A Mom Who Prays

This past week at MOPS I partnered with two amazing {inspiring, challenging, beautiful, humble, Jesus-lovin'} mommy friends to share on what we see as the mission of motherhood. It was probably one of my top 3 or 4 favorite meetings in the 8 years I've been doing MOPS. The Lord just "brought it" on Tuesday morning! It was so awesome to see the moms going away from the meeting with a fresh challenge to be the moms that God created them to be! I thought I'd share my notes as a few blog posts. I talked about prayer {Andrea talked about intentional mothering and legacies. Brooke talked about discipleship and evangalism}. Now, mind you, praying is something I'm passionate about...but I'm definitely not perfect at it. There are days that only one or two prayers will cross my lips. Other days, my conversations with the Lord are frequent. My challenges were as much for myself as the rest of the moms.

Motherhood provides us with an opportunity to lay down the things you cannot keep on behalf of the people that you cannot lose. They are eternal souls, they are your children, they are your mission field. 

-Rachel Jankovic

So, if your children are your mission field, then prayer must be a part of the work you do for and with them each and every day. I liken parenting, without expectant and intentional prayer, to running on a treadmill….you might be working hard and racking up the miles, but you’re not really getting anywhere. Prayer is a key to making good things happen in our children’s lives today and in the future…it’s a key to growing them into adults that chase after God’s will for their lives. We live in a day and age when we cannot afford to leave the destiny of the eternal souls of our children to chance.
As a mom, you should be covering as much of your children’s lives in prayer as you can. I love how Stormie Omartian describes prayer in her book The Power of a Praying Parent, which I highly recommend. She says “Prayer is much more than just giving a list of desires to God, as if He were the great Sugar Daddy/Santa Claus in the sky. Prayer is acknowledging and experiencing the presence of God and inviting His presence into our lives and circumstances. It’s seeking the presence of God and releasing the power of God which gives us the means to overcome any problem”.
When we pray, we are recognizing our need for God’s power and His presence…that we can’t do this mothering thing on our own. This means that each of us have the privilege of being used by the God who created the universe and knit each one of our children together, to focus His power on the people or circumstance we are praying for. How amazing is that?

Each day, especially now that my two older children are attending public school, I’m becoming more and more aware of the unseen battle that is going on for the lives of our children. Praying is my chance to get into that battle alongside of them…to hold a shield in front of their tender souls. It’s my way of foiling Satan’s plan for my children and helping God carry out His plan for them. Don’t think, though, that just because you’re a mom who only has a newborn, and that baby isn’t even mobile yet and is rarely out of your site, that this battle hasn’t begun for you...that you’re exempt from this part of the mission for a couple more years. Satan seeks to destroy those precious souls from the very first day that the Lord entrusts them to us. If you haven’t already started praying for and with your children it’s never too early and it’s never too late to embark on this part of your mission.

Lamentations 2:19 says “Pour out your heart like water before the face of the Lord. Lift your hands toward Him for the life of your young children.”

So here’s my challenge for all of us...

{Come back tomorrow to read more :o)}