The Daunting Role of Parenting

Today’s Reading: 1 Kings 1-2; John 18:19-40

I read something today that reminded me how beautiful life really is. Check out the post here.

As this little baby continues to grow inside of me, I can’t help but wonder what they’ll look like, how they’ll sound, and what exactly God will do with their life. I know there’s a perfect plan in store for my little one. And I know that I live the following years amazed that God has chosen me for the daunting task of motherhood.
I don’t see myself as measuring up. In fact, I see myself as coming up miserably short. I’m such an imperfect human being. Yet God has chosen to place me in this beautiful role. He has a plan that even I can’t see.
In 1 Kings 1-2, we’re once again reminded of the mistakes King David made as a parent. His children were highly undisciplined and selfish. If they saw something they wanted, like the throne, they took it. Yet, God used David for good. He saw past the imperfections and called him a true man after God’s own heart.
I pray that God does the same for me. Yes, I can look at David’s situation and say that I’ll never have children as undisciplined and selfish as his, but the truth is, there’s just some things I can’t control. My baby will be born into this world as a sinner. It will be up to my husband and I to teach this little one a better way. It will be up to us to direct this little one toward God, the only one that can take and change a sinful heart into something beautiful.
In order to do this I will have to depend on the Lord like never before. I will need strength and patience as I face temper tantrums and disobedience. I will have to have unconditional love when my little one is at their most unlovable.
But already it’s there. While this little one is still in the womb, God has already started to give me a gift of love that is like no other. Because I see this little one as God’s perfect creation, faults and all, the way God intended.

“Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart” (1 Samuel 16:7 NIV).

“Your eyes saw my unformed substance, and in Your book all the days [of my life] were written before ever they took shape, when as yet there was none of them” (Psalm 139:16 Amplified).