I was asked awhile back if I would be willing to write a little something/article for a monthly newsletter for a Mom's group at our church. I told her I would give it a try but if it got to be too much I would let her know. Since I don't have much else to say at this point on my blog, I figured I would post it and share it with my readers! ;o)
God’s Plans
“For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”
Something that I have struggled with as a mom and especially as a homeschool mom is the fear of failure. I know that I mess up a lot. I yell at my kids when I shouldn’t. I don’t always handle situations that arise calmly and fairly. And frankly, I sometimes just want to throw my hands up and give up.
There are so many pressures in life that can be put on us from society, other moms or even by ourselves, to see if our child “measures up”. Who of us hasn’t been guilty at least once of comparing our child with another child? Have you heard, or even worse said, “What! Your son isn’t walking yet? Jr. was walking at nine months.” Or “Oh, my little girl can sing the whole alphabet at two!” Here’s another, “Bless my little one’s heart, when I prayed with him last night he accepted Jesus in his heart and he is only 18 months!” Okay that was a little of an exaggeration, but you get my point. We could also look at all the activities available to our children. What sport can’t they sign up for? If you’re not into sports what about a martial arts class, dance, a reading group, or some sort of music training.
Do you feel the pressure? Are we failing our kids if we don’t provide every opportunity available to see what might click with them? “What if our child is the next Michael Jordan and I don’t sign him up for basketball?” “What if my child is the one who will come up with the cure for cancer and I don’t send him to the science fair?” “What if my child is a future American Idol and I don’t get her voice lessons?” I’m sure you can see where I am going with this.
Here is something that I read and it took that pressure off of me. Each of our children is going to be what God has created them to be, no matter what we do or don’t do. If God wants our child to do something in sports when they grow up, He will give them the natural ability and it will happen whether or not he’s been in T-ball. If God wants them to be an author, He will give them the love of reading and language arts. If God wants them to be a scientist, He will give them that love and ability to understand all they need to know in the science world.
Just remember that God has a plan for each of us and our children. In our weakness is when God is strongest and praise God that His grace covers us when we fail!
“For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”
Something that I have struggled with as a mom and especially as a homeschool mom is the fear of failure. I know that I mess up a lot. I yell at my kids when I shouldn’t. I don’t always handle situations that arise calmly and fairly. And frankly, I sometimes just want to throw my hands up and give up.
There are so many pressures in life that can be put on us from society, other moms or even by ourselves, to see if our child “measures up”. Who of us hasn’t been guilty at least once of comparing our child with another child? Have you heard, or even worse said, “What! Your son isn’t walking yet? Jr. was walking at nine months.” Or “Oh, my little girl can sing the whole alphabet at two!” Here’s another, “Bless my little one’s heart, when I prayed with him last night he accepted Jesus in his heart and he is only 18 months!” Okay that was a little of an exaggeration, but you get my point. We could also look at all the activities available to our children. What sport can’t they sign up for? If you’re not into sports what about a martial arts class, dance, a reading group, or some sort of music training.
Do you feel the pressure? Are we failing our kids if we don’t provide every opportunity available to see what might click with them? “What if our child is the next Michael Jordan and I don’t sign him up for basketball?” “What if my child is the one who will come up with the cure for cancer and I don’t send him to the science fair?” “What if my child is a future American Idol and I don’t get her voice lessons?” I’m sure you can see where I am going with this.
Here is something that I read and it took that pressure off of me. Each of our children is going to be what God has created them to be, no matter what we do or don’t do. If God wants our child to do something in sports when they grow up, He will give them the natural ability and it will happen whether or not he’s been in T-ball. If God wants them to be an author, He will give them the love of reading and language arts. If God wants them to be a scientist, He will give them that love and ability to understand all they need to know in the science world.
Just remember that God has a plan for each of us and our children. In our weakness is when God is strongest and praise God that His grace covers us when we fail!
4 comments:
Fabulous article. Just what I needed today.
Thanks Julie!
Love ya!
Amen to that! I love to encourage young mommies with all my "failure" stories because God's grace is sooooo much greater than our failures! And guess what? His promises are true and they turn out! Praise God!
Julie,
Your article both confirmed decisions I have made in parenting the kiddos and convicted me in areas where I struggle to "Keep up with the Jones's kids."
I read your article after I had another mom learning experience. Madalynn was due to make an expository speech at co-op Tuesday afternoon, and Monday morning we started on it. She needed a prop and topic she could speak on for 2-3 mintues. I thought, "What can I whip up in a day that she knows about and (here's the kicker) would be easy and convenient to me to help her do. I dismissed her idea of the topic of her speech being her little sister Jillian, thinking, "We've got to do something more academic to make this a learning experience, not just show n' tell." I worked for three hours putting a display board together for the topic of Kansas. Madalynn helped, of course, but she was just cutting and pasting what I told her to cut and paste. Travis worked with her on her speech that night. I got home and asked Travis how the speech went. He said, "Not good. She doesn't really know enough about what she's doing her speech on to be confident." Ouch. The reality that I had forced her to pick speak on a topic I liked and assumed she wanted me to do came hard and fast. I felt so bad that I tried to make something that should have been fun just laborous and confusing. I stayed up until midnight making some new display boards with pictures of Jillian all over them. She got up that morning and beamed when I told her sorry and that I wanted her to be able to speak on Jillian, what SHE wanted to do. Madalynn's speach was so great. She really has a passion about sharing her sister with everyone and her speech turned out great.
I think mom learned more from this assignment than Madalynn did!
Thanks Julie!
Love Ya!
Jae
Jae,
Thanks for sharing. It's an easy trap to fall in with homeschooling. (I struggle to stay out of it!) But I do have to keep going back to 1) God's called me to do it, and 2) God's going to fulfill His plans for my children, even when I mess up.
Post a Comment