Category: Biblical Womanhood

How to Pray More

“I don’t care what you say, talk to me.”

Any one know the reference? It’s a song from the musical Bye Bye Birdie, of all things. Where the protagonist is singing to the woman he loves, begging her to just talk to him. The few lines I remember from the song are always what pop into my head whenever I read a book or article about prayer, or when I hear someone teaching on prayer, and how we should be praying more (it always seems like we can be doing more).

This picture of the man begging his lover to “just talk to him” is what hits me about the song and how it relates to prayer. This really is God’s view of prayer. It is the means by which his people, his beloved, talk to him.

This is one of our first pictures together while on a short term missions trip to Italy.

What lover doesn’t want their beloved to talk to them? As a mom of four kids, I am always stealing away moments to talk to my husband. Talking to him is what I literally stay up late to do. I can’t get enough of the guy! Even with my busy days of babies, cleaning, homework, and making dinner.

If I spend so much time and energy talking to my beloved who is here, and who loves me imperfectly, should I not also have the same excitement to talk to my Beloved who loves me perfectly? I should, and I want to, then why is prayer so hard? Why do so many Christians find prayer hard?

Well, I cannot speak to everyone, but I can speak to what my problem is. For me it is an issue of habit. Simple? Yes. Easy? No.

I fall out of the habit of talking. I am introverted by nature, so it is easy for me to stay in my head and not talk. It is easy to not talk. I know not everyone is like this. Perhaps for you there is something you need to talk to your spouse, or parent, or friend about, but for some reason you can’t. You maybe find it easy to talk about sports, a favorite TV show, how your kids are doing, but not about it (whatever it is). The main thing you have been meaning to bring up, just never happens. Why? I think it’s because we stick to what is normal, what is easy, what is comfortable, and we don’t make new habits of talking. Talking to different people, talking about deeper things, talking about the things of God, or talking to God. It’s simple to change, we just start talking regularly, but it isn’t easy. (I have a theory that simple things are never easy, but that’s for another post.)

For me, I had fallen out of the habit of praying because it was never really a habit of mine to begin with. For those who don’t know my story, here’s the short version: while I grew up in a Christian home, and even made some kind of profession of faith, I didn’t truly give myself over to Christ’s Lordship and have a saving faith of my own until I was in college. I got married right after college, and became a mom a year after that. So, life progressed quickly for me, and there are lots of habits (whether in the home, or in my heart) I never developed. Prayer is one of them.

So, I’ve started anew. I’ve started setting up routines, times, and places for me to pray regularly. That word is key: regularly.

Here’s what I do to make sure I pray.

How to Pray Regularly:

  1. Pick a Time – For me this is during Jesse’s first, or second, morning nap. I sit in my nursing chair, read my bible, and pray. I use my bible reading to direct my prayers.
  2. Pick a Place – As I said above, I pray in my nursing chair. It’s my quiet place. It’s in my room, away from the rest of the house. The older kids can, and do, come to me there, but are always quiet and cautious to not wake the baby, which makes it a good place for Mommy to have some quiet time with God.
  3. Pick an Object – This is something I’ve picked up from a couple different places, but specifically from the tradition of prayer quilts. I was first introduced to the concept of prayer quilts years ago when my Nana got very sick. She was given a prayer quilt from some of her friends who had prayed for her using the quilt while she was in the hospital. A prayer quilt has strings on the top of it and people can gather around it and as they pray they tie the strings in to knots, one knot equaling one prayer. I really like the tactile nature of this tradition. I have adjusted it by using objects I use in my everyday life to be memorials of prayer.
    • My first object is my mug. I hold my mug with both hands, feeling the warmth from the hot tea (or coffee) and that feeling slows down my mind. I close my eyes and I pray. Right there with my mug in my hands.
    • My second object is a pair of earrings. Almost six years ago, a friend of mine was in the process of adopting an embryo. She had also made these earrings. Once we found out one of the embryos she and her husband had adopted had successfully implanted, I wore those earrings. I wore them nearly everyday for her whole pregnancy, and every time I put them in my ears I prayed for her, her husband, and the baby growing within her. (That little embryo is now a healthy, happy, five year old and dear friend of my children.) Someone in my life recently shared with me they are trying to conceive their first child and are finding it a bit discouraging. I’m wearing the earrings again.
  4. Pick Requests – I currently have one prayer request I am praying for every day. I don’t keep a list of prayer requests, mostly because I don’t have time, yet, to dedicate to praying through the list. However, whenever someone gives me a request, I pray for it right then in the moment.

Bonus points:

It takes discipline. I didn’t want to hear this, and I know this is hard (see, I told you! Simple but hard.) You have to choose to pray instead of doing something else. You have to take the time away from something else and pray. It’s totally worth it! But you have to do it.

You are not alone. God wants. you to pray, and he helps you to pray. This has been the most amazing part of creating a habit of prayer, for the Christian, this is more than a habit, it’s sanctification. Creating a habit of prayer makes you more like Christ.

Have you ever heard the advice “pray until you pray” when trying to develop your habit of prayer? I have, so often! It’s the idea that you should begin doing the thing before your feelings are in it, or even when your feelings aren’t in it. I didn’t really understand this, or how it could work until I read C. S. Lewis’ version of it. He uses the analogy of tin soldiers playing pretend at being real, that this is what Christians are doing essentially at playing to be like Jesus, except that he is beside us, helping us, and making us more real, and less tin (basically, the process of sanctification).

“Now the moment you realise ‘Here I am, dressing up as Christ,’ it is extremely likely that you will see at once some way in which at that very moment the pretence could be made less of a pretence and more of a reality. You will find several things going on in your mind which would not be going on there if you were really a son of God… You see what is happening. The Christ Himself, the Son of God who is a man (just like you) and God (just like His Father) is actually at your side and is already at that moment beginning to turn your pretence in to reality… The real Son of God is at your side. He is beginning to turn your into the same kind of thing as Himself. He is beginning, so to speak to ‘inject’ His kind of life and thought, His Zoe, into you; beginning to turn the tin soldier into a live man. The part of you that does not like it is the. part that is still tin.”

Mere Christianity, by C. S. Lewis

It’s a Process

What I take from the above quote, and from encouragement from scripture in general, is to keep going. Don’t give up if you’ve missed a few days or weeks, or whatever. Just pick up where you left on, or begin anew. God is always waiting to talk to his children. He loves it. It wants it.

I think it’s also helpful, and hopeful, to remember what Jesus said about prayer. He never said “if you pray, pray like this…”. Instead, he always said “when you pray…”. So do it. Just pray. Yes, it may be fumbling and awkward at first, that’s how conversations usually go when you haven’t spoken in a while. It’s normal. Just start talking with God.

I hope you are encouraged by some of my tips to get started praying, again or for the first time.

Soli Deo Gloria

Posted on by Anna Young Aside 2

Treasuring Christ When Your Hands Are Full; Gospel Meditations for Busy Moms – Book Review

Gloria Furman does it again. In this little book Furman goes through the truth of the Gospel: the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Then she takes that truth and applies it to the everyday mess and busyness that is motherhood.

The subtitle for this book says “… for Busy Moms” but to be real, what mom isn’t busy. This is for all moms. That being said, I cannot recommend it enough. It is a short 160 pages, which includes all of the notes and back matter. Yes, it’s a quick little book, but man does it pack a punch.

If you’ve ever read Furman before, you know what I’m talking about. Her writing style seems, to my eyes, to be heavily influenced by her life as a wife to a disabled husband, a mother to multiple children, a woman in ministry struggling through all the demands that work entails, and lives in a challenging international city in the Middle East. She does not have time for the fluffy, round about way of saying things. “Get to the good part! Tell me the good news, now! I need it!” Her words seem to say. That’s exactly what she does in this book.

Yet, there is not a sense of urgency or chaos, as sometime is the case when this attitude of immediate need is applied to writing. She presents the message, or the “Treasures” as the title puts it, of this book gently. With the tenderness of a woman, and a parent. It is a breath of fresh air after a long slog type of feel she gives in her writing.

I think this is mainly due to the content of this book. It is difficult to come across as harsh, chaotic, prideful, or condescending when you are presenting a message that is not essentially your own. Gloria Furman in this short, sweet book presents Christ, the Message himself, to tired, busy women, with children in tow. Her books is life giving, because Christ is. Her words are comforting, confronting, and refreshing, because Christ is.

She does this through, not her own words, but through the scriptures. I type this with a smile, for it is difficult to read farther than a sentence or two without some scripture reference or quotation. Further proving that this treasure, this good news, this hope, is not her message, but God’s message, is Christ himself presented to the world, and through Furman, funneled at mothers.

Moms, pick up this book! Read it. Re-read it. It is that kind of book that you can read a few paragraphs, filled with scripture quotations, as your quiet time and dwell on truth all day long.

I read this in the carline while I waited to pick up my children from school, with my toddler in the backseat. Grab a paragraph or two while you nurse (actually you may be able to get a whole chapter while nursing). Read a little while your kiddos do their homework next to you. It’s small enough to fit in most purses! Take it to work and sneak a chapter in on your lunch break. It’s not dense, so even a few sentences before you collapse into bed is possible.

If you’re not a mom, read it! It’s the gospel. It applies to you too. Better yet, read it, and pass it on to a mom. Then, you can have discussions about what’s in the book! What a blessing! And you will get much more out of it talking about it, as usually when you talk about something, your mind and heart dig into it a little deeper.

Whatever you do, where ever you are in life. Read on, friends!

Soli Deo Gloria!

Posted on by Anna Young Aside 0

Rock of Ages, Cleft for Me…

I went on a walk with my two older kids (ages 5 and 4). I had a letter I needed to send something via the post office, and I had a check to deposit at the bank. Both locations are just over a block from our apartment, and the parking is ridiculous. So we walked.

About half way between our destinations and our home is a church, with a brick – thing out front. We have been here before, but it never really hit me what the brick thing is. It’s in the shape of a cross. Longer on two sides, shorter on the other two sides.
And, my kids favorite thing to do with this brick thing is: hide in the corners of it.

My kids didn’t know that is the shape. They just like hiding in the corners and trying to scare one another.
My kids didn’t know that this morning I had read Exodus 33.

Moses said, “Please show me your glory.” And he said, “I will make all my goodness pass before you and will proclaim before you my name ‘The LORD.’ And I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy. But,” he said, “you cannot see my face, for man shall not see me and live.” And the LORD said, “Behold, there is a place by me where you shall stand on the rock, and while my glory passes by I will put you in a cleft of the rock, and I will cover you with my hand until I have passed by. Then I will take away my hand, and you shall see my back, but my face shall not be seen.”

Exodus 33:8

It struck me so powerfully, particularly this truth:
In the Old Testament, before Jesus came, Moses had to be hidden from God’s glory, had to hide from God in the cleft.
Later in the Old Testament, in Psalms, there are these words: “Be to me a rock of refuge, to which I may continually come” (Psalm 71:3). It’s the longing of the Psalmist’s heart to come near to God, to find refuge in God, the rock.
Then Jesus comes and we can draw near, immediately, intimately, continually (see basically all of Hebrews, but specifically 4:16, 7:19, 7:25, 10:22). No longer through the priests, no longer through the blood of animals, but in spirit in and in truth (John 4:23-24).

The rock in which we take refuge is the cross. Because of Jesus’ redeeming work, we don’t hide from him, we run and hide in him.

Enjoy Chris Rice’s rendition of this Rock of Ages.

Soli Deo Gloria!

Posted on by Anna Young Aside 0

Relationship-ing

During a pandemic? During a second shut down?

Yes and yes.

Life does not stop because of crisis, or rules, or sickness, or personal issues, or job losses, or stir crazy children, or school closures, or whatever. Life still happens. Importantly, relationships still happen. Most importantly, the calling and commands of God do not change (or completely evaporate) because of circumstances.

I am a wife. I am called and commanded to honor my husband.
Nothing going on has changed that.
I am a mother. I am called and commanded to teach, train, instruct, discipline, love, and encourage my children.
Nothing going on has changed that.
The fact that I am a mother, has also not negated the fact that I am a wife, and that the calling and command to honor my husband came before and trumps that of the calling and commands in regards to my children.

My relationship with my husband is crucial in raising our children, and my relationship with my husband takes precedence over the relationships with my children.

So, I need to take the time to keep investing in my relationship with my husband. I need to keep dating him.

Every couple is different. So finding what works for each couple will look different.
Some couples like to go out, do something different, explore the outdoors, do something service oriented, cuddle with a movie, buy each other sentimentally significant gifts, and so many other things.
For us, its talking. Yes, this pair of introverts loves spending hours together just talking. Talking together it how we date. It’s how we dated (literally, so many hours of college were spent just sitting in the Chick-fil-a parking lot talking, letting our food get cold, and our sodas watery).

So, maybe in a pandemic, or under certain shut-down/stay-at-home orders, formal dates are challenging. We love good food, so that’s been a change for us, not looking forward to that one time every few months to try some yummy food at a restaurant.
But, we have tried making new things at home, and ordered out (thank you Door Dash!) a good bit.
We like to give each other “just because” gifts. We can’t do anything real fancy, but my husband came back from the store last night with cranberry juice, my absolute favorite! So, you know, it doesn’t have to be fancy to be special. 🙂

I will say that although talking is a favorite for us, communication is not key to every relationship. Communication is essential to any relationship. There are no exceptions here. The more significant and central the relationship, the more important communication is.

No matter what relationship you are in: married, dating, single, child, parent, co-worker, grandparent, grandchild, teacher, student, friend, boss, employee. Keep investing in it, keep pursuing it, keep talking, keep doing that thing that connects you, keep working through those hard things that you butt heads over, keep forgiving, keep saying sorry, keep learning, keep teaching, keep being kind, keep relationship-ing.

Soli Deo Gloria

Posted on by Anna Young Aside 0

Patience? Ain’t nobody got time for that!

During this season of mothering littles, I find my number one prayer request being “that I would be more patient with my children”.

    My oldest with his tongue out (a standard whenever Mom says “say cheese!”) and paint dot on his nose.
    My middle who was supposed to be getting pants to wear under her dress, and came downstairs with pants on her head.
    My youngest who is always blurry in all my pictures of her, and whose favorite word is “go”.

    Man, I love my kids, and they never stop. I think the constant motion is pretty standard for littles, but it’s exhausting!
    My youngest is still in diapers, and doesn’t have all her teeth in yet.
    My middle has colossal meltdowns where no one but Daddy can calm her. My oldest is turning five at the end of the summer and will start kindergarten in the fall. I have a whole new set of things to think about! Have I prepared him enough? Does he know enough to be independent at school? Will he be kind to others? Will he listen to and obey his teachers? Will he get teased? Will he get in trouble?

    My worries for my oldest, have often turned normal parenting moments into this “do or die” test, to see if he is really ready for school. Many days, my patience is gone before I even wake up, because I’ve lost sleep worrying.

    But, God calls me to be patient.
    Actually, He calls all believers to be patient, not just the “extra holy ones”. Patience is a characteristic of God we are called to have ourselves as his children. It is one of the many ways we image our heavenly Father to a broken world. This world has no patience.

    So what is it? What is biblical patience?

    Well first, let me tell you what it is not: patience is the not the same as waiting.

    I don’t know why we think just waiting this is “good enough”. When we think about it, the act of waiting cannot be the same as patience, it just doesn’t make sense. I mean, have you ever seen a someone wait impatiently? Therefor, waiting cannot be what patience is.

    Biblical patience is this: a Godly attitude towards circumstances and people, which is founded in and completely resting in God.
    It’s an attitude of trust.
    Why do I struggle with being patient with my kids? Because I am not trusting God. How did I diagnose that? Because I am worried.
    More often than not, my attitude of anxiety has replaced the God-trusting attitude of patience.

    When I get off, I need more of God, I need his word.
    God’s word is our living water, our primary cause for heart change, and our gauge for our lives.
    Here are some passages I found to do a quick study on what practicing biblical patience looks like:

    Psalm 37:7
Be still before the LORD and wait patiently for him;
    fret not yourself over the one who prospers in his way,
    over the man who carries out evil devices!

    Practicing biblical patience means not worrying about circumstances or even about evil people, but focuses on the LORD, rests in God’s goodness, in God’s good promises. Therefore, we can be still before him, and wait patiently for him. 

    1 Corinthians 13:4
Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant

    Practicing biblical patience shows up in how we love others. See all the “not”s that follow? All three are me-focused. Therefore, a love that is patient and kind is others centered, it is God’s-will centered.

    2 Corinthians 1:6
If we are afflicted, it is for your comfort and salvation; and if we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which you experience when you patiently endure the same sufferings that we suffer.

    Practicing biblical patience is playing a long game, an eternal game. It is seeing our world for what it is, temporary, not our true home, knowing that the relatively brief pains now pale in comparison to a joy-filled forever after.

    1 Thessalonians 5:14
And we urge you, brothers, admonish the idle, encourage the fainthearted, help the weak, be patient with them all.

    Practicing biblical patience is remembering that those around us have an eternity ahead of them too. Dealing with others with patience infused love, focused on their good, not your own desires, or schedule.

    How can we possibly do this? (That’s what I’m thinking, I’m sure at least some of you are thinking the same thing!) I lose my patience with my family all the time.

    Here’s the progression: our love is shaped by our attitude of patience, which is caused and motivated by our remembrance of who God is and what he’s done for us. It’s all about perspective, and our perspective needs to stay fixed on God or we will get off track. On our own, we could never do it, but because God was gracious, loving, and patient with us first, and continues to be everyday of our lives, we can refocus our perspective, readjust our attitude, and restart our actions in a way that glorifies him.

    Soli Deo Gloria!

    Posted on by Anna Young Aside 0