by Jillian Wright
As I write this, I can hear my sweet four-month old daughter breathing gently in her sleep. Her precious little heart beat that once beat inside me being sustained and strengthened by God’s grace and peaceful rest. I love being her mom. What a privilege and honor to raise a daughter. What a gift, and what a calling. However, in light of the world today, the weight of it cannot be overlooked. As a twenty-two year old wife and mother, surrounded daily by what the world tells me I should look like, be like, and act like, it is often hard to feel like I am adequate enough. I am often plagued by the reality that I have only just scratched the surface of what it means to live out a life of freedom in the Lord, as a daughter of God, so how am I able to model this to another person? Will I be able to show my daughter what it truly means? Can my voice be louder than their voices? Enter all-consuming fear.
But no.
Enter Jesus.
Enter freedom.
When I rest in the truth that it is for freedom that Christ has set me free, I rest in the truth that Christ has everything I need to help me in raising my daughter in this same freedom I’ve received.
Jesus changes everything.
Jesus changes me.
He takes my fear and overwhelmed heart and reminds me that I no longer have to live under that. He reminds me that when He says He will never leave or forsake me, he really means it. He will be with me through every hurdle that raising a daughter brings. He reminds me that my daughter belongs to him before she belongs to me. I can rest in knowing that He holds her precious life in his hands.
I pray my daughter will come to know how fearfully and wonderfully made she truly is. I pray that she loves her blue eyes, and her one right dimple, and her blonde hair because that is exactly how Jesus made her. I already pray for her teenage years. For when she starts to care about the clothes she wears, the approval she seeks, and the number on a scale. I pray desperately that the Lord would guard her heart against the emptiness that I once tried to fill up on. I pray that if she ever finds her life in something other than Him, that she would experience the incredible redemption that Christ offers her, and stand in awe that such a saviour would seek her out.
As she rests in her nursery right now, I pray one day she would find Jesus to be her truest place of rest. That she would find Him to be her haven. Her name is Haven, and I pray that one day she discovers the meaning of that word in its most beautiful context.
And how freeing it is for me to rest tonight, knowing that my God is with me as a mom to this sweet girl. I am so thankful.
In what area of your life do you feel inadequate and how do you need to experience God’s freedom more fully?