Changed By Love

Changed By Love

Following the Lamb wherever he goes… Revelation 14:4

You Can Be the Woman of Your Husband’s Dreams

A Wife Who Wants to Please Her Husband and God Will Do These Things

1. Respect him. If he is loyal, works hard and is a good-willed man, then he deserves your respect. You may wish for more, but be honest. He does deserve your respect. He’s doing his best according to his understanding of relationships. And he needs respect from you more than anything.

2. Put his needs above your own. Meet his needs. That’s biblical.

3. Pray down blessings on his head even when you feel angry, frustrated or upset that he’s not meeting your needs. Anything that happens to him happens to you. So pray for good things to happen to him!

4. Forgive. Die to yourself. Love unconditionally.

5. Be on his side. Be his cheerleader. Don’t criticize or correct.

6. Speak well of him to your children and to others – and to yourself!

7. Take your unmet needs to the Lord. He is the perfect husband and lover. Cry out to Him. He knows you better than you know yourself. Find contentment in your relationship with God. Ask the Lord to reveal the meaning of the phrase: “I am my Beloved’s and He is mine.” Ask the Lord to show you how He feels about you.

8. Don’t act like you’re independent and don’t need him.  Or like you can do things better than he can.  If you take the attitude, “If I want something done right, I have to do it myself”, he’ll let you.

9. Pray for him to learn how to “do relationships” better. Pray that God will send along godly mentors and put teachings in his path that will direct him toward meeting your needs and understanding your needs for affection and security. He will NOT learn it from you.

10. Don’t fall into the trap of thinking that he’s not doing anything, and you’re doing everything. Chances are, he really doesn’t see those things that you consider so important and necessary. His priorities are bound to be different from yours. He is not trying to be a deadbeat. He is not actively seeking to neglect you. He may be doing things that in his heart are “just for you” that you are not appreciating at all.

11. Don’t nag. It’s counterproductive.

12.  See him as God’s son and your brother in Christ, not just your husband.  Ask God to help you to have right expectations of him.  Don’t expect him to meet needs that only God can meet.  Don’t make an idol of your husband.

By becoming the woman that God intended us to be, may each of us become the woman of our husbands’ dreams.

Bunch of Beechick Books That I Believe In

Ruth Beechick Shares the Wisdom Gleaned From Her Many Years of Studying and Teaching

I have read Ruth Beechick’s books for centuries! Now you know how incredibly old I am. Oh, I guess that would make Ruth pretty old, too. Sorry, Ruth. She’s still around, sharing with anyone who will listen her wonderful common sense, simple principles of teaching children. Simple. Basic. Common sense. Natural. Biblical. Those words describe her approach to teaching and learning.

She has written many more books than the ones I’ve showcased here. These are just the ones that I have read personally. I believe that she has a good grasp of the best ways to inspire and encourage children to learn in a non-threatening, non-competitive, natural way. She has been a teacher for more years than many of us have been alive. Sorry again, Mrs. Beechick. But I would really like to encourage new homeschoolers and old homeschoolers to read her books and find out how easy it can be to educate your child at home.

Okay, I think I’m done insulting everybody now. I’ll just make a blanket apology to everyone that I just offended. You’re only as old as you think you are. Think young. Read Ruth Beechick’s books.

Yeah, that really went together well.

Check out these amazing books by Ruth Beechick and tell me what you think.

You Can Teach Your Child Successfully

Language Wars

The Three R’s

Adam and His Kin

Genesis: Finding Our Roots

Parenting Like God Does

I have read many books and articles about parenting over the years. I have read Dr. Dobson’s books. I have read some of the classic homeschool parenting and discipline books. I have read one by John C. Maxwell. I have read numerous articles in magazines. I used to listen to Focus on the Family every single day. I have read Kevin Leman’s books. I’ve read Charlotte Mason, of course. 🙂

And I have parented 10 children for 19 years now. Well, that’s not entirely accurate. We only reached the number 10 two years ago, but you know what I mean.

I’ve only listened to Christian authors and speakers about this topic. I wouldn’t waste my time listening to worldly experts about such an important topic. They have all been biblically-based. But a person’s theology can have a big effect on their parenting style. How a person views God makes all the difference in how a person sees the role of a parent.

My view of God has changed throughout the years. I feel closer to Him than ever, and I know Him better than I ever did before. I have experienced His mercy, His grace, His provision, His presence, His love and His joy. I have heard Him speak to me. I have learned His ways. I have learned that He is all about love.

So speaking of God as a parent, I think His approach would be summed up in that one word: Love. Now the only thing we need to understand is what true love is. Love is not selfish. Love is more concerned about the other person’s welfare than our own. Love does what is best for the other person even if it hurts. Sometimes the one doing the loving feels hurt. Sometimes the one receiving the love feels hurt.

God has given His children free will because He loves us, and He wants us to love Him freely. He has given us His word and commandments so that we know what He expects from His children. But He does not control us. He has set up consequences for disobedience. They happen naturally. If we choose to disobey Him, we pay the consequences, which can be pretty horrible sometimes. But He does not reject us or slap us around for every little infraction of the rules. Sometimes He lets us get by with bad behavior for quite a while. He looks at our hearts. He wants our hearts to change so that we want to behave well because we love Him. He does not look at our behavior. He looks at the inner man. He wants our love.

So how can we apply this to the way we parent our children? I believe that we should lay down clear rules and expectations for the behavior of our children. And we should set up consequences for blatant disobedience. But we should have mercy on our children, as our Father in heaven has mercy on us. As Dr. Dobson always says, we should correct rebellion and disobedience, but we should not punish immature behavior that comes from being young and immature. When a young child continues to do a thing that we have told him not to do, a swat or something unpleasant but not harmful should be administered.

We should choose our battles, because some things are really just a matter of preference, and sometimes we are led by our moods and whims. When we know something is a real heart issue that is revealing a foundational flaw in our child’s belief system or understanding, we should take the time and effort to deal with this issue in a godly, loving way. When I am knowingly sinning, I tend to move away from God. Many times I sense Him moving toward me. When a child is sinning or disobeying, we should draw nearer to them. We should make eye contact and physical contact with them. We should pull them into an embrace. We should talk to them lovingly. Many times we will need to rebuke them, but that should not be harsh and it should not be the thing they remember about the encounter. The thing they should come away with is the knowledge that they are deeply loved and wanted. They should know in their heart that their mom or dad is always on their side and only wants the best for them. You might say this is grace-based parenting. I haven’t read any of those books yet.

I believe in spanking. I believe in natural consequences. I believe in correcting and rebuking disobedience and rebellion. But I don’t believe in controlling every action a child makes. I don’t think that God gave us authority over our children to browbeat them or berate them. I don’t believe we are acting like God when we belittle our children or treat them with disrespect.

The way we parent our children will affect them for the rest of their lives. May we all seek God’s guidance and help in doing it the best that we can. And may His love lead our every action in regard to our children. Let’s bless our children, not curse them. Let’s leave a generational blessing, not a generational curse.

You and I may not be perfect parents, but parenting like God does is certainly a worthy goal for us to shoot toward.

What Kingdom Does Your Heart Live In?

I frequently check Pete Wilson’s blog at WithoutWax.tv. Especially lately. Today I found a gold mine there. He published a quote that puts everything into perspective. Perfectly.

G. Cambell Morgan said:

“You are to remember with the passion burning within you, that you are not the child of today, you are not of the earth, you are more than dust; you are the child of tomorrow, you are of the eternities, you are the offspring of Deity.

The measurements of your lives cannot be circumscribed by the point where blue sky kisses green earth. All the fact of your life cannot be encompassed in the one small sphere upon which you live. You belong to the infinite. If you make your fortune on the earth,– poor, sorry, silly soul,– you have made a fortune and stored it, in a place where you cannot hold it.

Make your fortune, but store it where it will greet you in the dawning of the new morning…. We cannot lay up our treasure on earth, it is not characteristic of those in His Kingdom. It was characteristic of the Pharisees. In a sense He was saying to them, “This is just another indication that you are not in My Kingdom no matter what you claim. People in My Kingdom don’t lay up treasure on earth.”

We should be living in a different Kingdom than the people all around us who haven’t made Jesus the Lord of their lives. Some people have called it “the Upside-Down Kingdom”. We humble ourselves, He exalts us. We give to others, He provides for us. We die to ourselves, He gives us life abundantly now and eternal life from now on. We obey Him, He gives us authority. But if we don’t live these principles, we don’t get the promised rewards.

It’s a different kind of life. We should seem kind of strange to the majority. We should appear foolish to those who are storing up their treasures on Earth.

Our family learned how to do this by losing every earthly treasure we had. We willingly gave it up for the spiritual blessings that we knew God wanted to give us. We knew that we had to pay that price. You may not have to, but that’s how God worked it in our lives.

The point is God wants our hearts to be willing to give up everything that pertains to the kingdom of this Earth, just like He said to the rich, young ruler. He may not demand it of you, but He wants you to have your heart in heaven. For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.

Being willing counts for a lot with Him. Consider Abraham’s willingness to sacrifice Isaac. It counted for righteousness. His obedience showed his faith. His treasure was obviously in heaven. He was willing to do whatever God asked of him, because his treasure was in heaven. Radical, child-like, extreme, foolish faith is what God is after. Is that how you would describe your faith in God?

When (Jesus) comes back will He find faith on the earth?

Luke 18:8

If your treasure is truly in heaven, you will have this kind of faith.

Two of the comments on Pete Wilson’s blog struck me. One person said this quote reminded him of a Charlie Peacock song that had a line, “What if we lived like heaven was a real place?”

The other thought-provoking and clarifying idea among the comments went something like this:
God wants and needs to be in that place in our heart that is filled with “things”- worldly treasure- and the more of that stuff there is in there, the less room there is for HIM.

It makes you wonder about the validity of the American Dream.