Warrior Prayers: Day 1- "Obedience"

Children obey you parents in the Lord for this is right. (Eph. 6:1)

Ephesians 6:1 was one of the verses that my oldest son learned at a very young age.  We have talked about the importance that the Lord places on obedience and this scripture has been a big part of helping our sons understand that this is what the Lord requires of them.  Ultimately, that is the most important; that our children follow the Lord and obey Him first.  

Having children with special needs, I have had many comments over the years where others have practically written my sons off as not "able" to understand or comprehend things that typical children can, especially when it comes to God's Word.  However, we have experienced the opposite.  We have used God's Word from day one in our prayers, when we talked to them, and especially when we discipline.  For us, as we train up our boys, it is in the ways of the Lord not in Daddy and Mommy's ways.  The ability to read scripture and answer the questions of "why do I have to do that" or "why can't I do this", has been the way we have chosen to teach our children about obedience.  God gives us so many examples of what happens when we don't obey (Jonah) and what happens when we do obey (Abraham, Noah), that it brings it to life for them and helps them to see what we are trying to communicate to them.  We have also found that they ask more questions which results in reading or talking more about God's Word and I'm amazed at what they understand and remember.

So as you pray for your son's today, remember that God is in control and He CAN do great things in your childs life.  They can learn to obey!  They can understand Gods Word!  They can memorize scripture!  They can____________!  God is able and ready to meet us where we/or our sons are, and to help us; we just need to ask.

Goal for today:

1. Read the section on "Obedience" in Warrior Prayers: Praying the Word for Boys in the Areas They Need it Most.
2. Purpose to get up early and bathe your sons in prayer first thing in the morning.
3. Pray the prayers on page 15 one at a time throughout the day (inserting your sons name).
4. Make the prayers a part of your family devotion time, praying the prayers out loud over your son.
5. Spend some time in concentrated prayer late at night, around bedtime. 

If you have a chance,  introduce yourself to the group in the comments section and let us know who you are and a little about the sons you are praying for,  a link back to your blog if you have one, and/or maybe something you enjoyed about today's prayer challenge. 

As for me, I'm Denise and I'm married to James and we have two sons (12) and (5).  Both of our boys came into our family by a miracle of God through the gift of adoption.  Some of the special challenges we deal with are Fetal Alcohol Syndrome (FAS) and life somewhere on the Autism Spectrum.  We have seen God do wonderful and miraculous things in our boys and I know that He will continue to guide us on this path.  If I can help you or encourage you, please let me know.  It is my desire to be an encouragement to others, especially those Mom's who face special challenges as they raise their children.  When you are discouraged take a deep breath and speak out loud the words of  Phil 4:6-8. 

                                         

Warrior Prayers:Are you ready?

It is the day before we embark on this 21 day journey to lift up our boys before the Lord and watch what He will do in each of their lives.  As I looked at my boys today, I remembered how blessed I have been to be given these two lives to nurture and raise up in His ways.  I have to remember that they aren't mine but His and He has a plan for them!  I will only know what "His ways" are for my sons by digging deep into His Word and bringing each of them before Him and the the most important part is to WAIT for His response.

Before we begin our journey, make sure that you have your copy of  Warrior Prayers: Praying the Word for Boys in the Areas They Need it Most, it is available as a PDF download or on your Amazon Kindle.  The book is priced at $5.97 so every mom will be able to join. We will be reading through this and using it as our guide in focusing on specific areas of prayer in our sons lives.

If you haven't already sent me a message letting me know that you will be joining us for this challenge, please drop me a message at dml4jc@gmail.com.  I want to pray for you and your sons during this journey, so if you would let me know your name and the names, ages and any special needs your sons have, that will help me to specifically pray for you.  (All of this information will be kept in confidence)

Blessings on you and your families!

Prayer warriors wanted

 When I think or myself, "prayer warrior" is not one of the descriptions that comes to mind.  However, I try to bring things, whether for me or for someone else before the Lord.  Yet, I desire for a more structured prayer life.  I want more than just shooting up a prayer when someone asks me to pray for them. I desire to see the faithfulness of the Lord as He responds or answers my requests.  Oh, I have prayed and talked with the Lord, and have seen Him answer in miraculous ways, but wouldn't it be awesome to have prayers topics written out and the answer recorded as a testimony to the faithfulness of our Lord and Savior.  He does hear us and He answers our call. (Psalm 34:17)

Years ago, I went to a women's meeting with my sister-n-law and we heard a wonderful spirit-filled woman of God share with us how to create a prayer journal.  We made a small three ring binder that had the following sections:

1. Meditation on the Scriptures (what has God shown you through your meditation of the scripture)
2. Praise and Thanksgiving
3. Intercession (Divided into the following subsections)
    a. Marriage
    b. Family
    c. Friends/Neighbors
    d. Missionaries/Church
    e. Our Country
4. Personal Petitions
5. Repentance and Forgiveness Prayers

I've taken it out and used it at various times throughout the years, but today I am updating it so that I can use it to keep me focused in my communication with Him.  It is just a tool, and there is no magic about it, but when you journal you capture those moments, feelings or prayers.  When I have looked back in my journals and read the scriptures, thoughts, lessons and prayers, that I wrote down, I have seen the progression of what the Lord was doing in my life and even sometimes in the others whom I have prayed for.  It has been a great reminder of the Lord's faithfulness!

All of this will prepare me for the new challenge that I am embarking on this week.  I have committed to join with Brooke McGlothlin of  Warrior Prayers and many other Mothers around the globe as we pray for our sons in specific ways over the next 21 days beginning on June 8th.  I will be leading my readers over the next 21 days in this challenge and I will be adding a special focus for our "special" boys who struggle with various disabilities and learning challenges. 

I want to encourage you to join in this prayer challenge no matter what the age of your son is.  Even adult sons need the fervent prayers of their mothers.  Let us flood the gates of Gods Throne Room with our praises to Him and our prayers for our sons and then wait for His response! To God be all the Glory!

Mom's day at preschool

The delight of my day was a sweet time in my 5 year olds preschool class.  It was "Mom's day at preschool" and we were invited to come and spend the first half of the day helping our children make a Father's Day gift for their Daddys.  It was so hard for me to just let him make the gift without my perfectionist, symmetrical obsession, but I managed to back off and let him do it.  The second part of the day was having a sweet brunch/tea with the other Moms.  I had a wonderful time fellowshipping with the other Moms in our class. It is the last official get together of the year for the Mom's.  It was a little bitter sweet.

The best part of the day was having my son smile from ear to ear as we played games, and sang songs.  I think it meant a lot to have his Mommy in class for the morning.  What a joy that the Lord has given to me, being able to stay home and raise our boys.  Even though challenges are overwhelming at times, days like this rejuvenate me and give me the boost to keep moving on and enjoying the journey. 

As the school year is coming to a close, I am sad that this stage of our life is ending and we are embarking on new endeavors.  Moving out of the preschool years with my little one and into the elementary years and starting our "official" homeschooling journey.  I also have a soon to be teenager who is moving into a new phase of his life, and experiencing new challenges and changes in his life.  I am so glad that I don't have to do this alone!  I have my husband and the Lord walking on this path with me, and I am learning to enjoy each stage of their lives.

"Busy, Busy..."

It has been so long since I have posted to my blog.  Not because I haven't wanted to, but because I have been so "busy" and haven't had the quiet time to get my thoughts down.  As I was thinking about it the other day, the Veggietales song kept going through my mind.  Can you hear it now...

"I'm busy, busy, dreadfully busy
You've no idea what I have to do.
Busy, busy, shockingly busy
Much, much too busy for you.
We're busy, busy, dreadfully busy
You've no idea what we have to do.
Busy, busy, shockingly busy
Much, much too busy for you.


'Cause we're busy, busy, frightfully busy
More than a bumblebee, more than an ant.
Busy, busy, horribly busy
We'd love to help, but we can't!"

Life these days is more like a freeway than a country road.  Everything needs to be instant and fast, and more and more of us are becoming so impatient.  We are all so busy!   Being busy can rob us of being "still" and focusing on the important things in life, and it can sneak up on us so quickly. 

The things that keep us busy can be good things; serving God, bible study, homeschool conferences, taking our kids to their practices and games, helping a friend or family member, watching someone else's children so your friends can have an evening out, planning for our families meals, laundry, and so on and so on.  While all of these may be good and needful, they are not as good and life giving if we are not first with our Lord and Savior, building up our relationship with Him, confiding in Him about the things that burden us or we need help with, and spending time remembering all He has done for us and worshipping Him.

That is the desire in my heart, that I would take the time with Him and stop being so busy, dreadfully busy that I am to busy for Him.

How does your garden grow?

The word gardening can evoke different feelings for different people.  To me it was always a "bad" word, because I grew up having to pull weeds frequently in the yard and never learned how to grow a garden.  Another big one is that I abhor to get my hands dirty.  So when my husband expressed interest in getting a garden plot at the local "Community Garden" in our city, I didn't jump for joy.  However, things are beginning to change....

Earlier in the week, we went over to clear out the weeds that had grown in our plot and get it ready to plant some plants that a dear friend had given me several weeks ago.  That evening did not turn out to be such a great experience, but it was an opportunity for the Lord to work on my character once again.  I blew it, and did a lot of apologizing that evening for reactions to situations that occurred while we tended to the garden. However, it did help me to see areas in my life where I need to change.  It is always best if we can learn from our circumstances, take correction and change in order to line up with how our Creator desires us to live.

"The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and instruction"

Prov. 1:7

During this week, my husband tended to the garden each day, taking one of our sons over with him on occasion.  It was fun for our little guy to work with his Daddy.  At his tender age of 5, he is so curious and interested in anything new.  Gardening is a great opportunity for our son to grow and develop in an area that is really lost in our society today, where parents and kids are most often glued to electronic devises 24/7 rather than being out in nature or working hard to grow their own food.

So this morning was a wonderful time for us to go get some veggies to plant in our garden.  We all went to the nursery and picked out our favorite veggies and then went over to the garden to plant.  As we were planting, we had to work together and we all did our part.  I have to say my husband was so awesome at working with my 5 year old and allowing him to do the work too, my boys have one AWESOME Dad. 

When we came home, I had a much different perspective about "gardening".  Several thoughts came to me about what I found enjoyable:

• It was providing a chance for our family to be together.
• We are learning to work together with 4 different personalities, and desires.
• As a family, we are "learning" how to tend to a garden.
• Our sons are learning to do "work". 
• We are being given opportunity to meet other people in our community.
• We get to watch our plants grow and hopefully reap a harvest of yummy veggies.

Having a garden isn't as difficult as I had always thought it would be, but it takes TIME!  We have to make time to tend to our garden.  We need to pull ourselves away from the things that gobble away at our time; over scheduled lives, TV, Internet, etc...  How exciting to pull away from the crazy fast lane of life and slow down to enjoy something that can benefit us spiritually, emotionally,and physically. 

Hmmm...that sounds rather familiar.  This is also what we need to do to tend to our relationship with God.  We NEED to take time to nurture our relationship with the Lord, taking time away from what we feel are the pressures of this life, having that childlike curiosity we had as a baby christian and seek out the Lord and desire to learn and grow, and working on the one and only relationship that brings life...the fellowship with our Heavenly Father.

What an awesome lesson to learn this week, and I look forward to the harvest both in my garden and in my relationship with God.



Mother's Day!

Mother's Day is special to me, and is a time for me to remember the faithfulness of God!  I am so grateful to the Lord for giving me the desire of my heart, to be a Mom.  I didn't become a Mother in an easy or traditional way.  I waited, cried, doubted, prayed, waited and waited some more.  And after almost 10 years, the Lord fulfilled His promise to me and gave us a son.  I was now a Mom, what an amazing feeling! 

Our son was all that I had prayed for; a boy, a blood relative on the paternal side of my husbands family, and sensitive to the things of the Lord.  While the first two were obvious at the beginning, we have seen the last quality show itself at a young age and is continuing to grow. 

It is absolutely an amazing and overwhelming feeling to become a Mother, and such an awesome privilege.  He blessed us 6 1/2 years later with another boy who is also a true miracle of God. 

While being a Mother is challenging at times, it is such a blessing.  To have my little one smile from ear to ear and say "Happy Mother's Day" is such a sweet feeling, and a reminder that God is faithful to all His promises.

My first Mother's day was shortly after we brought our oldest son home.  This was the "Family Circus" cartoon in the newspaper on the morning of my first Mother's Day .

God is FAITHFUL!!! 

Psalm 37