A Gentle and Quiet Spirit....(Children are a Blessing)

This year as a mother has been one of the hardest years of my life and therefore one of the best. It has been a year that for the first time in a long time the Lord has brought me to the end of myself where all my efforts are futile, and I have nowhere that is worthwhile turning except to Him. For years I have been praying Lord give me a gentle and quiet spirit (as the Bible says this is one in which pleases the Lord). A gentle and quiet spirit means a peace in knowing that God is Sovereign despite the outward circumstances raging around you. It means a trust in the Lord that He is in control of all situations. Here is an excerpt from one of my journal entries.

Lord, give me a gentle and quiet spirit with a heart that wants to learn.
Lord, give me a gentle and quiet spirit amidst an overwhelming to do list.
Lord give me a gentle and quiet spirit with priorities set, and working to the best of my ability having spent time with You through prayer and study of your Word.
 Lord help me to remember what I learn in order to glorify You to my fullest potential. Thank you Lord for giving me a life that is washed by Your blood so that I am acceptable to You.

 I can rest that I am right where He wants me to be because I am Yours and through grace alone that is given only by You. I trust that You are in control and when the baby wakes before my alarm clock goes off and I don’t get my devotions done when I want, I trust that You is in control of that. When I do find time to do devotions and spend time with You and desire to learn, I am also then interrupted by children or I am too tired to retain anything. I am not settling for less, but resting that You are in control of even those circumstances. My heart pants for Him. I seek Him. I pray and cry out for help. I am empty and need filling. It is a sin to turn my frustration to my children. They are blessings, a gift from God, the Bible says. They are blessings that I desired and asked for. It is a sin to see them as curses and resent their interruptions, needs and distractions that really help to reveal how self-centered, entitled and inwardly focused I am.

However, when I repent and turn away from that, ask God to fulfill and fill me with the fruit of the Spirit (love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control), and see my job as a servant leader as Jesus was when He walked the earth, then my focus changes.

Perspective: When we as Christians fight our flesh through the power of the Holy Spirit and we are God focused and not self-focused, we are able to glorify Him and live a life in victory. Not perfectly. That won’t happen until heaven. Trust that in the interruptions, God is the one interrupting. Seek what He is teaching. To resent your children is to resent God.

Ask Him each day for wisdom as a mother to give you the perspective of seeing your kids through His eyes and to give you a servants heart. Set your mind on the fact that He has given you these blessings. They are His that He has entrusted to you. They are His and treat them as such. In doing so, your children can say that you pointed them to God. What you pour into these short years that seem so long, is the legacy that you leave on this earth.

…………………………………Resources………………………..
Two great life-changing sermons I have recently listened to and recommend are:
1) Francis Chan: Lukewarm….Are you a Lukewarm Christian or are you “on fire for the Lord”. Rev 3: if you are lukewarm He will spew you out of His mouth. What kind of lifestyle are you passing onto your children?
2) Matt Chandler: Suffering
You can google both of these or go straight to you tube and type in their names and titles in the search bar.
A great resource for sermons and topical studies is gty.org (Grace to You). The whole new testament in expository preaching is on this site and is downloadable for free.