There is pain between expectation and reality.
This kind of work in motherhood IS painful…yet it produces a love that compares with no other. It brings about character, joy, honor, patience, steadfastness, perseverance, and maturity. Pressing on through the hardship of motherhood not only binds families together in an indescribably beautiful scar-filled unity, but ultimately sanctifies us and causes our lives to look more and more like Jesus.
Jesus, while we were yet his enemies, laid down his life for our sake. We were ransomed from our futility by his own blood and have been born again into a new hope, a living hope, to be built up as living stones in honor of the one true God. We are a people chosen for God’s possession, for obedience, and for His glory.
Through the hardship and challenges of motherhood we learn to love like Jesus does.
I urge you, dear friend, if you find yourself reading this and you are not at peace with your children..drop whatever you are doing and begin with prayer before that frustration moves in to destroy. What is it you need to hear? Where is it you need to grow? What is it you need to change? Who is it you need to pursue?
Ask the Lord to change your heart first.
Don’t waste any time and don’t give any room for distance. If there is something you need to confess, do it. If there is someone you need to forgive, do it.
Carve out the time and energy to pursue the hearts of your children and ask God to give you eyes to see them as He does. No matter the age of your children, ask Him to give you the ability to see beyond what is on the surface.
Look carefully for what might be deeper. Is there loneliness? neglect? fear? shame? rejection? Ask God to give you a heart that seeks to truly listen, love, repent, forgive, pursue, and serve those who are in your care so that the hardness doesn’t destroy you. Ask Him to fill you with all joy and peace and to give you resolve to love like Jesus does.
Motherhood is for our good and for His glory. It is not to destroy us.
Let today be the day you soften your heart. Let today be the day you chase after theirs.
…but if I have not love I am a noisy gone or a clanging cymbal.
And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing.
If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing.
Love is patient.
And kind.
Does not envy or boast.
It is not arrogant.
Or rude.
It does not insist on it’s own way.
It is not irritable or resentful.
It does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth.
Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
Love never ends.
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This article originally appeared at MegMarieWallace.com, published with permission.
