A couple weekends ago, I attended the Borderland Ladies Retreat in International Falls, MN. This is the 4th year that I have been there, and it is wonderful. The ladies that put this retreat together go all out to make us feel special and pampered in the midst of putting together excellent speakers who inspire and encourage us in our walk as wives, mothers, and children of God.
This year was no exception. I'm going to focus on Donna Kauffman's first session in this post which mainly addressed "Decluttering our Hearts". By the way, Donna has a set of excellent books that can be found at Treasures Books. I would also highly recommend seeing if she can speak at your women's retreat or similar setting.
Our hearts are full of clutter. Each room of our heart is full of stuff: needing to be tended, cared for and cleaned...and cleaned out. There is a room for our husband, one for our children, the cleanliness of our homes, a room for fears, one full of clutter of worry and angry thoughts, another for errands we need to remember, yet another for special activities we're involved in...the list goes on and on. Imagine a room for each relationship, set of emotions and practical life. There is so much going on in these rooms and we think that we need to keep everything organized and clean in order to feel in control.
**It is terrifying for us to truly trust the Father.** Instead of trusting Him, we feel compelled to take control of every part of our lives...including our husbands and our children.
With all of this clutter, it is very difficult to quiet ourselves, allowing us to hear our Father and rest in His arms. We feel suffocated, trying to do good and yearning to be holy and perfect, and feeling like we need to work harder to get there.
When the room of fear and worry (or anger, or jealously, or, or, or...) is not all neat and tidy, those emotions come to the surface, maybe for the umteenth time and we can think, "Am I even saved?", "Will I ever get over this?", "Will God reject me because I can't get over this?" We become weary of the battle of our hearts.
We need to clean house, so that we can rest and trust in the One Who created us and loves us. We need to trust that God's grace WILL cover us when we fail over and over and over again as we run to His lap. We are accepted by Him and He desires to hold and affirm us.
Cry out to Him!
Know that He will never leave you and will walk with you through the battle. Allow unredeemed memories and past hurts to come to the surface in order to deal with them with the Father. Truth alone doesn't necessarily bring resolution. We need to bring it to the Father's lap and walk through it with Him.
In order to keep ourselves feeling "safe", we often put these strongholds ahead of God:
- Stronghold of control- "If I can have everything nice and in order, with everyone doing things my way, I'll be OK."
- Stronghold of contempt- "I'm worthless. I'm one big sin."
- Stronghold of criticism- "I'll look better if I criticize others."
We need to replace the stronghold of control with trust in God, the stronghold of contempt with the Father's love and the stronghold of criticism with the Father's comforting presence.
**Delight in the peace and rest of leaving everything in the Father's capable hands.**
Our job as wives and mothers is to love our husbands, teach our children to know God (not to please others) and to know Him ourselves. We need to get rid of the rest of the clutter in our hearts. (I will interject my personal thoughts here: Some may argue that we are to love and serve our brothers and sisters in Christ and be witnesses of Christ to the unsaved around us in addition to the above. I agree. BUT, I believe that these things will come about in our lives as we focus on our families and draw closer to His heart. Then those actions of love and evangelism will flow out of our love for Him and our close relationship to Him rather than a "works" mentality, which clutters up another room in our hearts. I hope I'm making sense.)
Receive the Father's heart that delights in us just as we are, quiets us with His love and rejoices over us with singing.
Zeph 3:17
The LORD thy God in the midst of thee is mighty; he will save, he will rejoice over thee with joy; he will rest in his love, he will joy over thee with singing.
KJV
May you be blessed as you mediate on His love and acceptance of you today.
4 comments:
What great nuggets, a lot of great stuff to digest. I think I'll come back again and keep reading...so much good truth in there!! To think, that was just one teaching, wasn't it! I hope you had a great time! Hugs, :)
Yes, this was only one teaching. My fingers were flying to write it all down, and yet I missed much. She has an excellent way of adding her own experiences to exemplify what she is trying to portray.
I did have an excellent time and I'm thankful for the chance to write these thoughts down to help engrain within my mind what God wanted to speak to me through Donna.
Thanks for the reminder...we too have 2 nights of ladies meetings this week and last night I took the one on home management and I was blessed by tidnits on how to gain extra time in your life. Did you know if you spend qo minutes a day looking for something that = 60 HOURS in one year...YIKES!
I found your blog via your comment on Georgene's blog. I just wanted to let you know that my dh has been working for two years in the same way that you said your husband would soon be working. I know about that fluctuating and/or inconsisent income! If you ever need to talk to someone else who is living with a job like that ~ I'd be happy to oblige!
Ann
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