If you’re not on this bandwagon yet, it’s time to jump on it. It’s the bandwagon of ditching mainstream theology and finally getting down to what YOU believe about God.

In my “dark night of the soul”, I had to figure out what or who was the source of my torment. Growing up in church I was told it was God allowing pain so I could be a person He could actually do something with. The problem with that messed up ideology is it makes God the abuser, defying His own laws of justice.

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“But if the watchman sees the sword coming and does not blow the trumpet to warn the people and the sword comes and takes someone’s life, that person’s life will be taken because of their sin, but I will hold the watchman accountable for their blood.’” Ezekiel 33:6

By God’s own decree, if you see the predator coming and don’t warn the prey, you are guilty of their blood.

Would God not hold Himself accountable to what He deems just? Would God make Himself guilty by not warning you of danger before it happens? God “will not let you stumble” (Psalm 121:3). But you might let you stumble.

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“Do not withhold good from those to whom it is due [its rightful recipients], When it is in your power to do it.” Proverbs 3:27

It is always within God’s power to do good for you. He cannot withhold it or He becomes a liar.

He is a good Father. And because of Jesus, you are the rightful recipient of good (Strong’s 2896: pleasant, agreeable to the senses). Pain isn’t good for you. It isn’t pleasant or agreeable to your senses. It is PAIN. Pain comes to steal, kill, and destroy (John 10:10). It takes life from you. It has no power to give life.

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“When tempted, no one should say, “God is tempting me.” For God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does he tempt anyone;” James 1:13

When we are in pain, we are never to draw a conclusion that God is testing us.

Tempt: peirazó, Strong’s #3985 - to make proof of, to attempt, test, to try, make trial of, to solicit to sin, scrutinize.

What is testing if not soliciting to sin? God never tests you. He just doesn’t do it. Period. He can’t. It’s not in His nature. Somehow the church totally missed that Jesus was tested for us. God has no need to scrutinize us or put us on trial. He did that to Jesus. You were raised up into life and righteousness. What is there to test?

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I had been a woman of prayer, studying the scriptures daily, for over 20 years when my life fell apart. I didn’t know how to dig myself out of depression from grief and loss, PTSD, fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue syndrome, and anxiety/panic attacks. I didn’t leave God but I left the ministry. I couldn’t take another sermon that was giving me answers but no solutions.

Don’t get me wrong here. I love the church even when she’s not acting like the church. I will serve the church for the rest of my life. But the church has lost more than just the proper translation of scripture. It’s lost its ability to solve people’s real-life problems.

To say God is allowing pain to train you is an answer (also, it’s a lie). But it isn’t a solution to your pain. It won’t help you walk out of pain. It won’t help you break free from destructive cycles. All it will do is cause you to accept an untruth about God so you can cope with your most life-dominating issues. Coping is managing and it certainly isn’t healing.

And that is all Christians around the world are doing…coping. They say they are helping others in their pain because they can relate. But all they can relate to are coping mechanisms that perpetuate the lie that God is the abuser and you should make peace with your pain.

I have no need in my life to make peace with pain. Not after all Jesus died to give me. Jesus didn’t make peace with pain. He defeated it. He put it in the pit of hell where it belongs.

And we can too. But the only way to do this is to put every ideology handed down to us on trial. We do this by testing them against the full council of scripture, not scripture taken out of context like pulpits across America do daily. And we stop reading the Bible in English for cryin’ out loud! Pull out a concordance and study keywords, if not every word in every scripture. This is part of the Biblical process of meditating day and night on the Word of God. We were never just supposed to read the Bible in a year just to check it off our good-Christian to-do list.

And definitely get a mentor. For the next two weeks, I feature an interview with my Hebrew/Aramaic teacher, Chaim Bentorah. I have studied under Chaim for years. Chaim received his B.A. in Jewish Studies from Moody Bible Institute, his M.A. in Old Testament and Hebrew from Denver Seminary, and his Ph.D. in Biblical Archeology.  His Doctoral Dissertation was on the “Esoteric Structure of the Hebrew Alphabet.” But most impressive, I think, is that Chaim has spent 4-5 hours a day for the last forty years studying the Bible in its original languages. Chaim was studying under those who translated the NIV in the 70s and witnessed firsthand how truth in translating was kicked to the curb in favor of money.

Yep. It’s that bad.

But the good news is that Chaim’s thousands of hours of teaching are available on his blog, daily word study emails, Full Access membership, and in his books. His studies will take you deeper into the heart of God than you’ve ever been before.

Photo: https://unsplash.com/@priscilladupreez

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We don’t listen to our hearts enough. As soon as you tell Christians to listen to their hearts they melt down. It’s the result of a lot of bad teaching on the heart.“I don’t listen to my heart! The heart is wicked!” Well, maybe. But not the new heart that Jesus gave you.

The number one way God relates to us is through the heart. When you received salvation, God put a new heart in you. He didn’t leave you with the old one because it was wicked. But your new heart can be trusted… as long as you write the truth on it and don’t let it become like the old one.

Jesus came to “heal the brokenhearted” (Isaiah 61:1). A broken heart is a heart that has been crushed and trampled on. To be broken-hearted quite literally means that someone or some circumstance has walked all over your heart, leaving you with a fractured sense of identity. A trampled heart will believe lies and make judgments that become so real it will no longer recognize the truth. When we see our lives through the lens of a broken heart, we will find evidence to prove the lies and judgments we’ve accepted.

Said another way, the heart will do whatever it takes to make our limiting beliefs real—more real than the Kingdom of Heaven to us. The Kingdom of Heaven is the realm we access through the heart in which all of God’s resources are available to us to solve any problem. We can’t enter into the reality of the Kingdom of Heaven—into Kingdom living, through a heart that has been diseased by lies.

Complicated? Maybe at first. But join me on the podcast this week as we journey to learn about the heart. You’ll learn how it has brought you to the place you are now and how to change course with a healed heart.

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Photo cred: https://unsplash.com/@ryanoniel

What we believe about God determines how well we function under pressure. And really, the root of all emotional stability starts from this same place. Who we believe God is and what we believe He is willing to do for us will determine our next move when we feel backed into a corner.

There is a very interesting exchange between Jesus and a blind man in the book of Mark:

“And they came to Jericho: and as he went out of Jericho with his disciples and a great number of people, blind Bartimaeus, the son of Timaeus, sat by the highway side begging.

And when he heard that it was Jesus of Nazareth, he began to cry out, and say, Jesus, thou Son of David, have mercy on me.

And many charged him that he should hold his peace: but he cried the more a great deal, Thou Son of David, have mercy on me.

And Jesus stood still, and commanded him to be called. And they call the blind man, saying unto him, Be of good comfort, rise; he calleth thee.

And he, casting away his garment, rose, and came to Jesus.

And Jesus answered and said unto him, What wilt thou that I should do unto thee? The blind man said unto him, Lord, that I might receive my sight.

And Jesus said unto him, Go thy way; thy faith hath made thee whole. And immediately he received his sight, and followed Jesus in the way.” Mark 10:46-52

We can be assured Jesus knew the man was blind. And yet Jesus still asks him, “What wilt thou that I should do unto thee?” In other words, what are you willing for me to do for you? Belief in God’s ability is rarely a problem for the Believer. The problem is we are not sure what He is willing to do for us.

And that begs the question: if it is impossible to please God without faith, but we don’t know what God is willing to do for us in our given situation, then how can we pray a prayer of faith for the outcome?

The answer is, we can’t.

The only way to pray a prayer of faith is to be absolutely certain what God’s preferred outcome is.

Which begs the next question: how can you always know God’s preferred outcome for your situation? Join me for this podcast episode where we learn how to become certain of God’s character, intentions, and will toward us. Once you know His desired outcome for your problem you will have to decide if you are willing for God to do it for you. If you know His will, and you are willing to agree with Heaven, you can pray the prayer of faith and experience miraculous results!

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Many would describe grace as God’s unmerited favor, but really that’s more akin to mercy. While favor is certainly a dimension of grace it isn’t a holistic view of grace. Grace is favor but it is a favor that EMPOWERS. It gives us ability beyond our own. It literally empowers us with God’s ability to do what we could never do on our own.

God’s grace working in us is SHEAR. RAW. POWER.

While there are numerous things twisted and wrong about the Supernatural TV series, one thing they did do was provide an excellent picture of grace. In the show, two of the main characters are angels. These angels only had supernatural power when they had their grace. When they lost their grace or if their grace was stolen they were left with mere human ability.

Paul understood the power of grace better than most. Check out these verses:

“I do not frustrate the grace of God: for if righteousness come by the law, then Christ is dead in vain.” Galatians 2:21 (KJV) The word frustrate means to neutralize. If grace were defined simply as unmerited (unearned, undeserved) favor rather than a favor that bestowed power on us and in us it wouldn’t be something we could just neutralize. We can neutralize grace or keep grace from working in us by operating in our own ability versus God’s ability. When we operate in our own strength Christ becomes of no effect to us and we fall from grace (Gal. 5:4). Falling from grace doesn’t mean losing our salvation experience. It means leaving that realm of God’s ability and choosing instead to operate through our strength.

You can see why grace is so vital to living a successful Christian life. Paul knew that aside from grace he was left to his own weakness. But with grace, even his weakness was strong! Paul described his thorn in the flesh as a “messenger of Satan” buffeting him (2 Cor. 12:5). Because a thorn referred to people in the Old Testament (Joshua 23:13) we see that Paul was referring to the crowds of haters that were constantly trying to cancel him (the original cancel culture) so they could persecute him. God responded to Paul’s plea for the thorns to be removed by saying, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” 2 Cor. 12:9. This was not God saying He would put Paul on life-support with a steady drip of grace. This wasn’t God saying, “Paul, I’ve given you unmerited favor. That should be enough for you. Get over yourself.” This was God saying He would empower Paul to triumph! God couldn’t change the free will of the haters but He did give Paul His own grace or ability to be strong in any situation.

God’s ability. Let that sink in.

Jesus had it. We can have it too.

Grace is available to us in abundance. James 4:6 says, “But he giveth more grace.” More grace than what? More grace than the power sin has over us. More grace (His ability and empowerment) than any situation or stronghold has to overpower us. Anywhere that sin abounds, grace abounds more (Rom. 5:20).

So what does this mean? Well, let’s define sin first. There are several Greek and Hebrew words for sin throughout the Bible. If you were to take a zoomed-out look at sin as a whole you would see that sin is not just violating the Ten Commandments. Sin is anytime we are living in a standard that is less than what Jesus died to free us from. Sin is anytime we come short of functioning in our new man, our new nature.

Addiction, depression, fear, unbelief…these are all expressions of sin. But where these abound in us grace ABOUNDS MORE. This means that if we choose to partner with God and lean on His ability to overcome addiction or any pattern of behavior that has held us captive, we can activate His grace which is more powerful and more abundant than the thing we want to overcome!

This takes practice. It could truly be summed up in the only thing God ever told us to strive for…entering into rest.

When we finally rest from trying to white-knuckle it,

grace can take over.

I have a million books in my head. It’s possible the next one could be a grace challenge. I hope you’ll stick with me. Podcasting is coming soon, and more teaching in my Getting Life to Work mentorship group…all designed to help you learn to walk in grace to defeat your addictions, codependencies, and repeated patterns of failure.

Because here’s the thing: many of us came to salvation in Jesus and were immediately set free from a whole slew of destructive behavior patterns. But the reality is, most Christians never overcome their most life-controlling issue, whether it be overeating and yo-yo dieting, pornography, codependency, shame-based thinking, etc. The good news is that it is the same grace working in us at salvation that will work in us to overcome that thing we haven’t been able to defeat!

Photo Cred: @where.mike.at

My Bible teaching centers around one fundamental truth that isn’t very popular. In the Kingdom of Heaven (the realm in which all of God’s resources are available to us), pain is never gain. Pain is pain. Pain comes to steal, kill and destroy. Always. Every time. No exceptions.

And that is why God never uses it to get a desired response from us.

I know. Saying this doesn’t always win me more friends. In fact, it makes a lot of people really mad. But the truth is the truth.

I’ve said over and over that pain has no ability to teach you, train you, or make you a better person. It is only your response to pain that can do that. And that is why God doesn’t use pain to train you.

And He doesn’t even allow it in your life. Man allows it.

Here is where people start freaking out and their heads start blowing up. People will do anything to protect the bad doctrine they’ve used to reconcile the pain that came into their lives.

How can I say God doesn’t allow pain? Because He doesn’t. And those who teach otherwise have to contend with thousands of Bible verses that don’t support their ‘no pain, no gain’ narrative, all of Psalm 121 being just a few of them. Check it out:

“I lift up my eyes to the mountains—
    where does my help come from?
My help comes from the Lord,
    the Maker of heaven and earth.

He will not let your foot slip—
    he who watches over you will not slumber;
indeed, he who watches over Israel
    will neither slumber nor sleep.

The Lord watches over you—
    the Lord is your shade at your right hand;
the sun will not harm you by day,
    nor the moon by night.

The Lord will keep you from ALL harm—
    he will watch over your life;
the Lord will watch over your coming and going
    both now and forevermore.” Psalm 121

I’m not sure how much clearer the Psalmist can be. God KEEPS you from ALL harm. If we find ourselves suffering it’s the result of a fallen world and/or we didn’t heed God’s warning. It was man’s free will that got us here.

God is only in control of our outcomes to the degree
we choose to take responsibility
and refuse to hold Him accountable for our pain.

If God allowed pain even when He could relieve it, He would be in violation of His own system of justice.

“But if the watchman sees the sword coming and does not blow the trumpet to warn the people and the sword comes and takes the life of one of them, that man will be taken away because of his sin, but I will hold the watchman accountable for his blood.” Ezekiel 33:6

“Do not withhold good from those who deserve it when it’s in your power to help them.” Proverbs 3:27

God holds those accountable who see evil coming and do nothing when it is within their power to act. God always sees down the line and it is always within His power to act. Would He not require the same justice of Himself?

The man who is overcome by the sword is overcome because of his own sin. Sin comes in many forms. Sin is not limited to simply violating the 10 commandments. In fact, there are 33 different words for sin in the New Testament. Sin is any form of unbelief in the goodness of God, missing the mark, or living below the standard of the abundant life Jesus modeled for us.

By giving us free will, God has OBLIGATED Himself to hand us over to our desires and beliefs. If we believe He is causing our pain, allowing our pain, or using our pain, we won’t recognize His warning to avoid the pain or take hold of His way out of the pain.

God is always trying to prevent our pain. And when we find ourselves in pain He is always trying to show us how to overcome it. He isn’t using the pain to teach us a lesson. God uses His word and the Holy Spirit to teach and train us. It is a fool that learns through pain alone. It is the wise that heed the warnings of wisdom and learn from instruction.

In my book, Prosperity to Providence, I use Biblical evidence to make the case for the failure of American Christianity, an extrapolated doctrine that taught us to blame God or blame satan for everything that happens in our lives. In all cases, whether we caused our pain, someone else caused it, or Adam’s original sin caused it, we are responsible… we are able to make a response that gets us out of pain. I’ll show you how to get the pain to stop by viewing pain through the lens of the finished work of Jesus. Download a copy today and learn how to get back on the racetrack you were born for!

In my quiet time yesterday, I put on a worship song. If I’m honest, worship music that I can bare to listen to is hard to come by these days. So much of our Christian music tends to put our focus on guilt, shame, and inability (the old man) instead of the new man that is already alive in us. I have found that if I continue to reuminate about my failures I forget about my authority.

But that’s a whole other blog post. ;)

A particular line in one song stood out to me. It said, “My anchor holds within the veil.” It comes from this verse in Hebrews: “This hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast, and which enters the Presence behind the veil.” Hebrews 6:19 (NKJV)

Every time I think of hope I think of this scripture: “Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a longing fulfilled is a tree of life.”

When you put the two verses together they seem to contradict each other. Is hope an anchor or does it make your heart sick? And hope in what? Just hope for the sake of hoping?

God never wanted us to live in the hope deferred condition. He wants us to live with desires fulfilled. The key is putting your hope in the right thing. The answer to what we must put our hope in is found in the verses that precede Hebrews 6:19.

“Men swear by someone greater than themselves, and their oath serves as a confirmation to end all argument. So when God wanted to make the unchanging nature of His purpose very clear to the heirs of the promise, He guaranteed it with an oath. Thus by two unchangeable things in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled to take hold of the hope set before us may be strongly encouraged.” Hebrews 6:16-18

There are two immutable things to put your hope in:

1. God doesn’t lie.

2. He guaranteed your inheritance of all the resources of the Kingdom of Heaven and sealed it with an oath by the sacrifice of Jesus.

I’m feelin’ like that is a pretty great place to anchor yourself.

Keep renewing your mind in everything Jesus died to give you. I say this all the time because I do it all the time. When I’m overwhelmed, frustrated, scared, sick, in grief, lack, or pain I recount what is already mine; what has already been done for me.

Here’s my list straight outta scripture:

·       I have been given all things that pertain to life and godliness. Everything I need to complete my mission and fill my purpose is already here.

·       Every promise God ever made to anyone is yes and amen for me because I am in Jesus.

·       All things can work together for a victorious outcome if I will allow the Kingdom of Heaven to be my only reality.

·       I can always be the head. I don’t have to be the tail.

·       I can always be above. I don’t have to be beneath.

·       God is always FOR me. He is NEVER against me.

·       I am saved, healed, delivered, prospered, protected, anointed, set apart, holy, and righteous.

·       This isn’t God testing me. He tested Jesus for me.

·       Jesus won the victory and gave me the keys to the same authority over death and decay that He has.

Once you’ve renewed your mind to these realities your heart will begin to anchor itself in the right thing and you will begin to see desires fulfilled.

But if you keep hoping in “maybe God will help me” or “God can do whatever He wants whenever He wants so it’s up to Him what happens to me now” you’ll never have the faith to see what you’re hoping for through to fruition. God exercised His free will to give you authority, dominion, and the right to choose whether to partner with Him for your outcome or partner with chance.

In and of itself, hope has no power to anchor you.

Hope for the sake of hoping is not an anchor for the soul. Hope in the finished work of Jesus is an anchor for the soul.

Hoping with fingers crossed that God will do something will make your heart sick with fear of the unknown, longing, and desperation. But hope in the knowledge that the victory for what you’re facing has already been loosed for you in Heaven will anchor you. It will cause you to be immovable and unwavering about the outcome.

In a word, anchored.

And it’s the one who is anchored, immovable, and unwavering that is able to receive what they need from God.

“But when you ask, you must believe and not doubt, because the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind. That person should not expect to receive anything from the Lord.” James 1:6-7 (NIV)

A friend told me yesterday her (now ex) pastor said, “You can’t manifest anything.”

Wow.

Maybe he was trying to speak into the “manifesting” fad that is trending on social media and use a shock statement to get attention. Or maybe he wanted people to fear God as the ultimate authority and make man out to be a puppet on His strings. Regardless of the motivation, he was wrong.

Here’s how I know: what one might call manifesting the Bible calls sowing and reaping. To say we can’t manifest anything because God is the ultimate decision maker is to have a very fatalistic view of God and to ignore every scripture that says He gave man authority, dominion, autonomy, and freewill.

Several years ago, when the book The Secret came out, Christians lost their minds. And recently a movie and documentary have come out, with Christians losing their minds all over again.

Meanwhile, non-Christians all over the world are successfully using the law of sowing and reaping that God wrote into the universe and not even knowing they’re doing it. And yet both the Bible and science (particularly quantum physics) back it up. We may not all use the same terminology, and The Secret may get some details wrong here and there, but manifesting is the Bible, whether we want it to be or not.

The truth is, made in the image of God, we are creators (Gen. 1:27, Psalm 82:6). We create futures. Our lives are the sum total of our past and present belief systems. We are daily reaping what we have sown (2 Cor. 9:6, Matt. 18:18). If we sow in fear we will reap more fear. If we sow lack, we will keep coming up short and even what we do have will disappear (Matt. 25:29).

In the same way, if we believe we have everything we need in the present, even when it doesn’t look like it (Luke 9:16, 2 Peter 1:3. Matt. 25:29), even more will come to us.

Some call it the Law of Attraction, others call it the Law of Belief. I personally lean toward the latter. When we believe there is a way out, we will find one (Matt. 7:8). When we believe we have everything we need to solve any problem (2 Peter 1:3) the solution will come, followed by the steps to get there. When we start with the basic belief that God is for us and not against us (Romans 8:31) and that He always provides a way out when we’re under duress (1 Cor. 10:13) we are sowing a seed. We are sowing a seed that begins with the truth and it will reap a harvest.

But as a seed, it only, ever, bears after its own kind (Gen. 1:11). It won’t bear anything else.

God has given you the ability to choose what you will sow and thereby choose what you will reap. All throughout scripture, He puts the responsibility back on man to decide what the outcome of any given situation will be.

Unfortunately, we miss endless possibilities of a great outcome because we think God is in control.

Nope.

He used His authority to give us authority. And He doesn’t lie or change His mind.

God is only in control to the degree that man gives Him control. And history proves time and time again (as does the present and as will the future) that man does a very poor job at giving God control.

BUT this is all incredible news for you today and every day after if you’ll let this sink in and put it to the test!

Here is my personal process of choosing my own outcome:

1. Look at the finished work of Jesus and decide what He died to give me:

   • Abundant life (John 10:10)

   • A healed heart and every wound relieved (Psalm 147:3 and Strong’s 2280, Isaiah 61:1)

   • Salvation from affliction (Isaiah 61:1 and Strong’s 1319)

   • Set free by any stronghold (limiting or lying pattern of thought/belief) holding me captive (Isaiah 61:1, 2 Cor. 10:3-5, Jonah 2:8)

   • An opening when I am trapped, bound, backed into a corner, or surrounded (Isaiah 61:1)

   • Healing from sickness and disease (Isaiah 53:4, Matt. 8:17)

   • A way out when I am tempted to fear or cave, have a fatalistic mindset about my situation, or tempted to sin in any way (1 Cor. 10:13)

   • “Yes” to all the promises above (2 Cor. 1:20)

2. Recognize God won’t violate my freewill (Jonah 2:7-8)

3. Confess (say the same thing) God has already said about my situation (review step #1) until I see His preferred outcome (for His preferred outcome see step #1) materialize in the natural.

There’s your manifesting folks. And it works if we decide to work with God to see it through to fulfillment, no matter how long it takes and no matter how bad things appear in the natural.

So happy manifesting friends!

There is no doubt things have changed drastically in the last 20+ years, but I also see some things remain the same, especially when it comes to child-rearing. Parenting and family is something I rarely write about, if ever. I think I’ve always avoided it because I wonder how you really know when you’ve succeeded and can claim to be an expert. What is the marker of success in raising kids? Christians would say it’s when you’ve raised fully devoted followers of Christ.

Then there’s the AA song by Walker Hayes…

“I'm just tryna keep my daughters off the pole
And my sons out of jail
Tryna get to church so I don't go to hell
I'm just tryna keep my wife from figuring out
That I married up and she married way, way down
…Hey, I'm just tryna stay out of AA”

Maybe success is somewhere in between? I have no idea where the line is, but after raising a 22 and 21-year-old, and recently becoming the guardian of a 15-month-old, I feel confident I have some timeless advice to offer when it comes to parenting. After looking back at what worked with my oldest two and what is working now with Charlie, here are my best tips for creating parenting years you can actually enjoy!

#1 - SCHEDULE, SCHEDULE, SCHEDULE!!

When my oldest two were little, the biggest controversy in parenting was whether you should use attachment parenting or sleep training. Attachment parenting promoted co-sleeping at night. Sleep training was quite the opposite. It meant helping your child learn to put themselves to sleep by allowing them to naturally fall into a schedule. You wouldn’t believe (or maybe you would) the backlash I got for choosing sleep training and boundaries with my kids. My own parents didn’t understand what I was doing by not rocking the girls to sleep with a bottle. I would put them to bed while awake but sleepy and they would simply fall asleep… no crying, no fits, and no waking up in the middle of the night after just six weeks old.

True story.

And over the years I can attest that women who were hell-bent on co-sleeping (baby in bed with mom and dad) paid a steep price for it in their marriages and overall sanity. (I want to be sensitive and acknowledge here that some parents with children born with medical or special needs that require around-the-clock attention are in a completely different category here. Co-sleeping can happen out of the child’s specific needs in these situations.) I will never understand why parents don’t see the damage they do by rocking babies to sleep and then putting them down. The minute the child realizes they are alone they are filled with terror, almost like time-travel movies where people suddenly wake up and find themselves alone in a totally different century and country. This is what happens to infants when they are consistently rocked to sleep and wake up alone. They are absolutely petrified. And as they grow, the fear eventually becomes habit and reflex. And worse… they come to understand that screaming gets them whatever they want.

Parents… please. Use your heads here. I know you love rocking and holding and snuggling. Do yourself a favor and save it for when they are awake or sick or just the occasional nap time. Come to grips with the fact that you are making that about you, not them. Use smart systems that cause them to naturally fall into their own sleep schedule and you’ll keep hundreds of sleepless nights from ever happening. The peace in your home and the happy little smiles when they wake up in the morning will be a great reward. Most tantrums and poor behavior are completely avoided with proper, REM sleep habits. I recommend the classic On Becoming Babywise by Gary Ezzo and Robert Bucknam. You can read the stories of Babywise moms on Valerie Plowman’s blog, www.BabywiseMom.com. You’ll find sample schedules and testimonies by moms who are constantly told their babies are happy and their toddlers are well-behaved.

Scheduling has worked for three out of three for me so far and I have yet to find a real-life pediatrician or counselor who doesn’t agree.

#2 - TANTRUMS DON’T NEED HUGS, THEY NEED “NO”!

You’ll need Gary and Robert for the pre-toddler and toddler years as well to survive tantrums. Be sure to read book two, Parenting Your Five-to-Twelve-Month-Old Through the Baby Transitions, and book three, From Baby to Toddlerhood, Parenting Your Twelve to Eighteen Month Old. Read these BEFORE you get to these phases. It will literally give you an action plan for every situation your toddler throws at you.

Most of the time, redirecting a pre-toddler is all you need to do, but a child needs to also learn how to handle a firm “no” without throwing themselves on the floor and screaming. If you tell them they can’t have something they want (a hot plate, your important documents, your laptop) and they throw a fit so you give them something else they like you’ve just reinforced a lesson. You’ve taught them that screaming and tantrums produce rewards. You think you’ve told them no. You think they can handle no. But you’ve literally just taught them the opposite.

I fully expected all of my girls to handle being told no without throwing a tantrum. If they did, they are separated from my personal space. They are not allowed to stand in my space and wreck my peace. They are moved to a playpen or another room (wherever it is safe but separated from the family) so they learn one of the most important lessons in life: self-awareness and how to behave in public. If you want to raise teens and adults who don’t throw fits and scream when they don’t get what they want, don’t raise toddlers or kids who do.

I love what one counselor I read years ago wrote about the goal of raising kids (when I remember his name I’ll share the link ;)). He said

“the goal is to raise kids who are a blessing to people around them.”

I would say that’s a pretty good marker for parenting success. My girls aren’t perfect, and I wasn’t perfect, but people do truly enjoy their company. When I raised my first two I studied and read book after book so I went in prepared for the hard stuff. I recommend pretty much anything Dr. Kevin Leman wrote, especially Making Children Mind without Losing Yours and Have a New Kid By Friday.

#3 - SLUMBER PARTY DAYS ARE OVER… AND HAVE BEEN FOR YEARS

I should have listened to Dr. Dobson but I didn’t. He was telling us to ditch slumber parties back in the 80’s. I confess. I didn’t want my kids to be “those kids” that never got to have sleepovers. You know those kids. We all do. They were always treated as teh weird outcasts and rarely had any friends.

But I paid a price for allowing sleepovers and I you will too.

You would be SHOCKED at what your child will be exposed to and by whom at the average sleepover. I thought I was careful. Slumber parties and sleepovers were at the houses of fellow church staffers Rimmel and I were tight friends but the kids watched horror flicks at five and six years old! I should have stopped sleepovers then and there. You would think I would have learned.

But I didn’t.

Years later, a teacher’s daughter passed porn around her fifth-grade slumber party.

My heart was destroyed on both counts. I didn’t do the hard thing. I wasn’t brave enough. I cared more about them fitting in than preserving their innocence. I was the one people knew as Mama Bear over her babies and these gross influences STILL got by me.

NO MORE SLEEPOVERS. Not with family either. In the majority of cases, abusers are family members. Be brave. Be smart. Set the boundary now so your babies don’t pay a steep price later.

Their self-esteem and sense of belonging ultimately come from you anyway. And do you really want your child to fit in with the popular crowd in most schools? Your child needs better friends.

#4 - LEARN TO HEAR GOD IN YOUR HEART. IT WILL SAVE YOUR CHILD’S LIFE. LITERALLY.

Rimmel and I will never forget it. Madison wanted to use our 7-passenger Jeep Commander to fit all her friends for their night on the town. Something in me said no.

“Madison, it’s not because I don’t trust you with it. Something is telling me no in my heart. I’m sorry but you need to take your car tonight.”

Her car was carefully selected by Rimmel. It was a 2005 Mazda 6. Low to the ground with a wide-wheel base. He knew that in a serious accident this would be her best chance.

And he was right.

She was on the freeway going about 70 when she wanted to switch lanes. She didn’t see the black SUV in her blind spot at first. When she did see it, she over-corrected getting back into her lane and the car did three 360’s and a 180, landing her in the Y of an off-ramp facing the oncoming traffic. Five cars piled up behind her. She and her friends were scared for sure but completely unharmed and her car didn’t hit anyone or anything. Had they been in the SUV they would have rolled multiple times and God only knows whether they would have lived or lived with serious injuries.

God is always trying to help prevent danger in our lives. Most of us recall a moment before a tragedy that we had a knowing in our knower. I have had a knowing in my knower when it comes to my girls more times than I can count. Learning to lean into the still small voice of God will help you more than anything else in your parenting.

#5 - APOLOGIZE. OFTEN.

Here’s what I know: parents take too much credit when their children do the right thing and don’t take enough responsibility when they do the wrong thing. We get puffed up with pride when our kids are shining examples of the best parts of humanity but we deflect and make excuses when they embarrass us.

Don’t be that parent. Be the parent who can acknowledge when you mess up. And when you mess up, apologize to your kids. Verbally. Not with a shopping trip or fun outing.

Use your words.

Nothing sealed the bond between me and my girls more than when I messed up, acknowledged it, and asked them for forgiveness. It helped them understand how important it is to be honest in relationships. It helped them see adults are often in the wrong and shouldn’t be trusted just because they are older. It helped them be honest in their relationships and own their own mistakes.

But most importantly, it kept bitterness from growing between us.

When you mess up, your kids see it… often more easily than you do. They feel pain when you yell at them, talk about them negatively to others, or give them a punishment that doesn’t fit the crime. They respect you when you are humble enough to admit your shortcomings.

Parenting is hard. It’s scary, exhausting, and frustrating. It’s also incredible and fun. But you don’t have to fly by the seat of your pants doing it. Be a student. Read lots of books. Read them out loud with your spouse or buy audiobooks. I used to read parenting books out loud while Rimmel worked on a project of some kind. Do whatever it takes to get on the same page and do it early, long before the common problems are known to occur.

And remember to breathe. It sounds cliche but it might be the most important advice you will ever receive.

“And God gave Solomon wisdom and understanding exceeding much, and largeness of heart, even as the sand that is on the sea shore.”
1 Kings 4:29 (KJV)

“Then thou shalt see, and flow together, and thine heart shall fear, and be enlarged; because the abundance of the sea shall be converted unto thee, the forces of the Gentiles shall come unto thee.” Isaiah 60:5 (KVJ)

Enlarged: רָחַב | rachab: to be widened, enlarged, relieved, and expanded with joy (BDB)

“Do not sorrow, for the joy of the LORD is your strength.” Nehemiah 8:10b (NKJV)

I recently shared with my private Facebook group, Getting Life to Work, that I am in the research and study phase for a future book to be called Profile(d). The book will break down the misconceptions in character profiles of some major players in the Bible and reveal how, through our misunderstanding of their lives, God Himself has been mischaracterized or profiled throughout the centuries as a result.

One of the key Bible characters this book will cover is King Solomon. We have this great misconception that God miraculously made King Solomon the wisest man who ever lived. Like, “Poof Solomon! You get to be wise but everyone else who asks for wisdom has to learn the hard way.”

Praise God that’s not quite the case.

When Solomon asked God for wisdom, God responded by showing King Solomon he already possessed the very thing he desired most… a foundation for the Spirit of Wisdom to be the guiding factor in his life.

“Behold, I have done according to thy words: lo, I have given thee a wise and an understanding heart; so that there was none like thee before thee, neither after thee shall any arise like unto thee.” 1 Kings 3:12 (KJV)

The Hebrew word for “behold” is “hinneh”. It means look, after all, lo, here, or indeed. It’s the same word God used in Job when He acknowledged that Job had already handed his own life over to the scrutiny of the enemy. When God says behold He is saying, “Take a look! This is already so.”

At the young age of twelve, King Solomon had already been trained in wisdom by his father, King David, whom he saw make both good and bad decisions. Solomon’s love for God and wisdom to rule is the reason he was chosen to be king. He already had the foundation required to rule justly, he simply needed to set his intention to continually grow in wisdom.

Because to him who has, even more will be given. (Matthew 25:29)

And even Jesus had to grow in wisdom and stature.

Because Solomon feared and loved God, he had the capacity to receive more and more supernatural wisdom. To fear God is to fear doing anything that would break the heart of God. In addition to having the capacity to contain wisdom and understanding, Solomon had the ability to have the boundaries of his heart enlarged. The word enlarged not only means to have the thickness of the walls of the heart enlarged but to have a heart that is specifically enlarged by joy.

How does joy enlarge the heart? When the joy of the Lord is your strength, your heart expands in its capacity to walk in faith-righteousness.

Nehemiah, in an attempt to encourage God’s chosen people after they failed to follow God and their city came to ruins as a result, said to them, “Go and enjoy choice food and sweet drinks, and send some to those who have nothing prepared. This day is holy to our Lord. Do not grieve, for the joy of the LORD is your strength.” Nehemiah 8:10 (NIV)

I’ve met many a Christian who tried to muster up enough joy in difficult circumstances in order to gain more strength. That’s hard to do when life has knocked the wind out of you. Especially if you believe God was the one who orchestrated your difficult circumstances. Even worse are the times we come to realize we were our own undoing.

We are told to just sing worship songs until we feel the joy of the Lord. We convince ourselves if we’ll just get excited about God we will have all the strength we need.

But that’s not what Nehemiah was getting at. Nehemiah is telling the people to allow themselves to call to mind the limitless joy and sheer pleasure God takes in them to receive strength. It is the knowledge of this pleasure apart from performance God takes in you that has the power to strengthen you from the inside out, if you do not allow your own heart to condemn you (1 John 3:20), creating boundaries and barriers of false beliefs you can never break through.

Both King Solomon and Nehemiah had incredibly high leadership lids. Everything they put their hands to came to fruition and the people they led flourished in their work for God! Rather than look at their lack (lack of years of experience, lack of resources, etc.) they looked to a God who took exceedingly GREAT JOY in them. They meditated on the joy of the Lord rather than on their shortcomings.

SO!!! Let the knowledge that God takes GREAT PLEASURE in you strengthen you for whatever you’re facing today! Mediate on that pleasure until it becomes real inside you and all self-condemnation melts away. THEN you’ll be able to receive the wisdom of King Solomon and the leadership ability of Nehemiah.