Church

Childlike Trust

 

The following petition comes from the prayers for this day by the Lutheran Church – Missouri Synod…

For childlike trust in our heavenly Father, that the Holy Spirit would lead us to trust that all we need for each day of life we receive as daily bread from our Father, and that He would drive away all worry and anxiety, let us pray to the Lord. Lord, have mercy.A child prays.

I was struck by the phrase “childlike trust.”  A childlike trust is one in which the child looks to the caregiver to provide all things. A child doesn’t worry about her next meal or where she will sleep. She doesn’t contemplate how the rest of the world views her. No, she trusts her father to fully meet her needs. If she needs something, she asks.

Throughout my barren walk, I have NOT kept a childlike trust. I have often wondered how there would ever be children gathered around my table for a meal. I have wandered the aisles of department stores, pondering the absence of a crib in my own home and begging God to give me a reason to walk down the baby aisles. I have kept my head bowed low as conversations about newborns and toddlers have been shared. I have been angry over “what should be mine.” I have not trusted  God to provide for all of my needs, and I have not taken my concerns to my Father in heaven. Rather, I trusted myself. I thought I knew what was best for me. I figured God hadn’t read MY plan-book yet. I failed to look to Him as my caregiver and provider. I disregarded His good plans for me, plans that may or may not include children.

And so I beg my heavenly Father for forgiveness. As the words are stated above, I pray that the Holy Spirit would teach me to receive my daily bread with thanksgiving. I pray that God would continue to put before my eyes all the blessings that are mine through His grace. I fervently beg Him to drive away all of my worries that surround my barrenness. It is He who brings contentment. I place my trust in God, my Father, for He will take care of me.

VBS

It’s easy to forget about barrenness during VBS week. Maybe it’s because there’s no time to think about it. Maybe it’s because there is such joy in helping parents in their own vocation of raising children in the Faith.

Or, maybe it’s because the kids can’t help but pour out their love, attention, and special brand of affection on whomever is taking care of them at the moment.

Here is a splash of some of that special brand I received this year:

“I want a kiss. No, on the lips.” Mr. Dumpling

“God has three persons!” Adorable Blonde Boy

“Hey, those are the same clothes you wore yesterday!” Miss Precocious repeatedly yelled out to me during the opening song. (Hey, I was only given one decal.)

“God is one!” Same Adorable Blonde Boy

(singing) “‘Only thou art holy; there is none beside me.'” Mr. Summer Tan

“What’s on your forehead?” Miss Wrinkles-Her-Nose (It was sweat.)

(silent, stoic high-five every time a song ends) Miss Teeny-Tiny

“She’s going swimming!” Mr. Not-Correct’s response to the question of why the missionary we were supporting was going to Cameroon.

“Are you going to get punched in the face?” Miss Teeny-Tiny finally spoke aloud to me in the middle of a song the final day of VBS. (She was mistaking me for the lady who was going to get a pie in the face if the kids raised enough money for the missionary through their daily offerings.)

“He’s a big, blue, powerful God.” Mr. Not-Quite-Right

“I can spell VBS.” Cutie Patutie with Curls (And she could.)

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Word

John 1:14

The Word became flesh and dwelt among us.

The Word.

As I sat listening to my favorite (and most handsome) pastor preach one morning, I was struck with the enormity of how John renders the Gospel in that one verse above.

Have you ever thought about how we use words? Language influences what and how we think and do things. Like, why do I like to work out? Because I was told it was good for me, and watched other female athletes talk and walk the walk of fitness as I grew up. I admired (and wanted to be like) them. While fitness is a nice and maybe worthy endeavor, my pastor* reminded us how the world’s words, tainted by sin, are full of half-truths, some are blatant lies and most are just plain selfish. Health and wealth is never the ultimate prize in this world. Yet we hurt and slander our neighbors, those closest to us, because we believe the world’s false promises of a better life with these achievements, so we try to get ahead and preserve ourselves. Yet even that, self-preservation, is a farce. Apart from Christ, we are not preserved. In fact, we should just strike that word from the dictionary as non-existent. Like autonomy and individualism. Erm, I digress . . .

Further, these godless words tear families apart. They construct golden calves where they need not be. No children? Not enough children? If we just take care of this medically… We buy into cultural and selfish desires of our own making, and justify them with words that have nothing to do with God. We’re going to a fertility specialist. After three kids, I’m done. I was meant to have this size (whatever it is) family. And whether we get our ways or not, we like to live in our own little worlds that avoid a connection to the Truth that’s outside of ourselves. We become our own little gods. But that gets old, lonely and scary quick since, well, we’re not God.

But . . .there’s good news.

Even in the midst of our folly, Jesus, the living Word, pierces through and yet mends our forked tongues and minds. He places on us the perfect Word, enacted and strengthened by the Holy Spirit through preaching, baptism and the Lord’s Supper by pastors, so that we might hear, touch, taste and repeat this Word to ourselves and neighbors. That anyone ever receives faith at all is because of it. And we live in this Word baptismally, through service to others, daily, and as God has rightly called us in our various vocations.

By God’s grace this Word enables us to repent, be served heaps of forgiveness so that we may humbly serve and reconcile to our loved ones… since we are sure to have caused them offense, knowingly or not. Apart from Christ, our words and works stink. They do nothing for anyone’s eternal well-being. But THEE Word and His work does. By becoming flesh, dying and rising again, this Word saves and brings us eternal life. Moreover, we get to receive and confess this very Word weekly in Divine Service with our one true family in Christ. Thanks be to the Word Incarnate!

*If the reader didn’t catch on, my pastor is my husband.  No scandals outside of Christ crucified here, folks.

A Tiny Suggestion

This post is not for the barren but for those who love the barren.

Dear, dear friends:

Thank you.

Thank you for reading this blog.

Thank you for loving your barren friend, for praying for her, for listening to her, for taking care of her physical needs, for encouraging her to go to church, and for reminding her of God’s promises made to her in Holy Writ and kept for her by Christ on the cross. Outside of these tried-and-true methods of help, it can be hard to know exactly what else you can do to support your barren friend as she bears the cross of childlessness. You may be tempted on occasion (in love and with the best of intentions) to forward on one of our posts directly to your barren friend’s personal email account. You may think that what we have said on here is something she needs to hear.

But, consider this bit of correspondence I recently received from a barren woman.

“Today I was ambushed by several well-intentioned friends with ‘helpful’ articles meant to encourage me, but they did just the opposite. They reminded me of my hurt.”

Personally forwarded posts have an air of projected expectation about them. They often read like law, as if you are suggesting to your barren friend through the post exactly how she should be feeling, what she should be doing, and how she should be enduring her grief and pain. If your barren friend is currently in the denial, anger, or depression stages of her grief cycle, then she does not need instruction on how to handle her grief. She needs simply to endure it.

What your barren friend really wants during these stages of grief is for you to listen to her, to sit with her in the stinking pit of pain, and to tell her that you love her.

I am not saying that it is never appropriate to share HRTB posts with her directly. I am simply saying that patient endurance of your friend’s long-suffering is a way of supporting her that will feel less like you are instructing her in her grief and more like you are loving her.

Which, we know, you always are.

So, thank you for patiently bearing with us, with our heightened emotions, with our perpetual bouncing back and forth between the stages of grief, and with all that comes with crosses.

We need you.

XOXO

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A stellar spot for listening

Barren . . .with Children?

Whoozeewatsit? Barren with children?

Well…yes. Stay with me.

When I sadly and too often see parents prioritize sports over Sunday School, sleepovers instead of sermons, poke fun of or complain about their pastors in front of their kids, or send their children to confirmation yet never darken the church’s door themselves, I have to wonder where the real LIFE of that family is. How can they keep their spiritual hearts beating when they aren’t receiving–or are blatantly denying–any quality spiritual food? One might say they are fast approaching a barren spiritual life, since where there is no Jesus, there is no spirituality or life. And that can’t be good for anyone, nevermind their children.

But readers, please don’t take this as a motivational speech, scared straight talk or condemnation (from me). We are all condemed who are born into sin. Yet Jesus is on the heels (the eyes, ears and knees, etc.) of the baptized; convicting and beckoning us all to Him, so that we might repent and confess Christ crucified for us, and be forgiven.

And when that conviction and peace comes, how can anyone stop it from overflowing from their own hearts and minds and onto our little ones? It simply can’t not (yup, I love double negatives). It can’t not compel a mother and father to bring their child into the sanctuary. It can’t not move parents to baptize their infants. It can’t not motivate them to discipline their young to listen to the Sermon, participate in the liturgy, and receive Christ in His body and blood. It can’t not… for where His Word is proclaimed and Sacraments administered, there too is Jesus, with all the promises and benefits therein to sustain his Church into eternity.

That is our true life, devoid of barrenness, and what faithful albeit sinful parents believe, teach and confess for their God-given little miracles. Our children need nothing more…and will certainly suffer with anything less.

I pray this post also encourages the childless who also faithfully gather around the altar, pulpit and font to know God’s wisdom in the face of their afflictions. But barrenness in this context points to the ultimate ail in all of existence… separation from Jesus, the one true, Fruitful Mulitiplier of His Church. The fruitfullness comes both in numbers and in faith, sometimes one more than the other, but it always comes, because He promises it will, in order that we might know Him and where He is. In Him we’re whole– both here and in heaven–because of Christ crucified and risen for us, not because of how many proverbial arrows we’ve been endowed with or not.

Let us confess joyfully this full life that we share, and pray that all are compelled by the Holy Spirit to bring their families right to where Jesus, our life and salvation, is.

My Husband Is a Father

My husband is a tender father in the Faith.

He sits at the bedside of his world-weary children and leads them beside still waters. He walks with them through the valley of the shadow of death and sings to them Simeon’s Song. He restores their souls in the reading of God’s Word.

My husband is a faithful father in the Church.

He baptizes and teaches his parishioner children. He catechizes, comforts, consoles, and counsels them with all fatherly affection. He speaks the unpopular Word to them for their eternal benefit, slaying straying hearts with the Law and resuscitating the repentant with the Gospel breath of God, Christ’s blessed work of atonement on the cross for them.

My husband is a warrior father in the marketplace.

He picks up the banner of life and waves it before his neighbor. He wears a precious feet pin on his lapel to remind himself and others of the children destroyed every minute of every day through abortion. He defends the rights of the least of these, entreating parents not to abandon their children to be frozen in fertility clinics. He gives his time, talents, and treasures to those who have none and opens his heart and home to the fatherless.

My husband is a devoted father to our nieces, nephews, and godchildren.

He patiently endures guerrilla attacks of tiny, would-be wrestlers. He reads pink-and-purple books about fairies and princesses to sleepy, little dreamers. He stands guard next to half-pints in hospital beds awaiting their turn in the operating room. He jumps off two-story pontoon boats into smelly, murky lake water for the entertainment of squealing, human fish, and he daily remembers those fish in prayer.

My husband is childless, but he is a remarkable father.

Happy Father’s Day, Michael! xo

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Get Ready to GETAWAY!

The Great Getaway is approaching fast, and registration for on-sight attendees is now filled and closed. However, we do have room left for commuting attendees.

Do you crave fellowship with other women who understand what it’s like to be childless or to lose a child? Do you have ethical questions about infertility medicine you’d like to ask a pro-life doctor? Would you enjoy eating decadent desserts prepared by a loving pastor and his wife who just want to spoil you rotten? Do you need a retreat in a beautiful house near a scenic park in historic St. Louis?

Then, you might want to join us this summer for the The Great Getaway on Friday, July 26th through Sunday, July 28th. Retreat details and registration information can be found here.

Children at Birthday Party

First Mother’s Day

Mother Watching BabyA Mother’s Day reflection from a sister in Christ:

“How exciting, your first Mother’s Day,” they say.  After many years of hoping for children, we welcomed our daughter last summer.  We are grateful for this new life given to us.  So why do I have a similar anxiety about this upcoming holiday that I had during all those years we struggled to conceive?  Afterall, our baby girl is now here.  It’s now my turn to celebrate, right?

I started to look at the print, television, and radio advertisements for Mother’s Day, and it doesn’t take long to add it all up. Take a look…

“Save on what Mom really needs.”

“Make it about Mom.”

“Give her what she deserves.”

“How to love yourself on Mother’s Day.”

“Say ‘I love mom’ with these items.”

“It’s all about Mom.”

Aha, the wordly trinity of me, Me, and ME!  A celebration without Christ is a celebration that fades with all things of this world.  The devil would prefer that I personally take credit for all of the good gifts God has given me.  This includes a child and the abilities God has given me to care for her.  It is not on account of my ability that I have these gifts, but God’s grace.  He works all things for the good of His kingdom, and we thank You, Lord, for this vocation of motherhood.

Thank you, Lord, for the sacrifice of your son Jesus Christ that we may not boast in our abilities, but in all things recognize You are the great provider humbly working in and through us.

Adrienne Rasmussen
Wife, mother, daughter, and your sister in Christ