Thank HIM

Children are God's sweet blessings that you inevitably don't understand WHAT they can teach you until you have them.

Out of 9 children, God has revealed parts of Him that I never would have known apart from them. Even the child we lost. Although he didn't take a breath before meeting his Lord, God used his little life to teach this mom a great deal on what our Father's love feels when we wander away, never accept, or how He LONGS to be with us.

The blessing is how God can use children to speak to us. What I love to see is how they can speak into my life in a way that is sweet, gentle, and loving. (And they probably never know what they have done.) Oh how I pray that God can use me the same way in their life! I fear more times than not that when I believe the teaching and training is MY job, there is nothing sweet, gentle, and often not loving, in how I do it. (I imagine over the years the lessons I thought I taught are not going to be it. It will probably be the things I never knew because it was God working through me.) Am I letting Him?

Its amazing to feel the joy of knowing that God tempers my temper, and can grab my attention for me to allow Him to speak through me.

Really they are His children! I just got the blessing to birth them, live life with them, and guide them as a sister in Christ. This is becoming more and more evident to me as I have teens. We must learn to let go of our children and point them to God. They ultimately answer to HIM.

Brady has been teaching us a sweet lesson at the age of 2!

Whenever you give something to Brady he will say, "Thank 'em" it sounds like THANK HIM.

I can't help think that this is another situation in which God continues to use a child to teach each of us, to THANK HIM.

When Brady says it, it is now my gentle reminder that I need to give thanks to the Lord. Whatever is before me I just begin thanking Him. (Which can be pretty interesting in a moms life!) I'm finding Brady says, "Thank 'em" a LOT! I look up and begin to do just that....for the laundry piles and piles, the dirty dishes or a clean kitchen, the food God provides, the home He has given, the children in our presence whether they are laughing hysterically or throwing the ultimate tantrum. And with this season....from another child...

..."to the birthday boy who saved our lives!"

(Thank you Kylie for such a sweet reminder!)

Now, GO Thank HIM!