Compassionate Judgement?

If you follow my blog, then you know that for the last 6 years we have been walking through the world of foster parenting.  Two years ago, the goal for two of the four blessings we have was changed to termination of parental rights.  For two years we have navigated the never-ending roller coaster ride of canceled and postponed court dates.  

At the beginning of the journey we were hopeful that the biological parents would be able to get the help they needed and reunify with the kids.  But as the years ticked by, and more kids were added to our number, and as they continued to struggle with making good life choices, we realized that termination of parental rights would be what was best for the kids.  Each of these sweet babies deserve a permanent, stable future and after 6 years of instability we were ready to move on.

Well the day finally arrived, with great anticipation we headed down to the court house ready to have an end to this craziness, at least for two of these babies.  We were filled with excitement and nervousness as we entered the courtroom and the trial for termination actually began.  The judge was seated at the bench, the state's attorney and DCFS lawyers were ready to go.  The biological parents were there with their attorneys, and we were sitting with our attorney.  Ready, set, go!

Then the strangest thing happened.  As I looked at my brother's face and his wife's face, I was struck with an overwhelming sense of sadness for them.  I was expecting a different emotion...joy that judgement day had finally arrived, "You made your bed, so go lie in it," kind of sentiments. Instead, I was heartbroken at the finality of all of this for them.  The children that they birthed would no longer be connected to them in anyway.  No longer would they have any legal rights to them, even the birth certificates would erase their existence from the lives of these kids.  I should have been jumping for joy...this has been a long, hard battle.  They have been terrible to the children, and terrible to my husband and I.  Time after time they had the opportunity to make changes and they did not even one time choose to make any real alterations.  They may have given a little lip service here or there but in the end they each went right back to the  lifestyles that got the children removed in the first place.  So why was I feeling compassion rather that satisfaction?

As I thought more on this, I couldn't help but connect the events of this situation to what is coming for all of us in the future.  Someday each of us will face our final judgement day (Matthew 25:31-46) and I couldn't help but wonder if God's heart would be as heavy as mine was for these biological parents.  Will He be heartbroken for the people who gave lip service but no real commitment to the life changing relationship with their maker?  Will He be filled to overflowing with compassion for people who continued in their lifestyle even though they had been given opportunities for change?  Will He feel tears spring up as He looks into the eyes of His creation and has to pronounce the judgement that he/she has chosen for him/herself?  I can imagine that His heart will be broken that day, knowing that He did all He could and yet hell is what is awaiting these people.  No more second chances, His name will be forever removed from their birth certificate.  This time, not because He chose that but because they chose to erase His existence from their lives.  It will be a sad, sad day for the Maker of Heaven and Earth when He has to stand in that "courtroom" as tears of compassion roll down His cheeks.  I guarantee He will have no thoughts of, "Well you made your bed..."  Rather, He will likely have to turn away as sadness overwhelms Him when the final judgement is read.

Thoughts?  Questions or Comments?  As always, I love to hear from you!

Knock It Off!...Oh Wait, You're talking to Me?

It happened again, it always happens.  I guess I can't blame people.  I guess I should be use to it.  But, I'm not.  Sometimes I can laugh about it, actually most of the time.  I can handle the stares, and smile back in response.  But, the comments...well I am not as graceful about those.

I have a big family, (8 children, 2 parents, sum total=10).  When we all go out in public together it is quite a sight.  It is no wonder people stare. Some of the bolder population will even ask me, "Are they all yours?" 

I can handle those questions with grace, because I realize we are a bit of a spectacle and that big families are not that common these days.  Recently, however, I was at a restaurant with 5 of my children, 1 teen and my 4 little ones.  Immediately upon being seated, I felt the stares and saw the pointing finger whispering.  I smiled, passed out sippie cups and french fries and went about my own business.  My precious, "I don't like restaurants, high chairs, or sitting" 20 month old began to tap the table with his cup.  It truly wasn't loud and I decided that it wasn't worth the battle and continued eating.  Unfortunately the whispering diner just down from our table, the one who needed to work on her whispering skills, yeah, well she thought it was a big deal.  She smiled at her family, nodded at her sleeping infant in the carseat next to her and stated in a fake whisper, "I'm glad my kids aren't like that."

The hair stood up on the back of my neck and my eye began to twitch.  I thought to myself two things. 1- I'm glad your kid isn't like this because clearly you wouldn't have the patience to deal with it and 2- Your kid isn't like this YET....but just you wait.

Now neither of those responses are very Godly.  Neither would display the command of Jesus from Matthew 5:43, "Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you." But I justified my thoughts by saying to myself, "Well I am not as bad as her.  At least I didn't say out loud what I was thinking."  I was still steaming about this lady's comments as I drove home from our outing.  I was discussing it with my teen, when I realized that my thoughts and attitudes toward this woman who had "judged" me, were every bit as mean and ugly as her words.  I began to think about all the Scriptures in the New Testament where it was recorded that, "Jesus knew their thoughts."

Geesh!  Next thing you know, I was convicted.  I realized that I am responsible for my attitudes and actions, not the whispering diner's.  I realized that it has to start somewhere...the no more judging, no more comparing, no more criticizing.  It has to stop!

Well God has a funny way of working and the next thing you know I get an email in my inbox from Hearts at Home's founder, Jill Savage.  Want to guess what it was about?  Well, it was all about this very thing.  It was an invitation to take the Knock It Off Commitment.  This commitment included the following pledges:

• Giving myself grace when I make mistakes.
• Extending grace to other moms when they make mistakes.
• Offering other moms the benefit of the doubt instead of jumping to judgmental conclusions.
• Recognizing that I cannot be and will never be a perfect mom.
• Refusing the temptation to judge when other moms make different choices than I make.
• Embracing differences instead of criticizing them.
• Resisting the urge to compare my insides to other women’s outsides.
• Making strides in honesty with other moms and living an authentic life.
• Doing my part to stop the mommy wars, one “Knock It Off” decision at a time.

So how about it?  Is this an area you struggle with also?  If so, are you willing to take the pledge with me?  Maybe we could start a whole new revolution.  I wonder what the world would be like if we all stopped criticizing and comparing and started helping each other out instead?  What if we truly loved our neighbor as our self?   What if we saw ourselves and others through the eyes of our gracious and loving Savior?  Will you join me?  Just head on over to the page Hearts at Home and sign up! 

Questions or thoughts?  You know I love to hear them!

The Scarlet Letter

I am currently working through Beth Moore's, Believing God Bible study, with an awesome group of ladies.  Today's lesson set my mind to thinking about the labels that we wear in our day to day life.  Labels that we allow to define us, and to keep us from walking in grace with ourselves and others.

Perhaps you have read the famous tale penned by Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Scarlet Letter, it tells the story of Hester Prynn, who finds herself pregnant with a child she conceived through adultery.  She is forced to wear a scarlet letter "A" on her clothing as a mark of her past mistake and present shame.  Reminds me of another woman caught in the act of adultery, maybe you are familiar with it.

The story is just 11 short verses right at the beginning of John chapter 8.  Jesus has traveled to the Mount of Olives and at the first light of day, the Pharisees bring in a woman who has been caught in the act of adultery and they remind Jesus, as if He has forgotten, about the laws of Moses.  They are trying to trap his but Jesus is smarter than that.

He bends down and writes some unknown message in the sand and then He says to them, "If any one of you is without sin, let him be the first to throw a stone at her" (verse 7).  Then starting with the oldest, most seasoned sinners, one by one, each of her accusers slip away.  Jesus then asks this scorned, shame-filled woman, "Where are they? Has no one condemned you?" (verse 9).  She tells him that no one has and then some of my favorite red letter words are spoken, "Then neither do I condemn you...go now and leave your life of sin."  (verse 11).

I can relate to both of these women, not in the area of adultery, but with wearing the label of shame.  With being in front of the whole world and having everyone see the mistakes you have made.  So many things mark my past.  I am unsure of where to even begin in sharing them. These are areas I like to keep tucked away in the darkest corners of my heart.  The problem is, these labels don't stay tucked in.  They creep out at the most inopportune times to remind me of my shortcomings...to shout to the world around me how inadequate and imperfect I really am.

The abuse I suffered as a child, marks me with the labels of shame and victim.  The rejection from my parents throughout my lifetime marks me as unlovable.  The unanswered cries for help marks me as forgotten. So the scarlet letters "S," "V," "U," and "F" are pinned to my daily attire.

These are all labels forced upon me, but even worse are the labels I have chosen for myself.  These are the labels I have the toughest time finding grace for.  Labels I have received because of the choices I have made: the struggle with alcohol in my early teens that lead to many poor choices, the failure to forgive others when I know I should marks me as unforgiving, my lack of trust in others marks me as controlling, the list goes on and on.  Add the letters "P.C," another "U," and a "C" to my already crowded clothing.

Maybe you are wearing labels to, whether by your own choosing or by no choice of your own.  Labels like: Divorced, Single parent, recovering addict, adulteress, abortion haver, terrible parent...the list truly is endless.

 But I am forgetting two of the most important labels we should be wearing.  Two labels that erase all other labels. REDEEMED and CHOSEN.  2 Corinthians 5:17 tells us that if anyone is in Christ, he or she is a new creation, the old (labels) is gone and the new (redeemed/chosen) has come.  Now friend that is some seriously great news!

The problem is applying that truth to the day to day.  In my mind I think my junk is worse than other's mistakes.  I bet Rahab could relate.  Do you remember her?  Her story is way back in the book of Joshua chapter 2.  She is the prostitute that helped hide the Israelite spies who had been sent to check out the promise land.  At risk of her own life, despite the label of prostitute that she wore, she hid the spies and helped them escape certain death.  An unlikely hero for sure.  But her story doesn't end there.  If you jump ahead to the New Testament book of Matthew the first chapter, you will get another look at our hero.  Matthew 1:5, "Salmon the father of Boaz, whose mother was Rahab..."  There she is, right in the lineage of Christ...and she is the mother of Boaz, the man who foreshadowed Jesus' rescue plan by rescuing Ruth after her husband had died.  Does that make you as excited as it does me?  God used Rahab, a harlot of harlots, to make up part of his son's earthly inheritance, talk about a life redeemed!  He changed her "P" to an "R."

I think we can get our best instructions on peeling off these labels from Ephesians chapter 4 verses 22-23, "You were taught, with regard to your former way of life, to put off your old self (and those scarlet letter labels), which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires; to be made new in the attitude of your minds."  Oh friend,isn't that where the battle lies, "in the attitude of your minds?"  We allow satan victory day after day over us because we struggle to forget what is behind and press on toward what lie ahead. (Phillipians 3) We allow our past to define our present. Sometimes our shame keeps us from being honest and open with others.  We say to ourselves, If they only knew where I have been, what I have done..."  May it not be so! God has so much more in store for us if we can just allow the attitudes of our minds to readjust.

 Tenth Avenue North has an awesome song entitled, You Are More, that reminds us, "You are more than the choices that you make, you are more than the sum of your past mistakes...this is not about what you've done, but about what has been done for you."  My favorite line says, "You've been remade," but I like to sing it, "You've been renamed," because despite all my labels, earned or assumed....I have been renamed, REDEEMED and CHOSEN, and if you have accepted Christ as your Lord and Savior, then so have you!  And though we may deserve to wear a variety of scarlet letters, Isaiah 1:18 sums it up best:

Come now, let us reason together,”
    says the Lord.
“Though your sins are like scarlet,
    they shall be as white as snow;
though they are red as crimson,
    they shall be like wool

Now that is something worth shouting, "Hallelujah" for!  If you would like to hear more or have questions please feel free to contact me, I will get back to you as soon as I am done peeling off all these stinking labels :)