given.

1 John 1:9—If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to purify us from all unrighteousness.

Matthew 18:21-22—Then Peter came to Jesus and asked, “Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother when he sins against me? Up to seven times?” Jesus answered, “I tell you, not seven times, but seventy-seven times.”

Lifter of My Head

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Recently, our local football team, the Dallas Cowboys, lost in the playoffs to the Minnesota Vikings. The score was 34-3. It wasn’t even close.

Several times during the game, it looked like the Cowboys would pull ahead. But ultimately, they lost, and lost badly.

It must have been a particularly disappointing loss for Tony Romo, the quarterback. In a game when he should have been at his best, Romo wasn’t. His stats were disappointing, and he was sacked six times. He knows he is capable of better. Everyone else knows it, too.

Though the loss certainly wasn’t Romo’s fault alone, I bet he assigned himself a significant percentage of the blame. At least, looking at the picture on the next-day paper’s front page, it looks like he did.

In that picture, Romo is walking down a ramp that leads beneath the bleachers to the locker room. As he approaches the tunnel, there are fans on either side and fans in front of him who are sitting above the tunnel. Romo is walking with his shoulders looking as slumped as they can in that protective padding, his head down. His posture says that he’s taking it hard, and the headline agrees: Defeated, dejected.

Romo’s not the only person who stands out in this picture, however. There’s one more, a fan to Romo’s right, leaning over the railing with his arm and hand extended down, reaching out to Romo. Many other fans in the picture are doing the same thing. But what makes this fan stand out is the look on the young man’s face.

He’s not smiling. He’s not calling out to Romo. He wears a quiet, solemn look.

The difference between him and all the others is that this young man looks like he’s reaching out to offer Romo support, rather than to enjoy the privilege of slapping hands with a famous football player.

I could be completely wrong about this man. Maybe he was starstruck. Maybe all he wanted was the brief contact with fame.

Or maybe he really was reaching out to offer Romo support. Maybe he was reaching out his hand to say not I want a piece of you but Hey. It’s okay, man. You’re still great.

I’ll never know how he really felt because I don’t know who he is, so I can’t ask him. But I do know Someone who does respond that way in the face of someone else’s dejection and failure.

Our God responds like that. He sees us hurting, and He stretches out His hand, or wraps His arms around us, and says, It’s okay. I still love you.

Just as the fan must have been well aware that the Cowboys had just lost, God is well aware of when we’ve failed. If our failure involves sin, He doesn’t minimize that. But He does reassure us that whatever the circumstances of our failure, whether sin, mistake, or inability, He still loves us.

Looking at the picture, I thought about Romo looking up and seeing the fan’s outstretched hand, and I realized that it was a beautiful illustration of how God lifts up our heads.

When we look down at our feet, we see only our sins and failures and feel only the crushing weight of shame and disappointment. But when we look at Him, our heads are lifted, and we can see and receive His comfort and love.

Are you looking down at your feet today? Is the weight of your failure so heavy that it’s bowing your shoulders?

Look up. Look up and see the comfort God offers you. If you need forgiveness, He offers that, too. Let His encouragement soak into your soul.

Yes, you have failed. So have I. But despite our failures, we are loved. So let’s no longer focus on the ugly way we feel, but on the beautiful way He feels. Rather than allowing our sin to be our shame, let’s allow Him to be our glory. May our heads and our hearts be lifted as we learn to look not to what we have done, but to what He has done for us.

Psalm 3:3—But thou, O LORD, are a shield for me; my glory, and the lifter up of mine head.

I Want to Help

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My youngest child, Jessica, loves to help me around the house. At almost two, she is eager to do whatever she sees Mommy doing. Often, she is the one to initiate helping.

One day last week, I was in the kitchen making my kids’ favorite supper, macaroni and cheese. I saw that the water was boiling, so I went over to the counter, where I had set out the boxes of noodles. At that point, Jessica entered the kitchen. “I want to help,” she said, walking over to me.

“Okay,” I said, opening the boxes and removing the cheese packets. I handed her one of the boxes. “Will you please carry this over to the stove for me?”

Jessica followed me to the stove, carrying her box of macaroni. I poured in mine, then hers. “Thank you for helping,” I said.

I try to encourage Jessica’s helpful spirit every chance I get. I usually don’t need her help, and in fact, it often takes me longer to complete a task with her help than without it. But I allow her to help for two primary reasons: first, because she considers it a privilege to help me, and second, because helping Mommy gets her in the habit of helping others.

These are the same reasons God allows us to help Him. He doesn’t need our help. He is the Almighty Creator of the Universe, Who made the world in six days. He doesn’t need us to help Him do anything. But He allows us to help because He knows it is a privilege for us to help Him.

Granted, there are some tasks God asks us to perform that are not pleasant. These are the ones we balk at. We don’t want to do them, so we complain. We forget that God always has a purpose for asking, and that purpose may involve our character development somehow, but certainly involves His glory. If we do what He asked, we do it grudgingly.

Where is our delight in being allowed to do anything at all for Him? Why do we not count ourselves privileged that He involves us with Him in His work by asking us to do something? We can either focus on the part of the task we don’t like, or we can choose to remember that God is allowing us to participate with Him in His work, and we can be grateful.

The second reason I allow Jessica to help is to get her in the habit of being helpful, and we can be certain this is part of God’s plan for us, as well. But He may not always allow us to help others in the grand ways we want to.

It could be that the job He wants done is small. It might also be that God knows we still need training before we will be ready to handle the big jobs. If I had told Jessica to make the macaroni herself, she would have failed, because she is not ready for that task.

In the same way, God sometimes gives us small jobs because He knows we are not yet ready for the bigger ones. Maybe there is a character issue He needs to refine. Maybe we simply need to learn a new skill.

Are you and I willing to perform small tasks for God, or do we only want to do the bigger ones? Are we willing to staple handouts for our group, or will we only be satisfied with being the group’s leader? Are we contented with singing our child to sleep, or will we only be satisfied if we can be the church soloist?

Let’s be grateful that God is willing to use us at all. We don’t deserve the privilege of helping Him, yet He has chosen to offer it to us, and in the most precious of all ways—caring for our children. We’ve already been awarded the most important task there is. Let’s perform whatever else He asks us with gratitude for His allowing us to work for His kingdom alongside Him.

After all, serving God is both a privilege and an honor. May we never act as if it’s anything less.

Psalm 84:10—Better is one day in your courts than a thousand elsewhere; I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God than dwell in the tents of the wicked.

Walking

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We live two blocks from our neighborhood park. The kids love to go there. It has a giant set of toys all connected together, including several slides and things to climb on. It has huge, grassy areas for the kids to run around on. It also has a small basketball court and a covered slab of concrete with two picnic tables. When the weather is right, the paletero often comes by pushing his freezer cart containing ice cream treats. All in all, the park is a great place to be.

It can take anywhere from one minute to thirty minutes to get to it, however, depending on our mode of transportation. When it’s too hot out during the summer months, I usually load the kids into the van for a ride to the park. That’s when the trip takes about one minute. When the weather’s more temperate, we often walk, or the kids take turns riding in our wagon. That’s when the trip takes thirty minutes.

If you’ve ever walked anywhere with a young child, you understand. You can’t just, well, walk there. You have to stop and look at every interesting thing along the way.

Between our house and the park, there are approximately one million fascinating things just begging to be more closely examined. Like…rocks. And that dog over there. And that puddle—wait! Don’t jump in it!—of dirty water.

I used to try to make our walk to the park efficient. After all, it was my job to teach the kids to do things promptly and without wasting time.

Fortunately, it wasn’t long before I came to realize that stopping to look at things, or just walking slowly, wasn’t a waste of time. In fact, it was the whole point.

I had thought that getting to the park was the point, so I wanted us to do business and get there. My children, however, had more wisdom than I did. They realized that the journey was as much part of the whole experience as being at the park was. In fact, they had a better time on our outings when they could experience life along the way, as opposed to when they had to pass life by so they could experience a smaller piece of it for a longer time.

I wonder how our lives would be different if we could learn to enjoy the journey instead of focusing on making it quickly and efficiently from one experience to another.

As moms, it’s easy for us to get so caught up in helping our child reach the next milestone or achieve the next goal that we forget to enjoy our child, and let him or her enjoy us, along the way. We’re so busy trying to keep the house clean that we can’t take time to cuddle our child as he crawls up into our lap. We become so focused on planning for the next vacation, or the upgrade to a bigger house, that we can’t enjoy what we have now.

Where does God fit into all this? He gets squeezed in on Sundays and sometimes Wednesdays. Maybe occasionally, we give a minute or two of prayer time.

What we fail to realize is that the journey with Him is part of the point. Had heaven been the only point, God could have taken us there the minute He saved us. But He has chosen to leave us on this world for awhile. Why? Because He knows that we need the journey. Walking with God here, now, on earth, is not merely a fringe benefit we get to enjoy on the way to heaven. It’s part of the goal.

Will my kids and I still make it to the park even if we don’t particularly enjoy the journey? Yes. Will you and I still make it to heaven even if we don’t particularly enjoy God along the way? Yes. But we’ll have missed the point.

We were made to enjoy God. We were made for a relationship with Him. And we don’t have to wait for heaven to experience that. We can love and be loved by Him now.

If we make it to heaven without having walked with God, we’re missing something.

And missing out on the journey with God matters a whole lot more than missing out on a journey to the park.

Oh, God, grant us a heart that deeply desires to walk with You along the way. Teach us how. Please, God, take us by the hand, so You and we can walk together.

Psalm 42:1—As the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul pants for you, O God.

Addiction

Megan Breedlove No Comments

Before my first baby was born, I made a decision: I wasn’t going to give her a pacifier. After all, I planned to breastfeed, and I didn’t want her to develop “nipple confusion”. Plus, why would I need a pacifier? If Ellie cried, I would pick her up and nurse her, rock her, or play with her, whatever she wanted. That would take care of the problem.

Things didn’t work out quite the way I had envisioned. I caved while we were still in the hospital. Poor Ellie was crying what seemed like non-stop (we found out later that she was having feeding issues), and nursing wasn’t working out as planned. I decided that having Ellie develop nipple confusion would be far preferable to having me develop lunacy. So I offered her a pacifier. Repeatedly. A few days later, our lactation consultant said, “You know, I almost never recommend that a baby take a pacifier. But I do for this one.”

Ellie took to her “bice” immediately, and she continued her love affair with it until she was almost two, when we weaned her from it by cutting a little bit off the tip. (She put it in her mouth, tried to suck, and realized something was different. “I know, it’s broken,” I said sympathetically. After that, she never tried to suck it again.)

My subsequent three children have also had long, close relationships with their bices. We broke Kenny of his bice habit the same way we had with Ellie, by cutting the tip off. We had to cut a little more off each day for another day or two before he gave up. Lindsey, on the other hand, refused to give up until we had cut off so much that she couldn’t even hold the bice in her mouth anymore. At this point, we haven’t yet weaned Jessica from her bice. We’re working on it.

Well, sort of.

My reluctance is because I always hate depriving my children of something they love so much. Sure, I know that taking it away is best for them, and even helps their dental development. But when it finally comes time to get out the scissors, I’m always nervous.

Will she cry? Will she hate me? Will I ever get any sleep at night again?

Fortunately, there’s nothing morally wrong with being addicted to a pacifier. After all, it’s not like my kids are guzzling vodka from a sippy cup or robbing the local Babies “R” Us. So addiction isn’t the problem. Addiction only becomes a problem when a person is addicted to the wrong things…or fails to be addicted to the right things.

Dictionary.com defines addiction as “the state of being enslaved to a habit or practice or to something that is psychologically or physically habit-forming, as narcotics, to such an extent that its cessation causes severe trauma”. If that’s what addiction means, then it’s wonderful, even vital, to be addicted to the right things.

Like God’s Word. The word “enslaved” shouldn’t throw us off, as the New Testament clearly teaches that we are slaves to Christ. So wouldn’t it be wonderful if we were enslaved to the practice of reading God’s Word such that we form a habit, to such an extent that the cessation of reading His Word causes trauma?

Most Christians take God’s Word for granted. Many of us have several copies in different versions sitting on a shelf at home. They’re there for us to read any time we want. Sometimes, we take one down from the shelf and read it. But most of the time, we act as if we’re satisfied just to know that it’s there, available if we ever decide we want it.

Or maybe we decide on a Bible-reading plan, try to make it stick, and fail. I just don’t know how I can make a daily reading plan work, we sigh to ourselves, and days pass, then weeks. Maybe even months.

Our children are far more attached to cheap little pieces of plastic and silicone than we are to the Book that reveals God to us.

We know we should read our Bibles, but it’s head knowledge. There’s no heart yearning to be vitally connected to God through His Word. We treat as optional a book that Christian brothers and sisters around the world have died for the privilege of possessing because they knew its value.

Most of us don’t. In countries where Bibles are cheap and easy to come by, where we can have one any time we want, most of us just don’t get it. Maybe that was Satan’s plan. He knows that where Bibles aren’t allowed, people are willing to die for the privilege of reading one. In countries where they are freely available, people are willing to die without reading one.

Have we truly formed a habit of reading our Bible? If we were forced to cease reading it, would we be traumatized at all?

I pray we can always answer “yes” to both of these questions. But if we ever answer “no”, may God bring us to our knees (literally or figuratively), and may we beseech Him to instill within us a life-changing love of His Word. May we not stop asking until He grants our request, which He will, because it’s within the scope of His will for us.

We’ve heard a child scream when his or her pacifier was taken away or couldn’t be found. May those cries pale in comparison to the cry of our heart to know and love God’s Word. Because through His Word, we come to know and love God Himself.

That, dear sister, is worth far more than a piece of plastic.

Psalm 119:162—I rejoice in your word like one who finds a great treasure.

(I credit one of the devotions in Michelle Adams’ Daily Wisdom for Mothers, Barbour, 2004, for introducing me to the original idea from which this devotional ultimately developed.)

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