Prayer Changes Things
1Timothy 2:1, 3 (The Message) The first thing I want you to do is pray. Pray every way you know how, for everyone you know…This is the way our savior God wants us to live.
More than anything, parenting takes courage. There is no going with the flow, no just trying to slide by, when it comes to raising kids.
As we enter the uphill battle of child rearing, we must trust the success of our parenting to God. Prayer is key. Sometimes situations are hard to see, and we feel like we are blindly tramping around. In raising kids in this day and age, we need to take all our needs before God and leave the results to Him. In prayer we plead our case before God, we get God’s perspective, and gain confidence and courage.
God doesn’t always answer our prayers in the way we hoped or expected, but we can trust that He will answer our prayer in the best way, not just sometimes, but every time.
As Gen X parents, we know that these are trying times to be raising children, but we must realize that we are parents now, not by chance, but by design. God has called us to parent specifically during this time in history.
Here are some scriptures for your parenting journey:
1. Prayers of need (Psalm 55:22, Jeremiah 17:7-8)
2. Prayers of thanksgiving (Psalm 40:5, Romans 11:33)
3. Prayers for seeking families (Matthew 11:25, Psalm 116:6-7)
4. Prayers for generations (Psalm 105:708, Psalm 100:5)
©Tricia Goyer
Labels: generation x, god, parenting, prayer
Guest Blogger...Cara Putnam
I really should be writing. Finishing that last sprint to the end of my current manuscript. I only have 3500 words to go, but this blog post has been running through my mind for days, so I’m going to stop and write it.
Deep breath.
Here goes. This is another one of those gut-level honest posts.
I’ve experienced a little grief when one set of grandparents died and when a uncle died. We also lost our dog (and first child in many senses) very unexpectedly a couple months ago. All of those were big losses.
But I’m learning that the death of a child through a miscarriage falls into a whole other plain…and very few people understand. Unless you’ve had one, most people don’t get it (with rare exceptions).
My family doesn’t understand. My friends don’t understand. Even my husband struggles to understand.
To each of them, it is a loss – a real loss – but a one-time loss.
It couldn’t be farther from that for me. Each month I am reminded that I’m not pregnant. Then there are the times that my son or daughter will say something innocent that reminds me again that we’re waiting for a baby. Or that they still think the baby will arrive someday. Or I’ll pick up my son and think I shouldn’t be able to do that because I should be nine months pregnant.
There’s the count-down of what a normal pregnancy looks like. The dates that you anticipated after the baby was born. And the one I dread, almost fear, the due date. That one’s barreling at me, and it’s easy to feel like everyone else has forgotten while I’m curled up in a fetal position wondering how I will survive.
I’m not prone to depression, but there are days that I truly struggle to find the positive in life.
Now don’t get me wrong. Life is still good. God is still good.
But there is also real pain. And if you know someone who has experienced a miscarriage, please remember that the pain doesn’t end – in fact in some ways it builds.
So pray for them. Ask how they are really doing. Because you may be the only one who cares enough to remember and ask.
Here is a great resource for women and families who have experienced a miscarriage.
http://www.miscarriageassociation.org.uk/ma2006/information/leaflets/hiddengrief.pdfLabels: death, empay, hope pregnancy center, loss, miscarriage, prayer, writing
PRAYER CHANGES THINGS
The first thing I want you to do is pray. Pray every way you know how, for everyone you know…This is the way our savior God wants us to live. 1Timothy 2:1, 3 (The Message)
More than anything, parenting takes courage. There is no going with the flow, no just trying to slide by, when it comes to raising kids.
As we enter the uphill battle of child rearing, we must trust the success of our parenting to God. Prayer is key. Sometimes situations are hard to see, and we feel like we are blindly tramping around. In raising kids in this day and age, we need to take all our needs before God and leave the results to Him. In prayer we plead our case before God, we get God’s perspective, and gain confidence and courage.
God doesn’t always answer our prayers in the way we hoped or expected, but we can trust that He will answer our prayer in the best way, not just sometimes, but every time.
As Gen X parents, we know that these are trying times to be raising children, but we must realize that we are parents now, not by chance, but by design. God has called us to parent specifically during this time in history.
Here are some scriptures for the parenting journey:
1. Prayers of need (Psalm 55:22, Jeremiah 17:7-8)
2. Prayers of thanksgiving (Psalm 40:5, Romans 11:33)
3. Prayers for seeking families (Matthew 11:25, Psalm 116:6-7)
4. Prayers for generations (Psalm 105:708, Psalm 100:5)
Labels: god, prayer, raising kids, scripture
Interview with Gina Conroy
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Here's is an excerpt of an interview with Gina Conroy at
Mom2Mom ConnectionGina has contributed to my blog on a regular basis (just last week infact)!
Help for Praying Moms: Gina Conroy With Mother’s Day coming soon, I want to highlight some special moms who reach out to encourage those of us deep in the trenches.
Gina Conroy is an author and mom of four who has a heart for using her gift of writing to build up her peers. According to her website, Gina grew up in a New York Italian family where she says “there was never a lack of drama, love and interesting dialogue.”
At the age of 15, she went to a Wayne Cochran retreat and gave her life to the Lord. She graduated with honor from Oral Roberts University with a degree in Communication Arts. Gina is founder of Writer…Interrupted and writes about her experiences trying to balance it all at Portrait of a Writer…Interrupted. She’s the co-author of Anytime Prayers for Everyday Moms and has also contributed to Reach for Your Dreams Graduate.
Welcome, Gina! Why do you feel it’s important for mothers to pray?
Believe it or not, praying is not an easy thing for me to do. I’m not talking about the quick prayers we moms mutter consistently under our breaths every day. I’m talking about the more concentrated and thoughtful prayers, specific to each child. I’ve always known it’s important to do, but knowing and doing are two different things.
When I wrote Anytime Prayers for Everyday Moms, God met a need in my own life through my own prayers. The topics I was assigned to write about were exactly what I was going through. My prayers flowed naturally from me and ministered to me.read the rest of the interview here:
http://mom2momconnection.com/2007/05/02/help-for-praying-moms-gina-conroy/Labels: gina conroy, interview, mother's day, mothering, prayer, writing
Guest Blogger...Gina Conroy
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Breaking Up Ain't Hard to Do
Okay, why is it that I'm not at all shocked any more when I hear of yet another well respected Godly couple calling it quits or separating?
Last time it was good friends of ours. The husband left his wife and two kids without any warning. He just didn't want to be married any more. My husband tried repeatedly to be a friend to him, but there was always an excuse why he couldn't get together for lunch.
Now it's a homeschool mom of three girls, raised in a Godly family and married to her college sweetheart who's left her family. I'm surprised, but not shocked and that's frightening.
It tells me that more and more people I know and respect are splitting up. Couples who I thought had a better/stronger marriage relationship than me and my hubby are now calling it quits. It's crazy! By all appearances I probably should have been divorced, oh fifteen years ago, but we made a commitment to each other and no matter how tough it gets, we're willing to work through it. Yes, mostly for the children's sake, but also because I believe that our union was orchestrated by God, though at times it's hard to understand what in the world God was thinking when he put us together. :)
But that's another story for another day!
Still, I know that we're together because we really need each other. Yes, I'm pretty stubborn about a lot of things and my baggage usually gets in the way of learning my lessons, but I'm not quitting. No matter how long it takes me to graduate.
I'm a product of divorce and never want my children to experience that. Even though ours is a dysfunctional family of sorts, we're still a committed family. That's why I can't understand what pushes these people to the edge. Why they leave their children and families?
Well, maybe I can understand. I've felt hopelessness and despair, but instead of withdrawing or running to someone else for comfort, I cried out to God. Instead of focusing on myself and the moment, I've tried to grasp the big picture and how my actions would affect the whole family.
Maybe it's not for me to understand. I probably never will. But one thing I can do is pray.
Will you pray also for these marriages and for the ones that are on the brink of destruction?
Gina Conroy
Portrait of a Writer...Interrupted:
http://portraitofawriter.ginaconroy.com/ Writer...Interrupted:
http://writerinterrupted.ginaconroy.comAnytime Prayers for Everyday Moms-- Available now!
Carnival of Christian Writers:
http://blogcarnival.com/bc/cprof_550.htmlLabels: breaking up, children, divorce, family, gina conroy, husbands and wives, marriage, prayer
Living with an eternal perspective...
How do we live today, here on this tangible and finite earth, yet
really live in light of eternity. It's something I struggle with, and I daresay, it's something we all struggle with from time-to-time. Having children can make it that much harder, but sometimes, it can make it easier too!
Tiffany: Keeping a book of blessings so I can look back over my previous tough times and how God was faithful to us then and remember how he will be faithful again.
Michelle R: Whenever I look at the big picture. I think about eternal things in my weekly Bible study and through reading great fiction and the scriptures. I realize that my life is short and what seems like a big deal to me in respect to eternity is really insignificant.
Lisa: fellowship with other Christian women.
Shannon: I think what really gives me an "eternal perspective" is my love for my children, and my protectiveness of them. I try to protect them, but in the end God loves them even more than I do and He is the only one who can truly protect them.
Michelle H: Psalm 127:3 is a great reminder to me. Because I work at home as a day care provider, my entire world can be consumed by children and housework. It helps to remind myself that the children in my life are gifts.
Robin: DAILY SCRIPTURE READING!
Michelle D: I realize that I should be keeping my eyes on Jesus all along. Psalm 139 is really important to me, because it reminds me that God is ALWAYS with me - right beside me - and that He's in charge. I'm so glad that God is God and I am not.
Rene: Lots of prayer. I pray all the time about parenting, and throughout the day, God gives me a lot of reminders about life, truth, reality. So much of what I experience as a parent happens inside my head, without much fact, which then leads to a lot of fear. God continues to work with me to keep me focused on what is right in front of me and how to deal with that. I also remember that it is through suffering and uncomfortable circumstances that we grow, which is helping me let go a little of the kids and let them experience life as it really is, not the Barney version.
Labels: bible study, eternal perspective, faithful, fellowship, god, jesus, love, parenting, prayer, women
Seeing God's presence....
As part of my research of
Generation NeXt Parenting, I sent out surveys on various topics on child-rearing and family life. One of the questions I asked was how do you help your children see God's presence in day to day life?
And here's what the respondents had to say...
Tiffany: I always try to speak of things in light of God. If there is a need [whether it is healing or toilet paper] I encourage the kids that God cares about them all and when we ask him for things and obey his instructions he always provides. When we don't now an answer and don't know how to find it we ask God for wisdom. I have verses taped up all over my house so no matter where you go there is the word of God and every night they fall asleep listening to worship music on a CD.Lisa: Since my daughter is only 15 months right now just talking to her, showing her things God makes when we go on walks.Shannon: I try to appreciate the little things in life and give God the credit and praise. I try to have an active, "any moment" type of prayer life and let my children see and join in this.Michelle H: I try to relate scripture and Biblical principles in everything we become involved in (relationships, schoolwork, issues with classmates, decisions we need to make....) I try to relay to my kids that there is a purpose in all they do and that God has a plan for each of them. I remind them daily how loved they are by God and how much He wants to bless them. When we pray, I confess and repent. We pray for others when they are in need. We read scripture and discuss how it applies to us. We enjoy hiking to enjoy the beauty in nature that is not only for us to enjoy but is so much a description of God himself. Now that I have God in my life, it seems so empty without him. It seems so pointless to live it without him, so we try to include Him in everything from music, to TV, discipline, and even in our mistakes. Michelle D: We pray. In front of my child. All the time. I'm not talking about before meals, or as a family devotion time. I'm really talking about when we get in the car, before we go to the store. Or when we can't find a missing toy. We try to help her understand the truth of Psalm 139 - that we are always in the presence of God and we can go to Him at any time, and with any concern, no matter how small.Rene: We talk a lot to the kids about God. But what we're realizing is that they learn more from seeing God work in our lives than us talking to them about how God is going to work in their lives. When writing novels, they always teach you "show don't tell" and we're seeing this is a good motto in life, too. The kids are watching how God is working in our lives, and that is more powerful than words alone.Julie: We try to find teachable moments...Some days they are frequent and other days they are scarce. We try and use music, movies, scripture verses for Sunday school and Awana and any learning opportunity possible.Labels: children, god's presence, prayer, scripture, teaching
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