Lean not, pray first, read aloud

Parenting skills (not hacks) this mama has picked up along the way

For the most part, I love to write an essay with one central theme but every once in a while I feel compelled to share a few simple things that I have been learning, realizing or that feel like the Lord wants me to share with others.

This essay evolved to be a list of recommended skills that the Lord has cultivated in me over the past decade and a half and is meant to be helpful and NOT a suggestion that I do all of these things perfectly all of the time.

I am just so pleased that parenting, while not easy, is often simpler than we think and the Lord is forever there with His outstretched arms offering a simpler, lighter burden and easier yoke than we often put upon ourselves.

1. Lean not on your own understanding has been something the Lord has been whispering to my heart lately as He has revealed MANY an answered prayer.
   
   This July we celebrated my eldest’s 15th birthday and fifteen solid years of parenting for my husband and I.
   
   Over the past fifteen years I have tried in earnest to make the best decisions for raising my children based on information I had at hand and (Praise the Lord) the various tuggings on my Spirit. These two guideposts have helped me at many a crossroads on my parenting journey.
   
   From schooling to friend groups, medical interventions to diet, church involvement vs. abstinence, screen habits and more, my husband and I have had to make many a difficult and often not popular decision regarding how we raise our children and run our household.
   
   We have disappointed family members, our own kids, offended peers and homeschooling groups (eyes rolling so hard), bewildered everyone around us, including ourselves and often times taken on extra-work in the quest to be obedient to what the Lord has been asking of us.
   
   There have been many times when I have questioned if we have done the right thing.
   I know we have made many mistakes along the way.
   But for some reason this week the Lord has in His loving grace and mercy shown me many answers to prayer regarding parenting choices.
   
   He has revealed deeper evidence of character and strength in my eldest son.
   He has helped both my husband and I to see how listening to the Lord above the voices of the culture, even Christian ones, has yielded good fruit.
   He has helped me to see the many times in which I followed blindly, leaning not on my own understanding through those scary, sometimes isolating and unfamiliar moments was in fact the obedience required by God at the time.
   
   There’s been MANY a decisions starting with the type birth, leading to interventions or not, childcare, breastfeeding…you know all the things, but I am specially recalling a decision I had to make 2 years ago that was very hard for me. It required me to once again turn my back on my logical [programmed] mind, cultural pressures and expectations and the beliefs of others all in obedience to God for the sake of my son, to preserve and protect Him rather than offer Him up on the altar of ease, conformity and the pleasing of others.
   
   When I think know about how I wrestled with this specific decision when it was so clear that God was in the entire experience, calling me to step out of line and follow Him, I smile to myself.
   I didn’t know, what I didn’t know and so it was hard for me to walk in obedience.

   
   I am happy that I listened and I wish I could go back in time and assuage all the fears and concerns I had in that moment, but I am that much more confident now for having trusted in the Lord above all else.
   
   
   I won't get into specifics here and now about raising our boys to be God-fearing men.
   We are still in process and learning every day, but I did want to share with you and encourage you fellow parents to seek FIRST the kingdom in EVERYTHING-including parenting and to LEAN NOT on your own understanding.
   
   We don’t realize how much our own understanding has been shaped by the world, by the enemy, and we need the Lord’s guidance to help us come out of Ur, leave Egypt, and follow His voice above all.

   

   Crossroads by Ann Lutz

   
   
   While I hope and pray that you have wise elders and support systems that make parenting an easier task, there is NO substitute for the voice and wisdom of our Lord.
   What He calls us to will never contradict His word, but it does NOT always make sense, even in the context of many well-meaning cultures: church, homeschooling, family or otherwise….
   
   ”If your son is praised by other mothers simply for being nice, compliant, and eager to please, consider it a warning sign. That is the recipe for a boy who might grow into a man resented by his wife, disrespected by his children, and ultimately drawn to the toxic corners of the internet in his search for freedom.”
   
   This is a quote for Anthony Bradley’s recent Substack is a great further reading for how counter-cultural we parents have to be in the raising of men these days.
   I have not ready anything else by Bradley, but I found a lot of truth in this particular essay and look forward to reading more of his work.
   
   Don’t think that because you have found a nice homeschooling group, church, friends group or doctor that you don’t have to seek the Lord in all things.
   Don’t defer to pastors, family members or peers over prayer and sometimes fasting (of something, doesn’t have to be food) to figure out what is right for your family.
   
   Parenting is a heavy mantle.
   
   We need to take it seriously and submit to God’s will just like Mary did, even if it makes ZERO sense, even if it could get us stoned, literally or metaphorically.
   Obedience is everything.
   
   Trust in Him with all your heart.

   
   

   Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight.
   Proverbs 3:5-6

2. Pray first.

   
   I’m sure I’m not the only mother or wife in the world that periodically looks around and feels overwhelmed by all the unfinished work, mess and chaos happening around her.
   I’d like to blame the farm, and it is a contributing factor, but truthfully long before we had this farm I lived in a tiny little house in the city and there was chaos there too, plus diapers.
   
   There’s a simple trick (people would now say “hack” but I find that term gauche) for this problem.
   I often forget it, so I want to share it here.
   
   When you feel overwhelmed and you don’t know where to start and your mind begins to cycle unproductively like this:
   
   Do I fold the laundry?
   Should I do the dishes?
   What about starting dinner?
   I am so tired, should I nap?
   What about exercise, wait did I eat lunch? I can’t remember.
   Did the kids eat lunch? Oh shoot, maybe that’s why they are acting crazy….
   
   You know the days.
   
   When you feel absolutely overwhelmed, pressed for time, unclear about what to do next and feel it would be impossible to get it all done even if you started now, get on your knees and pray.
   Honestly, I don’t think we kneel in prayer enough these days.
   Kneeling helps me to bow my heart and my head even when my mind is reluctant to.
   All too often my Spirit is willing, but my flesh is weak, so disciplining the flesh to obey, assuming the position and submitting can be helpful in many ways.
   
   And if you can’t steady or focus your mind, just say the Lord’s prayer over and over again.
   Or simply, “Jesus”, “Lord help me.” “Holy Spirit,”
   Nothing fancy.

   Your Father in Heaven knows what you need.
   
   And then the next part can be very hard.
   Trust.
   Trust that whatever comes next, whatever you do or do NOT get done, whatever He makes happen next is “His will be done.”
   Stay there as long as you can.
   I start the stopwatch on my phone because sometimes I barely make it through 4 minutes and I think it’s good to have a measure of how even 4 minutes is difficult for me to offer to the Lord some days….it’s enlightening.

   

   Woman Kneeling in Prayer by George Henry Boughton

   
   
   Just do your best. It’s the willingness to offer up the day and spend time with Him that matters, not how perfectly you do it.
   
   Trust me, you will feel differently and your day will change.
   
   

3. Homeschooling and parenting magic
   

   I see so many people on Substack writing about returning to motherhood, homemaking life and finding new inspiration in investing in their homes and families and it’s absolutely lovely.
   
   Many women are opting to homeschool their children and others are simply doubling-down on being home and available for their children before and at the end of their school day.
   
   Both commitments are difficult and challenging in their own ways.
   I’ve experienced them both and what I can tell you is one of the most profound and wonderful things you can do to educate, nourish, love and bond with them WHILE putting some ease into parenting is simply, read aloud to them.

   
   Hard day at school? Give them a snack and read.
   
   Unproductive day of homeschooling? Pick a book and read aloud.
   
   A beautiful day to be outside? Grab a blanket and a book and read a chapter outside.
   
   Children misbehaving and fighting stuck inside on a rainy day? Put them all in different chairs or different spots on the floor and start reading. THEN send them outside to the puddles and let them get absolutely filthy soaking wet while you make a cup of tea and gird your loins to bathe them and put them in dry clothes when they come back in.
   
   Feeling pissy and frustrated with the incomplete list of things you meant to get done today? You will never regret taking 30 minutes to read aloud to your children and the how it changes the tone for the day.
   

   

   
   
   

   Reading aloud is one of those things that is recommended by every educational institution, secular, progressive, Christian or not.
   There is NO denying its benefit.
   Reading aloud has given my children an amazing vocabulary, spurred their imaginations and educated them beyond all measure.
   It fosters in them a love for reading.
   It helps the family to bond.
   It calms your nervous system, which will calm your household.
   It delivers.

   
   xoxo,

   Sarah Smith