Category Archives: Elise_Fitzpatrick

Because We Never Stop Being Moms -Book Club- Chapter Ten and Conclusion-

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It has been a good thing to read this book with you all; thanks for reading along, for your emails, your messages on Facebook, and your comments here.

The last chapter in our book is about the time in which our children get married and we start increasing the members of our family. A chapter in life that my husband and I will start living -not only reading about!- soon. As I read this chapter and the conclusion, five principles stood apart which I want to remember in the years ahead:

1. Your children’s marriage is sacred.  As our children get married, they will start their very own family, in which their primarily concern will be to please their spouses, not me or my husband.

2. Respect should always be present. In my relationship with each one of my children and their spouses respect should never lack. By respecting their decisions, their dreams and desires, “their obligation to raise their children according to their own conscience and convictions, remembering that the Lord has put them in charge of our grandkids,” we will be strengthening our relationship with them.

3. Become a source of blessing to your children and grandchildren. Through respect, wise conversations (in which listening plays a major role), laughs, prayer, willingness to help, and generosity, we can bless our children, their spouses, and our grandkids.

4. Trust God for your children and grandchildren. My God is a faithful and sovereign God who loves to save families. Who has promised to be faithful to a thousand generations. I believe in Him and in such Rock I stand. As one mom who from fear moved to trust in this stage, beautifully said,

“The outcome belongs to the Lord. I really have a sense of freedom having this attitude. The other idea is that I don’t have to know everything that they are into, who they are with, or where they are going, because the omniscient, omnipresent Lord knows. I don’t have to take up that “burden” (so to speak) which belongs to Him. Therefore I am really free to focus on building the relationship and at peace to trust God to work his perfect will.” (emphasis mine)

When we parent in fear or through worry we are in fact not parenting in love. We are not building a relationship, instead we are pulling it apart.

5. Pray and ask for help. Always prayer before action, is what my wise friend told me once. And the action to take at times is to ask for godly advise.

Sisters, we have a great challenge before us every day. No matter in which parenting stage we are now, we need God’s grace, God’s wisdom, and God’s Word. But all those are not hidden from us. God has given us, his children, grace to endure every season in our life. He has promised to give us wisdom (and wisdom in abundance!) when we ask for it. And we have His living Word, our sure anchor, a light to our feet! We have all that we need to do this. God is faithful and we can rest assured that His plans for us and our children are perfect.

 Under His sun and by His grace, 

Becky

Because We Never Stop Being Moms -Book Club- Chapter Nine

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Thank you, Friends, for coming again to our weekly meeting to discuss the book, We Never Stop Being Parents.

This week it is an honor and a great joy to introduce you to my friend Angel Warner. We met a few years ago when we left our sons in College, and we can honestly say that our sons have been blessed by this family. The Lord has given them grace to raise godly children and many of us are now enjoying the blessings of their hard labor. God is good!

Thank you, Angel.

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Chapter Nine.

Our Dreams, Their Dreams, though unsure of the source, I have often heard it said that the most important decision after choosing to serve God with one’s life is the answer to the question: Alongside whom shall I serve Him? 

For parents, even of children who have been given grace to rightly choose God as their master, the potential answer to the second question can be the source of much concern, and rightly so. As married people themselves, parents know firsthand the pitfalls of being joined into one flesh with another sinner. Moreover, married couples are joined to new families who are likewise comprised of sinners. The potential for conflict and trouble grows exponentially, but so do the opportunities for all involved to grow in wisdom, maturity, humility and grace. In chapter nine, the authors do a wonderful job of demonstrating some of the ways in which parents can fall off the rails if they are not seeking to guide their adult children by biblical principles. Deferring to preference when our children are selecting life mates has the potential of doing serious and long-lasting damage to our relationships. But, as in all stages of parenting, we have God’s Word to guide us toward prudence.

As has been pointed out in the other chapters we’ve read so far, our relationship with our adult children must shift from authority to counselor. The same holds true as our young adults select spouses. Because we want the best for our children, Christian parents begin praying early that God will be preparing godly spouses for them. As we pray, we naturally begin to envision the ideal characteristics we’d like to see in our future sons and daughters-in-law. There’s nothing wrong with that, of course. The problem comes when we create idols: phantom men and women who will be members of our particular church, children of our dearest friends, skilled and witty conversationalists, gifted musicians or artists, on it goes, even down to physical features. As the authors so wisely point out, the problem is that these are our daydreams, and our children have no biblical obligation to make our dreams come true. For parents to try to impose such an obligation where none exists is to usurp the authority that belongs to the Lord as the sovereign over our lives and those of our children. In some Christian circles, fathers have been taught that they are the supreme authority even over their children’s marital choices. It is true that, for a season and to illustrate heavenly realities, fathers act as prophets, priests, and kings in their homes. However, this temporary authority is designed to help fathers point their children to the Lord who is the true Sovereign. Fathers who can see themselves and this temporary authority rightly should delight in relinquishing their adult sons and daughters into the care of a King whose judgments, mercy, and leading are without error. Thereafter, parents must trust their children and all their decisions into His care. Our dreams are not as important as God’s will. 

We have been through this process four times now, and I can say without reservation that it can be challenging. We have one son-in-law, two daughters-in-law, and one daughter-in-law to be. We dearly love each one of them, but we have had to confront our pre-conceived notions each time. I have to admit that this was most pronounced with our daughter, not because of her choice, but simply because she was a daughter. We had taught her (and all her brothers) the principles of biblical roles in marriage and male headship. It is one emotional milestone to marry off a son; it is quite another to walk one’s baby girl down the aisle and place her into the care of another man who will become her head. My husband and I found that it required us to exercise a new level of trust in the Lord’s care for our daughter. In contrast, when sons marry, there is something very humbling about watching the father of a young woman walk down the aisle and place his baby girl into the care of your son. This has been a summons for us to pray fervently that our sons will be godly, merciful, tender, strong, and faithful servant-leaders who will love these women who have been entrusted to them. In either circumstance, trusting God to lead our adult children in our stead is both freeing and sanctifying. Our children are called to their own journeys and their own struggles. They may choose spouses who surprise us. They may handle their trials in ways that we would not. Yet, if we truly believe that God is sovereign, we can trust that God is using these things to mature them in grace. We have seen this at work in the lives of our married children and have been amazed at the refinement that is being produced through trial. Likewise, we can see how God has used our relationships with our married children and their spouses to refine our own growth in grace.

One thing I most appreciated about this chapter was the continual exhortation to exercise love, even if we are disappointed in our children’s choices. It is so easy to be critical and narrow in our definition of who warrants our love. The biblical principle, however, is that we are to exercise love toward others—no qualifiers. There are times when adult children may enter into relationships that go beyond mere preferences crossing the line into sin. In the section “We Are Free to Love and Welcome”, the author states:

“By remembering the gospel message, that we are both sinful and flawed yet loved and welcomed, we can welcome this uninvited visitor warmly. When you keep the doors open, you’re helping your own cause because the uninvited visitor will view you as a friend and perhaps even a counselor. No one wants to take counsel from someone who really doesn’t like them. If you openly welcome your child’s new friend, you will remove the pressure of disapproval, and your child may then actually invite your counsel.” (p. 144)

Of course, there is a distinction between loving a sinner and enabling sin. True love does not make provision for the practice of sin. I believe this makes the author’s point above more poignant. It’s a fine line to walk, but when we are warm and loving, our children are more likely to be understanding of our refusal to facilitate immorality. Here again, obedience to the biblical principles, in this case exercising love and upholding righteousness, may not be easy, but God plainly tells us that He will bless faithfulness to His commands. Thus we have another opportunity to take Him at His word and show our children that our faith is genuine.

Finally, after reading this chapter, I found myself reflecting on two underlying theological aspects of the larger discussion. The first is indicated in the initial illustration about the father who refused to embrace his daughter’s romantic choice simply because the young man held doctrinal positions that were different than his own. While his reaction was extreme, if most of us were honest, we’d probably have to admit to this same type of bias in our own hearts. Of course, we would prefer that our children marry people who embrace our theological leanings. It certainly would make for fewer potential landmines in table conversations. Yet, to look askance at someone who does not is evidence that we are not discerning the body of Christ as we should. His church is much larger than our particular segment of the Christian faith, and we should embrace opportunities to exercise grace toward our Christian brothers and sisters. How much more so when they are part of our own families?

The other theological principle is that of generational faithfulness. If we truly believe that we and our descendants are in a covenant relationship with God, then we ought to be thinking in terms of how we are part of God’s plan to pass on the truths of the covenant to future generations. There is simply no way we can be part of this plan if we jeopardize our influence by ungracious behavior toward the parents of our grandchildren. Any hard-heartedness on our part will prohibit our witness. We must earn the right to be heard; we must demonstrate that we can be trusted; we must humble ourselves taking on the attitude of servant-hood to our adult children, loving them and showing them respect. Only then can our message convey a sincere love for our Lord and His covenant.

May our Lord help us to live with grace as we seek to be a blessing to the next generation.

Angel Warner

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Angel Warner is married to her best friend, David. They are parents of eleven (7 by birth, three by marriage, and one by engagement). Their greatest earthly delight is their family, which now also includes a grand-daughter, their first grandchild. More than anything, Angel lives in wonder and gratitude for the continual faithfulness, love, and mercy of the Father. She, her husband, and youngest daughter live in beautiful Geneva, Illinois, and are in the process of restoring a 1927 home—their third historic restoration project.

Because We Never Stop Being Moms -Book Club- Chapters Seven and Eight-

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Last week I was busy enjoying my adult children and their friends in a beautiful beach in Mexico; maybe that explains why I didn’t post here.

Chapter seven has three main principles that we don’t want to overlook.

1. We are responsible for raising our children in the Lord, they are responsible for their own choices, but God alone can save our children.

Sovereign saving grace, God’s desire to save the lost, and His covenantal faithfulness should be our hope and comfort.

What a wonderful reminder to our heavy souls that God is the one who does the changing in our children’s lives. Not us. We don’t have the power to change their heart.

What a convicting exhortation to parent our sons and daughters not motivated by guilt and fear but by genuine love that has learned to rest on God alone.

“Our dollars won’t buy their love or repentance, and we can’t fund their admission into God’s Kingdom. Only the Holy Spirit can change their hearts.”

2. We need help. We need help. We need help. Yes: WE NEED HELP!

“If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given to him.” James 1:5

The author says it in such a clear way that we cannot miss the exhortation:

“[T]he Bible is the only sufficient source of wisdom for our lives. In faith we need to trust in His Word, rather than merely following our own thoughts and feelings.”

And then, an encouragement to seek the advice of godly people:

“We need objective (and sometimes tough) godly advice from friends who are not afraid of wounding us by their counsel when necessary (Prov.27:6)”

3. Saying “no” is many times the louder way to say, “I love you.”

“Only with the Lord’s help will we be able to be as strong and as patient as needed.”

I appreciated very much that under this principle, the authors advice parents to involve their pastors and elders (when the children are members of the church) in specific situations, even to the point of church discipline.

Understanding the role of the church as we raise our children is an important part of understanding the covenant bond among us.

It is important, however, to remember that saying “no,” or making drastic changes, doesn’t mean that we should totally shun them out of our lives. Maybe, you have the huge blessing of not having  wayward children, but remember that we must apply these love principles with our friends’ children to. Let us be always hospitable, waiting in hope.

 

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Chapter Eight is, in my opinion, kind of repetitive. Do you agree with me?

It is a chapter about money management and how we should not finance our children’s irresponsibility or sinful lifestyle. However, many of the important, wise, and timely advices the author mentions here, he has already pinpointed somewhere else in the book. So I want to avoid doing the same thing…

Next week we’ll be talking about chapter nine: Marriage: Our Dreams, Their Dreams. I hope you can join us.

Praying for grace as we keep pressing on, 

Becky

Because We Never Stop Being Moms -Book Club- Chapter Six

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First of all sorry for the late post, and thanks for grace and understanding!

This chapter is the perfect one in which differentiating between a principle and a method is important.  The examples the authors give at the beginning of it are more of methods based on the principles that further in the chapter the author will tackle. Understanding the difference is essential in order to embrace what one must do -Biblically speaking- in our relationship with our adult children and what we may do in specific circumstances.

For example: one may or may not have a curfew for his 19 yo daughter living at home (method), but one must protect her. That is a biblical principle.

Chapter six is about us not about our children, and as I read it I was challenged by the biblical principles that the author points here.

First of all, we, like our children, are sinners. Not because we are older and -hopefully-more wiser are free from sin. No. We often struggle with the same kind of sins that our children struggle: self-righteousness, pride, selfishness, bitterness. We need a Saviour too and we need to be washed with the Word every day. We need to ask forgiveness and be forgiven. And pride, I think you might agree, might be the most prevalent as we parent our children. The author says,

“Pride blinds us not only to our sin but also to the true struggles of others.”

And what is the opposite of pride? Humility. Thankfully humility is not something we produce in ourselves by trying hard. Humility is, the author reminds us, “the fruit of the Holy Spirit’s work in our hearts as he convicts us of sin and overwhelms us with reminders of our unmerited blessings.”

 

“Humility is that quality is Jesus’ life that enabled him to deal gently with sinners… Humility caused him to empty himself and become like us -to share in our weakness- to bear with our frailty.”

So, the principle is clear: we need humility to deal with our children.That is the starting point no matter which method we end up using.

“Humility is the eyewash we need to use every day.”

 

The authors say that we specifically need humility in these areas:

1. Humbly convey clear expectations. And I would add, humbly ask forgiveness if your expectations have not been clear or if your expectations have not been real (by this I mean that you are expecting from them to allow you to micro-manage their life under the cover of “submission”).

2. Always offer humble respect. 

“Nagging will always damage a relationship because it is not the fruit of humble respect. It is the fruit of pride and impatience.”


3. Humility speaks little and listens much. When we have a humble attitude we will find that it is more easier to listen fully and attentively -not thinking at the same time of a response with which to strike harder- (Read James 1:19, Prov. 20:5). Listening, Newheiser reminds us, is a skill that not only requires humility but love. It takes effort to be a good listener.

“Because we are sinful and proud, the majority of us are poor listeners. We’re accustomed to doing most of the talking while our kids listen to us. Listening is an easy way to demonstrate that we are sincerely interested in them as human beings. Careful listening demonstrates humble respect for their opinion and perspectives.”

When we listen humbly we are persevering in communicating with them. And as one mom pointed out, this only happens when “we refrain from interrupting or correcting our adult children.” Humble listening, of course demands that we recognize that we don’t know the correct answer at all times and that other times we have erred.

A good question to ask ourselves to see if we are humble listeners would be, “When I listen to my son/daughter’s perspective, am I  open and willing to reconsider my position?”

4. Humility makes an effort to communicate. Communicate clearly all your expectations, don’t assume that they will read your mind on all sorts of manners. I firmly believe that a clear communication clears the way to build stronger relationships.

5. Humility respects their individuality. 

“Humble respect for our kids’ individuality flows out of the truth that each one, though different, is created in the image of God.”

6. Humility admits sin and wrong. I love, love, love this principle which I think summarizes all the rest:

“Relationships can only survive where there is grace. Not only do our children need grace from us, but we also need grace from them.”

We need humility to ask forgiveness and seek reconciliation.  Ann Voskamp said it well somewhere else: “First to listen is wiser. First to forgive is freest. First to begin afresh again is happiest.”

 

“We need to incorporate grace in our parenting. Nothing must ever stop us from loving our children. “

7. God’s grace helps us assume the best of our children because “Love… hopes all things” (I Cor. 13:7).  But at the same time God’s grace will help us see the sin in our children and be blind to it.
I was reminded here of the book by Puritan Richard Sibbes, The Bruised Reed; if you have not read it and the kind of faith you see in your child ‘s life is only a weak flame, I recommend  it to you. It will sure help you see with hope those sparks of faith.



8. Humility overlooks and forgives. Our own children can hurt us, but we sin against them when we don’t forgive them quickly, but instead let bitterness be rooted in our hearts.  Humility, I would add, recognizes that God is in control of our children’s lives. Humility draws us to God in prayer for them and gives us hope when we seem there is none. 

9. A humble heart will say, “I want to spend time with you because I enjoy being with you.”

10. A humble attitude will always be willing to give. Always give your children grace in a thousand tangible ways.

The questions at the end of the chapter are very good. Don’t overlook them. I was convicted of some things as I answered them.

Note: Next week I will be traveling and might not have an easy access to Internet. So, I ask you to bear with me if you don’t see me posting timely next Wednesday.

God is good and Him our hope is secure.

Becky

Because We Never Stop Being Moms -Book Club- Chapter Five

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How was your week? Mine has been a mixture of everything: wonderful moments (visiting our dear friends in Las Vegas for a long weekend) and busy moments (having to catch up with all my papers to grade). But each day I have seen that I have been given more grace than what I’d have ever expected. God is good.

We are now in chapter five (half way through our book!), a chapter that mainly deals with three issues: being productive, financial responsibility, and living in community.

In this chapter the authors stir us up to consider how are we to live in community in our homes with our adult children when they are staying home for a season and for the good reasons. Newheiser warns us that “we might be tempted to micromanage their day or fly off the handle…” I agree. And even through distance, even if our children are off in college, we may face this same temptation because we are only a “text away” from them.

The authors recognize that not all the children of parents reading this book are Christians, so they remind their readers that “through common grace even a non-Christian can learn how to work hard and live productively in a community.” However, he also reminds us that we should never “lower our household standards to a level that would displease the Lord.”

If we could summarize the suggestions the author gives us in the next part of the book we would have these main points:

1. Develop an open friendship with your children, so that they will be open to hearing our wise counsel when they ask for it (p.71). Maybe you can review your notes on chapter one as this was an important principle Newheiser laid clearly at the beginning of the book.

2. Parents must set expectations and make them known (p.72). And I particularly love that the author reminds us that “laying out these expectations is both wise and loving.”

3. Expect them to be productive (p.72). Being lazy is a form of stealing, and not making the best use of our time is a sin. This sentence, in my opinion, summarizes the principle in a clear way:

“Rather that seeing a schedule as enslaving or as thwarting their creativity, our kids need to embrace it as the good means God has given, so that they might know the joy of accomplishing much for him (Prov.21:25).”

4. Young adults living at home should do an adult share of the housework (p.74). We have seen -and heard- this many times: children demanding to be respected and treated as adults but at the same time don’t want the full package of what it means being an adult. They want the privileges only but not the responsibilities.

“One twenty-one-year-old told us that he had learned that “nothing kills work ethic and discipline more effectively than the welfare state of parental indulgence.”

5. Establish reasonable moral standards (p.75). The reason, the motivation for this should be that we want to honor the Lord in our home. (Remember Eli and the way he neglected honoring God in his household?)

“We want to help our young people understand the difference between our negotiable house rules and timeless, biblical standards.”

6. Nothing is more important for living in community with others than trust (p.77).

7. Failure to meet expectations must result in consequences (p.78). I have found through many conversations with friends that trying to avoid the consequences we, parents, find ourselves tempted to overlook the lack of meeting of the expectations we have established beforehand. We are may times so much like Eli. We forget that God cannot be mocked, sooner or later the consequences of all our sins will come.

6. Follow through (p.80).

“Discipline is hard work and often unpleasant. “All discipline for the moment seems not to be joyful, but sorrowful; yet those who have been trained by it afterwards it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness” /Heb.12:11). But we continue to discipline our children in the hope that God will work in their hearts to make them wise.”

7. Get good, godly counsel from your pastor or trusted friend and cry out to God for the courage to do the best, most loving thing for your young adult (p.81).

I purposely left out the point in which the author says that, forcing or not an adult child living at home to go to church is a matter of personal conscience on the part of the parents. And I did so because I think that in this particular issue, the godly counsel of the pastor would always be necessary.

What about you? Thoughts?

May God give us grace to parent well each one of our children through all the different seasons of their lives.

God is faithful and good, and in Him we can fully trust,

Becky

Because We Never Stop Being Moms -Book Club- Chapter Four

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This is certainly a strong chapter, don’t you agree? In this chapter, Saying Hello to Please God, the author challenges us to see if we are not acting like Eli, “this sad figure in Israel’s history [who] is the quintessential example of a father who chose to please his sons rather than God and lost everything he cherished as a result.”

We are like Eli when we hear that our children are not being faithful to the Covenant, when they are not walking in the Lord and we pretend we are dealing with the matter using words, an infinite number of words that sound hollow in our children’s ears. We are like Eli when we refuse to do what we know God wants us to do, but instead we only keep up having conversations with our children -while fooling ourselves knowing that the reality is that they are not listening to us.

“Eli was fully aware of his sons’ actions, and he knew that they were not only in the wrong but in danger of the Lord’s judgment. He certainly nagged them and criticized them, but he did not restrain them and ultimately both he and his sons paid the price.”

How many times we, parents in the church, have not done everything in our hands to restrain our children from doing evil? May the Lord have mercy on us!

Moms, if you are reading this and have younger children, don’t fall into this trap. The world is telling you that the best thing you can do to make your little one come to her senses is not the rod, but a good conversation. Beware of this philosophy; if you start following this pattern of not doing the hard, biblical thing, of not doing something beyond a good talk with your daughter to restrain her from sin, you won’t be able to find a way out of this terrifying maze when she grows up. Remember, the sin of not restraining our children often starts when they are young.

And as always, there is a heart issue behind our actions -or behind our lack of obedience-. In the text we read that Eli honored his sons more than he honored God.

“Eli’s sin was that he treated his sons as more weighty or important than the Lord. He was so concerned with maintaining the peace that he didn’t have the courage to do what the Lord required him to do.”

The authors give us some good examples on page sixty-one in which we can clearly see when parents are nagging their children and not seeing changes: the sluggard child, the one who parties every Friday, the girl sleeping at her boyfriend’s house, the one who abuses their parents’ provision, the child who gets drunk over and over again and brags about it on Facebook, the one who is disrespectful, the one who is unloving, the one who shouts and wants things done her way. But we can also think of lesser examples that if are not dealt with, will only lead to our children’s destruction. Oh, that the Lord will give us a humble heart that recognizes and admits these struggles. That He will give us grace and courage to deal with the most difficult issues and stop pretending that things are really not that bad.

The key in how to act once our children are adult but are living a sinful life under our roof (or somewhere else with our credit card) is found on page sixty-one:

“While parents cannot be held responsible for the sins of their independent adult children, they are responsible for what goes under their roof. When dad and mom, like Eli, become enablers of a sinful lifestyle, they inadvertently dishonor the Lord and share the sin and guilt of their kids, even though that’s the farthest thing from their minds.” (emphasis mine)

We know that in this life there is no neutrality. We are either building or destroying. We are either enabling sin in our children’s lives or we are restraining it. 

Sisters, we have a God full of grace who not only gives us grace to endure the hard providences in our lives, but One who also gives us grace to obey Him in the most difficult things. His Grace is sufficient.  God can give us the grace to open our eyes and see what we have been trying not to see all along because “we feel entrapped by our love and hope for them.” The questions are real, “What would happen to them if we told them to choose between right and wrong? What if they chose wrong?” But there is no way around, the only way to keep our hope for our children anchored in Christ is to obey our Lord.

And, oh what a great and unshakable hope we can have in Christ! In our Savior! To know that He hears our prayers, to know that His promises are truth, to know that His desire is to save families! What a blessed hope!

On page sixty-four we read some practical things that the Lord might call us to do in order to restrain the sin in our children’s lives, but I like the way the author summarizes it:

“Parents don’t always have to actively chastise their irresponsible children. Often the best thing for us to do is nothing. Sometimes love looks like taking a step back and allowing them to experience the fruit of their choices (Galatians 6:7)… If we continually step in to “protect” our children from the consequences of their wrong choices, we may be guilty of honoring our children above the Lord by standing between them and the chastisement the Lord is bringing upon them… Remember that the Prodigal son only came to his senses when his circumstances were so bad that he longed to eat pig food.”

And I am reminded again of this powerful article in which Abraham Piper and his father John write about the time in which Abraham was excommunicated from his church. It is certainly a powerful testimony of a father who honored God more than his own son and the way God answered his prayers. It is a story that will build up your faith and renew your hope. It is a story like the ones that God loves to write.

This is something that I understand should be dealt with as a couple. I encourage you to talk to your husband about your concerns, read this chapter with him and answer the questions on p.68 together, seek the counsel of wise men in your church, and mostly don’t lose hope.

  Trusting in God with you,

Becky