The Whole Truth

Sometimes you have to be bold and say it out loud. You have to say what happened to you or what you experienced even through blinked back tears and when you have no idea how it will come out.

Three weeks ago I miscarried our second child.

I’ll be honest, I’ve not wanted to be a blogger who wrote about having a miscarriage- not that anyone “wants” to have the experience and write about it. Please know that I am grateful for those of you who have written about that experience, but {and please hear the grace in this} I didn’t want to be that writer. It isn’t a story I wanted to tell.

My mom had miscarriages. She isn’t here to ask about them, but I do know that they were before she had my brother or myself. I’m blessed I have a healthy daughter a gloriously ordinary first pregnancy and no previous miscarriages, but I think that somewhere in my soul I knew that I would walk this road. Maybe I’m walking this road for someone else who is going to walk it behind me.

The first thing that I said to my husband when I realized that we were probably losing the baby was that I dreaded telling people. Most of our family knew about our impending addition and we’d slowly started sharing the news with an ever widening circle of friends. Some of you are hearing this for the first time and for that I am sorry. Grace?

It wasn’t that I was afraid of what people would say. I know that we are loved and that tenderness and sympathy would be in heavy supply from all. I’ve been scarred by tea and sympathy from losing too many in my life. I have an aversion to it. Kyle gently reminded me that I didn’t have to tell anyone.

I’d almost decided not too.

My reluctance to tell this part of my story has to do with my own struggle with grief. I’ve realized that I fear being the girl who lost her {fill in the blank}. Growing up I was the girl who lost her parents and this has reminded me that I still worry about that being the way people one dimensionally see me.

Truth be told I don’t have to sit here and write this story out for everyone who stumbles on my blog to read, but as I’ve mulled over this new part of my story I knew that it wouldn’t be authentic to hide it. I’m not afraid of the ugly pieces of my story because I know that those are not irredeemable pieces for God.

Let me say that I am okay. The recovery has been very manageable and we’ve been cared for well. Yes, it stinks that we lost a baby. I’ve sob-soaked a t-shirt or two of my husbands in recent weeks. I’m dealing with my emotions {alone time, Scripture, chocolate, girl time, good books, Zumba class and retail therapy help} and I’ve been shored up by a few sisters who have walked with me through this in the most tender way.

I’ve wrestled with the right emotions in the midst of it all. I was between 9-10 weeks when it happened so it was still early. My connection to the baby was not super strong at that point and so the loss doesn’t feel as great. In some ways I wish that it did because that is the way that I think I should feel, but don’t.

That was scary to write because that bumps up against all kinds of insecurity I harbor about being a good mom. Should I be more emotional? I did just lose a child. Will someone think that I don’t value life or personhood because my child was only 10 weeks old when I miscarried and I’m not overly distraught about what happened? These are questions that swirl as I type.

I’d say the biggest thing for me right now is the fears that are creeping around the edges of life as we think about the future. What ifs are a huge trigger for my anxiety and I’m having to press forward in letting that go and believing that all is grace whether we have another child or another miscarriage.

Sorry for being a serious Debbie-downer right before Mother’s Day. I tried to not hit “publish” but it felt unauthentic. Someone out there is walking this path right now and I hope that you can see me a few steps ahead waving and telling you that it is ok to not know how you feel and to keep walking any way.

Every woman who has carried a child, no matter how long or how short, knows that our children break parts of us off. They split us open and down the middle and we’re never quite the same once their lives have touched ours. Even if it is an ever so light touch.

Let’s be sad for a second together. Let the weight of it sink in. Let the tears fall free. Don’t fight it or question it. I promise to sit with you for as long as you need.

I don’t have anything revolutionary or mind-blowing to say about this experience. I’m still processing it and the half dozen other things that have blindsided us these past few weeks- April was a doozy of a month.

All I know is that I want to share in this space my real in every way. I’ve made a point to always do that and even though these aren’t the words I wanted to add to my story in April of 2014 they are evidently the ones that God wanted to add. Not the words of a cruel unfeeling God, but the words of a master storyteller honing His craft in my life for my good and His glory.

Thanks for cupping this story in your hands gently.

{Feel free to share your own miscarriage/loss stories in the comments. Whisper them in an email handmedowngrace(at)gmail(dot)com if you aren’t brave enough to say them out loud. I’d love to hear your sweet words of encouragement- keep it light and lovely though. I need some happy up in here.}

A bit of happy to add…

The giveaway for The Vintage Honey Shop teething necklace is still going on and I’d love for you to enter. Seriously, it would knock my socks off to give a piece of beauty to you. You. Yes, YOU! Go enter!

+ Mother’s Day, HELLO! Break out the breakfast in bed and day off of dishes!

Catch up on this weeks reads…

This week has been full of great posts:

Why We Can Say “Yes” In Our Mess {Kristen Welch’s Rhinestone Jesus is now available!}

Mother’s Day Redeemed {For all of the motherless daughters out there}

100 Way You Know You’re A Mom {A Guest Post by Lisa-Jo Baker!}

Learning to Share {+ a giveaway from The Vintage Honey Shop}

For the Older Ladies at Zumba (My Take on What Miley Cyrus Needs)

I drag myself into my morning exercise class not exactly ready to Cardio Jam as the name would imply I should be. I positioned myself in the middle of the pack and tried to get my mind set to break a sweat and bust a move without busting, well...anything else. 

The class is an assortment of older retired women and young(ish) mamas. We start the class off slow moving and grooving to whatever song the instructor spins first. I look thrilled at this point, utterly beside myself with glee over the twisting, turning, shimmying and shaking.

Ok, that might be an overstatement.

About a quarter of the way through the class a few of the older ladies with the determination and grit of a thousand of us young women start hamming it up. They shimmy. They shake. Their joy just starts spilling out all over the place and pretty soon we're all laughing and hollering and the spell of glum ho-hum Monday life is broken.

They smile and show off the crows feet and laugh lines and they are intensely beautiful. 

I catch one of their eyes and she casts her grin my direction with a little shimmy thrown in to boot.

I turn all misty and feel silly and a bit crazy because it is just the everyday.

Two weeks ago a young woman who seems to me was only a short time ago a little girl Disney star shook her business on television to the shock and awe of the general public.

Don't bother going to look at the video. It won't improve your life.

Some things you just can't unsee and the twerking and jerking that Miley Cyrus did and the stone faced Robin Thicke (another topic for another day) who stood there and let it happen is not something that any of us really need to see. 

I told myself not to write about it. It just seemed too expected and as if I couldn't bring an ounce of nuance to the discussion so quietly I excused myself from the conversation.

Until this morning when those older ladies let loose on the rest of us with their joy. Until their smiles and their paving the pathway to glee happened to me on a Monday morning.

As I watched (yes, I did watch it on the internet the next day) Miley humiliate herself in front of millions I grieved our culture and what it does to young women, particularly celebrities. It was like watching a controlled experiment gone horribly wrong. I was watching how the deadly sins of greed, self-indulgence, false liberation and pride can kill someone in real time and it made me sick to my stomach that we as a culture let that happen and often cheer it on.

The bottom line is that the biggest need of any of us is for Jesus to wreck and rearrange us and for the Holy Spirit to indwell and change us from the inside out.

Jesus is the canvas for change in our lives, but people are often the paint He uses to make a gorgeous work of art out of us. I watched those older ladies this morning dancing like no one was looking and it blessed me and all I could think was, "We need more of these types of ladies in the Body."

We need older women who cup joy in their hands and throw it around like confetti. 

We need women who bear the lines of age and wisdom and smile through them and tell us to keep going that it only gets better and better the closer we get to Jesus. 

We need ladies who believe in modesty and self-control and who don't even know what twerking is. 

We need women with silver in their hair to show us how to speak with grace and walk with Jesus. 

I realize that Miley Cyrus is a grown woman. All of us at some point begin to make our own decisions and forge our own way, but I am so grateful for the women that have lined my path with encouragement and whispers of grace. I'm afraid for those who don't have that in their lives. 

It is easy to say that we live in a different world from years ago. It is easy to throw up our hands and let the world ride the cultural steam engine straight to hell, but we don't get to say that we had no part in it. If we truly want to say that then we best be clinging to the timeless truths of Scripture AND showing the women behind us how to do the same.

If we don't want our daughters to emulate Miley, Ke$ha or Lindsey then we have to give them something worth far more than fame and fortune. We have to teach them the value of a daughter of the King and we have to long for it, live for it and cling to it more than anything else in our own lives.

We have to embody it to the point that our daughters, biological and in the faith, can't help but start following our lead.

There will always be Miley Cyrus's in this upside down world. Our job as warrior women is to fight for the daughters that will come behind us. Our job is to clear a path so that they can run up next to us and say thank you for showing me how to get to the light.

I was feeling dark this morning and the white haired women in my exercise class grabbed my hand and ran for the light.

Miley is just one of many young women groping in the dark.

I want to be a woman whose hand she can grab.

What "More" Might Just Look Like...

I wrote the other day about how I'm dreaming and envisioning what "more" looks like. I'm not sure, for me, that it looks like a conference- even if it is a shiny new and amazing looking conference.

Because what I want, what you want, what we really want is more of God.  

 Maybe "more" looks something like this, 

I'm (me + the husband and wee girl) living (read as extended housesitting for a couple) in a double wide trailer (cue my husband singing "This here's the queen of my double wide trailer.") right now.

It is a true blessing. A blessing that allows us to be in full-time ministry without a few bills on our plate. I'm grateful, but there are days when it feels like the walls are closing in on me and that opening my temporary home's doors is something that shouldn't be done for the sake of everyone involved.

I've spent most of my adult life waiting to arrive at some kind of plateau or semi-final destination. Somewhere that I could plant my feet, get my bearings, and start making a rooted life. The truth is that all this time all the rough edged puzzle pieces have been making my life and God has been re-making me.

This red tin roof that hangs over my head and the normal non-trailer sized door with the less than perfect DIY wreath on the door- it is my life, my one God given life. My life is anything but pinterest perfect and it is my imperfect door that I can choose to shut the world out with or open up and invite anyone who might stumble in.

It would be easier to keep it closed. I've kept it closed because of my own fear of rejection.

I bet you've done the same.

My gut feeling is that you have too. Maybe it is because you heard that other woman at church, you know the one, the one with the perfect nails, perfect hair, perfect kids who sleep perfectly through the night. {FYI: She's not perfect- just good at covering up the cracks.}

I believe that the "more" I am aching for isn't going to be found in nuanced rhetoric with the greatest minds on earth. My "more" won't be found in my perfectly decorated no-seams-showing home. No the more I'm looking for is going to be found inside these four walls while sitting across from sisters who just let all the ugly cracks show.

It will be found in community, in community with other women who just straight out plain and simple confess insecurity, tell the truth about their ordinary and link arms side by side to walk forward brave.

We need a space, a holy bench of nodding and knowing, that will level the playing field of motherhood and sisterhood. I want to roll out that bench, open up the door and invite you in. Since I can't invite you in to much more than this space I'm going to turn my gaze on the women around me.

I'm kicking my front door open and I'm gonna yell up and down the street to all the women I know. They are welcome to come on in once a week and put their feet up and let their hair down.

I'm going to make this tiny trailer a place where we can all go. 

I'm not redecorating. I might not even clean up the crumbs on the floor and the dust bunnies in the corners. Some nights might be store bought cake and a less than fresh pot of coffee, but I'm welcoming anyone who will come into my imperfect.

I'm realizing in the sisterhood of the velveteen hearted worn and real we just want a place to be and belong and sister that is more than most of us get in our day to day.

Jesus gave us each other to be grace for each other. 

My hard is your grace. I get to live the hard stuff and you get to see me and see the grace of God. You get to live the hard stuff and I get to see you being real and say, "Thank Jesus that He holds us!"

Maybe, just maybe, "more" is nailing a sign to our door proclaiming "Come as you are." Because God has been redeeming us with those words through His Son, the Word, since the day we fell and bruised ourselves terminally.

In the words of Philip Yancey, 

"When I write about what I believe and how I should live, it sounds neat and orderly. When I try to live it out, all hell breaks loose." 

I think this might be one of those hell-breaking-loose and running a-muck times. 
I'm willing to test that theory.

When You Want More But It Scares You

I have a degree in Women's Studies. I've been to a handful of Christian women's conferences. I've held a lot of birthing mama's hands on both sides of the Atlantic. I've brain-stormed and worked in sticky African heat to help women rise from the ashes of war and poverty. I'm a girl mama. I've learned from women young and old what it means to internalize the Gospel and live it out.

I believe in the beauty, power, and uncontainable tenacity of women. 

I've been craving more. 

More for myself and more for us all. All of us who have met Jesus at the well and are intent on drinking from His water of life from now until eternity.

There is a stir that is happening in this generation of women. I feel it down deep in my bones. We are weary of tidy looking women's ministry and exhausting and exhausted debates on gender.

We see past sterile cookie cutter neat and clean church life to a world that is broken busted and bleeding out. We are the broken, busted and bleeding out and we we want to be the ones to push the pressure, to hold the surrender flag out to one another and to the world to say, "...But Jesus..."

I read about the idea last week and it spoke right to my core.

Women. Gathering. Jesus.

I was excited and then...well, then...I wasn't.

You see what is happening isn't safe. The goal isn't to have a bunch of women that look a certain way and ascribe to certain rules of spiritual law. Nope, it is to gather women from across the Christian spectrum to think, storytell, dream, relate and actively hope in Christ.

That all sounds a bit utopian if you ask me.

I don't go around shouting my opinions (which are many) on this blog because I truly desire to live in grace and let this blog be an extension of that journey. A blog can be a powerful mouthpiece and I don't trust myself to have the grace and self-control to use it with restraint. Don't get me wrong, I don't fault anyone who does use their blog to exposit their thoughts on life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness- truth is that I admire you because all to often my rabid fear of conflict keeps me from speaking up. 

Over the course of the past few years I've started really listening to other women and their journeys and going again and again to Scripture to iron out of it's pages what Jesus had to say about us, the female gender, the Daughter's of Eve.

The one thing I know for sure is that we have value to God. 

He had a purpose in making us women and that purpose was not simply so we could clean house, cook supper, birth babies and show a little leg. We are part of His redemptive story and every mundane thing that we do to love those who live with us, down the street from us and on the other side of the world matters.

I want to be a part of a group of women that gets that truth and embodies that calling- even if it gets messy along the way. Because it will get messy along the way. We are more alike than different and it is that alike-ness that is the very likeness of God, His very image etched into every curve of womanly beauty.

Even though I am not sure about what I think about this movement, this rushing wave not of feminism, but of God-sized redemptive hope, I'm still going to join it.

Maybe you should too.

25 Truths Every {Motherless} Daughter Needs to Know

1. You are always first and foremost a daughter of the most high King. There are no orphans in the Kindgom of God.

2. It will never not hurt. Whether you are eighteen or eighty that mama shaped hole will always ache. I wish that someone had told my twelve year old self this.

3. The richest of  life's blessings can live right next to that hurt. Don't let fear tell you any different.

4. You will miss her in the strangest moments. When you splash water from the sink all over your new dress on the way out the door to church. When you're driving in the car and that song comes on. The one that she danced around the kitchen too. The tears will swell and sister, let them fall.

5. Not everyone has a perfect mother even if she is living. Some women don't have a mother at all even if she is living. Sometimes that is harder than not having a living mother. Always reach out to love that type of motherless daughter.

6. Some women have amazing mothers. That is something to celebrate even if our own mothers aren't with us.

7. Having your own children will bring the loss of your mother full circle. It will feel like hurt and healing all at once.

8. You will feel more passionate about the calling of mothering than you ever imagined possible. Embrace that passion. It is one of the few gifts we are given as motherless daughters. We know the power of motherhood and what a power it is.

9. Your husband won't know what to do with your grief, but he will let you cry. Don't expect him to know what to do with your grief. Just let him be that shoulder to cry on. I've soaked my husbands shirt with ugly crying more than a few times.

10. There will be days when you wonder if you know how to do anything right. You wish that you could pick up the phone and call your mama for all that advice she never got a chance to give. Don't let those days defeat you. Your ability to love and care for yourself and others does not hinge on you having a mama of your own. Don't believe that lie.

11. Mother's Day will be bittersweet. Make it more sweet than bitter. Plant flowers, go for a run, eat the best dark chocolate you can afford, whatever you need to sweeten your day and your mama's memory.

12. Fear from loss can keep you from loving fully. The loss of your mom will make you fear losing other things and whisper that it is all right to hold those you love at arms distance. Don't listen to it.

13. You are never not your mother's daughter. Death can't take that from you. She is woven into your very own DNA. 

14. It is important to teach your children about your mama. You are the only memories that they will have of her. Make a photo album of her just for them. Let them give her a name just like they would any other grandmother. Celebrate her birthday. Make it about her life for them, not her death.

15. Some of us had great moms and we lost them. Some of us had moms who failed us during their lives. Most of us had a combination of those two things. Grieve all of it not just her physical death.

16. There are more than enough mamas to go around in the family of God. Pursue relationships with older women and let them pour into you.

17. Know that you are beautiful. The temptation is only to see the cracks. Some of our mothers failed to tell us that in real time and it has left deep scars. God says we are beautiful and no amount of our mothers saying that or not saying that changes that fact.

18. You will wonder what it would be like to have a relationship with your mom as an adult. Don't romanticize it. You might have been best friends, but you also might have butted heads in a very real way.

19. Write it down. All those memories, the way she rubbed in her foundation and swept eyeshadow across her lids, write it down. {Another great way to achieve #14 for your children)

20. That need to please that you have deep down in your soul, you know what I am talking about. That part of you that wants to hear your mama say "That's my girl!" one more time. Let it go. She is proud of you. God says that who you are in Him is enough and...you are and it is. 

21. Sometimes we need a good cry about all this mama-less living. Let yourself have those moments. Preferably with a cupcake.

22. Choose joy. When you are tempted toward self-pity. The loss of our mothers does not define us. Choose joy. 

23. Remember that you are not alone. We are a rare sisterhood. I'm holding your hand and I'm going to squeeze hard when this road gets rough.

24. You don't have to live under a cloud of loss. God's grace is sufficient and you can embrace your own family in the freedom of that grace.

25. Be a mother to someone. A motherless daughter knows the power of motherhood. Be that in someone's life.

A Guest Post for the (in)motherhood Ladies (or anyone else who reads!)

Today I've got a dear friend writing on the walls around here. Linda and I connected a few years back before my own family made a journey to Africa. She has been the bearer of encouragement and grace to my mama hungry heart on more than one occasion. I invited her to offer her story here for the women of (in)motherhood to read. The benefit is that her words will be read by anyone who drops by today. I hope you're as blessed and inspired by her beautiful heart as much as I am.

Blessings,

“Becoming a mama will hurt and the job is anything but easy (don’t believe the glossy ads),” writes Jessica Hoover, “but it will also make you more whole than you ever knew if you let God work grace in you and through you to its fullest.”

In only 15 months of motherhood Jessica had pinned down what it took me years to figure out.

So now, on the other side of motherhood, I assure you: Jessica is right.

Growing up, my priority dream was to be a mother so I was thrilled when I became pregnant and loved every part of it, even morning sickness.

But I was in for a surprise, starting with excessive tearing and blood loss. And like all new mothers, I dealt with sleep deprivation, exhaustion, chaos, inadequacy, and impatience. And questions: “Why didn’t God make women so that when they got pregnant, they grew another arm?!”

A season for radical, selfless love

But God, in His grace, gave me perspective: There’s a time and season for everything (Ecclesiastes 3:1), and I was in a short season. It was a time for giving radical, selfless love. (That gave me my first real glimpse of God’s radical selfless love, and that of my mother when I was a newborn. It was my turn to pass it on to baby Matt.) That perspective gave me hope and kept me going.

To do my mothering well, I had to make choices to do the job right. My husband and I chose to live frugally so I could be a stay-at-home mom. He was going to college full-time but was willing to also hold down a full-time job, bless his heart. 

Despite the 24/7 workload, I adored little Matt and marveled at God’s matchless gift. By the time his sister, my beloved Karen, was born, I had a more settled perspective on the radical, selfless love of motherhood.

A season for selfless, committed love

Sometimes mothering my young children felt unrewarding and I felt unappreciated (which gave me a glimpse of how God must feel about our response to His loving care).

I had entered motherhood during the feminist movement when vocal women bad-mouthed men, marriage, and motherhood. They said we should find our worth and fulfillment in careers outside our homes.  They scorned stay-at-home moms. Social pressure was intense.

Many young mothers joined the movement but I chose to live among the despised.

Why? Because of a burning commitment not to just mothering, but to mothering well which, I believed then and now, was a high calling from God.

I chose to live among the despised because while I was pregnant with Matt, this haunted me: In high school and college, some of my best church friends got into drugs and alcohol and messed up their lives—even though their parents seemed to do everything right. That really scared me. I didn’t want my kids to go astray. 

God impressed upon me that I had to raise my kids right the first time around. I wouldn’t get a second chance at it. God reinforced my perspective:  I was in a season, a time for selfless, committed love. God had given Matt and Karen to me as precious gifts and I needed to steadfastly carry out His high calling.  For that season, mothering was my career priority.

After the kids started school, sometimes I worked part-time outside the home but mothering remained my career priority: I always arranged to be home when the kids were home because God gave me this perspective: after the kids grew up, I’d have many years to enjoy a career and pastimes. God gave me peace in that perspective and that led to a sense of worth and fulfillment. My role in that season as Matt and Karen’s mother was my joy, my delight, my privilege.

A season for selfless, contented love

The time came when every newspaper, magazine, and TV ad told me my possessions were not good enough, new enough, or the right color. I wanted a bigger, newer house with matching furniture. I wished I didn’t drive an old car. I wanted more of the American Dream. That required money and that meant I’d need a full-time job.

God didn’t give me peace, though, about keeping up with the Joneses. Bible verses leaped off the page: Don’t long for material things. Don’t accumulate possessions; they only wear out and have no lasting value. (Hebrews 13:5, Matthew 6:19).

God really zinged me with what Jesus said in Matthew 6:32. Money and possessions are what pagans run after! Pagans! Did I want to act like a pagan?!

“Watch out!” Jesus said, “your life isn’t defined by the abundance of your possessions!” (Luke 12:15)

Instead, he urged us to make God the center of our lives, our first priority, and said, “Don’t worry about missing out. You’ll find all your everyday human concerns will be met” (Matthew 6:33, The Message).

Again God helped me with perspective: I was in a season, a time for selfless, contented love. While my children lived in my house, they were my priority. I chose to focus less on material possessions, live within our means, and be content with the house and furniture we owned. That was God’s high calling for that season.

Don’t get me wrong: I was not a perfect mother. I made mistakes and have asked my kids for forgiveness, but, by God’s grace, Matt and Karen are remarkable adults. I know, I know—I’m their mother and I’m biased, but people I’ve never met have publicly acknowledged they are exceptional. 

My heart rejoices at what God has done.  

But hear me on this: Even if my kids hadn’t turned out well, I’d still know I hadn’t chosen selfish or material pursuits over my children. I’d still know I had done everything I could to raise them well.

A season for extra-radical, selfless, committed, contented love

{A special note to the single mamas among us}

Most, if not all, of you single moms don’t have the option I did: I got to stay home full time when my kids were little and part time once they entered school. But because I was raised by a single mom, I have some understanding of your situation.

After my father moved out, Mom worked like crazy as an elementary teacher to feed, clothe, and shelter my little brothers and me. She made many personal sacrifices to do so. She was in a season of selfless, committed love.

Mom did her best to carry out what is near and dear to God’s heart: to care for the fatherless, the vulnerable, needy, and powerless—those things recorded in the Bible from cover to cover. God also tells us not to turn away from our own flesh and blood (Isaiah 58:7). My brothers and I were innocent children, too young to protect and provide for ourselves, and God called Mom to focus on meeting our needs.

But she did more than meet our financial needs: She raised us in a happy home, a secure home, a fun and God-centered home.

Now, single moms, listen up: You are doing what my mother did. You’re doing what’s near and dear to God’s heart: You are caring for the fatherless, the vulnerable, needy, and powerless. You are caring for innocent children, too young to protect and provide for themselves. You are providing for your own flesh and blood.

Because I was and am so blessed by my mother’s commitment to God-honoring mothering, I really mean it when I say I applaud you single moms for doing your best for your kids emotionally, spiritually, and financially.

Let me say that again: I believe God will honor you single moms for your commitment to responsibly provide for your children.

Why do I believe that? Because by meeting your kids’ significant needs right now, you’re doing what the Bible describes as true worship, the kind acceptable to the Lord. Furthermore, God promises that if you fill needs of the vulnerable and needy, He will meet your soul’s needs—He will strengthen you and give you a full life—in dry and empty places. You’ll be like a well-watered garden and a spring that never runs dry. (Be sure to read Isaiah 58:6-11.)

I encourage you to remember: This is just one season of your life, a time for giving extra-radical, selfless, committed love.

Pray like crazy, trust God to take care of both your physical and spiritual needs, stay focused. Lavish your kids with love. Make your home happy, secure, fun, and God-centered. Take lots of deep breaths.

So, precious young mothers, I leave you with these thoughts:

• Give God and His purposes priority.

• He created your child in your womb—each eyelash, kneecap, fingernail; the unique way he’d laugh and she’d sneeze; the shape of her ears; his ability to sing. God has a detailed plan for each child’s life, (Psalm 139:13-16; Psalm 138:8) and in giving you that child, God has called you to partner with Him by being the best mother you can be.

• Choose selflessness over selfishness; place God-given responsibilities above your own pleasures.

• Your children will live in your house for a season, only a few brief years.

• Do your mothering right the first time; you can’t go back and do it differently a second time.

• What you do today and next week will determine whether you have regrets in the future.

• Hugs your kids and tell them every day that you love them.

• Keeping up with the Joneses and pursuing the American Dream are often in conflict with a life committed to God. Like Jessica said recently, the American Dream is too small! Pursue God-sized dreams!

• After your kids grow up, you can pursue any number of things. (Indeed I have. That’s a picture of me swinging on a vine in the Kakamega Rainforest in East Africa at the bottom of the page.)

• Pray every day, study the Bible, and train your children in the way they should go. That is your high calling from God.

• God is good and He has good plans for you and your children!

Whether you’re a stay-at-home mom or a mom that works outside the home, Beth Moore’s words will bless you. She addresses those, like you, who minister to those who “don’t have much to give back.” She says, “The satisfied soul is never a more beautiful display of God’s splendor than when willing to empty self for the lives of others.” (Breaking Free)

Remember, motherhood can make you more whole than you can imagine if your heart’s desire is God and living in His grace. 

 P.S. Don’t yell at your kids because … ahem … Have you ever yelled at them while you’re standing in front of a mirror? Is that how you want them to remember you?!

Linda and her husband worked with Wycliffe Bible Translators for three years in South America and eight years in Africa. Linda's memoir, Grandma's Letters from Africa, covers her first four years there. A former Teaching Leader with BSF International (Bible Study Fellowship), she now teaches memoir classes based on Deuteronomy 4:9, "Always remember what you've seen God do for you, and be sure to tell your children and grandchildren!" She also offers writing tips and inspiration at her blog, Spiritual Memoirs 101.

The Women That Let Their Roots Show

She grabs a bottle of Nice-n-Easy on her way to the check out line. She is always forgetting to cover up her roots and wonders why, in the autumn of life, she even bothers. She sweeps the dirt piles under the rug and tidies up just minutes before her house is full of young women with Bibles tucked into diaper bags and little ones tucked under arms.

Strength is her beauty now, but she hasn't always laughed at the time to come.

Sometimes she doesn't laugh at it now and she shakes her head to the rhythm of God's heartbeat for every woman filling her mosaic-of-a-life lived in home.

She is as real as they come and even with a house busting at the seams with chattering women she wonders in fear and awe what she possibly has to give any of them. 

Her kids aren't perfect. Her marriage has had it's holes and found it's wholeness only in recent years and only in Christ alone. Some days she wonders if she got any of it right and other days she is certain that she didn't.

But Jesus...

She has a secret. She has a secret and she is just dying to share it with her younger sisters, her daughters in the faith. Her secret isn't the best beauty creme to ward off crow's feet. Her secret won't give more bounce to your locks or unlock the key to keeping a spotless house.

Her secret is grace.

Grace experienced. Grace given freely. Grace drank in deep and infused into every area of her life.

The women that lug heavy car seats and even heavier hearts into her home each week can rest deep knowing that they are welcome. They are welcome to bring it all in, the tired, the hurt, the sweetest mama joys, the frustration, their faith with all it's holes and hearts with the broken edges and all of their I-just-can't-do-it-alls.

I've been privy to a circle of women like this one. I've been blessed by older women who let their roots show and who grew mine a bit deeper at the same time. The older women that have gathered me close never felt like they had much to give, but they gave the little that they thought they had and just like the loaves and fishes there was far more than enough.

They had more than they knew. Diamonds, rubies, jewels of the faith only tarnished a bit, but glowing when presented simply, humbly with open hands. You don't have to be Mom of the Year or Woman of the Year to open your heart {and maybe even your home?} to younger women.

Worldly accolades don't qualify us to love one another and your own insecurity doesn't amount to a hill of beans when Christ is at the helm. Christ did that. He spilled grace far and wide, once and for all and now we can do it from here until eternity for one another.

I've been blessed by some amazing older women who have held the hand of this motherless daughter and who have been bold enough to share their own brokenly beautiful journey with me. I hope more older women will be inspired to do the same.

My friend Linda Thomas author of Grandma's Letters from Africa is a precious mother in the faith and she is going to be coming by the blog on Friday to offer her story to all of us, but especially to the ladies who are a part of the (in)courage (in)motherhood community group.

I really can't wait to share Linda's words with ya'll. They are the most beautiful kind of grace.

Are you longing to invest in younger women, but aren't sure what you have to give? Do you wish you had an older woman walking the long days by your side? Leave a comment and let's talk about how we can invite each other to open our hearts and share grace at each stage of life.

When the Mom Voices Tell You You're Doing It Wrong

My shelves are heavy with books, a book on the basics of midwifery, a book covering the ins and outs of vaccines, a handbook on labor progress, a few dozen infant care books and what looks like an encyclopedia of all things breastfeeding. {I am a doula after all!}

My resource library is a contradiction in itself. I've covered my bases with books on co-sleeping and books on cry-it-out. I decided long ago that I would know a bit about everything and that from there I would make an informed decision. Sometimes I feel too informed. Can you relate?

Could it be that we suffer from too much information? 

Could it be that the weight of all the information is breaking our backs and tearing at our mama hearts?

Sister, the sum of motherhood is not found in doing things the right way.  It is found in the fact that we fail at every turn, but Jesus...but Jesus. 

Jesus, rich in mercy, slow to anger, abounding in grace ties up all the loose ends and the just-can't-do-it-alls.

I am self-proclaimed as a semi-crunchy mama. That means my daughter wears an amber necklace, I coach women through pregnancy and birth, I spend hours of my day huddled around crockpots brewing yogurt or dehydrators making fruit leather and I clean with massive amounts of white vinegar.

Don't shut me down sister. I'm talking to you and me. We're all in this together. Grace abounds.

If you buy conventionally grown produce and love your Mr. Clean Magic Eraser you won't find me beating you down. My favorite parenting philosophy is grace.

You love your family just as much as I do. I believe this with all my heart.

Breast, bottle, freezer cooking, meal planning, cleaning schedules, natural birth, medicated birth, c-section, co-sleeping, cry-it-out, baby wearing, stroller pushing, cloth diaper, work at home, stay at home, full time job, t.v., no t.v., organic, home school, private school, public school, spanking, no spanking, Santa Claus, Easter Bunny,...blah,blah,blah. None of this adds up to a good mom and sometimes it can lead to a downright worn out mama. All these things that make life can drain it right out of us and leave us empty and longing to do it all right.

We've built some ivory towers mamas and we love to pontificate to one another from their heights. We blog about the best way to do "X" and we spout our opinions on Facebook and twitter.

I've done it myself. Guilty. 

I have a motto, "You can't know everything about everything."

We can give out advice and we can see all the less than perfect in everyone else, but I'll be the first to say that sometimes all this stuff that we're trying to accomplish as mamas can just leave us worn out and feeling like there is only more and more to know, to do, to be, to clean, to try, to fix in this broken world.

Who you are, in Christ, is enough. 

Not who you are on your Pinterest boards...No, who you are in CHRIST is enough. 

If you need to order takeout tonight because you're exhausted and if that takeout is a pizza from the less than healthy place down the street...well, do it and know that grace abounds and you are still loved.

There are a million blogs and books to tell you the right way to do this or that. A million ways and there are literally billions of mamas finding our own ways in this world.  Turn the voices down and turn Jesus up and sister, you will find your way. You will find His way and His way is always grace and more love then we can understand.

The healthiest thing for our families is for mama to stop listening to the voices that don't matter and listen to the ones that do. Our children. Our husbands. Most of all, our Jesus.

5 ways that you can turn down the mom voices in your head {and other mama's heads}

1. If you get into a discussion about a controversial topic on Facebook or Twitter tell the person you are sharing with that you can share your thoughts in a private/direct message. I did this recently on the topic of vaccines- a hot topic to say the least- in order to avoid unnecessary conflict with others that might read the post. Because not everyone needs to hear my opinion on everything.
2. Pray about the way you come across in conversation- both online and in real life. Are you accepting of other ways of doing things? Do you show grace for different perspectives? Ask God to grow you in gentleness. Not as easy as it might sound.
3. Make a point of taking the Sabbath as a day to rest. Rest from your mama "to do" list as much as possible. This always helps me see that my family survives even when I don't do everything I think I should be doing. 
4. Turn up some good music, take a deep breath and dance it out {Pretty much my answer to all of life's problems}- might I suggest Van Morrison's Tupelo Honey? You can thank me later for this smooth, soulful tune. 
5. Stay in the Word. {The Summer session of HelloMornings will help keep you accountable and in the Word.} No blog post or parenting book can answer the heart of our questions. When I'm not in the Word I always feel like I am lacking. The voices of others can easily drown out God's voice when I am not listening to His heart.

When You've Got Nothing To Prove

I sat in nearly four years of classes on all things gender. Yes, I am one of strange few that can claim the useless degree of Women's Studies. I claim it proudly. I made it through every gender debate, every emotionally charged argument over the Equal Rights Amendment, every quotation of the Feminine Mystique, and every mention of God being a woman and I emerged on the other side with my faith in Christ bolstered. A rare thing in this truth-is-relevant world.

I had a true education and learned a few unexpected things in the process. Everyone has an agenda. Everyone has something that they believe in so deeply that they will work it into every conversation and every nook and cranny of their lives. It might be football or it might be feminism, but whatever it is you can be assured that it dominates their thinking and informs everything they do. I think that unbeknownst to us feminism (and yes, the definitions are many) has woven its way into our subconscious and that fact hasn't been without consequence. It is the air we breathe in the 21st century.

I don't know about you, but the only air I want to breathe is the Spirit of God working its way through my dead flesh and making me alive in Christ. Anything less just might be a false God.

The gender debates that have raged in our country for the last 100 + years (they have, don't make me give you a history lesson. Lawd, you don't want that because I LOVE Women's history like I love chocolate). The debates have left us confused and I think have found women feeling like we've got something to prove. If you're a working woman then you feel the pressure to balance and spin a million plates. If you work in your home as a wife and mother you feel the need to justify and fortify the work you do. Nothing women do is ever enough. It is never enough to get equitable pay and it is never enough to make us feel really worthy in the world's eyes either. Don't lie sister, you feel it too. The endless pressure to prove we're enough just as we are. We've created enormous pressure for ourselves and the weight of the glass ceiling can feel like a million pounds of failure on our backs. It can if we let it. It can if we believe the lies.

What I'm trying to say is that in a fallen world where womanhood and manhood are marred by sin our focus can get blurry. Heck, the visibility can get down to just about zero. Gender matters. I believe it matters to the heart of God. I believe that His design for us is unique and beautiful.  I believe that being a woman is something valued by God, designed by God, celebrated by God uniquely. Ladies, we've got nothing to prove to God. His design for us is perfect, but we live in an imperfect world.

We live in a world where girls are married off at thirteen to men twice and three times their age. We live in a world where women in Afghanistan, Liberia and Somalia will die {today} pushing babes out to life. We trudge forward in a world where women will eat meager burnt rations after their husbands and children have eaten their fill. Womanhood can feel inglorious in a fallen world. Womanhood, apart from God's redemptive work, is inglorious in a fallen world.

Feminism, this movement to promote women to equality and fight for the cause of women the world over, can feel right and good. It can seem like it is the way to tie frayed edges together and make whole what has been torn apart. I don't disagree with the presupposition. Women are treated like expendable commodities in many parts of the world. Consumer culture gone mad. Even in our own culture we see it splattered across the screen telling us what to buy and how to think at the expense of our daughters and sons. I don't disagree with the presupposition that women are not treated equally. I disagree with the conclusion.

All the woman-power in the world won't right this upside down world. We need a God sized solution. We don't need girl power. We need God power. God lifts up the humble and if there is anything that I saw in four years of Women's Studies' courses is that feminism is not a movement born out of humility. It is a movement born out of pulling ourselves up by our (combat) boot straps and demanding our rights be made right.

What if we humbled ourselves? What if we dared to believe God's Word? What if we silenced the gender debate by embracing our differences? I don't mean to say that we settle for inequitable pay scales and oppressive cultural practices. That isn't God's heart. No, I mean to say that we believe that God created men and women and He said that it was good even before we fell into sin and the whole experiment went topsy turvy. He said it is good and He meant it and He still means it and gives grace for it to be good in the here and now.

Maybe we need to take off the power suits, stop the man-bashing and give the sharp tongued, quick come back lines a rest. Our brothers need us to protect them and pray for them and stop viciously competing with them and tearing them down so that we can build our own agenda up. Sisters, we've got nothing to prove if Jesus is alive in us. We live our lives and we read, we breathe in the Word and we believe that He is making all things new, even this age old fight. Embrace our femininity which is not summed up by frilly dresses and makeup. Oh no, sweet friend, it is far vaster than that narrow view. Womanhood is a glorious calling to prove to a cynical world that God is gracious and gentle and worthy of our whole life. Every womanly piece. 

Feminism tells us that we have everything to prove as women. We need to prove that we are just as good (or better), just as smart (or smarter), just as strong (or stronger) than every man on the planet. I have one wild and wonderful daughter and I worry that she will not see the forest for the trees of feminism. I want her to rest in the fact that, in Christ, she is free from the debates. She is free to be a woman fully resting in God's grand design. That might take her over the sea to minister to the least of these as a single woman or it might find her leading a business with integrity or preaching with her life the Gospel every single day in her home. When you've got nothing to prove you can live free, untethered and full. I want that for us all more than I want anything else. For it is the freedom in Christ that so few ever experience that is the true light in the darkness of the gender debates.