Have you been hurt by the mommy wars?
Have you struggled to make decisions regarding how you raise your children because you fear what others will think of you?
Do you feel the judgment from other moms? Or do you fear it?
I wonder if the women in the Biblical days struggled with the mommy wars? Have you ever wondered that?
They didn’t have the luxury of all the lifestyle choices or decisions we have today, but I imagine they still fought the temptation to compare themselves against one another. The same sins of the heart and flesh have existed since the Fall: envy, jealousy, pride, unrighteous judgmentalism, gossip, and a competitive spirit.
I think we need to talk a glance at the infamous mommy wars through a biblical lens.
These mommy wars distract us from being the courageous moms we were made to be!
It starts even before we give birth to our first baby with all the choices we face as we eagerly and nervously face childbirth for the first time.
Where are you going to have your baby?
How are you going to have your baby?
Are you going to vaccinate or not?
What about circumcision?
Then a woman enters motherhood and the decisions she has to make abound.
Breast or bottle?
Go to work or stay at home?
Will you use cloth diapers or disposable?
Homemade baby food or store bought?
Every stage of development and growth has its issues; from education choices to what extra-curricular activities you put your children in. And that is not even to mention the tensions that arise when women begin comparing their child’s abilities to other children (sports, academia, music, etc).
What movies and music do you let your kids listen to?
What defines modesty?
Do you allow your teens to date, or do they court?
Now, don’t get me wrong, the Bible does give us as parents a beautiful road map of how to parent. As Christ followers, our goal as parents should be to be obedient to God!
Our role in the Church is to make disciples, and it starts in our home, with our children! This is our mission and calling!
As we strive to be moms on a mission, we get to engage all of these questions and topics with our spouse, on our knees, and through the Word of God!
Motherhood should be an exciting adventure!
Yet somehow, along the way, all of these choices, which are freedoms we get to decide, somehow create division among women!
If you have experienced this in your life and need encouragement to embrace motherhood in the Freedom of Christ, I want to invite you to join me for my online Bible Study, The Christian Woman’s Guide to Building Authentic & Intentional Friendships. The online study is $42.00, but I am offering it to my blog readers for $25.20! That’s a discount of 40% off!
What we need to realize is that any division we experience in our relationships is essentially caused by sin.
The choices don’t cause the sin. It’s how we allow our decisions to become idols in our life, THAT causes us to sin.
If we didn’t have the option to put our children in school or have anesthesia during birth, for example, we would find other issues to compare amongst ourselves and judge one another on.
Mommy wars are created by our sin.
In our humanity, we all have a battle which rages inside of us. It’s the battle between the Spirit of God, which resides in us and our human sinful nature. Paraphrased from Jerry Bridges, Who Am I?
And when we allow ourselves to be tempted to compare or judge, we begin to fall into a trap that can literally disable us from fulfilling our calling as a disciple of Jesus Christ!
We sin when we look to others for approval instead of asking God to give us wisdom as parents!
Moms everywhere, agonize over decisions they are faced in parenting. They feel unconfident in their decision making, which creates stress and confusion, when all any of us really want is the best for our kids.
God is calling us moms to wake up.
He says, “Be strong and of a good courage, fear not, nor be afraid of them: for the LORD thy God, he it is that doth go with thee; he will not fail thee, nor forsake thee.” Duet. 31:6
We need to recognize that as Christ followers, who have the Holy Spirit inside us, with Christ we can conquer and defeat the sinful nature which resides in us!
The first step to overcoming any sin is recognizing it. We have to be willing to recognize and admit our sin. We need to be able to label it for what it is. You can’t fight a battle with an unknown enemy and win. Let’s expose the sin, and expose our enemy who is the deceiver and tempts us, just as he tempted Eve in the garden.
God gave us tools for overcoming sin (John 1-3: The Word of God), He gave us weapons (Ephesians 6, Armor of God) to fight the spiritual battle, and He sent us the Counselor, a Guide, The Holy Spirit to empower us with a supernatural wisdom and strength to make wise decisions (Acts 1:5-8, 2 Tim. 2:25, John 1:13)!
This topic is heavy on my heart. Do you feel it? It should be heavy on yours also, because it’s not about the issues women fight over. It’s about how we become ensnared into believing lies about who we are as women, as moms!
And even if you are strong in the Lord and you are living in the Freedom of Christ, you should be weeping just knowing that you have sisters who are aching, struggling to be who God made them to be!
I see many of you suffering and I feel for you. I feel the heaviness you bear as you agonize over the decisions you have to make regarding how you mother. I see you making decisions you shouldn’t because you fear judgment. I hear you are feeling like a failure as a mom because you are comparing yourself and your children to others.
You are overwhelmed.
Do you not know just how loved you are by God?
He has given you EVERYTHING you need to fulfill the role and relationship of mother to YOUR children!
Do not look to others for approval!
Seek the Lord! “Seek first His Kingdom, and His Righteousness; and all these things will be added unto you.” Matthew 6:33
Do not let the devil win.
There are 2 Things I preach to myself and I want to encourage you to do the same.
Write them down on your fridge or mirror in your bathroom today.
1. You have been given everything you need in Christ Jesus by the power of the Holy Spirit to overcome any temptation of the devil. Do not give him a foothold. Ephesians 4:27
2. If this is a test from God, He has blessed me with everything I need to pass it!
“Lord give me the wisdom to pass the test and bring You glory!” I will pass this test because I have Jesus and the Holy Spirit. God, the Father has allowed me to walk through this test, trial, or suffering because He cares about my character. He is refining me to be more like His Son.
We need to recognize that these mommy wars are created because we are literally fighting, like children, over disputable, non-eternal issues, and it is sin!
Image from the online Bible Study! Go Here to Watch Promo Video.
***WARNING***
Ladies, listen! I love you as a sister in Christ. And I get that exhortation is hard to take. Our culture is not accepting of correction, no one wants true accountability today. Most of us were never disciplined as children and were left to our own depravity. We are not accustomed to be corrected, but this should not be so.
When we fell to sin and began comparing ourselves to others we were in our youth and we needed accountability and teaching. We needed to be pointed to the cross, to find our identity there instead of in performance based acceptance of ourselves!
And now, because we weren’t taught to be aware of the devil schemes and the potential temptation to sin in our own hearts we have a big problem in and outside the Church. It’s such a big problem it even has it’s own name: The Mommy Wars.
These mommy wars are divisive. They are tearing apart the fabric of the Church.
We need to be awakened. We need to be aware of what is at stake!
We need to see that these divisions disable us from ministering to one another the way God intended.
This quiet fight and sometimes loud fight between women has literally disabled the Church.
We need to recognize our sin, we need to choose to fight the good fight and live our lives before God alone, not looking to one another for approval.
And we need to be motivated by a desire to be the Church God calls us to be and designed us to be. It should wreak our souls to think that we, as a Church, are not functioning as the Body of Christ in this world to the capacity that we could simply because there is division among us.
Do you know a sister who is struggling? How can you encourage her today? How can you value her?
So Sisters, are you with me? Are you ready to Redeem this Division Among Women? Jesus is the one true Redeemer, and with Him, we can create unity for His glory and be the light of the world.
If this resonates with you, I want to invite you to join me for an in-depth online Bible study covering topics such as a competitive heart, the comparison trap, idols of the heart, confidence in the Lord, developing God-centered friendships, and learning to truly grieve and rejoice together.
I have revised my online Bible study, The Quiet Fight Between Women, and it is now entitled The Christian Woman’s Guide to Building Authentic & Intentional Friendships.
I believe that God desires for His Church to be whole, no one left out, everyone empowered to exercise the gifts He has given them. Do you need encouragement to be who God made you to be?
Don’t let other people’s opinions of you scare you from obeying God. I know it is easier to say than to do. I get it. This is something I am still learning to do myself! But we have a responsibility to raise our children according to God’s guidance! If we don’t do that, where will the church be in 20 years? In 10 years?
You were chosen to be your child’s mama. Embrace it, ask God for wisdom, and have courage to make the decisions you need to even if they are counter-cultural! Let’s do this!
If you haven’t already signed up for my 2 Secrets the Best Moms Practice Challenge Click Here and you will get a personal text from me with a link to 2 short videos that will transform your relationships with your children.
