It is the beginning of t.v./computer free week for our family. We usually have a t.v. free week 4 times per year. This is not one of the scheduled weeks. Our lives have been kind of disorganized lately so I felt that it was time to get rid of all the distractions that keep us from focusing on what's important.
I'm really glad we have these and that I can actually tear myself away from these things that I usually use to comfort me. It forces me to turn to God and spend time with Him. I've needed to do this for awhile. I think we may add an extra week now, right before Christmas.
See y'all in a week!

You may have noticed that I have been struggling with my parenting choices.
I've found that when I see others doing so well, I realize how inferior I am. I've tried not to get defensive, but learn from them, confessing that I'm failing and asking God to help me change.
God knows me so well. He knew this would be difficult for me and hasn't forced me to face it until now.
When I became a parent I realized what an important job it was. I didn't want to just follow the lead of those before me. I wanted to do a good job. I didn't want to be responsible for ruining an entire life. I also didn't want to lose the very good relationship I've always had with my husband. That was the most precious of all.
I read many opinions from many perspectives. My child, of course, would be perfect as long as I didn't mess him up.
If you've met me, you know that I can be an emotional basket case. I think a lot of my emotions came to the surface when my son was born. I couldn't believe how quickly I fell in love with him and how I could possibly love my husband more than I already did. We were suddenly a family, a real family.
My response when my son cried was immediate. I didn't like it. I had a physical need to comfort him. Some experts recommend suppressing this need and a lot of mothers are successful at doing that. I could not. I had planned to, I wanted to, but I couldn't. My baby needed me and I needed to comfort my baby.
I continued to try to follow the experts recommendations. I really wanted some time with my husband. I envied the women who bottle fed or could express their milk and went out with their husbands, alone, only weeks later. I could not, though I desperately wanted to.
Months passed. My son was on a pretty good schedule, with a regular bedtime and naptime.
I rocked him to sleep. I still couldn't bear to hear him cry.
I had to return to work. I begged God to make a way for me to stay home. I thought of many ideas, none were practical. I weaned my baby onto a bottle at 6 mos., heartbreaking. I prepared to take him to my mother-in-law while I worked. We visited regularly, getting him used to his new surroundings. Sanford and I went out for our birthday when he was five mos., we enjoyed our time together but also missed our baby. When we called to check on him, he was sick (vomiting with a fever) so we went home.
He cried every morning when I left him and I cried all the way to work, praying that he would be okay and still praying for a chance to stay home with him.
I was torn between my obligations at work, time with my husband and time with my son. It was hard for me.
My frustration with the nanny shows and moms that do things differently is that I could not do it that way. I recognize that it was my failure. If I could take a step back and allow some emotional distance, things may have been different.
I hung onto my self proclaimed title of "good mother", knowing that I was meeting my baby's emotional needs, but perhaps neglecting those of my husband and my own. I can see now that I probably wasn't healthy emotionally, maybe I'm still not.
I know my kids would have been fine with a different mom who has different methods. Those moms are great and organized and have time for their husband way sooner than I could be. The nanny shows are probably beneficial, I just can't bear to hear the little children crying and so, I can't watch them.
I'm giving to God this last thing that I thought I could do well, because in truth, my kids are great kids because of Him and in spite of me.
Somehow we've made it through. My husband still loves me and after this last batch of kids we're anxious to get back to being simply, a couple. I hope the decisions we've made haven't caused any damage that time together can't fix.

Have you ever met someone that saw all of your potential? That knew you better than you knew yourself? That pushed you to do new things before you thought you were ready? So you avoid him, because he makes you feel uncomfortable and you just know he's going to push you in a new uncomfortable direction.
Jesus is like that for me. I love Him so much but when I talk to Him, I know what He's going to say. It's not going to be pretty. It's not going to feel good. I'm gonna hafta change. So I avoid Him, but He keeps tapping me on the shoulder. "I love you Maureen, come spend time with me" You can't run from that forever.

My Abbreviated Story

I was born in Toronto to a Catholic family. I am the second of four children. My mom was born in Canada with Austrian and some kind of U.k. ancestry. My dad came directly from Liverpool England. He was born in 1930, so spent much of his childhood in bomb shelters and exploring the debris of the bombed homes around him. My parents were not affectionate, with us or each other. I didn't get hugs or I love yous. I don't blame them though, I understand that they didn't know how, or didn't understand that I needed it.
I had a pretty good childhood. We never had much money, but my mom made sure we had plenty of opportunities. I had piano lessons, ballet lessons, I was a brownie and later when my sister expressed an interest in horses, we both got lessons and later our own ponies, none of which we could really afford.
My parents would occasionally fight. We would all be sent to our rooms where we would have what my sister called "kid's meetings". It helped us feel less insecure.
When I was 10 we moved to a farm in Dufferin County. My parents assured us that we would go to the Catholic school in Orangeville where we new some people that moved to this area before us. Bussing wouldn't allow it however and we were forced to go to a public school.
I was very shy and didn't make friends, very easily.
There weren't many catholic kids in this school, they were pretty much white protestant farmers, or descendants of white protestant farmers. Very different from what I was used to. Everyone knew everyone for generations. Even my mom, who is quite a "joiner" and makes friends pretty easily, found it difficult to fit in.
I'm sure each of us has our own ideas of what happened next. My mom and dad fought more, we had way more "kid's meetings" that started involving what we'd do if our parent's divorced and what we could do to make things better. My mom started to get depressed. Eventually she was hospitalized, we went to see her in the psych ward. My sister turned into our mother. We all tried to do all the things that would make my mom happy and bring her home, but it didn't work. She came home for awhile but continued to be depressed, she started seeing psychiatrists regularly. During this time my sister went to a camp with Campus Life, Kiaros. She came home acting weird. She loved Jesus and told me all the time, it was annoying.
My sister went to a youth group with her friend from school and of course the weekly campus life meetings, which she loved. I went to a Youth for Christ event, I forget what it was about, but I remember when I first heard that Jesus really loved me and wanted to forgive my sins and what he suffered to do that. They asked for anyone that wanted to take that step to come to the front and I really wanted to. I leaned toward my sister and asked if she wanted to go up there. She sneered at me and said "no". I later understood why, she was annoyed that I thought she wasn't already a christian, when, of course, she was.
It became increasingly difficult to live at home with my mom. She maintained that it was our fault and brought in children's aid workers to try and fix me and my brother, we were smoking and skipping class and not doing much around the house. The threat that was always presented was "you can be kicked out, do you want that?" Well, actually, yes I did.
Eventually, it happened. Not too long after my 16th birthday. My mom told me not to come home. So, I didn't. I had a friend who had already offered to take me in. She was a self proclaimed satan worshipper. That sounded great to me, no rules, no moral boundaries, I was free! But I couldn't find her anywhere. She wasn't at school.
My sister found someone that would take me in, Nikki. I didn't want to stay with her though. I went to her house once. Her mom talked about Jesus all the time. They were weird. But I had to sleep somewhere.
Nikki was 16, like me. She smoked, she drank, she skipped school, she had no respect for authority (except God, she would stop dead in the hall when the Lord's prayer was recited at school) she was loud and she swore, perfect! She became my best friend, we were inseparable.
Nikki told me she was pregnant. I thought that was great. Ever since I heard about what the baby experienced during an abortion I was completely against them and I looked at every pregnancy as a miracle.
It was required, that we go to church on Sunday. We went to Bethel Bible Chapel in the morning and the Pentecostal church at night. I'd never seen anything like it. They were crazy charismatic people, I was uncomfortable.
Nikki often spoke of her cool older brother, Sanford. He came home to visit one weekend and moved home the next. He claims he loved me the moment he saw me and has maintained that story ever since. I never met anyone like him before, he listened to me, and wanted to be my friend, not just a boyfriend. I looked around at the teenagers making out in the halls at school and wondered if they knew that they could have something this real.
This time proved to be a crossroads for the 3 of us. Nikki, with her impending motherhood, leaned on Jesus more and more. Sanford struggled with our relationship knowing that he couldn't stay with me if I wasn't a christian and I was surrounded by all this love and acceptance, but in the center of a very dysfunctional family, that knew, for sure, that there was a Jesus who forgives sins and changes lives. I wasn't even sure that there was a God anymore, but I started looking at these wonderful people as not so weird.
One day, Sanford and I sat at the kitchen table, he wasn't feeling well. He was having another asthma attack and was gathering his energy to go to the hospital. So, I thought I'd give praying a shot. I asked God, quietly, to myself, if He was really there, to heal Sanford and let him breathe. I told Him that if He did, I would know for sure that He existed.
An unbelievable thing happened, that has never happened since. Sanford lifted his head off the table and looked puzzled. He said "I can breathe...that's never happened before". I was amazed! There really is a God! He does exist and He answers prayers and performs miracles! It's really true!
I've had a lot of ups and downs since that day, and a period of time that I questioned again if there was a God, but He keeps pointing me back to that day, and I know for sure that He exists, He has nothing more to prove to me.

When I'm confronted with two opposing viewpoints I usually find out what people are saying for this point of view and what they are saying against this point of view. I don't like to dive into things head first just because someone claims that it is good. Usually there's a balance in the middle somewhere.
For example: low carb vs. low fat diets. For awhile I was all for the low fat diet. I exercised like crazy, hardly ate protein, it was carbs all the way. Then low carb came into fashion. I looked into it, listened to what the nutritionists said for and against it. I came to the conclusion that meat is good, fat is good, and carbs are good. God made them all, enjoy. Eat healthy and exercise.
So, I'm doing the same thing where the emerging church is concerned. Some of what they're saying is so good. They are the very things that I have been dissatisfied with as well. I long to be open and real with people and connect with them at a deeper level. I want to go into the world and tell people about Jesus in a way that they will understand. I was all ready to do that until I was told that the words I spoke where "christianese". I need to learn this new language emergenese? pomoese? or maybe it's like they say, speak the language of the one you're speaking to. That's cool, but then I feel like I'm being fake. Do I need to become like a teen to relate to one? Or can I dig into my experience as a teen, remembering how it feels and relate to them that way? We all speak some variation of the English language don't we? I think they're smart enough to figure out what I'm saying even if, to them, I have an accent.
I read some blogs by post modern people who explain that indeed alot of their followers are missing the point. They're caught up in their anger and bitterness and missing what postmodernism is about. Even without the bitterness though, I still feel that something's missing. I'm not sure what. I'll research further.
Brian McLaren spoke recently about the 7 layers of postmodernism. I don't think I'm anywhere near the first level, and I'm not sure that I want to be. I'm sure that if it's meant to happen God will open my eyes. He's so good at doing that.

Labels

Labels are used to identify what's inside. We frantically search for a label to describe ourselves, perhaps with a flaw label (I'm shy, I'm a.d.d., I have a personality disorder) or maybe It's what you do,(I'm a mom, a wife, a doctor, a lawyer, president). Is that what defines us? Labels?
I used to ask God "who am I?", I felt that His reply was simply "My child" In the end, when everything I am is stripped away, when my children leave, my husband dies and I am alone, I will always be His child. There's great comfort in that.
Since I first became a christian I've been concerned with how different churches name themselves, why are there so many? Dave B. said at church recently that we have the mind of Christ. If we are all following the same savior, then why is there so much to argue about?
There is a movement with yet another label, emergent. These people are questioning and moving in a new direction. It reminds me of a time when I was watching Oprah, she was talking about how God was in all of us and when you meditate you're connecting with God, or your inner self. That didn't seem right to me, though it made sense. This emergent church idea doesn't seem right to me either, though their arguments make sense. What they believe isn't clear and their explanations seem vague. Maybe I'm just not smart enough to understand what they're saying. Perhaps someone can explain it to me.

I miss my husband

I miss my husband. I miss him when he's sent away for work. I miss him when he's at home, but working on something. I miss the time we used to spend talking after supper before my dad moved in. I miss the time we spent sitting in the car in the driveway while our children were sleeping (the big ones don't do that anymore). I miss long talks without interuptions. I miss weekends to ourselves, because we had so many babysitters available. I miss going out for dinner, without making plans, or finding a babysitter. I miss sleeping in together on the weekends and planning our day because we have absolutely nothing to do.
For now, I cherish what I have, and look forward to when we will have more. I can see it's just around that corner.

Judgments

Everyone hates to be judged. It's so simplistic to make a judgment about someone without knowing who they really are. But we all do it, to some degree. We look at how someone dresses and decide that maybe they have money or not very much. We listen to how they speak, or look at how they type and assume that we know how long they went to school. People that have run down houses with old cars laying around probably have a drinking problem and are on welfare.

We can decide that we aren't going to do that anymore and, for the most part, succeed. Until we're faced with a homeless person. "Get a job" you might think to yourself, not really wanting to find out anything more about this person. Or, you might want to help, and give him some change, sit and talk with him awhile and find out his story and how hopeless he feels and maybe help him to find hope.

Okay, you can see that the homeless guy might not be who you thought, but what about a murderer, or a pedophile, or a wife abuser, or a rapist. Do they deserve our mercy? Do they deserve God's mercy? These people have a story as well. They were once little babies, little children. Someone might have loved and wanted them once or maybe they were never loved or wanted. Along the way something went terribly wrong and eventually they became a person that would be described as evil.

We all make mistakes, we all sin, we all have ventured down the wrong path. I believe that the greatest pain comes when we look at ourselves in all its filthiness. I believe that those with the greatest sins have the most difficulty facing them and even after being forgiven, carry the pain of what they did. I hope, that if they did ask Jesus for forgiveness, that in heaven they would feel that pain no more. There is no fear of hell if you feel the pain of it right now. Perhaps that is what hell is...you see your sin for what it is, when it's too late to do anything about it.

I read the headlines, about these terrible people and I can't help but see their pain. Instead of anger, I only feel sadness. I know there's so much more underneath that perhaps only Jesus can see. I pray for their salvation.