We complain a lot in America… most of us have this inborn sense of entitlement… we call ourselves broke when we can’t afford that new car or that trip to the beach. Many times when we profess to not be able to put food on our own tables, we manage to find the money to buy cigarettes, alcohol, tattoos, and hair dye. I am not a legalist… I am not here to say those who smoke, drink, have tats or purple hair are hell bound. Anyone who knows me in real life knows that is so not true.

However, when I can’t afford food for my children… but can find funds for these things then something is wrong.

The thought process seems to be… I can get someone else to feed my kids, there are food banks and food stamps and wic and and free health care, etc. So I will let them do all that and I will use the little I have for these things that I can’t get for free because someone else will pay for my kids food and clothing. I don’t know of any tattoo shop that is going to let you walk in and say, “I really need a tat… but I can’t afford one because I spent every dime I have on providing for my family, so do you have a program for free tats for those in need?”

I know that there are those who truly are in need in our nation… I am not mocking… we live in a dark day. However I don’t believe our need is really food, shelter, and clothing… but more our need is knowledge and right thinking.

Therefore My people go into exile for their lack of knowledge;
And their honorable men are famished,
And their multitude is parched with thirst.

Isaiah 5:13

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My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge.
Because you have rejected knowledge,
I also will reject you from being My priest.
Since you have forgotten the law of your God,
I also will forget your children.

Hosea 4:6

Our thinking is so out of whack. Our current culture is as backwards as they come. The American idols we have set up, this idea to become the freakish and most outlandish and shocking… and most Americans cheer it on or tune in to watch so they can talk about how outlandish and shocking it is… so that they can by their excuse “to know” give the ratings needed to continue the financial funding.

Our church had a 24 hour prayer time this past weekend and I walked the halls in prayer and entered into the classrooms… when I approached the door of the Toddler room I was overwhelmed. Tears welled my eyes and the heaviness of the Spirit of God weighed on my heart… these kids must know truth. This generation… must be fully equipped to stand firm. It must begin NOW! I entered the Nursery… those new to this world and the welled tears began to fall… we must teach them now. We can’t wait until they can “read”, until we think they “get it”, until they can explain it back to us… who am I to suppose what God is cementing in their soul? I am called to sow… it’s His job to grow and reap.

Are you sowing?

Or are you only focused on what you yourself are  or are not reaping?

God desires His people to be HIS PEOPLE!

Truth: I am blessed. My husband and I are in a day of walking in a reward of faithfulness. I am very much aware of that. Our heart and mind and soul went through a season of great testing. So many times I heard the whispers of hell to run, to quit, to fall away from the faith. However the Word of my God in front of me kept saying…

I AM THAT I AM. I AM GOD. TRUST ME.

We chose to trust truth. To do what the Word said to do. To not listen to our emotions. To walk by faith.

Today I know that God has rewarded my family for that faithfulness… every good gift comes from above, it comes from my Father in heaven. However I am not holding too tightly to them. I love my God because He is my God… not because He rewards me.

Today with every apparent “blessing” I stop and ask.

Is this a blessing from my God or a distraction from my enemy? 

I don’t want to be distracted. I want to keep the main thing the MAIN THING. If I am not being used to bring people into the kingdom, to be the hands and feet of Christ, to teach and preach the gospel… then I am not blessed, but cursed.

So when anything is offered to me under the description of a “blessing” I must stop and ask…

“Father, is this from you?”

I am raising kids in America, but I do not want to raise American kids. I don’t want to raise kids that are only focused on what this world can bring them… I want to raise kids that are focused on what their life can bring to the world… I don’t want to raise another Disney generation that makes their fame off the innocent and trusting and then turns and laughs and leads those that built them up straight down the path to depravity and death.

I want my kids to have eyes for the hurting to bring them hope… not eyes for the desperate to bring them death. Right now I have one that wants to play softball at the University of Alabama while she studies to become a doctor… I pray for her heart every day… I don’t know about the softball thing… it scares me a little… but I pray that God would open doors that need opened and shut doors that need shut in order to keep her in His purpose and plan for her life.

Today I watch her now choosing to serve rather than be served.

As I listen to others grumble and say, “unfortunately I am stuck in the nursery this week” I watch her eyes light up when its her turn to serve. I see her step up and choose to keep her commitment to the adult choir and leave early from the youth or go later to the youth. I see her willingly choose to serve in the 2 and 3 year Puggles club rather than be served.

She can do all this because she feeds herself the Word of God daily. She is full and is only looking for opportunities to poor out into others instead of worrying about what someone else is doing for her. She doesn’t walk in the doors of the church looking for what is offered for her… but what she can offer to others.

You better believe this mother is protecting that girls heart with my own shield of faith and so is her father… we are bathing her in prayer and covering her in our grace and standing firm against the schemes of the enemy who WILL attempt to distract her with the things of this world.

We know this.

I do not ever give a rip if my kids are successful  according to the standards of American success… I just want them to be faithful to their God and His calling on their life… no matter what that is… My husband and I talk… and we can see our Shelby walking out the door of our house at 18 years old and never looking back as she jumps head first into whatever God has called her to… and God has already placed role models in her life to give her vision hope…

Kristianna Puckett, at the ripe old age of 18 years old, was given eyes to see the hurting in Uganda… and she walked out her American door and into a little pink house in Uganda and is pouring her life out for the glory of Christ as the director of Yesu Asobola Ministries

So in her my girls can see that they can be kids raised in America, but they don’t have to become today’s American kids… I don’t want them looking for meaning in life through a job or a college degree or through a man… I only want their worth and meaning to be based on their love for Jesus and their service to Him.

He is key…

All else hangs off of Him…

He is the Root, the Vine, the Tree… we are too abide in Him.

 I am the vine, you are the branches; he who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing.

John 15:5

I write this from a swank hotel in Nashville… reaping the benefits of a God-loving, hard-working, risk-taking husband. A husband who with every job promotion opportunity has left for the interview with a prayer that if the receiving of this advancement would keep him or distract him from being the husband and father that God has called him to be, that He would shut the door… and yes some doors have been shut… and it hurt for the shutting… but the blessings in our home have remained abundant. Our home is full of peace, love, joy, grace, mercy, hope… and forgiveness.

I almost at times feel guilty about where we are in our life and I look back and am amazed at how God brought us here… and the last thing I want is for the blessings that came to us through facing trials in faith be used by that slimy serpent from hell to distract our girls from faithful devotion to Christ.

Therefore, you shall keep the commandments of the Lord your God, to walk in His ways and to fear Him. For the Lord your God is bringing you into a good land, a land of brooks of water, of fountains and springs, flowing forth in valleys and hills; a land of wheat and barley, of vines and fig trees and pomegranates, a land of olive oil and honey; a land where you will eat food without scarcity, in which you will not lack anything; a land whose stones are iron, and out of whose hills you can dig copper. When you have eaten and are satisfied, you shall bless the Lord your God for the good land which He has given you.

Beware that you do not forget the Lord your God by not keeping His commandments and His ordinances and His statutes which I am commanding you today; otherwise, when you have eaten and are satisfied, and have built good houses and lived in them, and when your herds and your flocks multiply, and your silver and gold multiply, and all that you have multiplies, then your heart will become proud and you will forget the Lord your God who brought you out from the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. He led you through the great and terrible wilderness, with its fiery serpents and scorpions and thirsty ground where there was no water; He brought water for you out of the rock of flint. In the wilderness He fed you manna which your fathers did not know, that He might humble you and that He might test you, to do good for you in the end.

Otherwise, you may say in your heart, ‘My power and the strength of my hand made me this wealth.’ But you shall remember the Lord your God, for it is He who is giving you power to make wealth, that He may confirm His covenant which He swore to your fathers, as it is this day. It shall come about if you ever forget the Lord your God and go after other gods and serve them and worship them, I testify against you today that you will surely perish. 

Deuteronomy 8:6-19

I haven’t done a good “Confessions of a Christian Housewife” post in a while… so this one is well overdue.

Last night I spoke at a women’s event. Speaking is always terrifying to me… because God fills me full of His Word and I learn while I study and He teaches me and I am filled with thoughts and memories and failures and victories and I never know what is going to actually come out when I open my mouth…

So sometimes I leave blessed and full… sometimes I leave with this churning feeling…

Today I am churning… and I am not sure why.

I have been before the Lord this morning seeking to know clear understanding as to why… the only thought that continues to permeate is the one about what could have been…

There was a time when my husband and I struggled. We struggled greatly in our marriage. I believe I have shared that before… Last night as I shared, God had so put it on my heart to help these women understand how important it is to love their husbands and to love their children and to not give up on their families…

There was a time when I didn’t think I could do this marriage thing any longer. You see the lack of peace in my home was just so overwhelming to me. What I know now is that my adversary the devil was right there whispering lies into my mind… firing his flaming arrows of doubt and discouragement… My husband and I were in a battle against the forces of hell… but Satan had us convinced we were fighting each other.

I made a plan to leave while my husband was gone on a trip… that way it could be done peacefully. I had even convinced myself that God was blessing me in this decision… I had even dug up some Scripture and internet research to support me in my plan. I even had it figured out how after some time I could still even be in ministry… But you see I was blind… blinded by fear, emotions, flesh, and sin.

God however took care of things.

He stepped in and intervened by sending a snow storm… that not only cancelled the business trip but left me playing in the snow with my husband. I remember how confused I was at that time.

Now I thank God because that snowstorm was a turning point.

Come now, and let us reason together,”
Says the Lord,
“Though your sins are as scarlet,
They will be as white as snow;

Isaiah 1:18

That snowstorm began a healing… a healing that required picking off old scabs and pealing away dead skin so that the Balm of Gilead could be applied in the deep places of my soul… and in my husband’s… we were now about to take part in God’s most beautiful soul-mating adventure.

The years that followed have been filled with confession and forgiveness and yieldings to mercy and offerings of grace. My husband is now my best friend and there was a time when I didn’t even think he liked me… and I didn’t think I liked him to much anymore either.

Today I adore him. Today I want to see him smile. Today I like him… I really like him… I am flat out head over heels in love with him. Are things always perfect now? Ummmm no. We are both still in the flesh, we both still have hormones, we both still get aggravated, and make mistakes… but the difference is grace. We are much quicker to apply grace and mercy to each other and we are quick to forgive. Really forgive. I love him y’all. God as my witness, I love him.

When I think what could have been if God had not stopped it… I cringe. I was about to quite right before the breakthrough was to come. I was about to let Satan triumph over me. Where would I be? Where would my girls be?

You know where I would be?

I would still be trying to hide the lies I had answered questions with before we were married. I would still be carrying the shame of my past. I would still be walking around in fear of not being loved… if he knew… I would still be in a shadow of darkness when God wanted to use this man to bring me into His glorious light.

I had to make a confession. I had to admit my part in the lack of peace in our home. As much as I wanted it to be all my husbands fault… it wasn’t. Deep down I was the one that had allowed my fear of losing him, to build up the first wall that would be a barrier between our souls. I was afraid if he knew… he would despise me… because, well, I despised myself.

Neither of us were walking with the Lord at the time. So we didn’t understand all this then… but I see it now. We spent a lot of time reacting and self-protecting. I self-protected by lying or hiding and he self-protected by anger and fighting.

I was the first one to use the d-word. In all recollection I don’t think he has ever used it. You see I was a flighter. He was a fighter. My reaction was always to run. His was to fight.

The enemy wanted me to run. Satan wanted me to give up… but do you know one truth that God used? God used to say to me, Nicole, you say you love Me. You say you want to love others with My love. You say you want to tell people about My forgiveness, about My grace, about My Son. You say you want to do awesome and mighty things for the glory of My name… but I am saying to you… You love, because I first loved you. If you say, “I love God,” and you hate your brother, you are liar; for if you do not love him whom you have seen, you cannot love Me whom you have not seen. And this commandment you have from Me, that the one who loves God should love his brother also (1 John 4:19-21 paraphrased for me).

God reminded me that I had prayed for this man. I loved this man. He reminded me that if I wanted His grace and forgiveness for my mistakes I better be willing to extend it to others… especially my husband. If I, as a professing praying and gospel proclaiming Christian woman, thought my husband acted the way he did because he just needed more Jesus… then why on earth would I purposefully remove from him the best opportunity for Jesus with skin on that he ever had in his life… me, his believing wife and his believing children. Would that not like be shoving him over a cliff, or just twisting the knife in his back?

We seem to live in a day where every person is forgivable but our spouses. It ought not to be so.

I don’t know where you are right now in your marriage. I know somethings are out of our control. But I implore you men and women of God… you are supposed to be the most Jesus with skin on in your family’s life. To your wife. To your husband. To your children. To your parents. Walk in love… real Jesus love. It’s not always easy. Sometimes it requires humility and humiliation.

Your family is your mission field and know that it is indeed under heavy attack. Don’t let the enemy turn you against each other when who you are supposed to be fighting is him.

Had God not brought us to our senses, had we not been willing to obey Him, had we not been willing to forgive as we had been forgiven… I would have missed knowing the most amazing man I have met.

I watch my kids wake up to both their parents, I watch them crawl up on the couch with me and my husband… 12 and 9 years old and plenty of seats in the house and they both choose to pile up on top of us… All of us on one couch. I. LOVE. IT. Crowded and glorious. I smile at the future. I look forward to falling in love with my husband over and over and over again. I get excited watching the greying of his beard… knowing that we are growing old together.

What could have been will never be… and I am forever grateful.

The Snowstorm

From our family photo shoot Fall 2013 🙂

“Would that they were wise, that they understood this,
That they would discern their future!
“How could one chase a thousand,
And two put ten thousand to flight,
Unless their Rock had sold them,
And the Lord had given them up?
“Indeed their rock is not like our Rock,
Even our enemies themselves judge this.”

Deuteronomy 32:29-31

Unless… Oh this is such a huge word! As I study the Scriptures and learn to teach them to the children… God has brought to my eyes the importance of the focus on these little words… like “unless”

He has led me to explain and define these big words to them… so that they are not foreign to them as they grow and continue to read and study the Scriptures on their own, but as for the focus in the lessons… God has opened my eyes to how important it is that I teach them to not overlook the obvious. Every week he has me to point out the but, the in, the if, the and… They won’t get boggled down and overwhelmed by the words they cannot yet pronounce and understand as long as in their minds and hearts and eyes they are searching for these small, easy to read, and follow words. These words are key and these words they know and understand. Most have already been studying them, even in secular school. I may not be able to rescue the public school system, but I most certainly can learn how to take advantage of what the public school system is teaching and use it to open our kids eyes to the truth of the Word of God.  

So today we come to the next unless in the Word of God… at least according to the NASB.

How can one chase away a thousand?

How can two cause ten thousand to run?

UNLESS…

How many times do we stand before a situation, before an enemy, and we see no way to win. How many times do we know that God has called us to a situation, to stand before an enemy, and yet we shrink back in fear and contemplation… having no faith to go… fearing we would fail. How many times have we said, I wish I could, but I can’t now… maybe later… maybe after I get this in order… maybe after…

Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go to such and such a city, and spend a year there and engage in business and make a profit.” Yet you do not know what your life will be like tomorrow. You are just a vapor that appears for a little while and then vanishes away. Instead, you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we will live and also do this or that.” But as it is, you boast in your arrogance; all such boasting is evil.

Therefore, to one who knows the right thing to do and does not do it, to him it is sin.

James 4:13-17

This passage in Scripture is often used as disclosure after we have made plans. I often say it myself. I have plans. I have goals. I have hopes. I have dreams. Yet, I know not what my future holds, I only know the One who holds my future. So I make my plans, but with a disclosure to myself and others, that they are “if the Lord wills“

However today, I want us to see the flip side of this passage.

What are you putting off that God has called you to do for fear that He will not come through for you? What is in your heart to do, yet you say, well maybe tomorrow, maybe next year, maybe one day… yet you know that you know that it is God that has put it in you… and you are disobeying His Word, His written, recorded Word, His Living Word inside you, the unction of His Spirit dwelling in you… by your unwillingness to step out in faith.

I have lost count of the times I have shared something… whether it be about homeschooling, about being a stay at home mom, about taking Bible Study, about praying, about speaking out and up in an unwelcome situation and time… and I have heard, “oh I wish I could… but I can’t…” for whatever list of reasons.

It is not about, nor is it ever about, what you can or cannot do. It’s about knowing what your God can and cannot do.

What can He do?

For nothing will be impossible with God

Luke  1:37

If nothing is impossible, then that means all things are possible.

What can He not do?

In the same way God, desiring even more to show to the heirs of the promise the unchangeableness of His purpose, interposed with an oath, so that by two unchangeable things in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have taken refuge would have strong encouragement to take hold of the hope set before us. This hope we have as an anchor of the soul, a hope both sure and steadfast and one which enters within the veil…

Hebrews 6:17-19

God cannot lie. It is impossible for God to lie. Which means if He said it… He backs it.

I have a friend who knew that God was calling her to stay at home with her child and to homeschool him. However to do so would require a major sacrifice to the family finances. She had been the main bread-winner always. She attempted to do both. Homeschool and continue to work full time. However that was only half-way obedience… which is really disobedience.

Finally, her and her husband, chose to step out on faith and obey what they knew God was calling their family to do.

She had a job, that the enemy had convinced her would cause a company to fall apart if she left. She carried guilt about leaving them and she carried guilt about not being their for her child. She was stressed and guilt ridden and confused and hurting and just plain tired.

She shared with me not long ago, that after she turned in her notice after training her replacement, she realized that her company did not miss her at all… and it hurt her feelings a little to come to this realization.

No, her company did not miss her at all… but guess who had missed her like crazy… her husband and her sons. They had not even realized how much they had missed her. Yes, she might have been replaceable at her company… but she is irreplaceable to her family.

Oh moms and dads, husbands and wives, even if your job is in the ministry… your place there is replaceable… my husband and I went through a time at our church, when we felt the Lord might be moving us… at first we thought how could we go? Look what we do there? What would happen to these, to this, if we moved… but God opened our eyes to the fact that if He called us to move… He would fill those and that… we weren’t doing it anyway… we were simply the vessel.

I realized I needed this time of searching for many reasons. One was to help me realize that my first priority is my husband and my children. My first priority is to show the love of Christ to them… and then to my community… and then to the world. My Jerusalem was not the city I lived in… but the house I lived in and the people within its walls.

Ladies, Gentlemen, men and women of God… do you know the right thing to do, yet you do not do it? This is as much a sin as doing all the wrong. Is God calling you to do something that makes no sense right now to do it… yet you know it is God?

Will He not keep His Word?

Will He not provide as He has promised?

Will He not clear a path for the purpose He has planned?

Your life is but a vapor and then it is gone… today’s opportunity is not promised to you tomorrow. Don’t miss it because you refuse to trust your God. If opportunity is knocking at your door… answer it beloved. Answer it.

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Read more in the Unless Series here: Unless Series