New Beginnings

03 Tuesday Jan 2017

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Christian spirituality, new beginnings, new year resolution, Prayer, relationships

“Have you made any new year’s resolutions?” my grown son asked me, turning the tables. When he was growing up, I’d ask him that question each time a new year rolled around.

Some of my resolutions/goals for the year are more spiritual/relational/subjective. Can’t put a ruler to them and measure success. Others are more concrete. I can look back at the end of the year, even along the way, and see progress.

As years come and go my new-year resolutions are becoming prayer lists. I’m learning there isn’t any real success without the working of God’s Spirit in the situation. I will need his grace every moment, every day of the coming year.

At the beginning of last year, one of my resolutions and prayers was for healing and renewal in some relationships that had become strained. This seems tricky because there are two sides involved. But when God is invited into the relationship there are three, and for his part he is working on all sides, giving new eyes to see, ears to hear the other person, desire for fellowship. The results may not be measurable with a calculator. They are felt, though, and I know God has worked his wonders in those relationships I both resolved and prayed about a year ago.

Measurable resolutions I’ve made: eat better, exercise more, be more faithful to pray daily for family members, write more, practice piano more, see more of the beautiful state we live in, identify 125 species of birds this year.

Have you made any new year’s resolutions? Can you look back and see how God has helped you realize any of last year’s resolutions? Are you thanking the Lord for his help the past year and praying over this year’s list?

New beginnings, such as a new year, give us the opportunity to reflect and return and be restored in what really matters to us and to our Creator.

“In returning and rest you shall be saved; in quietness and in trust shall be your strength.” Isaiah 30:15

~ Catherine Lawton (first published this post Jan. 3, 2013)

Posted by Catherine Lawton | Filed under importance of prayer, the healing journey

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The Blessing of ‘Imperfect’ Children

06 Monday Jul 2015

Posted by ardisanelson in challenges of motherhood, encouraging each other, Gratitude, importance of prayer, Parenting

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a heart filled with love and hope, authentic relationship, Children, Family, Finding our identity, kids leaving home, life stages, life's upward path, Modeling the faith, Mothering, Parenting, Prayer, Praying for our children

What a challenge and a blessing, walking with Cameron from preschool graduation (above) to Class of 2015 graduate.

For those of us who have children with learning disabilities, educational milestones like a high school or college graduation are especially significant. It is a very proud moment indeed, one that celebrates the journey as much as the goal.

My youngest son was diagnosed with ADHD at the onset of high school, and was greatly challenged by a rigorous curriculum at a new school in our district. He persevered and recently received his diploma as part of the first graduating class at his high school.

What I’ve been struck with in hindsight is how eager I was to compare my son’s journey to his older brother. These two intelligent boys forged their own educational paths through different schools. The older one started school at a very early age and rarely needed any homework help or guidance. He was considered the ‘perfect’ child and made parenting easy.

His younger brother put in a tremendous amount of effort, but was hindered by his learning disability from keeping pace with his course load. Before he was diagnosed, we didn’t understand how someone so bright could have so many academic problems.

He challenged my husband and me. At times it was hard to not internalize his academic struggles as a reflection of our parenting. At other times, I began to think I had failed him miserably.

Like other parents with more than one child, I learned the hard way what it means to be proud of, to love and respect my kids for each of their unique gifts. In the process, I also learned a lot from my son. His struggles with ADHD helped me to come to terms with my own adult-diagnosed ADHD. We pursued treatment together and bonded in loving ways.

As graduation neared, I was reminded of a friend who told me she prayed a blessing over her son every night when he was young. She would recite Deuteronomy 6:24-26.

The Lord bless you and keep you;the Lord make his face shine on you and be gracious to you;the Lord turn his face toward you and give you peace.

I was touched when I heard that she recently sent the Deuteronomy blessing to her now adult son in a card as he celebrated the first birthday of his daughter. What a beautiful spiritual legacy she is leaving her grandchild.

Blessing and praying for our children is one of the greatest gifts we can give them. Graduation seemed to be the perfect time for me to give my son the spiritual gift of a blessing. So I wrote this prayer/blessing:

May Cameron grow into maturity as a godly man, clinging to his faith when the challenges come his way. Lord, bless his hands and may the fruit of his labor serve to glorify you. When the time is right, bring a godly woman into his life that appreciates him for his uniqueness and heart of compassion. Lord, guide his footsteps and give him godly wisdom and discernment for the journey. In Jesus’ name I pray. Amen.

I invite you to likewise write a blessing to say or silently pray over your children. Even if your kids are now adults, it’s not too late. I know the faithful prayers of my mother made a difference in my life. Pray about what the Lord wants you to say.

Our ‘imperfect’ children teach us that we are imperfect parents and imperfect people. However, if we are open to the Lord’s lessons throughout the challenges, we will also learn that we are perfectly blessed to steward them into adulthood.

~ Ardis A. Nelson

Removing Rocks and Hard Places

18 Wednesday Feb 2015

Posted by Catherine Lawton in Free to Love, God's healing love, Guest Post, Inner healing ministry, Jasona Brown, mother wounds, the healing journey

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Emotional and spiritual healing, Joyful wholeness, Prayer, unresolved hurt, Women's Issues

About the time I was compiling the stories in the book, Journeys to Mother Love, I met Jasona Brown, a woman experienced in prayer for inner healing. Jasona has so much to offer in this area, that I want to introduce her to our readers as our first guest blogger:

by Jasona Brown

Catherine, I can relate to so many parts of your story in Journeys to Mother Love because He has ministered to me in similar ways: speaking through Scripture, healing my memories, and even using dreams to bring healing to my soul. He is so beautiful and faithful! Thank you for sharing your story.

Being both a daughter and a mother myself, I know that these relationships are so complex and often fraught with tensions and obstacles. We all need the hope that our failures, shortcomings, and deprivations can be healed and redeemed, and can even be used to lead us into deeper fellowship with the only One whose love is perfect.

I love to hear of the many and varied ways that the Lord ministers love and restoration to our hearts.

We don’t get healed, though, just to be healed, but also so that we can bear “much fruit” in God’s Kingdom: “You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit—fruit that will last,”( John 15:16). To the degree that we are unhealed, our ability to love God and others as He created us to do is limited; wholeness, especially the joyful kind, frees us to love as He calls us to love. And if we can love our mothers well (honor your father and your mother), we are well on our way!

I love how the apostle John says his joy is made complete by bringing others into the fellowship with the God of love that he has found: “We proclaim to you what we have seen and heard, so that you also may have fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ. We write this to make our joy complete,” (1 John 1:3-4).

I pray that Journeys to Mother Love will create in others a desire for healing and the hope to seek the Lord regarding their mother-wounds.

Jasona Brown is a wife (her husband is a pastor) and mother (two girls and one boy) living in Colorado, a long ways from where she grew up in Washington state and Alaska. She is also a seminary graduate with a heart to help people experience joyful wholeness through inner-healing prayer. She blogs at http://thedeepestlove.com/. Jasona’s forthcoming book, Stone by Stone: Tear Down the Wall Between God’s Heart and Yours can be pre-ordered at Amazon by clicking this link: http://amzn.com/1939023572.In her book, Jasona shares what she has learned through personal experience and years of ministering to others, that when a wall of stones blocks our heart from fully receiving God’s love, we live a stunted Christian life. With Stone by Stone she will help us identify and remove ten stones that may block our intimacy with the God of love including guilt, unforgiveness, and unhealed memories, so that we can live in the joy as God’s beloved sons or daughters.

A Friendship Born in Sorrow

06 Wednesday Feb 2013

Posted by ardisanelson in encouraging each other, God's healing love, importance of prayer, reach out and touch, show love by serving, the healing journey

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a heart filled with love and hope, authentic relationship, Emotional and spiritual healing, friendship, future hope, Prayer

Rosa

As mentioned in my story, “Walking My Mother Home,” during the time I was walking through healing in my relationship with my mother I developed a long-distance friendship with Rosa, who lives in Spain. Rosa’s mother, Carmen, passed away a few weeks before my mother. The connection with Rosa led me, a Protestant, to a Catholic Church to pray on bended knee and release my mother to the Lord. It was at this exact time that Carmen’s funeral was proceeding in Spain.

Rosa’s and my relationship was born out of sorrow, nurtured by prayer, and sealed in love. It was perfectly timed to help me heal the void and loss in my heart caused by never really knowing my mother as a person and not being able to have a relationship with her. Her death brought out a lot of feelings and the Lord has been faithful to heal and give me a fresh start.

Rosa, though, was close to her mother. Two years later, Rosa is still grieving the loss of her mother, Carmen, who was a significant part of Rosa’s life. Carmen was the family matriarch, surrounded by a large Catholic family that loved her. The loss was great not only for Rosa, but for Rosa’s father and the rest of the family as well. While my burden is light, Rosa’s is still heavy at times as she alternates live-in care giving with her sister for their aging father. One way or another, life goes on for both of us.

My relationship with Rosa has become a beautiful testimony to the legacy of mother love and of the Lord’s love for us. Our lives intersected in a painful and poignant way. When I first heard of her mother’s terminal illness, I knew God wanted me to come alongside Rosa in her grief. It was not easy to be so vulnerable with her—someone I never met, who lived 5,300 miles away, spoke a different language and belonged to the faith (my mother’s faith) that I had turned my back on many years ago. I feared rejection. Yet God called me out of my comfort zone to extend a heart of compassion to her. And I’m glad I did!

~ Ardis A. Nelson

A Yarn about Love

20 Sunday Jan 2013

Posted by Catherine Lawton in losing mom too soon, the healing journey

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a heart filled with love and hope, life and death, mother and daughter, Prayer

Mother was not expected to live much longer. But she never spoke of death. She kept knitting Christmas presents and making plans to see all her family.

One day I took her to the hospital for cancer treatments, and a nurse told her about a good place to buy yarn at the woolen mills nearby. Mother wanted me to take her there.

“Are you sure you feel up to it?” I knew car rides were painful for her.

“Yes. Let’s go now while we’re out and I have the energy.”

“So we set off in my old Volvo through crowded and confusing city streets. At one point we found ourselves driving in circles. Mother held her sides as she laughed. If it hurt, she didn’t let on.

At the factory store, we found wool yarns dyed in every imaginable hue. Mother exclaimed over the colors and textures. “I get excited just thinking about new projects. Knitting is fun because each pattern is a new challenge. I’d love to make these sweaters.”

She thumbed through a pattern book, then replaced it on the rack. “After I finish the afghan I’m working on now, I’ll knit for the grandchildren.” Her tone indicated there would be plenty of time.

Inspired by Mother’s enthusiasm, I selected a basket full of yarns. Waiting in line to pay for them, I glanced at Mother. She stood near the woolen fabrics. A cloud seemed to have crossed over her. She was frowning. How tired she looked, how thin, how old (cancer had done that, though she was only 48 years old).

The joy of my purchase vanished. Leaving the shopping cart, I walked over to her. “Mother, here’s a chair. Why don’t you sit down?”

“I think I will. I guess I should have taken a pain pill this morning, but I hoped I could get by without it.”

Returning to the cashier’s line, I thought, What are we doing here? Suddenly I resented the whole scene: bustling shoppers, busy clerks, long lines. What is the purpose of all this? I made my purchase and walked Mother to the car, sadly realizing time with her was coming to an end.

Later I watched Mother as she sat knitting a ski cap for my sister. I knew she often prayed as she knitted. The long blue plastic needles kept crossing and interlocking the loops of green and white yarn. In a similar way her prayers were connecting link upon link of loving requests to the heart of God on behalf of those she loved.

She died about two months later. Mother loved life and held to it as long as she could. But even more she loved God and the people He put into her life. That love enabled her to endure, believe, and hope to the last.

~ Catherine Lawton

p.s. This true story first appeared in the book, My Turn to Care, compiled by Marlene Bagnull. First published by Thomas Nelson in 1994, it was reprinted by Ampelos Press. In 2012 the book was re-released by OakTara.

p.p.s. It is still hard for me to read and share these memories of my mother’s suffering and my loss of her when I was in my twenties. God has done so much deep healing in me through the years. Yet sadness can still wash over me and I long to see her. I know she’s completely free and whole and joyous with Jesus. As I get older I don’t want to spend too much time looking back, but keep looking forward in hope and anticipation.

THE RESULT OF PRAYER

17 Saturday Nov 2012

Posted by arcecil in encouraging each other, expectations, family gatherings, generations coming together, the healing journey

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authentic relationship, Holidays, Prayer, Thanksgiving

I wrote this e-mail in response to the e-mails of my three daughters, who are planning our family Thanksgiving this year:

Dear Daughters,

As I see your e-mails flying back and forth from one of you to the others, I am filled with joy. My grown daughters are planning Thanksgiving together! You want everyone to be considered, you want it to be a good time, and you are wise enough to know a bit of planning will iron out many wrinkles.

As you know, prayer will be in our plans and in our time together. And we’ll also need to bear in mind our Thanksgiving will not be wrinkle-free. If Norman Rockwell were still living, he would not choose our family for an up-dated Thanksgiving family portrait.

I will now jar your memories with a few recent times together. However, as we revisit these “wrinkled” times, we will also be revisiting God’s hand upon them. In the summer we attended the wedding of one of you in Florida. We had prayed for many months before. The result: We had more rainy days than sunny ones, but I have never seen sunnier dispositions. The little ones who had ridden in a car for many miles to play in the sand were cramped into one room of a condo where, without whining, they watched reruns and bonded through games. The wedding was moved from the lawn to a second-floor room, but the bride did not let that dampen her spirit.

In the late summer, your father and I visited one of you overseas. We prayed for many weeks before. The result: I hobbled through Scotland on two stress-fractured feet, but it was a great vacation, made possible be an outpouring of hospitality. And my feet made for a few good laughs.

One of you, with your spouse and child, recently came for a visit. We prayed before you arrived. The result: Our son-in-law was under the weather for most of the time and the three-year-old threw up all over the bedding and himself. But, we were glad to be together and everyone felt blessed.

Yes, I’m quite sure Norman Rockwell would not have chosen our family as one of his group subjects. At Thanksgiving will there be those occasions when the children fight over a toy or fuss when bedtime is called? Sure. Will every dish of the meal turn out to look like and taste like those on the cooking shows? No. Will the house that I will work hard to have in order before you arrive stay that way? No. Will there be some real laughs? Yes. Will everyone leave better for being here? I pray they will. Will God smile down on us? I sincerely believe he will, because, through prayer, we will have included him.

All my love, Mom

~ A.R. Cecil