Tag: Parenting

Cultivating Hope in the Home

As parents, it is our honor to cultivate the hope of Jesus in our homes and in the hearts of our children. What if during this holiday season, friends and family who stepped over the threshold of our homes encountered the life-changing power of hope? Would they leave changed? Would they feel they had stepped into the presence of God and yearn for more?

Yet, what do we say most often? I do not want to get my hopes up. Or, Well, I do not want to Jinx it. We dare not hope because we want to protect our hearts from disappointment. But what if most disappointments are ushered into existence simply because we refuse to allow the power of God’s hope to take effect? Job said, “That which I have feared has come upon me.”

Did you know the Hebrew word for hope literally means a rope? A tangible lifeline in the turbulent sea of life. God gave us hope to carry us through the heartaches and heartbreaks, the seasons of silent waiting, a rope to grab onto as we fix our eyes on His faithfulness.

The very reason God gives us Hope is to preserve us from fear and defeat, to see us through dark times, to raise us up out of the ashes to conquer. To pursue the victory. As the world and all it’s worries fade away, Hope is one of three that remain.

Stop and think about that for a moment. When all else fades away faith, hope, and love remain. Which means there is a life-changing, eternal power in hope we should be tapping into.

God’s Word has much to say on all that is accomplished by hope. Here are a few:

Hope

Steadfast Anchor

Unashamed

God’s Full Attention

Fearless

Source of Joy

Strength

Tree of Life

Victory

Christmas fast approaches and there will be many coffee mugs, pillows, and ornaments with the word hope written in calligraphy. Commercialism desensitizes us. But, this Christmas I challenge you to take hold of the lifeline God has forged for you and hold tight to the faith we profess and meditate on the power of Jesus, our living hope. Let hope sink deep into your heart and home.

Teach hope to your children. Teach them to be in awe of the miracle that gives us access to this powerful four letter word: the Creator of heaven and earth abandoning his throne of eternal splendor to sacrifice himself for us so that we might awaken from our ashen slumber and come alive once again. That we might live with hope.

For afterall, if nothing is impossible with God, who else has more authority to possess an unrealistic hope than a Christian?

Fun facts:

If you are of a curious nature like me, you have likely wondered, What is a Jinx? And why must I be afraid of it?

Loosely paraphrased, a “Jinx” is rooted in Arabian culture and legends. It is a demonic spirit that preys upon, steals, deceives, kills and tortures people. Much effort was spent in this culture avoiding any contact with or attention from a Jinx.

Which means that we, by denying God’s hope in an effort to avoid drawing attention from a Jinx to our situation, proclaim the boundaries of our faith and declare through action who we believe is more powerful.

Do I credit the legend of the Jinx? Well, I am less concerned about legends as I am cultivating faith. I am however, fully aware of the spiritual battle my family and I fight constantly and how it is effected by our words and actions. As Paul said, our “fight is not against flesh and blood but against the rulers, the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.” I do not care what name it goes by or what myths it has wrapped itself in.

If God’s hope is a powerful weapon that guards our hearts against one on a mission to kill, steal and destroy, I’ll take God’s hope and I will fly his banner high.

What I have learned from school

Here I am in my office wondering how many oatmeal creme pies I can eat before turning into one. Now, I’ll need a new helper day snack for Micah’s class because I have officially eaten too many of them. (Don’t tell Autumn Calabrese, she wouldn’t understand.) What he doesn’t know won’t hurt him. Micah will likely never find out unless I publish a book about this time in our lives when I used to hide and binge on creme pie cookies.

This new season of school was like going from my slow and steady pace of staying at home all day every day with five little kids, to voluntarily going through one of those old fashioned wringer washers. Between kindergarten and preschool, drop offs and pickups equaled about 3 hours  driving time before one o’clock. Once home, the kids would go nuts while I silently watch the clock count down to “quiet time.” (This is my new version of nap time because I am hopelessly dependent upon those two hour naps and I have discovered the travesty of my kids outgrowing them.)

Although we have five children, they didn’t come one at a time while we acclimated to parenthood. Rather, our first three stormed into our lives in eleven months. For the first time in six years, I am at home with just two and oh how I love these precious hours! Yesterday we read Dr. Seuss’s Sneetches and What Was I Scared Of? (my personal favorite) twice each. Pure bliss.

As the youngest in my family I have often heard the theory and even been accused of the youngest being the favorite. However, it occurred to me this year that the youngest are not favored in a family. They are simply on the receiving end of parents who are waking up to the fact that this family is growing up and will soon be gone. The youngest are around to experience the polished, parenting methods we did not yet have with our first.  It appears like parents favor the youngest but truly, it’s simply a shift of perspective that affects our behavior. By the time our youngest children cruised onto the scene, I had only begun to learn which battles are not worth fighting.

For example: every night Esther used to want to wear her princess dress to bed, and it was a fight  to get her into her pajamas nearly every night. Now, Ruthie wants to live in her Rapunzel dress day and night and I simply don’t care if she does. I realize now what seemed so important in principle earlier, is really not a big deal. In the end my relationship with them supersedes any costume-pajama combo they may come up with. And really – there is such a short window in our lives when we can dress up as a princess every. single. day. Or Captain America if you are my like my boys.

So here’s a toast to this new season and all that I will be learning. This parenthood thing is a refining fire, and it can be easy to focus on the ashes, but more and more I see the strength and beauty of what remains. God has shaped and strengthened me through these little people. It amazes me the impact such a tiny person can have. After all, “A person is a person no matter how small.”