Provoked: Faithfulness in All Seasons of Life w/ Rachel Zwayne

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Brothers, what we do in life echoes in eternity.

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I mean, this is what's wrong with the Christian church today. We don't know who God is, and we don't know who we are.

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This is where we hold them. This is where we fight. Officer, you need to repent of your lawless conduct.

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You don't know the law, and yet you pretend to represent it. That's not law enforcement, sir.

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That's being a thug. We will not stop fighting and bothering you all until this monstrous, barbaric practice of legalized abortion ends, and we are teaching our children to do the same.

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God's word says that the shed blood of innocent humans cries out for justice, and mark my words, they will have their day in court.

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Nobody gets saved by being treated nicely. They get saved by hearing the gospel.

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Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ. If we don't open our mouths and commend

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Christ, we're not loving Him, no matter what we're doing with our hands.

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Hello everyone, you are watching another episode of Provoked. My name is Desi, and I'm missing my best buddy and co -host,

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Zach. But today I have a very special guest, and it's going to be, I don't know,

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I think this is going to be one of my favorite episodes. But we'll see. Before we get started,

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I just wanted to encourage you to get Apologia All Access if you haven't yet, because when you do that, it really keeps the lights on, and keeps us able to do all that we do here at Apologia.

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And if you haven't yet, you should definitely sign up to get access to Bondson U, because it's free, and it's amazing, and there's all these amazing lectures, and just such great content that you're going to have access to.

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There's so much new stuff going on, if you haven't watched Ask Me Anything yet with Pastor Jeff, then you need to go check those out, because they're really fun, and informative, and pop on.

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I think it's just for All Access members, but you can ask Pastor Jeff anything, so it's really cool.

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Today we have a very special guest. Her name is Rachel Zwain. She's the daughter of Ray Comfort, wife to Easy Zwain, and she has a lot going on in her life, being a mom of five,

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I think, and a grandma, and a wife, and she has a page called

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Joyful Mothers, where she's encouraging wives and mothers to set their minds on the things of Christ, and just to encourage them through all seasons of life.

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So I'm going to bring her on right now. Hi Rachel, how are you? Hi, thank you so much for having me.

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Oh, it's an honor. Thank you for your time, and for joining me today. I've been looking forward to it.

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So many of my friends follow your Joyful Mothers. I've shared that, and they're all excited to hear this episode.

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So thanks for hanging out with me today. I'm excited. I'm excited. I was just so blessed to chat with you on the phone the other day, and I'm excited to keep talking.

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Likewise. Thank you so much. So what I want to do is just kind of start with telling the audience who you are, and you can go as far as you want, like back, or brief, or however you want to do it, but I just want them to kind of get a snapshot of who you are, kind of your testimony, and your life, and we'll just go from there.

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Yes, well, I am originally from New Zealand, way down under, and I was,

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I grew up in a Christian home. I was very blessed to have that kind of upbringing, and basically, you know,

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I had just, I was a pretty compliant child, and so I didn't have to be disciplined too often, and I was always hearing the gospel, and the danger with that was that I think that I was trying to be a good person in one sense, but also understanding that that's not how

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I was going to be saved, but there was just a sense of just feeling good about complying and obeying, but one of the issues that the

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Lord used for me was my relationship with my brothers, and I remember thinking every night,

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I would confess my sins, and then I would think, okay, tomorrow

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I'm just going to be really nice to my brothers, and so, sure enough, the day comes along, and I'm struggling so much, and feeling so angry with them, and frustrated just like kids do, you know, that sibling struggle, and all the things that come with being tight -knit and being together so much, and so I remember one night just feeling the weight of that, the guilt of that sin, and how

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I was just struggling with being kind to them, and I went to my dad, I remember this vividly, in the kitchen, and I came out of my room,

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I think it was bedtime, and I was reading my Bible, and I just started crying, and I said,

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Dad, I just, I can't stop being mean to the boys, and that's what

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I called my brothers, because I have two brothers, and I really believed that at that moment, that was where I truly understood,

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I truly understood my need for a Savior, and my need to, that I couldn't be good enough,

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I wasn't going to be able to be good enough, and it really showed me how much I needed Christ, and it was great in that moment to understand that, because I think that that's so important for children to understand that it's not just about asking

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Jesus into your heart, because that's what everybody does, but truly understanding, so my testimony is pretty simple, but ultimately it is very profound, right, because it's such, everybody has a beautiful testimony, and I am so thankful that my parents and my dad especially was instilling just that understanding, giving me that understanding of the fact that I was a sinner, and even though I seem like a good person to so many other people because I was so compliant, and I always seemed to do the right thing, it's an issue of the heart, and it's an issue of the

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Lord seeing those sins in our hearts, and we're all sinners, we all need

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Christ, and we've all broken God's law, and so I see that as the time that I truly did understand, and then just growing up,

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I always had a really tender conscience, and my dad especially just had,

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I'm very close with him, and he had such an incredible impact on me, because he was so genuine, and so sincere, and he lived what he was preaching, and that was extremely impacting my life, but I think probably between the ages of 12 and 14,

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I went to a Christian school, I was very influenced by my friendships, and those became very big, probably idolatrous in my life, and I was kind of, things were getting a little bumpy for me, just some different compromises, and even just my line of thinking, and what

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I was really prioritizing, and interestingly enough, that was right around the time that the

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Lord moved us over to the United States, and so I lost all of those friendships, and I look back and just see

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God's goodness in that, because I feel like they had a negative impact in my life, and so we moved over here to California, and then

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I went to actually a public school here in LA County, and I really struggled to make friendships, and it was quite a culture shock for me coming from a little

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Christian school in New Zealand, and going to a school in LA County, but that time was really crucial for me,

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I think I just went through a deep time of loneliness, and it really just drew me closer to the

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Lord, and I just realized, wow, God doesn't change, He's always there, and I need to prioritize my walk with Him, and so I grew stronger in the

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Lord during that time, and then I really didn't have really barely any friends for at least a year or so, it was just a really hard time for me, but then the

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Lord blessed me with a great godly Christian friend, and through that friendship we both grew even more in the

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Lord, and it was very pivotal in my life, so that was a huge blessing. Wow. I have to tell you, just to put a bookmark on that, because I want to get right back into it, but we used to live in San Diego, we're in Chandler now,

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Phoenix area, but we would go to Comic Con in San Diego to do evangelism when we lived there, because it's huge, and one year we got to go out with your dad, and I think your hubby was there,

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I don't think I got to meet him or say hi or anything, but I did get to talk with your dad a lot, and one thing that always just stuck with me for the rest of my walk now is that I watched your dad, and he just had this genuine love and concern for the lost, and I think upon that often in doing evangelism and just witnessing to anybody, to your kids, but especially

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I feel like when you're witnessing to unbelievers and in the public setting, it can become robotic if you do it a lot, and you're saying the same thing over and over, but just watching your dad after doing it for how many years has he been doing it?

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Decades, I know, 40, 50, a long time. Yes, probably about 48 years or something.

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Wow. Yeah, and just seeing his face, seeing the way he looked at people, it'll stay with me for the rest of my life.

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So, anyways. That's so wonderful, and what's been just so awesome for me is that when people come and share with me how my dad or the

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Lord has used my dad to impact their lives, I can always just be so joyful and excited with them because I know he's the real deal, and I think that that is such an amazing, beautiful thing, and we've just seen so much within Christian circles that not everybody that seems like they're a certain way are actually that way behind closed doors, and he really is, and all the more, he's a lot more than even what people see, and so that you can only imagine the impact that has on someone's children when someone's that way because you're hearing how hard is it for kids that hear people praise their parents, but they see something different behind closed doors, and that really is tempting the child towards bitterness and resentment, and so I am so thankful to be able to say, hey, this guy is the real deal, and he's not perfect, but sometimes

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I feel like he's close to it because he's had such an amazing impact on my life, and so that's encouraging to hear that you had that experience.

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It's encouraging as a mother too to hear your testimony and your side of it.

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I haven't heard all of it yet, but just to hear that from you, and gosh, I pray, Lord, that our kids would see us that way, you know what

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I mean? Like I want them, like you said, we're sinners, but I pray that they would see my mom and dad, you know, they were the real deal.

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They loved Christ. They were sinners. They messed up, but they weren't one way, you know, at home and then one way out doing ministry,

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God forbid. So, yeah, just the work of Living Waters has really impacted me and my husband's life so much, and so we're just thankful for him, and it's just so encouraging to just to see how the

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Lord has used your dad and your whole family, and now how he's using you, and so you guys, all of you just bless us so much, so we're big fans.

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Well, it's so encouraging too because it was such a big move for us to move from New Zealand. It's not like moving state to state, you know, it's a big trip to go back, and it was very permanent, it seemed, and it has been, you know, and you know, it was so difficult for me during that time.

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It was extremely painful, and I was incredibly homesick, and I always would say,

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I'm gonna, you know, once I'm old enough, I'm probably gonna move back to New Zealand, and I'm probably gonna marry a New Zealander, you know, what

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I thought, and so it was painful, and so it's really beautiful just to see God's goodness and kindness, and just seeing so much fruit from that move, and I have such a soft spot for my homeland too, but it's funny to see what

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God did, and you know, what my little plans were about moving back, and I don't know if I'm gonna fit in here, and I'm not sure if I can, you know, be an

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American, and you know, now I have pretty much an American accent, at least to my family in New Zealand.

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I have some remnants of the New Zealand accent, but I can hear it slightly, very slightly.

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If I hang out with, you know, New Zealanders that are fresh from New Zealand and have the heavy accent, it'll kind of come back even more, but it's very endearing though.

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It's so funny. I feel like it sounds a little strange just because it's mixed, but yeah, it's just funny, but anyway, what's interesting is just to see, you know, everything that God did, and you know,

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I think when I thought about who I was gonna marry, you know, I desired to be married one day, and so, you know, the desire of who

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I would like to marry, my dilemma was, okay, my dad's

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Ray Comfort, and he's so zealous, and I admire him so much, and how, like,

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I can't marry someone that's not like him. Like, I don't know how I could do that because this is just so important to me, and it was something that I really,

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I wanted to marry someone just like my dad, and so I would tell my dad that, like, I want to marry someone like you, and, you know, he was, he would just be praying about it for me and just thinking like, okay, because in my circle of friends at the time,

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I just, there wasn't anybody that had that same type of zeal, and I won't tell the whole story, but basically, because it's a little bit too detailed, but basically the

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Lord used my dad to introduce me to my husband, EZ, those are his initials, his name is

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Emile Zwayne, we, my dad was speaking at a church, local, in the area, locally, not out of state or anything, and he had,

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I was actually looking for a new church because I had been going to a church that was really big with a friend of mine, and I just needed, and she got married, and all my friends were getting married, and so I was feeling like I need more of a tight -knit community, and it's a smaller church, and so my dad was speaking at the smaller church, and he said to me, hey, you should come along, there's probably some godly, handsome boys there trying to get me to come, and so I ended up going that day,

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I think my mom had dropped him off for first service, and then

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I was going to go pick him up and stay for the second service, and so that day, I met EZ, and we, well, it's a funny story because I actually had met him previously a few months before at a different, at the same church, but at a midweek, but we always talk about the day that I went with my dad as the day we met, because EZ doesn't remember meeting me that day, so we have an ongoing joke about it, that I wasn't very memorable to him that night, because of God's timing, and I actually had another boyfriend at that point too, so that night when

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I met him, I was with someone else, and I ended up breaking up with him, and then this particular

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Sunday that my dad asked me to come was the day that we really connected and we kind of officially met, and had a conversation, and so, long story short, the

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Lord just really knit our hearts, I mean, when I started talking to him, and then he got up and shared one of his amazing poems, at the time he was an associate pastor at this church, very young pastor, and he got up to do some announcements before my dad spoke, and he shared this beautiful long poem that he had written, and I almost fell out of my chair, and I thought, man, this guy's pretty deep,

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I think I need to spend a little more time talking to him, so anyway, we were friends for a while,

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I ended up starting to go to the church there, and then the rest is history, and we were married pretty quickly, and just it was so, as I got to know him, it was just so amazing to see how much he was like my dad, and how much they connected, and he was the one that organized having my dad come speak at the church, because he was just so excited about my dad's ministry, and my dad's zeal for the lost, and so they had really hit it off, and basically just continued to get closer and closer, and then became best friends, the two of them, so that was just so incredible for me, because it just meant so much to me that my husband would be so close to my dad, and so he was pastoring for a while, and I just thought

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I would be a pastor's wife for the rest of my life, at a specific church, and then the

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Lord just opened the door for him to start working at Living Waters, and it was obviously we were so supportive of Living Waters, and involved, but I didn't actually think that EZ would work there, and so that was really exciting, and a little bit of a shift at first, just to kind of even change directions a little bit, but I've just seen the

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Lord's hand in that just so much, because EZ's just my dad's right -hand guy, and they just complement each other so much, and just their giftings, and so that's been really exciting, to see that go down over the years, and just their closeness, and excitement together, and even just seeing my husband opening up preaching, like I had watched my dad do my whole life, it was just really really awesome.

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You prayed for someone like your dad, and the Lord gave you someone like him, that's so cool.

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And it was so out of the blue, and just very divine, and exciting just to see that.

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And how many years have you been married now? We've been married for 25 years. Praise God, congratulations.

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Yeah, so five children, and that's just been amazing, experiencing parenthood with him too, and just even looking at, you know,

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I think we just knew, as we got to know each other, and our friendship, we just had so many of the same convictions, we felt so strongly about certain things, and they just were lining up left and right, and you know

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I think you can't even always know all those little details, even when you get married

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I mean you're still getting to know each other even more as you get married, and have more just time under your belt,

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I guess. But as the years have gone by it's just been a blessing, because we line up so much with parenting, and just the things that we believe in, and doesn't mean we don't have discussions about different things, and work through stuff but we really do

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I'm thankful that we line up so much with all of that, and I kind of it was almost like I kind of knew that when

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I met him that day, it's like wow, we are really connecting here spiritually and that's amazing, because that's so important, all the other stuff, you know, you could have hobbies in common or things that you like, or shows you like, or something, but when you're connecting spiritually that's just, it's a beautiful foundation.

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Oh yeah, and that's what's going to carry you through life you know, through all the different seasons of parenting, and now you guys are grandparents right?

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Yes. So tell me about your grandbaby, you have one grandbaby? Yes. Okay. So he is six months old, he is named after Charles Haddon Spurgeon his name's

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Haddon. Good name. And I was so excited about that, because I absolutely love

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Spurgeon. Me too. He's impacted my life in countless ways, which that's another really cool thing a little story is growing up, my dad, you know, he's a fan of Spurgeon, I mean, who isn't, right?

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So he would read from Spurgeon, I think it was, I think it's called John Plowman's Talks or something like that, to us as kids during our devotional time, and I would just be like what in the world is this?

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Because it was just a little bit above my head at the time, and you know, as a kid, sometimes you're just not connecting, it just doesn't have the impact that it will have as you grow and you mature.

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And I love that he was just planting those seeds, and eventually I came to really recognize and appreciate

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Spurgeon just for his depth and his analogies and his pictures of things, you know, he just opens things up so much, and so that's kind of a little testament to parenting and sowing in different ways because you're not going to understand and appreciate maybe until they're older.

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One of my favorite Spurgeon quotes is, and now I'm paraphrasing it, but it's the one that says the sovereignty of God is the pillow

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I rest my head upon each night. That brings me it's such a comforting quote because it's like anything that happens, you're like, okay

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God is sovereign over this and I'm just going to rest in that. That's one of my very favorite quotes of all time and especially of Spurgeon.

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So yeah, so back to my grandson, that has just been incredible, and of course everybody always tells you, oh wait till you're a grandma, it's going to be incredible, and they're right and the love is so deep and it's interesting because one thing that I didn't anticipate, because of course, like I said the love is there and you're like, okay everybody was right, like my heart is going to burst

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I'm just so crazy about this boy but the one thing I didn't really think through which I probably should have and really recognize that this would happen is now

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I have more to surrender in my life, right? I remember in the first few months after he was born,

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I was laying in bed going to sleep and I started thinking about, oh wow what if something happens to Hedon and it's like we go through that with our kids we're just laying in bed thinking about all the terrible things that could happen to our kids and what are we going to do when that happens and how are we going to handle it and just the love that God gives us for our children is just so intense that there must be surrender or we're going to drive ourselves nuts and just live in constant fear and so that night

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I recognized like, okay, so now I have another child to add to the list of surrender because I felt so panicked in that moment of like what would

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I do if something happened to him and then I had to also not experience the pain of something happening to him but watch my own daughter go through the pain of losing a child and of course my mind is my mind works that way a lot

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I kind of go down a trail and then I'm in trouble and so that was kind of like, oh wow

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I need to put this boy on the altar and make sure that he has the right place in my heart because I just need to trust the

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Lord for that but that's kind of a little picture of like how intense the love is and it's just been so wonderful to experience watching my daughter be such an incredible mother, my son -in -law is an incredible dad and I love watching that play out and it's exciting and it also kind of keeps me in that place of remembering remembering the hard times watching my daughter go through the hard stuff and the exhaustion and just the constant nature of you know, non -stop 24 -7 parenthood and that's good, keeping it fresh and so I don't forget how difficult it is because it's important for us to remember that so that we can love on the young moms

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Yeah, I have this like and I need to write it down because I know I'll forget it it'll be gone but I have this like mental checklist in my mind going you know, like okay, not checklist but like notes, like when

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I'm a grandma these are the things that I want to remember, you know, to help with my kids and I should write it down so that you know, when my kids one day

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Lord willing have children of their own that I can be helpful and like you said, remembering back and I had that with my,

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I remember when my firstborn was born Liam, he, I loved him so much, just like you're saying, that new fresh like feeling of being a parent and I did the same thing where I would just like lay in bed and think of every bad case scenario that would happen,

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I would tell my husband why are you doing that to yourself but just like you, I had to be like no, he's

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God and I need to surrender you know, his life to the Lord, he has him and he's sovereign and also not make him an idol because what am

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I saying if I'm like my life's basically over if anything happens to this child, well I'm making my child an idol too so yeah, it's just like a, it's a fine balance of obviously loving them,

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God gave us this, this maternal instinct and this love for our children that's a blessing and they're rewards but also knowing ultimately our joy and fulfillment is in Christ so so well

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I want to hear, talking about motherhood, I want to hear about joyful mothers and how that came to be how did you start it, what you hope to do through it and how you want to honor

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Christ through it, so it's been such an encouragement for me, I'm like always sharing your stuff and I've been trying not to be on social media as much because it can just eat your time away and right now yeah,

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I have a one year old and I'm nursing still and so a lot of times I just pick up my phone and I scroll and all of a sudden

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I'm like what did I just do for 30 minutes, I could have been reading a book or you know, there's a lot of negativity and so it's nice to have something that I, a page

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I know like oh I can go on here and I can scroll and get, you know, positive right, godly wisdom and insight and good things to lay my eyes on and not just negativity or being

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I feel like there's a real temptation to become a busybody when you're online too because you have, everybody's posting all of their stuff and you're like oh, there they are you get all this information that you wouldn't normally get and so I'm like lord help me turn my eyes from worthless things and help me to put them on something that's worthy so I feel like your page is worthy of that because it's you know, it points everyone to Jesus it's scriptural truths, it's encouraging mothers, you know, so anyways

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I will stop talking about it and let you talk about it so you can explain. Well, thank you for that encouragement because that's so in my heart, like I just want to be an encouragement and I just want to keep us on our toes you know, because it's so easy to slip but basically well it's probably been about eight or nine years

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I started out with something really little on Facebook first and then

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I went to Instagram, which interestingly enough, Instagram is growing more rapidly and I think it is because there are a lot of very young moms that just are on Instagram, they're not on Facebook for some reason,

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I don't know, it seems, yeah seems to be that way but like it's kind of if you're becoming

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I don't know, I'm not really sure the science behind it but it just seems that there are a lot more like my daughter's age who's 23 all of her friends are on Instagram but they're not really on Facebook so it's just interesting not really sure what that is but anyway,

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I basically just remember waking up one day and in the thick of things so that would have made, let's see my oldest 15 and my youngest about 5 or so at that time and just thinking like I really want to have some specific encouragement from mothering every single day so obviously

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I'm just getting more than I need from the word but as an addition something that just really keeps me on my toes were something convicting, something encouraging something that would just keep me focused and so I wasn't really finding anything and maybe

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I, not that I'm saying that there's nothing else out there but I just hadn't come across anything that was really specifically for motherhood and solid, solid biblically that was not just going to be wishy -washy and you know give you the feels and make you feel good but really kind of provoke you to be thinking and so I thought you know what,

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I'm just going to start something with my small group of friends ask them if they want to join this group and I'll just post scripture and post quotes from people that I love and from books that I love on parenting and then

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I included some marriage stuff as well because obviously that all plays in and so my friends were all for it and I started out probably with 20, 25 women and just started posting and it was great, it was just kind of a little bit but to be honest

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I wasn't in it just to get lots of feedback, it really was just for me because I was going to be looking for that stuff,

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I was going to be posting it but it was going to keep me on my toes to be posting that and really living it and not just saying hey everybody else live this way but really taking it to heart and so I did that for a while and then eventually

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I decided to open it up and to make it public so that I could, you know people could share from the page and maybe it could be an encouragement to more women and I was a little bit unsure of that at first because I didn't want to invite a bunch of arguing and stuff and I didn't want it just to get distracting and for the most part praise the lord it actually hasn't been that bad with that kind of stuff, there's some different things that I'll respond to but it's been pretty good in that regard but then there was kind of a turning point where I started just to post some of my own thoughts and I found that I got more response from that which was really interesting because I'm like I'd far rather hear from Charles Burgin than from me you know but I think it was just more direct and it was coming from a mom that's lived through some of these things and some advice on how

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I've dealt with some stuff or whatever it might be you know the words that you're speaking and how you're treating your husband and your patience level with your children and all that kind of stuff and so I just really have been so blessed by the feedback and really wanting the group to grow so that I can reach more women and have more be encouraged by God's grace and I'm just always praying that lord would help me to be very biblical with everything

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I'm sharing to be very careful but at the same time not to be so careful that I'm holding back truth and so that balance can be tricky sometimes because I really don't you know

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I don't want to discourage women or you know make them feel condemned but ultimately that is the ball is kind of in their court because as a mature

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Christian we understand that we don't live under condemnation and that we can really process things that are shared and love that are hard truths we can process that through God's word remember who we are in Christ and that the

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Lord is at work in us that he is he who began that good work will be faithful to complete it that there is no condemnation for us in Christ that Lord sympathizes with our weaknesses he remembers our humanness he remembers that we're dust and so through that lens we can take some of those tough things we're you know being reminded hey you need to repent of different things or you need to make sure that you are being humble with your children and being patient and some of the stuff you know that maybe even a little more tougher than that and just seeing it through that lens and understanding like wow this is a good word

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I need to take this to heart and really check my heart and that has always been my desire as my kids were growing

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I just didn't I don't want to be coddled because I didn't want to look back and think whoa you know

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I was letting some of that stuff go a lot of those things a lot of those ways that I was acting as a mom that were not godly because I was giving myself so much grace behind those closed doors and what has always been convicting to me is to really think about okay if my friends are over and we're just hanging out and letting our kids play am

34:06

I treating my children in the same way as when they're in my home when I'm home alone with my kids because I think that often times we give ourselves a pass because there's familiarity there we let our guard down but you know the people that we say that we love the most should be the people that we truly are loving the most and we have to just remember that and so that's probably a big theme for me is just saying hey and like I told you earlier

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I had that modeled for me growing up is having a godly Christian a godly

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Christians you know my parents just live in godly ways behind closed doors and it was so impacting and it's the right thing right and so just really being able to just remind us like I honestly love that kick in the pants it's not exciting to be like wow you need to repent but it's faithful yeah faithful are the ones of a friend right yeah yes and just sharpening each other because we aren't sharpening each other when we're saying you're such a great mom right don't worry about it even though you just yelled at your kids yesterday it's fine we all do it and you know just you know it's it is what it is but it's but it's not a lack of sympathy and that's what

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I really want to to express is there's all the sympathy in the world there's the arm around the shoulder there's the crying that we do with each other and that's what

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I've been blessed with with some of my close friends is we don't we come together and we don't bash on each other and say oh wow you're such a loser

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I can't believe that you you know yelled at your kids yesterday we listen and you know and but most of the time you know if we're coming together and sharing those things it's with contrition and but you know if there isn't that then we're going to gently say hey but there's a better way and there's you know we should be being accountable with each other and taking measures to kill off those habits that we have with our children and you know there there is that line you know where we can just we have to be careful we don't want to come hard on come down hard on someone that really has a deep rooted struggle because you know maybe because of their upbringing and what they've gone through in their life there's you know there's so much to take into account but is that person taking measures like really strong measures you know just like we are told by Jesus that if your hand causes you to sin cut it off I mean we need to be taking strong measures and so for you know

36:51

I was encouraged one of your struggling with anger and you're yelling at your kids every day you need to what are you going to do about that right are you just going to repent about it or hint of it at the end of the day or are you going to start reading books on anger are you going to get friends involved where they're praying for you you're meeting with them you're confessing that to them every time it happens

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I encourage women that are going through that where they just cannot stop just losing it on their kids just really making commitment that they're going to text their friend every single time that it happens and there's something just practical about that that helps us it's a safeguard because that doesn't feel good to have to do it in that moment it's just easier at the end of the week to say oh

37:34

I had a really bad week right it just there's no sting involved there's no accountability yeah it's like there's you don't have to humble yourself with that but there's something about it that just kind of pushes us in the right direction faster and so just taking measures like that accountability with your husband having him giving him permission saying please ask me at the end of the day how did you do with the kids and I need to give you details about that and as you're discussing those things and working through them and getting prayer from friends and praying over yourself and reading those books you're at least taking measures and it doesn't it doesn't mean you're going to be perfect overnight or something but you can stop some habits that are more extreme by taking those strong measures and but even there's practical things too right this could have to do with your health there could be different things going on with your health whether it's your eating habits or maybe there's something deeper that you need to delve into a physical issue that is causing you to be on edge causing you to be more prone and more provoked to sin so weeding out those things as well and even just the ups and downs of through the month you know as women what we go through being aware of that being aware like okay like these are the times of the month that I really struggle so I'm going to get extra prayer this week and I'm going to you know

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I'm going to do some more things that I'm going to avoid situations on those days where I'm really struggling and you know there's just different things that we can do

39:06

I think sometimes we do set ourselves up where we plan all these things and we're trying to get out the door and we're so frustrated because we're late and all that kind of stuff and we have to kind of think okay let's change plans today

39:20

I'm struggling in my heart so we're not going to do that we're going to you know whatever it takes you know those kinds of things of being very proactive and so that yeah that's my heart in regards to just sharing with women and really saying hey let's link arms here right let's let's really be serious about being faithful to each other in the body of Christ because I do feel like we can live in seclusion because it is difficult when you have little ones to get out of the house a lot right and it's just I remember with the five little ones and like we're not going anywhere you know like it was just you know you just it's so much work and so it's hard to get everybody out of the house or it's hard to to do a lot of like even just get together with other moms and connect or even you're so exhausted at the end of the day right so you want to have coffee with a friend because that maybe is the only time you can do it when your husband's home yeah but you're like I'm just going to skip it

40:25

I'm too tired but really thinking through like what does that mean that means I'm not really getting good fellowship and I'm I need to maybe be a little bit more tired tomorrow just so I can get this fellowship and this accountability right and I think that's key and we need to be faithful to that and I know that's hard because there are a lot of moms that are not really finding friends that are faithful to really sharpen them so keep praying for that yeah and in the meantime there is

40:54

I do think that social media does give some of that accountability and fellowship and friendship so I think it's a good thing but it definitely needs to be balanced because we can be on there too much right and I think who we're following is important what we're looking at and scrolling through would be really wise with that one of the things

41:16

I know that is a concern for me right now as I've just been

41:23

I think specifically even on Instagram because you're such there's a plethora of parenting pages or accounts on Instagram that you can follow with parenting advice and my concern as I've looked at some of these accounts that I'm seeing reposted or even in my feed it'll because I have a parenting account it's feeding me ads for other parenting accounts and I'll come across a lot of them and some of them are even labeled

41:53

Christian parenting and it's pretty shocking some of the advice that's given on there it's incredibly unbiblical and so my concern is that women are just not really doing their research and really digging deeper and picking apart what is being fed to them through these parenting websites and the posts that are made that give advice okay deal with your child in this way when they lie it means this and it's because they're feeling this and they have these big feelings and we need to just be sensitive to this and so there's no mention of sin and digging deep into the heart and explaining the gospel to your children and viewing it through that lens and so I just want to encourage women to be very very vigilant with this to do your research to ask your husband because a lot of times our husbands you know as women we tend to be looking more at this stuff we're anxious right we want to know like someone give me advice like what are we going to do with this child and so you want advice and I think that's good that we're you know just not kind of winging it or ignoring things like we want to get to the root of issues that we're dealing with with our children but I just want to encourage women to really dig deep and really get serious about what you are giving these these accounts permission to do is which basically they're influencing you and that's been on my hat lately just influence like we give permission we say okay go ahead and influence me right now when we follow these pages and so just being able to be faithful or being faithful to say okay

43:37

I know that everything I'm following is biblical and I mean obviously you know you can't get too crazy on that but at least that it's not unbiblical right in the sense of you know you might just follow some decorating page you don't have to be looking for scriptures on the wall at home that you're looking at right but you know what

43:55

I'm saying I'm just talking about that advice that you're being given and from your marriage or in parenting or in life and making sure that it lines up with God's word and with that we need to be faithful to ask others as well because I think that it's helpful like asking your husband if you feel that he is you know if he's in that place of having that biblical mindset and he's leaving your home saying honey will you look through this account just look at some of their posts tell me what you think about it and just getting those extra eyes on it and asking different friends that you trust and that you know are solid and in the word because it's so easy for us to just think oh that sounds good you know because it is mixed in with truth some of this some of these lies are mixed in with truths and so we have to just be careful with it we have to be vigilant and be serious about making sure that we're not just listening to woolly philosophies and these ideas that are really incredibly unbiblical and really in some cases damaging because a lot of these ideas and philosophies are very much centered on coddling a child and never talking about their sin and they didn't mean to do these different things and we need to be faithful to see like our children need to be rescued we are on a rescue mission every day and it's our responsibility to be shining the light for them and to be modeling

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Christianity for them and modeling that example of a Christian who repents and who humbles themselves and who recognizes their sin before the

45:41

Lord and that is just such a wonderful place to be and to living to be living that way and to be open and not afraid not afraid to hear some hard truths now on the flip side of that I know that there are some pages or accounts out there that are really harsh and a little bit over the top so I'm not saying go look for those pages or those accounts that are just going to rip you apart every day because we do we need that gentle encouragement we need the balance of grace and truth exactly and I that is my heart and I pray for that because I want to be faithful to just be a sympathizing loving encouraging friend to the women that follow and I take it really seriously

46:31

I pray for these women because I I'm you know they are choosing to follow me and that's like that's sobering to me and so I am praying that the

46:41

Lord would just give me wisdom and there probably will be times when I mess up and I have to correct myself or something but I'll message you and then you message me if I do but you know but of course

46:55

I have amazing people around me that keep me on my toes you know my husband is so amazing with that right

47:01

I was going to say too just before you started explaining that there's so much out there right now just with you know the temptation in the day and age that we're living in right now is there's obviously blessing in having so much information just readily accessible at any moment and these little mini computers that we carry with us all day long you know you can figure out so much like you know my son was doing school today at home and I was he asked me a question

47:29

I'm like okay here's you know here's the dictionary here's history you know it's just everything's right there and there's so much good from it but there's also so much not good unbiblical advice and we don't need any more of that we don't need any more of you know the world telling us how great we're doing like you're saying like your friend is yelling at her kid and you know that would be unloving for us to be like that's okay you know it's fine it's not okay like you said there's sympathy there obviously none of us are perfect but what we need is to be pointed to Christ and pointed to scriptural truths and grace and truth and not just whacking people over the head but we need that as women and I feel like for women especially it's obviously a temptation for men and women but women especially we're prone to I fall victim

48:27

I think of looking at social media and comparing a lot or just getting advice that is not of the word of God you know not biblical and nothing that's going to benefit us you know in the long haul maybe there'll be some like you said there's tips and stuff that might be practical and like you said there's not everything you look at you know potty training you have to do it you know scripture or something but when you're looking at like the meat and potatoes like your marriage and raising kids and being hospitable and you know you need the word of God to sharpen and correct you and so you need friends to do that around you to be accountable to like you said and put in your eyes on things that are true and so I think like your ministry that you have here like doing this

49:22

Joyful Mothers is a really important one especially right now because of all the untruth that is readily available it's a great place to not only go to for yourself to be encouraged but when you come across somebody maybe you meet at a park or your friend and you can say look why don't you just go to this you know

49:43

Joyful Mother page in the morning after you do your devotional and be encouraged you know be encouraged and share and it's cool to see what

49:52

God yeah it's cool to see what God is already doing through your page just from the people

49:59

I know in my circle I just mentioned oh I'm going to talk to Rachel's Wayne and they already knew who you were and they're like oh we love

50:06

Joyful Mothers and so you're encouraging a lot of people and you don't even you don't even realize it so yeah it's reminding me of Titus 2 3 older women likewise be reverent in behavior not slanders or slaves too much wine there to teach what is good and so train young women to love their husbands and children be self controlled pure working at home kind and submissive to their own husbands that the word of God may not be reviled

50:33

I pray that for myself too that I would you know help young women do that and I feel like your page is doing that for young and old women alike you know that's such a blessing and yeah it's you know we so need the encouragement because I just and like you were saying earlier about you want to remember things for when you're a grandma that's always been my hat as I've gone through the stages of life is like I want to remember how bad this was because I want to be able to help someone else because you know you're you're stuck in the thick of it and you just feel so overwhelmed and so I do want to get that point across too is that I remember vividly so many a multitude of times of just tears and frustration and being incredibly overwhelmed and we don't see really

51:26

I mean there are a few pages that you know some women will take a picture of their messy house or something and I appreciate that so much you know but for the most part we're just putting cute fun things on there and there's nothing wrong with that but what ends up happening is that we're you know we end up just seeing all the good stuff right and it can feel like no one else is really going through what we're going through and even just going to church on Sunday everybody's happy to be there some people might be being fake and stuff but for the most part people are happy to be there right and they're not bringing into church what they've gone through during the week and we're not seeing that play out in front of our eyes and everybody's excited and you know some people that are putting their kids into children's ministry are extra excited to get the break and you know

52:12

I think you can really start to feel lonely and feel like does anybody else experience the emotions that I'm going through you know because everybody's posting about the cute little kid and their vacations and how much they love them and just how crazy they are and this kid is you know the cutest sweetest thing in the world and of course like all of us feel that about our kids but we have a lot of other feelings we've got kids at times when we're so tired and they're being you know they're following their sin nature right so we're dealing with tantrums and screaming and fighting and bickering and we're trying to just find our way and our head is full of so much we're trying to get a meal on the table we're trying to keep that bathroom somewhat clean you know there's so many things that we're trying to juggle so we're seeing this somewhat type of perfection on Instagram and Facebook and we're kind of feeling like what like I don't even know if anybody else's life looks like this and I think it's just important for us to come together and be sharing these things of what we're going through because it can be really depressing and so I want to make that be known as well that you know

53:30

I understand that there are so many different things that we that I went through and that women are going through and I find at times

53:40

I'm so there is a temptation to not post something that's going to sting a little bit because I know how crazy life gets and how so many of these women are feeling discouraged and so I've tried to balance that a little bit with some you know some encouraging posts as well so I you know that is my heart that we can do that for each other as well like really come alongside each other and check on each other you know moms checking on other moms even when we're going through a lot but just really being real too and open about what we're going through because sometimes we don't want to share it because we feel like no one's going to understand that I mean that mom there's no way that she gets mad at her kids because she's the sweetest nicest person

54:23

I've ever met maybe she doesn't yell at her kids there's plenty of moms that don't do that but I'm just saying that her weaknesses are probably in other areas you know and like for me one of my biggest weaknesses was just being stressed like I would start or basically allowing stress to provoke me to sin and so I would just be a grumpy grouch and really

54:46

I really struggled with having joy just in the daily life and that's what sparked

54:52

Joyful Mothers too because I'm like even just the name is I long to be a mother that was joyful I mean

55:00

I would die for each one of my kids a thousand a million times over but I didn't it's not always fun to be changing diapers all day long and potty training and dealing with just a lot of different things you know that you're dealing with and schedules and in the car all the time and school issues you know however you school your child there's so many aspects to that that are very challenging and their education and teaching them different things and making sure they're on track and all of that pressure and that stress can just cause you to really fall into just either a miserable grumpy attitude or even just an underlying just unhappiness or just you know there's not a lot of joy and so that was one of my big weaknesses that my husband was so patient with me and and just continued to encourage me and I found that as I continued to seek the

55:55

Lord that he really was doing that work in my heart but I want to be real about that and open because I believe that a lot of women are struggling with this that they're really struggling to find joy in the mundane and you know it's important for us just to be real and say hey it's not just hey put on a happy face you're fine everything's great it's like yeah this is real but dig into God's word and understand your calling and how beautiful it is what you're doing is and those are the things

56:27

I want to encourage women and is you know this is this matters this is beautiful this these acts of service are teaching your children something even if they can't articulate that and they may not ever say thank you for it right it is teaching something and it's important for us to to really see the seriousness of the spiritual value in it because we're being obedient to the

56:50

Lord we're loving our children and these are acts of love that we're doing yeah and through that obedience the world will bless it but we have to keep the biblical mindset because if we just stray from being in the word and coming before the

57:04

Lord and burying our hearts before him we're just going to get these grudges we're going to we're going to look at things on Instagram we're going to envy other people that have easier lives that seem to have it all together or maybe have more conveniences that help them whatever it is yeah and so making sure that we are fighting for this and it's that balance right because it's a work of the

57:27

Holy Spirit in our hearts but there's a discipline involved in it it's taking that first step right and surrendering and laying your heart before the

57:35

Lord and taking those measures being in God's word is incredibly important filling our hearts and minds and if you cannot even find a second to open up your

57:45

Bible I think most of us can but there are seasons they're absolutely insane just stick that audio

57:51

Bible on even as you're you know just getting ready for the day or jump out of the shower just keep sticking that on and getting

57:58

God's word in your heart right amen one thing I wanted to go back on is maybe this is how we'll close up this session

58:06

I do want to have you on again if you're available and I would love to this is so fun oh good great

58:12

I would love to talk next time about just evangelism and and the work at home you know how we can disciple our kids to the glory of God and just in that season of having little ones at home so I think that we could probably talk for another hour about but you said something and I was actually just thinking about this a week ago but you said you know how would you treat you know say somebody super important in your mind was coming over like somebody you really respect or I don't know somebody famous or something you know what would you do to your house like how would you prepare the meal like you know what would your demeanor be would you be excited what how would you prepare your heart and your home for this like important person to come by and then you should probably be doing that for your family every day you know because they're the most important people to us you know and so we should view them that way we should view them like when we go out and we do important work of ministry if we're at the grocery store and we're sharing the gospel with somebody we gotta make sure we're sharing the gospel with our kids too and being patient and explaining to them the truths of God and so yeah

59:27

I just I think so much right now just there's so much right now for especially women

59:34

I think that are looked down upon for staying at home and taking care of their kids and women that choose to do this this high calling work and so it's good to have a resource to remind us how important the work really is and that it has eternal consequences and you are doing it unto the

59:53

Lord and you had posted something the other day I had it pulled up here but I'm becoming an old lady on the internet anyways it was awesome it said something like you know the work that you're doing at home is no less important than doing you know public evangelism basically and it's so true everyday you know

01:00:13

Ephesians 2 were called to good works that were predestined before the beginning of the foundations of the world that we might walk in them so anyways

01:00:24

I'm so encouraged by you and I just I hope that you keep going with this Joyful Mothers and I just loved hearing your story today and all that your family is doing and I'm just going to keep praying for you guys and I can't wait for our next conversation well thank you so much for having me alright guys well you just listened to another episode of Provoked I hope you were as blessed by that conversation as I was

01:00:49

I felt so many things she said I just like making little mental notes of like oh I need to bookmark that but you know the purpose of our show is to provoke the church to love and good works to preach the gospel whether that's in your home, in your neighborhood out in a public setting to rescue babies from abortion and to tear down cultural idols so pray for Rachel and her ministry and her husband and their family and I hope you were blessed by this episode and thank you so much for listening to us again if you haven't become an

01:01:20

All Access member go ahead and do that and blessings on your day and week we'll see you in two weeks we do this you know every other week we try to we haven't been super consistent in that and you know

01:01:32

Zach and I apologize for that we would love to he's just you know he's an elder of our church and so he's got so much going on and then me with having little ones at home sometimes we just can't make it to the studio so we appreciate all of you that have been so patient with us in your comments and you know our mission of this podcast is just to encourage you know the brethren but you guys in return end up encouraging us we get so many messages from you guys starting ministries you know getting the courage to talk to loved ones about the

01:02:04

Lord talking with I got a message the other day of somebody saying they got the guts to talk to some

01:02:11

Jehovah's Witnesses that came to their door we had another message of a guy who said you know what after listening to your show the