today, i took my oldest, precious, amazing son to his 1st grade orientation! where are the years going? next year, i’ll be taking him to college. okay, not next year. but it really feels like these years are going at such a fast rate.
man, i want to do things right. i want to love him well! but today- i’m just going to enjoy being his mommy and the one he loves more than anything. today, i’m going to sit and listen to him read book after book. today, i am going to listen to him tell me every single detail he can about everything he can think of. i love my boy. i love every inch of him. and i love getting to be his mommy.
so… first grade- no big deal! he’ll always be my boy! at least in my mind!

Love and fear are enemies.  They have completely different sources.  love is from God, and His enemy produces fear.  We need some methods, tools and skills to respond to our child’s sin in such a way that we create love, not fear.  …But if all we have is what we were given, most of us have tools that create anxiety, because we are afraid.  “I’m scared, so let me teach you a lesson.  The lesson is, be afraid when I am afraid.”

But on the cross, Jesus dealt with the condition that required God to relate to us from the outside.  As a result, punishment, wrath, and intimidation have all disappeared from His attitude toward us.  God is a safe place.  Because sin has been dealt with in the New Covenant, we no longer need to be punished or controlled but need to learn to manage our freedom reponsibly, which changes the goal of government as well as the goal of parenting.  When love and freedom replace punishment and fear as the motivating forces in the relationship between parent and child, the quality of life improves dramatically for all involved.  They feel safe with each other, and the anxiety that created distance in the relationships is chased away by the sense of love, honor and value for one another.

Isn’t that good stuff?  Here’s more:

This connection (heart-to-heart) replaces the disrespect factory and introduces the honor factory.  The practice of honor brings power to relationships and the individuals in those relationships.

Therefore, we indroduce freedom to our small children, and we allow them to practice messing it up when they have a safety net in our home.  We create a safe place for them to fail and to learn about life, they end up saying, “This is the safest place I’ve got, right here at home.  You can handle my mistakes,  I can be myself, and you can find out about who I am.  I can practice life, and I can run to you in my time of trouble, because you are an ever-present help.  I want into get in your laps when I have sinned because they are the safest place I have on this earth.  There is no one who has demonstrated love like you have to me.”

Isn’t that what you want as a parent?  Isn’t that what you want to give to others?  Grace, freedom.  It’s life-changing, life-giving stuff.  I want to be a part of that. I want to breathe life into those around me.  I want to give them a glimpse of the Father’s love.  I want to show them a tender parent whose love is unwavering.  I want to empower them.  I want to encourage them to Jesus.  I want them to, at the end of my role, be thankful for how I lived my life and loved them.  I want bless them.

I want my actions to say this to them:

I will not allow anything to be more important to me than my connection to you.  Your homework will never be more important to me than my connection to you. Your obedience, your respect level, and your success at chores will never be more important to me than my connection to you.  There is nothing that I will allow to sever our connection on my side.  And I will work to let you experience the truth of that promise to I can help cast out the anxiety in your life.

Over 17 years of my life has been spent in marriage.

Overall, these years have been good, if not great at times.

There are other times however, when marriage has been anything but good. Sadly, a majority of these times where brought on by my own stupidity.

I’ve made many of the following mistakes throughout the course of my marriage. Thankfully I have a loving and forgiving wife.

As a rule, remember that everyone makes mistakes. Every marriage has arguments. Every marriage also has highs and lows.

The important thing: how the ebb and flow of marriage is addressed.

I’ve written before about the marriage killers as well as the secret to a lasting marriage, but how the mistakes we make in marriage are addressed is key to improving your relationship.

Here are some of the common mistakes made in marriage.

1. Lack of respect. A fundamental component of a healthy marriage is respect. It’s interesting that there are times when I see people treating their neighbor with more respect than they do their spouse. Little things like saying thank you, talking them up rather than down to your friends and co-workers, and letting them know you appreciate them and your relationship will go a long way to increasing the respect between you.
2. Little sex. It’s been reported that there are as many as 20 million sexless marriages in America. While sex is not the end all, be all to marriage, it is an important component. If little sex is occurring in your marriage (and you’d like more) discuss this with your spouse and/or seek professional help.
3. Always being “right”. Probably one very unattractive quality in a person is the know-it-all syndrome. Add to this the idea of always having to get in the last word and you’ve got a recipe for trouble. Admit your mistakes or that you perhaps don’t have all the answers. And if you still insist on always being right, riddle me this – if you’re always right, what’s that make your spouse? So what’s it like being married to a loser?
4. Saying “I told you so.” Much like the previous point, rubbing in your being right is never a good idea. It sounds too much like a parent-child relationship. And when it comes to parenting your spouse, can you say… disaster!
5. Dishonesty with your spouse. Lies and secrets can harm any relationship. They can create a distance and lack of trust between you, making it hard for both of you to enjoy the marriage. Own up to your decisions in life. If you’ve got some things going on outside your marriage that you don’t want your spouse to know, that speaks more about your integrity than it does theirs. Live according to your core values. It makes life much more enjoyable for everyone, especially you.
6. Hurtful sarcasm. While some of the exchanges aren’t meant to be harmful, if one of you thinks the comment is hurtful or disrespectful, it is. One way to look at it, if one of you thinks something is a problem, then it’s a problem.
7. Unclear boundaries with family members. Part of creating a marriage and a family requires boundaries around the marriage and the family. Picking up the phone to include your parents, or your children, in your marital difficulties often only exacerbates the issue.
8. Too much story telling. I’m guilty of this one by providing too much detail in the discussions with my spouse. While there are times when the story needs to be expounded and the details serve a valuable purpose, providing too much often gets in the way.
9. Distance. Whether the space between you is physical or emotional, it’s hard to have a meaningful relationship with someone who’s not there. If your life requires that you be physically apart from your spouse at times, this doesn’t mean you have to be emotionally apart. Use technology to your advantage. In-network phone calls are unlimited. Chat with each other over the web. Video conference one another or send video emails. You can remain connected even though you’re miles apart.
10. Unfair fighting. While disagreements and arguments are bound to happen, it’s vital to stay on topic in the discussion. Bringing up all your partner’s faults and failings doesn’t help the situation. Neither does raising your voice. As my grandfather would say, anytime a person raises their voice in a conversation, it’s about power and pride.

Today is our 9th wedding anniversary.  9 years!  And what a 9 years it has been!  There have been really high highs and some really low lows.  But, I think that is what marriage and relationship is all about.  It’s been a great 9 years!Here is a quote I still love that was on our wedding program:

How beautiful, then, the marriage of two Christians, two who are one in home, one in desire, in the way of life they follow, one in the religion they practice…  Nothing divides them either in flesh or spirit…  They pray together, they worship together, they fast together, instructing one another, encouraging one another, strengthening one another.  Side by sie they visit God’s church and partake of God’s banquet; side by side they face difficulties and persection, share their consolations.  They have no secrets from one another; they never shun each other’s company.  To such as these He gives His peace where there are two together, there also He is present.     ~Tertullian

Good stuff, right?  And marriage is just good stuff.  I love they way God has made us for one another.  And it’s just a glimpse of how much God loves us and provides for us.  It’s a beautiful thing.

This really is my favorite picture from the day.  It’s a view I didn’t get to have myself.  But I love getting to see it.  I love the intimacy of the moment.  I love the warmth that’s given.  I love being surrounded by the people we love and call family.  And I love that so many of these same people are still in our lives encouraging us onto greater things.

I remember the excitement and preparation of that day.  It was months of preparation, joyful preparation.  It was entering into something that I didn’t know exactly what it would look like, but I knew the person I was entering into it with and I could hold fast to that.  And I see it that way with the Lord.  I am now to be joyfully preparing myself & His church for Him.  And our relationship with Him is good, not predictable.  But we can so hold fast to the goodness of God, walk each step with Him, trusting His love and protection.

I am so thankful for Gabe.  I am so thankful for the man God is making him to be.  He truly is a great husband and a wonderful father.  I love His heart for the Lord and his commitment to hear from Him and do the right thing.  He’s a blessing to me in more ways than I could have ever imagined.  I am not the same person today that I was 9 years ago.  I really believe I know myself deeper and can love better because of my marriage.   And I thank God for His provisions!

If children live with criticism, they learn to condemn.
If children live with hostility, they learn to fight.
If children live with fear, they learn to be apprehensive.
If children live with pity, they learn to feel sorry for themselves. (more..)
If children live with ridicule, they learn to feel shy.
If children live with jealousy, they learn to feel envy.
If children live with shame, they learn to feel guilty.
If children live with encouragement, they learn confidence.
If children live with tolerance, they learn patience.
If children live with praise, they learn appreciation.
If children live with acceptance, they learn to love.
If children live with approval, they learn to like themselves.
If children live with recognition, they learn it is good to have a goal.
If children live with sharing, they learn generosity.
If children live with honesty, they learn truthfulness.
If children live with fairness, they learn justice.
If children live with kindness and consideration, they learn respect.
If children live with security, they learn to have faith in themselves and
in those about them.
If children live with friendliness, they learn the world is a nice place in
which to live.

i love this quote from Tim Kimmel’s Grace Based Parenting:

God left our families in communities to serve as porch lights, if you will, for the lost people around us.  We are to be the steady glow that helps them find their way out of the darkness.  When families are committed to being this light, they are inclined to live more intimately with Christ.  They pray more, they study their Bibles more, they care for one another more, they reach out to their neighbors more.  Somewhere in all the talk about raising kids, we moved away from this as a priority in our parenting.

what about you?  what is it that you want your community to look like?  what are your thoughts on community?  i would love to hear!

Let him sleep, for when he wakes

he will move mountains.