You aren't what you eat.

I want to share something pretty personal because I think it will be very helpful to any mother. For many many years of my life now I have obsessed and worried about food in one way or another. Food: the stuff of life. 

When I became a wife and mother I had new reason to obsess: the very nutrition and health of my family depended ON ME!!! Every morsel that passed through their lips could either destroy their bodies and health or even poison them, give them cancer, etc! I was not going to fail them.

For 7 1/2 years I have studied nutrition. If you go back through the archives of this blog, even recent posts, you will see how many times I have blogged about it. But friends, recently I was very nearly driven to despair. Because here's the thing. I'm so sorry to tell you this. 

THERE. IS. NO. PERFECT. DIET.

Vegetarians. Vegans. Primal. Paleo. Low Fat. Low Carb. South Beach. Atkins. Whole Foods. Weight Watchers. Raw Foodists. *Insert others here*. 

So far other than Elijah and Enoch we know of not a single person that has escaped death. So far no food has been able to keep our physical bodies from death.

Then there's the "our bodies are temples of the Lord" argument. We MUST take the absolute BEST care of our bodies that we can, while we can, despite the end we know awaits us all!

But are you taking it too far? Do you obsess about food? Do you find yourself thinking about your diet all day? Do you have a bad day and convince yourself that your bad feelings, emotions, tiredness, etc are because of "cheating"? Do you meet someone at the grocery store or a restaurant and automatically want to tell them about their poor food choices and why yours are better? Do you think you are better than others because you are so superior in your health and ability to abstain from fleshy tasty temptations? Do you think you are sinning if you don't eat according to your diets restrictions?

I recently emailed a friend on a night of absolute despair. I could have answered yes to all of the above questions on that day...esp the last one. I was sobbing as I emailed her and explained that I didn't even want to eat anymore because food...all food...FELT SO WICKED. 

Her response floored me. 

It is wicked. All of it. It is wicked because it is on a wicked earth. A wicked, dying, and diseased earth. A broken earth. A sin-filled earth. An earth that every single day gets sicker and sicker in its death march. In her words, "our poor, dear earth is dying even as we die..." And as a result of that death our food too is dying. Soil is not as rich, plants are not as strong against bugs, and nutrients are diminishing. Every. Single. Day. 

"And He said, “Are you also still without understanding? Do you not see that whatever goes into the mouth passes into the stomach and is expelled? But what comes out of the mouth proceeds from the heart, and this defiles a person. For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false witness, slander. These are what defile a person. But to eat with unwashed hands does not defile anyone.”

(Matthew 15:16-20 ESV)

There is nothing new under the sun. We are all and have all always been food obsessed. Self obsessed. Health obsessed. Obsessed with making laws not in Scripture for others to follow. If we are the law givers that means we have authority. Perceived authority that is. 

IT IS NOT FOOD THAT CAUSES LACK OF HEALTH. 

IT IS NOT FOOD THAT CAUSES EVIL AND DEATH. 

IT IS SIN. 

But there is ONE food and drink that grants LIFE. There is ONE food and drink that is NOT affected by sin in its ability to grant, sustain, and give life and healing and forgiveness. It is our Dear Lord Jesus Christ's own Body and Blood given for you. Eat, drink, and have life. 

Every day that we have health is a blessing from God. A temporary blessing. These bodies are temporary in this life. Our health is temporary. We must pray for strength to have no other gods be it ourselves in gluttony/disregard for the gift of our bodies/health or ourselves in health itself by obsessing over food. Both are sins.

Mothers, stop listening to the latest gurus. Stop wasting your time reading those articles, watching those shows, and worrying and crying over it. Stop staring at your reflection. Instead pray, read God's Word. Feed your family. And feed on Christ. And God keep you.

But turning to them Jesus said, “Daughters of Jerusalem, do not weep for me, but weep for yourselves and for your children. For behold, the days are coming when they will say, ‘Blessed are the barren and the wombs that never bore and the breasts that never nursed!’ Then they will begin to say to the mountains, ‘Fall on us,’ and to the hills, ‘Cover us.’ For if they do these things when the wood is green, what will happen when it is dry?”
(Luke 23:28-31 ESV)

I hate Mother's Day. I really hate it. I hate the stupid superficial fakey fakeness. I hate walking into the grocery store and seeing the millions of ridiculous balloons, bakery items, and cards exploding in the entrance taunting children of all ages to spend money on them. I hate it.

Let me tell you what I love. I love that when I woke up from my nap this afternoon my children came up with their messy drooly (teething baby and toddler) faces and happily presented me with drawings they had made to show their love. I love that when I walked in to tuck them in tonight that they broke out in an original work entitled "Happy Mother's Day to you" to the tune of "Happy Birthday" :D. I love that my little 2nd born sweetly lifted his head and said, "Happy Mother's Day Mama, I'm going to make you the best paper airplane and draw you a picture on it tomorrow for a present."

My husband's sermon really caught my attention today. He shared a very sobering thought. One day you will be forgotten. All that you do will be forgotten. Every dish washed, every diaper changed, every little thing you do special that you think makes you stand out: poof, gone. It's all going to pass away. For EVERYONE. Every last word and moment and work that you do. Every important person will be forgotten and will die with their importance. But love? Love my friends, love will never die. Love is the one thing we do that will live on. When you love your children unconditionally, and when those children have been baptized and then trained into true love (that is the verb love: both received and then joyously acted upon), it will live on. And 5 generations from now, God willing, you will be a name in the long line of a Godly heritage.

Today I found myself fighting the need to lament. The passage above kept running through my mind. I lamented just as I do at Christmas how desperately wrong the rest of the world gets it. True motherhood is sacrifice. It is dying to yourself: death, hardship, sin in your face all day every day, poop, dirt, screaming and sobbing (and sometimes even from yourself!), constant discipline, and an endless charade of chores that are undone as soon as they are done...over and over and over and over...forever. It's cruelty mocks me and my inability to keep order or prevent sin.

But Mothers? The wood? It's not dry. It's bursting with life and song. Christ is ARISEN! HE IS RISEN INDEED, ALLELUIA! But a little while, a little little while, and we will be gathered to His breast and finally WE will be nurtured yet again. Every tear will be wiped away. Every sleepless night, hurting heart over our children's sin (and OUR OWN!), and spiritual battle we have to fight, it will all be conquered and in God's mercy and grace, we will stand with our children a Holy Nation, a people belonging to God.

Happy Mother's Day oh faithful Mothers. May God be with you in the battle. And may you all be kept every day in the One True Faith, strong and steadfast in God's Word, and brought quickly again to the Supper so that one day we can all stand together in the courts of our God. Come Soon Lord Jesus. 

Worth More Broken

I have this habit of occasionally watching these videos. The reason I watch them has nothing to do with them being military home coming videos, but in this particular video because of that first little girl and her reaction to her Daddy coming home. It makes me sob uncontrollably every time. Because one day it will happen to me. One day it will happen to you. One day the separation will end and in a blink we will be reunited with our loved ones and come face to face with our Lord. I cannot tell you in words the terrible pain of a girl having her Daddy ripped from her arms. Especially when that Daddy was her everything. So to see the jubilation that takes place as these families are reunited with these men fills me with such joy and reminds me that one day I'll see him again, feel his arms around me, and with him by my side (just as I was when he first took me to the font) I'll see my faith's completion in the face of our Lord Jesus Christ. I also couldn't help but notice the title of the song in the video "worth more broken", not because of what it may mean to military families, but because for Christians we know that in brokenness, in sin, there is our Lord with compassion, forgiveness, love, sacrifice, and, ultimately, redemption. Come Soon, Lord Jesus!

Legalism you can use.

Read your Bible. Yes, you. Every day. Stop making excuses. Put down the self help book, romance novels you shouldn't be reading, or whatever other junk is filling your head (yes even you classicists that are eyeball deep in whatever it is your classicists read) and read your Bible instead. It is the only classic that will truly endure. Forever.

Magister Mundi sum!

No you're not, so put down that copy of The Apology of Socrates, The Republic, fill yourself with living water, and carry on. Now that is wisdom.

And then it dawned on me...*

Once I met this friend. It was on a horridly hot day. Her husband could not attend our little shin-dig and so she braved the drive with her many children and then had to deal with the long horridly hot day taking care of her children alone while I enjoyed the help and comfort of my husband, and that with less children than she. All of this so that we could finally meet.

So we met. We chatted. The kids played (And how!!) and got sunburnt. And we all got dehydrated. If I remember correctly there were bugs too. In addition to what I already knew about her (that she is one of the most amazing mothers and servants of God in addition to being hilarious-though I'm not sure if that's on purpose ;) I learned something new. And it caught me off guard. Her parenting. Her children adored her and she them, and yet, she had a certain sharpness she used sometimes. She wasn't afraid to show her annoyance when they behaved inappropriately and she even used words like "stupid" or "dumb" when referring to childish behavior. I wasn't quite sure what to make of it. Part of me felt relieved knowing how hard I try to be soft and gentle and always have words dripping with sweetness and yet fail and here this mother struggles the same ways I do. And yet, she wasn't struggling, she was very purposeful in her words. This realization made me uncomfortable. I was told to never use unkind words when I was a child. It could hurt someone's feelings! As I became a mother, I became aware through public teaching, how harmful it could be to their "self esteem". But her children seemed fine! Even confident! They were happy, joyful, and quick to talk with me and my husband. I was left to ponder this strange phenomenon for the past year or so.

Today I met a new friend in person. She happens to be a friend of my first friend. Go figure: I witnessed the exact same phenomenon. I even commented on it to her face to face. I never thought to ask her why she does it and how her children are so amazingly awesome despite her insistence on going against the grain in not verbally coddling her children. But I didn't need to. Because as I watched her in her long flowy skirt it suddenly dawned on me.

She is a queen.

It's one thing to be mean, to be a bully, and to purposely seek to cause harm in your speech. It's another to be a queen in your home demanding respect and training with a firm and loving hand...even if that means pointing out the truth: however "mean" it sounds. But is it mean? No, not when a child's entire world is one of unconditional love, nurture, admonition, and TEACHING/TRAINING.

My world was not like this. I grew up in a very broken and "re-mended" and broken again several times over on both sides family. It's no wonder it's a battle figuring out that my children do not have the same emotional hurdles to overcome that I do because to me that is all I've ever known. But my how they enjoy my emotional weakness because they see it, they know I worry too much, and they delight in using it against me sometimes.

I cannot tell you how relieved I was to finally understand. Because as one who to tends towards legalism, I was actually sick of my own voice by the end of each day: talking in a fake high pitched "sweet" tone ALL. DAY. LONG. And honestly, my kids were quite sick of it too. But when I can speak to them as I would speak to any adult, and give them that courtesy of showing them that I believe they are capable of learning to be mature and speaking to them in such a way that shows how much they are needed not by coddling but by demanding maturity and making them active help in our home...well perhaps my children too will show the royal flair that these amazing kids do.

*pun intended

Order

I'm currently working on ordering my days.

Monday= laundry day
Tuesday= Kitchen day
Wednesday=Office day
Thursday= Cleaning day
Friday= Town day
Sat= catch up/ yard day
Sun= Worship

This will be my 4th week at it and I'm tweaking things here and there but the idea is working better than I thought it would. It's nice not panicking as each week starts trying to figure out what on earth I need to tackle each day and feeling like I have a million projects all unfinished. Now they each have their day. If something comes up and I don't get the day's work done, I know it will always come around the next week and will be gotten to eventually. That's a good feeling. I also do bits and pieces of other days as part of my daily routine. For instance, I do one load of laundry every day in addition to laundry day so that laundry day isn't a terrible beast that can't be completed. And of course, each day's job is done in it's allotted time as there's lessons, cooking, playing, etc to get done each day in addition to the day's task. Kim Brenneman in "Large Family Logistics" gave me this idea and she spoke of God's wisdom in creating one area at a time on the 6 days of creation, not just skipping around, and how that gives us good insight into the wisdom of ordering our days. I like that. Does anyone else order their days or have memories of grandmas or great grandmas having a day for each task? What was the particular daily assignments if you remember?

That pesky mirror

My two year old has been behaving very 2-ish lately. But at least he's actually 2. In the mean time I have stamped my feet and whined about it but have realized I myself am not 2. He's a very good mimicker, that 2 yr old of mine. At least he's so stinkin' cute. Now if only I could find my cute switch and realize that while I whine about his 2 yr old ness I am passing up one of the most fun years of a child's life....right next to baby, 1, 3, 4, 5, ......