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A God Who Serves Mothers

November 15, 2018 by amanda Leave a Comment

Motherhood puts my people-pleasing-talents to the test. Melting back into the couch cushions, knees to my chest, I pray to turn this burden over to the Lord. It’s hard to be a people-pleaser who can’t keep up the pace.

For one thing, I have two little children who’ve taken to heart the words of the old song: “Make all my wants and wishes known.” There’s no way one tired mama can (or should) fulfill all their wants and wishes. And yet, I end each day feeling the weight of not being enough for them.

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Loving the Mom Who Is Different from Me

August 23, 2018 by amanda Leave a Comment

While motherhood often brings women together, it can also highlight differences that challenge our love for one another. More than ever before, in this world of Motherhood-by-Instagram, opportunities abound for comparison, criticism, and misunderstandings.

Quite often I’m tempted to judge or criticize a mom who parents differently than I do, feeds her kids healthier than I do, prioritizes her family better than I do, keeps house better than I do, or exercises more than I do. If I find some fault in her, I am less apt to feel inferior in comparison to her. …

5 Hymns to Teach Young Children

May 31, 2017 by amanda 16 Comments

Our children will face hardship. Every mom’s heart hurts to consider her child’s encountering difficulties, but because we know that challenges will arise for our children, we want to prepare them to find hope and joy in the trials and crises of life. We also want to share truth and doctrine with them in such a way that they can build their house upon the Solid Rock, Christ Jesus.

Music is an especially ideal method for teaching biblical truths to children. My kids are 2 and 5, and we have so much fun learning to sing hymns together. Our kids need solid truths running through their hearts and minds when they face heartbreak, loss, pain, and challenges, and I trust that the words to some of the hymns we are teaching them will ring in their hearts long after this season where I sit on the couch beside them to teach and instruct them.
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The Daily Inconvenient Path to Joy

April 18, 2017 by amanda Leave a Comment

My five-year-old and I recently started some seeds indoors that we will transplant later this season into our garden. Every morning, he wakes up and goes to check on his seeds to see how they are doing.

After we first put them under the soil, my son told me he didn’t know where his little seeds had gone. He had buried them away underground the week before, and now he wasn’t quite sure what had become of them. Now we can see the little shoots, and we anticipate a bountiful harvest in the coming months. But for a while, they were nowhere to be seen.

God designed the seed’s cycle of death and life in such a way that he could demonstrate the gospel to my young son. The plant cannot live and bear fruit unless the seed is first buried away to die. Then, once the seed relinquishes its life, a plant can emerge with the promise of yielding fruit….

Living Out the Beauty of the Gospel Together

March 15, 2017 by amanda Leave a Comment

Last spring, a couple of friends and I had gotten our kids together a time or two for play dates, and we talked about how much we would enjoy using our time together to fellowship around the things of the Lord and his word. After tossing around several ideas, we decided to read through a book over the summer and discuss it when we could get together….

When You Need an Escape

January 4, 2017 by amanda Leave a Comment

Do you ever wish you could just escape it all? Press pause for a while, stop the world, and get your bearings before the next deluge of needs and demands and pressures?

I was reading about Noah and The Flood yesterday (Genesis 6-8), and a truth in this short phrase brought such cheer to my heart:

“And Noah and his sons and his wife and his sons’ wives with him went into the ark to escape the waters of the flood.” Genesis 7:7

Maybe you’re in a stormy trial, or you’re walking through a struggle where you see no soon escape. Maybe the demands and pressures and expectations of those around you leave you desperate for rest and relief. If you’re fighting for joy, needy for grace, and looking for a place of respite, escape into the Ark Himself, Jesus Christ….

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