Re-post: "Mothering in the Internet Age"

This valuable post deserves a re-post.

It's brief - make the time to read it, young moms.  :-)

And the next time you or I have a mothering question,

maybe we'd be better off if we lay off the research and instead reach for the phone?

If we turn to Grandma rather than to Google?

The Goodness of the Lord in the Land of the Living

               The locusts in the back lawn - always the last to lose their leaves - are bare.  We've had our first snow, which means we need extra time in the morning to don hats and gloves as we rush out the door to school.  The giant, inflatable witch’s cauldron that hovered in Home Depot has been replaced by Santa and a smiling elf atop a whirling helicopter.  All signs that my favorite holiday – Thanksgiving – is almost here.

                For most of my life Thanksgiving included a few glimpses of Macy’s Parade and a sumptuous dinner at Grandma’s, our large extended family seated at a massive, provisional table constructed out of ping-pong tables and saw horses, with football, Dominos, and Mom’s matchless banana cream pie following.  For a time it included a second family celebration at night, complete with leftover turkey on buns and Bingo with prizes.  Now that we live far away from family members, Thanksgiving entails hosting whatever generous relatives decided to make the trip to join us and some members of our church family at a much smaller table.  (Aunt Lynne’s deviled eggs still make their appearance.) 

                But I’m blessed to say that for all of my life, Thanksgiving has always been more than a day of feasting and football.  It’s been a day that begins in worship, in a giving of thanks that continues – both outwardly and inwardly – throughout the day.

Our younger boys are learning Psalm 27 lately.  It’s a familiar psalm, ideal for little men in love with the idea that they are Christian soldiers: “The LORD is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? The LORD is the strength of my life; of whom shall I be afraid?” (vs. 1).  Psalm 27 was my Grandma’s favorite Psalm, and her funeral text.  It was my husband’s high school graduation text: “One thing have I desired of the LORD, that will I seek after; that I may dwell in the house of the LORD all the days of my life” (vs 4).  It was the Psalm our pastor read on the night we learned that B.J.’s father had filed for divorce: “When my father and my mother forsake me, then the LORD will take me up” (vs. 10).  It’s the Psalm that comes to me now, as I muse over the year gone by, it’s trials and joys, and all the struggles with my own sins and sinful nature:  “I had fainted, unless I had believed to see the goodness of the LORD in the land of the living (vs. 13).”

                And I have seen – and I do see – his goodness.  Do you, dear friend?  Here and now, in this life, in the land of the living?  There are the joys of health, family and friends, sunshine and rain, and food…in abundance.  There are the blessings of faithful preaching and the communion of the saints.  Sometimes it’s in the way of trial and pain that we experience his goodness.  Perhaps your year included illness or injury; maybe it’s been marked by death or depression.  It’s my prayer that you see the goodness of the Lord to you in sending those trials.  Even if you don’t understand his way right now, I pray that you find peace in believing that he works all things for the good of those he’s called.  It’s my prayer that that knowledge spurs you on the path of obedience, for its when we walk in that way that we have peace which passes all understanding.

              Hear and now, in this life.  In the land of the living.  

Obedience and Seven Deadly Symptoms

Well, my poetry well is running a bit dry.  For some reason or another, Leah came home the other day determined to write several acrostic poems for each month of the year.  She inspired me!  Below is an acrostic for chapter eight of OST, in which Owen maintains that the believer's obedience must be universal: that is, if you determine to mortify one besetting sin while neglecting other Christian duties, your attempts will fail.  Here's a notable quote:

"There are no less sins and evils than that under which you groan.  Jesus Christ bled for them also…If you hate sin as sin, every evil way, you would be no less watchful against everything that grieves and disquiets the Spirit of God, than against that which grieves and disquiets your own soul…Do you think He will ease you of that which perplexes you, that you may be at liberty to that which no less grieves Him?  No.  God says, ‘Here is one, if he could be rid of this lust I should never hear of him more; let him wrestle with this, or he is lost.'"

Striking to me was the realization that God sometimes allows us to struggle with particular sins in order to chasten or curb other sins.  For example, Peter’s denial of Jesus chastened his self-confidence; likewise, the "messenger of Satan" that buffeted Paul prevented his pride (2 Cor. 12:7).

O – Occasioned by trouble and fear, and 

B – Bothered by its consequences, a man

E –Exercises himself against a sin.  His attempts are

D - Driven by self-love.  True mortification –

I  - Infused with a hatred of sin as sin –

E – Entertains no thought of a hierarchy of sins, nor is it

N – Negligent to watch against anything that grieves the Spirit of God, to

C – Cleanse the self from all filthiness of flesh and spirit to

E – Engage in an obedience that is universal, deep and wide.

- Sarah Mowery

Owen diverts a bit in chapter nine to address sins that are so deeply-rooted they threaten the very life of one who calls himself a believer.  Sadly, I think each of us has probably experienced some - if not all - of the seven deadly symptoms below.

Seven Deadly Symptoms

Consider the symptoms of your favorite sin

to know if you’re losing the battle that rages within.

Is your sin habitual and deeply-rooted?

     Your sensitivity to God’s chastening is woefully diluted.

Do you claim God’s approval while loving your lust?

     He cures not welcome diseases; they bring him disgust.

Do you apply grace and mercy to a sin never treated?

     Such wounds will soon stink; your judgment be meted.

Does this sin often seduce your inward desires?

     Your immunity’s weak; your condition is dire. 

Do you fight this sin out of fear of pain that may come?
                 What the gospel can’t cure won’t to the law’s treatment succumb.

Does your sickness spawn further disease or affliction?

     God’s allowed further ills so you know your condition.

Do you fail to heed warnings from the Great Physician?

     Only one near to death will not heed admonition.

If these things are true regarding the sin you’ve contracted,

no ordinary prescription will make it be extracted.

- Sarah Mowery