Category: Sister Judy (Page 1 of 276)

None of us can put Jesus into a box and think we know what He will do next. Our part is to trust, pray and ask, but as we all know, the answers don’t necessarily come as we hoped. Neither do they necessarily come quickly. We may even wonder if He heard us and is concerned over what is happening. But in the waiting, He also does a work in our heart, and it may cause our roots to go deeper into Him as we wait and wait.

Jesus is not predictable, which means we can’t be sure if He will answer our prayers in a certain way. So we need to hold things loosely and let Him surprise us rather than grumbling that He didn’t answer the way we wanted. Let us be as David who said, “I will keep my eyes on the Lord. With Him at my right hand I will not be shaken.” Psalm 16:11.

The next verse that follows is asking for His help to “Rule though our willful hearts; Keep Thine our wand’ring thoughts; in all our sorrows let us find our rest in Thee: And in temptation’s hour save through Thy mighty pow’r. Thine aid O send us. Hear us in mercy, O Lord, we pray.” How important it is to rule our thought life for it likes to wander all over, especially when we want to sit in quiet and just listen to the Lord. But as our thoughts center on the Lord, we will find rest from all our worries, anxieties and fears. When we are tempted, it is His power that we need to overcome and He has promised to help us when we call to Him.

The song closes with “Show us Thy mercy, so shall we live and sing praise to Thee.” We all need His mercy and grace to daily die to our self-life and to live for Him. We are giving up our selfishness to worship and live for Him who is love, truth and peace. Why do we hang on to our selfish concerns when we can rest In Him? Let us open our hearts wider to Him and let Him rule in every part of our lives.

Many today suffer from mother deprivation, and it shows up later in our lives as mother wounds and a lack of ability to attach. John Eldredge, author and counselor, writes about children with compulsive tendencies to steal who all had mother deprivation. One family who adopted such a boy, had to lock things up every night in the house as he would steal, which was likely the result of unmet needs in his young life.

Although deprivation makes human attachments very hard, there is healing and hope for our souls. I love Isaiah 49:15-16a, “Can a mother forget the infant at her breast, walk away from the baby she bore? But even if mothers forget, I’d never forget you—never. Look, I’ve written your names on he backs of my hands.”  God loves each of us and is the source of all mothering. No matter if we got the mother-love we needed, Aldredge writes, “We need to come home to the mother-love of God, regardless of what we learned from our earthly mothers.”

There is hope for meaningful attachment love, as when we know the Lord we are like branches that are attached to the vine and draw our nourishment from Him. It is His life that flows through us each day. (John 15) God’s love can even flow to those empty places inside of us, including the place of mother need. We can invite Him into our need for that love and nourishment. A few words of the prayer given by John Eldredge follows:

The enemy does all he can to cause us to doubt God’s love as he wants to steal our joy from us. He tries to distort God’s grace and love and wants to shame us. Pastor Francis Chan has written a book called Beloved to help us find unshakable assurance of God’s love. His mother died giving birth to him and his dad rejected him and gave him to his grandma to raise until he was five years old. His dad gave him no affection at all, but God is the healer of broken lives and he is now happily married with seven kids and five grandkids who all love the Lord. God restores what the enemy tries to steal from us.

We can go to the scriptures that speak of God’s love, especially when the enemy speaks lies to us and attempts to make us feel like we are worthless. We can meditate on Jeremiah 31:3, “I have loved you with an everlasting love; therefore, I have continued my faithfulness to you.”  Paul says in Romans 8 that nothing can separate us from God’s love, not even death or any kind of powers. In fact, death is our homecoming call, when we will be united with the Lord forever. Sometimes it helps to share our doubts with another Christian when we have trouble experiencing God’s love and receive prayer. Let us not live in doubt of our Heavenly Father’s love, but pray to experience it in new ways.

God is infinite and cannot be captured in any concept, thought, or image. When we were children, we saw pictures of Jesus blessing the children or as a shepherd with the sheep. As we mature in our faith, we move beyond images and pictures, for God is beyond images and is reality. I read an example of a mother fish in the ocean whose baby fish ask her, “Mother, what is water? Show us water!” Of course, we know they are immersed in water and yet don’t have a concept of water. So let’s say she sets up a PowerPoint projector and shows them pictures of great waterfalls, the ocean, etc., and they receive a concept of water. She tells them that they know more about water now and they can just swim in it and let it flow through them. When the Powerpoint is turned off, the little fish struggle to believe they are swimming in the water. For them it is like the dark night of faith. Likewise, our imaginations give us pictures with the Powerpoint of God, but these are simply images. Faith is moving beyond the images and ideas of God, as we come to believe what we cannot see and go deeper into God. Mother Theresa lived for fifty years in this state, though those around her were unaware as she turned outward to serve the poor.

You don’t choose when you go through the dark night, but it is wonderful to know in faith that God is doing a deep work. It may feel lonely, but remember God is breaking through and flowing into your life more strongly than ever before. God exists and the reality is not dependent on our feelings. We no longer depend on Powerpoint images, but swim in reality of His love.

There is a lie that Gen Xers have believed, and that is that daycare is necessary and even beneficial for modern family life. But the truth is, later statistics show that 1 in 5 children develop a serious mental illness. Gen Z and Gen Alpha have mental health issues as well, result of screen exposure and daycare in infancy. Komisar says there is no such thing as “good daycare” for a mother’s presence can’t be replaced, especially in those first three years when 85% of a child’s right brain is developed, the part that has to do with emotions and social understanding. When an infant is held by the mother, the baby’s nervous system is soothed, building emotional resilience.
Fathers are important and Kosim describes them as playful, tactile stimulators who encourage risk-taking and exploration. They are protectors against external threats. No wonder, a mother wakes up when the baby cries while the father sleeps, unless he hears danger which alerts him quickly.

When an infant is put in daycare with different caregivers, their developing brain goes into a state of stress. Left for eight hours, the baby perceives abandonment, resulting in a diminished capacity to handle adversity. Komisar writes that ADHD is not a disorder, but a symptom of a nervous system stuck in a hyper-vigilant, flight-or-flight state. Attachment disorder may result, and in later life, depression, anxiety disorders, and even borderline personality disorder. Before the age of three, children need a secure one-on-one bond with a consistent caregiver, which is hard to achieve in any day care center.

I want to encourage women today not to feel they have to work as a prerequisite for equality, but think more of the developmental needs of their children. There are years later to be in the workforce when children are in school. For some it is not possible because of circumstances, but one option named is a loving relative filling the spot or a long-term nanny. Let us be willing to make personal sacrifices to give our children what they need most: the consistent, loving presence of their parents, especially in the first three years of life.