Manna For Moms

Devotions for Moms Like You!

Devotions

Safety

Megan Breedlove No Comments

My youngest, Jessica, is fascinated with how things work and what she can make them do. She loves watching us use a particular object, then trying to do the same thing with it herself. She also likes to figure things out on her own.

A couple months ago, I was sitting at the computer, and Jessica was crouched on the floor nearby playing with a toy. She wasn’t really familiar with it, and she was exploring it. After whacking on it in various ways for awhile, she suddenly hit the wrong button, and the toy started playing really loud music.

Immediately, she straightened up and came running the few feet to me, wanting up in my lap. I picked her up, and she looked back at the toy, giving it a wary glance.

I reassured her that everything was okay, and she soon got down and began playing with the toy again. It wasn’t frightening anymore, because she knew what to expect.

But when she was scared, she did exactly the best thing, in terms of what would produce the most immediate, best comfort: she ran to her mommy. Her first instinct was to seek comfort from me.

Do our instincts work the same way? When we are frightened, is our first reaction to run to the arms of our heavenly Father?

Often, it isn’t. We call a friend, or we read a book about fear, or we try some other technique we learned somewhere to take our mind off our emotions. There’s nothing wrong with doing any of those things, but why are they our first reaction? Why don’t we seek God first?

I’ve caught myself many times remembering to seek God in a particular matter only after I’ve sought counsel from others. Sometimes, it feels like I simply must talk to someone else about whatever happened, and I pick up the phone. Why do I think any human being can give me better help than God can?

Sometimes, God does touch us through others. I can think of times when God has ministered to me through someone else’s words, and I’m sure you can think of times when you’ve been ministered to in this way, too. But I don’t want God to be an afterthought. I want Him to be my First thought.

I want to seek Him as instinctively as Jessica sought me when she was scared. She didn’t take time to call a friend or read a book, and it wasn’t just because she doesn’t know how to read or use the phone. It was simply because when she was scared, she wanted Mommy. I want my seeking God when I’m troubled to be equally instinctive.

You see, whether we realize it or not, we need Him as desperately as Jessica needed me that moment. Not just when we’re scared, but every moment of every day. I want seeking Him to be as natural for me as breathing is. I want it to be both my first thought and my last, and to color every thought in between.

I know you do, too.

Let’s both do something this week. Let’s bow before God and confess our utter insufficiency in and of ourselves, and His complete sufficiency. Let’s tell Him that we want Him to be our “best thought, by day or by night”—that we want to live in an attitude of seeking Him. Then, let’s ask Him so to change and order our hearts and minds that we seek Him as naturally as we seek our next breath.

Beloved, nothing could make more of a difference in our lives, or be more worthwhile. Because the incredible thing is, when we seek Him, He has promised that we will find Him. He will reveal Himself to us. I guarantee that no phone call, no book, could ever satisfy you more.

Psalm 73:28—But as for me, it is good to be near God. I have made the Sovereign LORD my refuge; I will tell of all your deeds.

Fountain of Fun

Megan Breedlove No Comments

I bet you can identify with the mom who wrote to me that her son is always asking her if they are going to do something fun. It’s hard, she explained, when you’re already spread thin emotionally, financially, etc., to come up with fun things to do, and then, as soon as you’ve finished one fun activity, to have your children want to know what fun thing you are going to do next.

I know I can certainly identify with her.

All of us have times when we are spread thin. Maybe our finances are tight this week, this month, or this year. Maybe we’ve been pouring ourselves out emotionally in so many different directions that there isn’t much left for us. Yet during those times, we still have to parent. When we’re too exhausted or stressed, we still have to think of things to do with our children.

So when we scrape the bottom of the barrel to come up with something, and our kids barely finish it before they want to know what’s next, it’s hard.

Even when we’re not spread thin, and life is reasonably satisfactory for the time being, it’s still annoying to have our children ask what’s next before we’ve even had time to ask them how they liked the first bit of fun.

Most of us have had this happen to us, at least once or twice. We know how exasperating it can be.

How much more exasperated, then, must Jesus have felt when the people around Him were always seeking a miracle?

We know how He felt. You’re not coming to me for my teaching, He told them. You’re coming for the miracles. In other words, He was saying, Look, I know you just want to be entertained. You don’t want me. You want the show.

Are we the same way? Do we demand that God always put on a show to keep us entertained? Do we complain when Christianity gets “boring” and we have to exercise some discipline to keep following through with prayer, reading the Bible, or going to church?

What is it we’re expecting from our relationship with God, anyway?

Far too often, we’re not seeking God Himself. We’re seeking how following Him makes us feel.

Please don’t misunderstand me. Living in relationship with God certainly can be exciting. It’s often new, as when He teaches us something. It’s fine to enjoy the mountaintop experiences when we have them. In fact, we should enjoy them. But if we are seeking the experience rather than seeking God, we have made an idol of our emotions and relegated God to second place or even further down the list.

Precious mommy, are you seeking God Himself, or are you seeking the fun? Where is your focus?

I pray that you and I both will walk closely with Him and keep our eyes on Him. I pray that even the most wonderful or the most terrible things that happen to us will not be enough to cause us to take our eyes off of God and focus on the experience.

But it’s hard. So I suggest you do the same thing I am going to do. Pray. Ask God to keep your focus on Him, where it belongs, and to convict you when it slips. Confess your lack of proper focus. Acknowledge His worthiness as the supreme Person upon Whom we should fix our eyes, and praise Him.

See? Your focus is back where it belongs. Rely on Him to help you keep it there.

2 Corinthians 4:18— So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.

Hebrews 12:2—Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.

Counting

Megan Breedlove No Comments

love the age my children are now for many reasons. Not the least of these is the fact that my children think I know everything, or pretty close to it. They’re also pretty sure I can do everything. I love it when they come to me and ask me to do something that’s too hard for them, with total confidence that I can do what they can’t. It never even seems to enter their minds that I might not be able to do something. When, on occasion, I have to admit that I can’t do what they’re asking (carry a child or two as well as my purse, a diaper bag, and fourteen bags of groceries) or don’t know the answer to their question (“Mommy? How big is Jupiter?”), they are surprised.

They are also easily impressed. Feats of strength and creativity that seem average to me are incredible to my children. For example, one day shortly after turning five, Ellie was practicing counting. She would think of huge numbers (some of which were real) and try to count to them. Sometimes, however, she would get stuck on which number came next. So she turned to me.

“Mommy, are you a good counter?” she asked.

“Yes, I’m a very good counter,” I said.

“Can you count to 800?”

“Yes.”

“Can you count to twenty-hundred?”

“Yes. That would be two thousand.”

“Can you count to the last number hundred?”

“There’s not really a last number, but I could keep counting forever,” I said.

“Wow!” Ellie exclaimed, amazed.

As far as Ellie knew, I was a math genius, and she was impressed.

Friend, you and I live every day in the presence of One Who is truly a genius. Actually, “genius” doesn’t even begin to encompass the magnitude of His abilities in every area we can imagine. So why aren’t we more impressed with Him?

God is capable of far more than we can imagine. He can do vastly more than we, being limited and finite, can do or ever will be able to do no matter how hard we might try. Yet we fail to be half as impressed with His extraordinary abilities as Ellie was with my average ones.

When was the last time you stood in awe of God’s magnificence? When was the last time you were truly impressed, so much so that your heart was moved to praise, or maybe to silence?

Oh, sure, we know that God can do incredible things. We know about all the miracles described in the Bible. Yep, pretty neat, we think to ourselves, and we never really stop to contemplate the greatness of the One who commands the elemental forces of nature and the hearts of kings with only a word.

You and I can’t even sustain a single breath on our own. We are dependent on Him for the very movement of air in and out of our lungs. He is the One Who provides us the air to breathe and properly functioning lungs with which to breathe it.

You and I can’t create anything if we start with nothing.

We can’t speak a word and cause something to come into being.

We can’t orchestrate the entire universe so that our master plan comes to fruition.

You and I should be in serious awe of our majestic God.

Spend some time just being in awe today. Go before God. Ask Him to forgive you for taking Him for granted, if you need to do that. Ask that He grant you a fresh appreciation of His incredible power and skill in superintending the universe in general and your life in particular.

Then praise Him for all He is, and all He has done, is doing, and will do.

It’ll be a taste of the worship we’ll be privileged to render unto Him for all eternity.

Psalm 113:5—Who is like the Lord our God, the one who sits enthroned on high?

Psalm 145:3—Great is the LORD and most worthy of praise; his greatness no one can fathom.

Yahoo!

Megan Breedlove No Comments

It was a beautiful day, the kind where you just have to go to the park. In fact, it was so beautiful that my (then) three children and I walked. Ellie, at just over three years, was pushing a doll in her own stroller. I pushed twenty-one-month-old Kenny and three-month-old Lindsey in our gigantic, all-terrain, mountaineering-isn’t-a-problem double stroller.

Twenty minutes after setting out, we got to the park. (It was only three blocks, but you know how it is walking with small children.) The first thing the kids wanted to do was swing. I helped Ellie and Kenny get into the child swings, and I placed Lindsey nearby in her car seat, which was secured in the stroller.

Both Ellie and Kenny loved to swing. I’d push them as high as I could without scaring myself too much. They thought they were flying. They would grin and soar through the air, again and again, reveling in the delight of it.

This particular day was as exciting as all the others. As Ellie swung back and forth, a huge smile on her face, she suddenly exclaimed, “Yahoo! I’m a caterpillar!”

My first reaction to her announcement was that it was delightfully funny. As I thought more about it, I realized that it was also beautiful and profound.

You see, in Ellie’s mind, it was really true. She was a caterpillar! In that moment, she believed that anything was possible. And she was excited! Under those circumstances, wouldn’t you be excited, too?

Why do we as adults stop believing in wonderful possibilities? Granted, we know some things can’t happen. We can’t actually become caterpillars just because we want to. But why do we let our realism that certain wonderful things can’t happen spill over into cynicism, into the mindset that nothing wonderful will happen? It makes our earthly life a lot less joyful. A lot less vibrant color, and a lot more drab gray.

It makes our spiritual life less joyful, too. We often develop the same mindset spiritually. When we become Christians, we start out believing that God can do anything. So we pray for anything and everything, believing that surely, God will take care of it all. But as God answers “no” to some of our prayers, as Satan tries to do his work in us, and as we come to realize that tragedies do happen, marriages fail, and children die far too early, we become disillusioned. We stop asking for quite so much, because not receiving what we hope for hurts less if we didn’t actually ask for it, or because we figure we’re not going to get it anyway. The joyous expectation with which we began our Christian lives gradually erodes, and we’re left in a place where we don’t expect much, because we think we’ve learned not to.

But precious mommy friend, let me tell you something. The God you began to worship as a baby Christian is still the same God you worship now. Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, and today, and forever. He is still capable of doing the marvelous, mind-blowing things you asked of Him before you started to forget Who He was and began to settle for much less.

In fact, Paul tells us in Ephesians that God is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine. He wasn’t suggesting, and nor do I suggest, that God will necessarily shower us with material blessings just because we ask. But God will grant us every spiritual blessing we need. In fact, His Word tells us that He already has.

And Malachi the prophet records God’s promise that if the Israelites were to bring their tithes into the storehouse, God would pour out so much blessings upon them that they would not have room enough to receive it. And He will do the same thing today. But note well two things: first, God was not promising material blessings; and second, there is a prerequisite to receiving the flood of blessings: dedicating oneself wholeheartedly to the Lord.

Have you done that? Have you dedicated yourself wholeheartedly to Him? You may be a Christian, but that’s not necessarily the same thing as letting God have your whole heart.

Get on your knees before Him, or in whatever posture best suits your body when you make the cries of your soul known to your King. Offer your whole heart to Him, not just for a moment, but forever. And then prepare yourself to receive more than you can ask or imagine.

Ephesians 3:20-21—Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.

Hebrews 13:8—Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.

Malachi 3:10—“Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house. Test me in this,” says the LORD Almighty, “and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that you will not have room enough for it.

Ephesians 1:3—Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ

Loving Stephanie

Megan Breedlove No Comments

Two years ago, my children and I attended a birthday party for one of Kenny’s friends. At the time, Ellie was four, Kenny was two, and Lindsey was one. Ellie was excited about going to the party, but not just because it was a birthday party. Ellie knew the birthday boy’s older sister Stephanie would be there, and Ellie considered Stephanie her best friend.

Stephanie was several years older than Ellie, an older girl but not yet a tween. Usually, when our families were together, Stephanie was interested in playing with Ellie. Other times, she not only seemed disinterested but ignored Ellie. Because of her age, I would have expected her not always to be interested in playing with a four-year-old. But at her age, I also felt she should have known how to politely respond when Ellie spoke to her, rather than simply ignoring her.

Due to special circumstances, and because Ellie idolized Stephanie, I sometimes allowed the two girls to play together and then dealt with issues as they arose. And Ellie never seemed to mind that they often did. Though she would sometimes feel hurt or bewildered by Stephanie’s words or actions, she never stopped loving Stephanie, and she never stopped being overwhelmed with excitement when she saw her or had the opportunity to play with her.

That’s what happened at the party. Ellie had brought some glo-sticks—those tiny tubes you can make glow in the dark and then form necklaces or bracelets with—that she wanted to share with Stephanie. We arrived at the party, and we didn’t see Stephanie at first. But soon, Stephanie appeared from her room and headed toward the kitchen, where the snacks were set out. “Stephanie!” Ellie squealed excitedly, and started toward her.

Stephanie grabbed a handful of pretzels and started toward the back patio doors.

“Stephanie, I have a glo-stick for you!” Ellie said proudly, holding out the treasure she’d kept safe all the way to the party.

Stephanie didn’t even look at her.

“Stephanie!” Ellie called. “Stephanie!”

Stephanie opened the patio doors, stepped through, and shut them again.

Ellie came to a stop, a bewildered look on her face. She stood for a moment staring after her friend, then turned back to me. Silently, she returned to sit beside me, her head down. My heart ached for her, and I wondered for the thousandth time how Stephanie could so completely fail to realize that she shouldn’t act like that, and why.

Oh, but precious sister in Christ…isn’t that the way we act toward God sometimes? Don’t we ignore his love, freely poured out to us who don’t deserve it? Aren’t we sometimes rude to Him? Don’t we take for granted the fact that He loves us with all the passion in His heart?

Sure we do, and then we only pay attention to Him when we’re interested. When we want some comfort or some amusement, we turn to Him. Otherwise, we head right out the patio doors.

Ellie was hurt and bewildered at Stephanie’s response—or lack thereof. God is never bewildered, but His heart is wounded when we fail to respond to Him in love.

Friend, do you treat God the same way Stephanie treated Ellie? Imagine how He feels when you do that. Or imagine how God the Father feels watching us treat His Child the way Stephanie treated my child. Probably similar to the way I felt, or the way you would have felt in my situation.

The most remarkable thing about the relationship between Stephanie and Ellie is this: Ellie continues to love despite the many offenses Stephanie has committed against her.

The most remarkable thing about our relationship with God is that He continues to love us despite the many offenses we have committed against Him, and despite the fact that He knows there will come a next time where we hurt Him.

There came a point where Stephanie’s verbal offenses became too numerous and too hurtful for me to allow her and Ellie’s relationship to continue, except within the boundaries of strict limitations. Aren’t you glad that God the Father doesn’t limit our relationship with His Son when we have racked up too many sins?

Yes, our sin separates us from God and creates distance between us, similar to the limitations I had to impose on Stephanie and Ellie’s relationship. But aren’t you glad that those limitations can be removed any time we’re ready to repent and return to Him? Don’t you rejoice that there is never a “point of no return”?

Despite the imperfect way we love Him, God never stops loving us. He never stops being willing to have a relationship with us. He keeps on loving us despite the times we hurt Him, or ignore Him, or sin against Him in some other way.

So, as incredible as it is that Ellie still loves Stephanie…isn’t it vastly more incredible that God still loves us?

Praise Him for His perfect, everlasting love. Repent of any sins you have committed against Him. Then, ask Him to help you love Him with all your heart.

Don’t ignore the relationship with Him that He’s offering you. Don’t just head out the patio door. Turn to Him in awe and gratitude that He wants to relate to you, a human being, at all. Go to Him, and spend the rest of your life loving Him. Not just sometimes, but always.

Deuteronomy 6:5—Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.

Complaining

Megan Breedlove No Comments

I’m not really into cooking. I don’t hate it; I just don’t much look forward to it. The reason, however, has nothing to do with the cooking itself. I actually kind of enjoy the process of preparing and creating something. It’s just that it’s too frustrating to try to spend an hour or two cooking when the kids are guaranteed to need me repeatedly during that time.

Every now and then, however, I do spend more than ten or fifteen minutes preparing dinner. Sometimes, I get the urge to make something really nice.

Once, I spent time making a new chicken dish and mashed potatoes. Everyone in my family likes chicken, so I thought this would be a sure hit. I even let the kids have straws in their drinks, which is a special treat in our family. I thought the stage was set for success.

I was wrong.

One of my children kept talking about what she would and wouldn’t eat—even after being told by Daddy to stop talking about it. Another child kept trying bites of the meal and then picking them out of her mouth when she found them unsatisfactory. One child in particular was chewing on his straw, as he likes to do. I didn’t mind, but apparently my husband did, because he said, “That’s why I don’t like giving them a straw.”

You can imagine how I felt at that point. I was frustrated and irritated—really irritated—by their ungratefulness. I was also discouraged. After all, I had gone to a lot of trouble to do something nice for them.

I wonder how God feels when we do the same thing to Him.

Every single day and moment of our lives, God puts an awesome amount of effort and creativity into preparing wonderful things for us. Sometimes, we receive His gifts well, but often, we complain.

We are a lot like the ancient Israelites, whom we usually condemn for their on-again, off-again attitudes. First, the Israelites complained (understandably so) about their slavery in Egypt. So God rescued them. Then, the complained about being hungry, saying, “Well at least in Egypt, we had food.” So God gave them manna. After awhile, they complained about that. So God gave them quail. Then they got sick of that.

They were never satisfied.

Friend, are you satisfied with what God provides for you? When He gives you a gift, do you receive it gratefully? Or do you complain, because you don’t like it…or you want to choose what parts of it you will and will not accept…or it isn’t the way you would have done it?

It’s true that sometimes, God allows things into our lives for which we’re not grateful. Sometimes, He allows tragedy and suffering. He doesn’t expect us to respond with jubilant enthusiasm to such things, and those aren’t the kinds of things I’m talking about here.

I’m talking about the things He gives us that are in no way tragedies, but to which we sometimes respond as if they are.

What if God gives you a house with fewer bedrooms than you think you need? Could you be grateful for it, or would you complain?

What if He provides not a new car, but one that’s ten years old and has a hundred thousand miles? Would you thank Him?

What if…He gives you children and a husband who aren’t perfect? What then? Will you spend more time celebrating His gifts, or complaining that they aren’t perfect?

What gifts in your life have you failed to appreciate? What have you complained about when you should have been grateful? Spend some time in prayer today. Ask God to forgive you for your attitude toward His blessings. Seek His help in changing your heart to be a grateful one. And rejoice! You have been blessed.

James 1:17—Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows.

God Sees

Megan Breedlove No Comments

Precious mommy friend, this devotional is going to be a little bit different from the ones I usually write. I don’t have a story involving one of my kids to share; I don’t have anything funny to say. But I do have a word from the Lord which He wants me to share, so that in the writing of it I may be encouraged, and in the reading of it, you may be.

In the Bible, God reveals Himself in many ways, often through one of His names which is especially relevant to the situation. The name I want to focus on this week is El-Roi, the God Who Sees.

In Genesis 16, Hagar recognizes God as El-Roi because He responded to her in her time of extreme need. Therefore, she knew He must have seen her in her despair. And because there is no shadow of turning with God, we can know that He sees us, too. He sees us not only in our times of suffering or difficulty, but always. He is intimately aware of even the smallest details of our lives.

So may I offer you some words of encouragement this week? Some ways in which God might see you as you go about your mothering?

When you’re so tired you’d give anything for just fifteen more minutes of sleep…when you can’t remember the last time you slept a solid eight hours…when weariness is coloring your world in shades of gray…God sees.

When you carve time out of your day to spend preparing a nice meal, only to have your kids reject it…God sees.

When you’re awake—again—in the middle of the night, feeding a hungry baby, and it feels like you’re all alone in the world…God sees.

Or when it’s the middle of the day, and you’re lonely because you haven’t had time for a good, long phone conversation with your best friend, much less time for a lunch date, because you’ve been busy mothering…God sees.

When you clean up vomit or give another dose of cough medicine at 3 a.m….God sees.

When you do the best you can, and it’s still a horrible day…God sees.

When you need a friend…

When you need encouragement…

When you need strength…

When you need sleep…

When you spend all day doing things that no one notices (though they would certainly notice if you didn’t do them), remember…God sees.

Friend, you do not walk alone. God walks with you every step of the way. He sees what you do for your family, which is ultimately what you do for Him. He knows how hard it can be. He knows that sometimes, being a mom doesn’t seem so great. He knows we sometimes have to struggle for patience, for creativity, or for endurance. He knows it’s hard to be a great mom on four hours’ sleep…or when you’re going it alone…or when other circumstances in your life are crowding in.

But best of all, not only does He know, He cares.

Just as “listening” involves hearing, but is so much more, I believe that in this passage, “God sees” refers to the reality that He both sees and cares. And as if that weren’t enough, He does something about our struggles, just as He did for Hagar. He comes to us. What an incredible encouragement to know that God has chosen to be with us—in us—as we live our lives!

Try something this week. As you go throughout your days, remember that God is El-Roi, the God Who Sees. In your spectacular moments, in your mundane moments, and in everything in between, He sees. He cares. He loves.

I can think of nothing more incredible than that.

Be encouraged, dear friend.

Genesis 16:13– She gave this name to the LORD who spoke to her: “You are the God who sees me,” for she said, “I have now seen the One who sees me.”

Moving Away

Megan Breedlove No Comments

My 6-year-old, Ellie, has beautiful curly hair. She loves it, and I think it looks pretty on her. The only problem is that she doesn’t like to wear barrettes in it or wear it pulled back. That means it sometimes gets really, really tangled.

Combing Ellie’s hair (actually, we use a Hello Kitty brush, which she insists hurts less than an actual comb) isn’t a pleasant event for anybody. Ellie certainly doesn’t enjoy the pain of having the tangles coaxed from her hair, and I don’t enjoy her screaming and crying. I can be gently removing a tangle from her hair, and she will suddenly, shrilly scream as if I am ripping her hair out by the roots. The tears flow quickly and copiously.

One day, I was brushing Ellie’s hair as we stood by her dresser. She kept moving her head around, trying to escape the brush. Instead of helping, this actually made the whole thing worse. I wasn’t able to remove the tangles gently because I couldn’t ever tell where her head was going to be next.

“If you keep moving your head away from me, it makes it harder for me to comb your hair without hurting you,” I said.

But Ellie was convinced that if she held still and submitted to what I was doing, it would hurt worse. She didn’t believe me when I told her that if she did what I asked, it would actually hurt less.

We respond to God the same way, don’t we? He begins to orchestrate something in our lives, and we fear it will be painful, so we move away. Hold still, He tells us. But fearing the pain, we continue to squirm, hoping that somehow, we can make the pain bearable if we can avoid it in some measure.

The truth is, refusing to submit only makes our circumstances more painful, not less. If Ellie had cooperated with me, the pain would have been lesser, and it would have been over sooner. But because she didn’t trust me enough to believe that it was in her best interests to do what I was telling her to do, she resisted, and she wound up causing herself more pain than necessary.

The same is sometimes true with us and God.

Trying to squirm out from under the circumstances God has caused or allowed into our lives never helps. In fact, it always makes things worse. True, there are times when He lets us sin and go our own ways, but there are also times when He is determined that we must comply. And if God has ordained that He will accomplish a certain part of His will in our lives, we cannot avoid it.

Our choice, then, is not whether or not we will have to go through the circumstances, but whether we will accept God’s will without fighting Him. Will we believe Him that submitting is in our best interests, or will we choose to rely on our own wisdom that says that trying to avoid the pain might result in actually doing so?

God never causes us any more pain than absolutely necessary. Sometimes, however, we cause our own pain when we keep trying to move away from Him. Resisting God never produces the outcomes we hope it will. It never ultimately satisfies us. Sometimes, it even results in more hurt, because when we keep trying to move away from Him, it’s harder for Him to accomplish His will in our lives without hurting us.

Oh, friend, is there some area in your life in which you need to accept His will and stop fighting it? I know that your circumstances may be agonizingly painful. But do you need to stop fighting God? To stop causing yourself additional pain by struggling against what you cannot avoid?

Resisting God will not help you avoid the pain. It won’t make Him change His mind and remove the circumstances from you. It will only cause you to miss out on His comfort in your circumstances.

So stop fighting. Stop struggling against Him, and let Him hold you. Feel His strong, loving arms draw you close to His chest and hold you securely. Let His peace and His comfort flow over you. Let Him carry you through.

John 14:27—Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.

Matthew 23:37—O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing.

Psalm 91:4—He will cover you with his feathers, and under his wings you will find refuge; his faithfulness will be your shield and rampart.

Mommy Cares

Megan Breedlove No Comments

My daughter Lindsey is pretty hardy. She doesn’t get hurt easily—which is good, since she loves to try new physical skills. In fact, one day when she was not yet two, I had to remove her from the bathroom vanity twice and the kitchen counter five times. In the bathroom, she had climbed up on the potty and from there to the sink. To get onto the kitchen counter, she had pushed a dining room chair up next to it and climbed onto the chair, then onto the counter.

But on this particular day, she had hurt her toe.

I saw her crying, and I said something like, “You’re okay. Go wipe your nose.”

I was nice about it, but I knew she wasn’t really hurt. Lindsey thought otherwise. “My toe, my toe,” she repeated tearfully.

I looked at her toe. It looked fine to me. But looking at her tearful face, runny nose and all, I realized that she had really hurt herself, or at least believed that she had. Indestructible Lindsey was hurt.

“I’m sorry,” I said compassionately. “Now go wipe your nose.”

Lindsey got up and went willingly to get a Kleenex. I had given her what she needed. She was then able to move on.

I didn’t make her toe feel better, but I did make her heart feel better. You see, Lindsey didn’t need me to fix the situation; she needed to know that I cared.

Often, that’s the same thing we need from God.

Granted, there are times when we desperately want His help to fix a situation. But there are other times—many other times—when we can live with the situation if we just know He cares.

We live in a fallen world. All of us know that. We understand that that brings consequences—pain, sin, suffering, and even death. We know that not everything in life will go the way we desire, and for the most part, we have accepted that. We don’t rail against everything that happens to us, just the most painful things, if we rail at all. But even in the midst of a level of hardship we can accept, we want to know that God cares.

You see, that’s what helps us make it through—knowing that God cares about the details of our day-to-day existence.

When we come to Him and tell Him something hurts, we want to know that He cares. We don’t expect Him to fix everything, because we know that sometimes, in His infinite wisdom, He allows suffering. But just as Lindsey sought from me some evidence that I cared, so we seek from God the knowledge that He cares.

And we find it, again and again and again.

God cares more about us than we can possibly comprehend. He demonstrated His love and concern most blatantly when He watched His Son hang on a cross, dying. But He also shows His love every day, all day.

He provides the air that we need for each breath. He gives us shelter. He blesses us with family and friends. Not only that, He provides us comfort and strength any time we need it.

Any time, anywhere, God makes Himself available to us for comfort, wisdom, strength, or anything else we might need. Isn’t that incredible? The God of the entire universe is always, immediately available to respond to you. To me. If that doesn’t convince us that He cares, nothing will.

Friend, is there some area of your life today where you need to know that God cares? Could you make it through your circumstances if you just knew that He cared?

Go to Him. Tell Him that you need to know. Tell Him you need reassurance of His love and caring. He’s there, ready and waiting to give it to you, and He won’t condemn you for needing it.

It’s true that sometimes, God doesn’t make His presence as intensely felt as others. There may be times where He asks you to walk by faith, without the emotional experience you were hoping for. But even during those times, He will make His love and concern plain to you. He’s already done so throughout the pages of His Word, the Bible. He may use His Holy Spirit to speak to the needy places in your heart. He may use other people. Whatever the means, He will offer His comfort any time you need it. Why? Because He cares.

So go to Him. Tell Him what you need. And open your heart to receive the loving answer He will give.

1 Peter 5:7—Cast all your cares on him because he cares for you.

The Hard Way

Megan Breedlove No Comments

I think moms should get P.E. credit for changing diapers.

Why? If you’ve ever had a child like mine, you know.

My daughter Jessica is now sixteen months old. She is well past the newborn stage where at the most, all she did during a diaper change was cry. She’s even graduated past the stage where babies discover they can kick, and that doing so can interfere with Mommy’s changing a diaper and possibly cause enough trouble that Mommy will change her mind and leave the baby alone. Jessica is now to the stage where if she’s not interested in having her diaper changed, she puts forth some full-body resistance.

This often involves rolling from side to side, or even trying to roll onto her tummy and get up. She’s smart, and she usually waits until I have the least control over her body—that is, when I’m trying to hold the front part of the diaper on her tummy with one hand and use the other hand to bring the tab up and around to secure the diaper closed. She will roll to one side, almost onto her tummy. In the split second it takes me to realize that she’s done it again, she’s onto her tummy, and the diaper is history.

One day, I was attempting to change her diaper as she lay on her changing table pad. For some reason (she didn’t want to be messed with, or she didn’t want to lie down, or because it was the wrong day of the week), she was particularly fussy.

I tried to interest her in a toy we had hanging in that wall hanging thing you buy with a set of bedding—you know, the one that has several pockets for you to put toys or supplies in.

It didn’t work. Jessica continued to fuss and to squirm back and forth.

Finally, I gave up trying to convince her to lie there nicely and decided I was just going to have to make it happen. “All right, we can do this the hard way,” I said firmly.

I leaned over, using my forearm to hold down her torso while with my hand and the other arm, which was free, I was able somehow to get that diaper on her.

Jessica didn’t like it one bit. Realizing she couldn’t get out of the situation made her even angrier. She screamed and cried indignantly until I was able to pick her up and cuddle her (whereupon the tears magically ceased).

It didn’t have to be that hard, I thought as she calmed down. You might as well have submitted, because it was going to happen anyway.

Then I realized something. Sometimes adults struggle against the inevitable, too.

Have you ever resisted God’s will or direction for your life when it didn’t match up with what you wanted—or wanted to avoid? I bet you have. I know I have.

Just as a diaper change was necessary for Jessica, so are the things God allows into our lives necessary in some way. So why do we resist? Why do we kick and scream in protest until the circumstances stop?

We do it for the same reasons Jessica did. Sometimes, we hope we can prevent a thing from happening if we resist strongly enough. Maybe if God knows how much I hate this, he’ll stop, we think. Other times, we resist out of anger that we can’t have our way. When we realize, as Jessica did, that the circumstance is going to happen and there’s nothing we can do to prevent it, we scream out our anger.

But friends, we need to remember what I wish Jessica could have understood: the one causing (or allowing) our circumstances knows what is best for us, and he wouldn’t force us to submit unless it were absolutely necessary.

Had Jessica submitted to my attempts to change her diaper, the whole experience would have been more pleasant (or at least, less odious), and it probably would have been over sooner. If we submit to God’s sovereignty in choosing our circumstances, we may find the whole experience less hateful. It may also be over sooner, because sometimes, God allows us to remain in a circumstance until we’ve learned a lesson. If we make that take longer than it has to, it’s our own fault that the circumstances endure.

I don’t know the circumstances of your life, and I won’t presume to tell you why they are what they are. But I do know that God only lets what is necessary through his filter of protection and into your life, and I know that resisting what he has chosen cannot possibly bring you any good.

Instead, stop resisting, and accept the comfort he offers. If Jessica had accepted the toy I was offering, she would have had a fun few seconds playing while I finished up. But in order to accept the toy, she would have had to submit to my will for her at that time. Even so must we submit to God’s will if we want to receive the comfort he offers. If we are too busy fighting him or railing against our circumstances, we’ll miss the opportunity to be comforted.

We will go through unpleasant circumstances in this lifetime. There’s no question about that. The only question is, how will we go through them.

Acts 26:14—It is hard for you to kick against the goads.

2 Chronicles 30:8—Do not be stiff-necked as your fathers were. Submit to the Lord.

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