Episode 11: Facing Modesty Head On!

FROM OUR HOME TO YOURS w/ Nancy Campbell

Rocky: Welcome to the podcast, FROM OUR HOME TO YOURS w/ Nancy Campbell, founder and publisher of Above Rubies.

Nancy: Hello ladies! What a joy it is to come into your home again. I love to just join with you in your home and hope you can share in a little bit of what is happening in our home. Today, I'm going to welcome into our podcast, Meadow Campbell.

Meadow: Hall.

 

Nancy: Whoa, that's right! Meadow is now married. In fact, she wasn't even . . .

Meadow: Campbell wasn't even my maiden name.

 

Nancy: You weren't even Meadow Campbell, you were Meadow Barrett. Can you believe it, ladies? I still call my daughters . . .  I'll call up on the phone. Call Serene Campbell. Oh, that's right, Serene Allison. Call Evangeline Campbell. Oh, I mean Evangeline Johnson. It's amazing how it's so hard to get used to the new name even after all these years.

Well, many of you know Meadow as Pearl's oldest daughter. Pearl of Serene and Pearl, Trim Healthy Mama, and Meadow herself is also involved in social media with Trim Healthy Mama and is now married. Of course, she has a new name, Meadow Hall. She is married to the most wonderful guy, Kendall. We all love him, and they now have this most precious, gorgeous little baby boy, Warren Charles. He's just doing so well. And Meadow is the most beautiful mother. You're enjoying it, Meadow?

Meadow: Oh yes. I love motherhood so much. It really turns your life upside down, but there's nothing more fulfilling. It really teaches you how to become more Christ-like and selfless, I think. I really have to give up other parts of me, but there's nothing more fulfilling. It’s so worth it.

Nancy: I think that is so true. In fact, I don't think that we learn to do it all at once. I think, as I look back on my mothering, that I learned to do it little by little. I do think that my daughters and my beautiful granddaughters have an advantage in that they've been surrounded with the joy and the love and the promotion of motherhood, and I think that helps toward embracing motherhood. When I came into motherhood, I didn't have that around me. I had to find out for myself, and I remember it took time to just lay down my life. In fact, with every baby, I learned to lay down more.

I remember when Serene arrived, my sixth baby, and I think I mothered her more totally, more completely than even all my other babies. Even though I just totally adored and loved every one of them, I had learned to give more of myself. I think motherhood does take time. It takes time to learn to give of yourself, and, in that, we find ourselves. That's the wonderful thing.

I'm such a great believer in the Word of God of course. But that Scripture in Mark 8:35 where Jesus said: “He that will save his life will lose it, but he that will lose his life for my sake and the gospel’s, the same shall find it.” Now, those are the words of Jesus. Therefore, they are eternal words. They are an eternal principle and they cannot be denied. They work. When we try to save our lives, pamper our lives, and try to make everything work around us, we lose. But when we come to that place of laying down our lives, losing our lives for the sake of others, for the sake of my baby, for the sake of my family, and as we lose our lives, we find an amazing thing happens. We find our lives. We find life. And so many women think, oh, you know, I want to find my life. Well, you don't find your life by finding your life, you find your life by losing your life. It's an eternal principle. And you're finding that too, Meadow?

Meadow: Oh yes, that's so good, Nana. That reminds me of . . .  remember that baby shower that you held for Kendall and me? And it was so amazing. Instead of just a ladies baby shower, we had couples come, so we had mothers and fathers there, and we had parents speak to Kendall and I and give us marriage advice. And one of the things that really stuck out to me was when my mom was talking to us, she was saying that when she had me, she was like, Whoa, there's no more me anymore because she had to give up all her time. But then she realized, this is me. And I remembered that. And now that I take care of my baby, I realized this is me. This is my most important job. This is who I am now. I'm a mother.

Nancy: Yes. Oh, I think that's another wonderful revelation. You are so blessed, Meadow, to have caught that revelation now, in the beginning of your motherhood . . . that as a mother, that's who I am. I'm me. I'm a mother. That's who God created us to be. And it is a sad thing that so many women are frustrated. They're trying to be everything else than who God created them to be, a mother.

 

Meadow: I feel the same way, Nana. And I just feel so saddened that so many women, of my generation especially, they feel like they need to wait a few years. Wait maybe five or ten years before they settle down and have children because they have to be successful first, as if being a mother is not successful, as if it's not the most important job. My desire is to show these other women, with how I mother and how I live my life, how important this is and how this is my most important job. Why would I want to go chase other things? Because that doesn't make me more important.

Nancy: That's so true. Meadow has a real burden to reach those of her generation, and I think that's so wonderful. I hope we have all mothers listening today. Older mothers, oh, I really trust, dear older mothers, that you are still interested in motherhood. Can I share something that's burdening me at the moment? In fact, it burdens me every time a new Above Rubies goes out. By the way, have you got your new magazine? It's all out in the nation now.

When a new magazine goes out, we have changes of addresses and cancellations. One of the things that saddens me more than anything else is when older mothers write to me and say, “Thank you Nancy for all these years of blessing me with Above Rubies, but my children have grown now. I'm in a new season, so I don't need any more magazines.” And my heart wants to cry because, dear precious mothers, we never change from being a mother.

When our children grow, that's not the end of our mothering. In fact, it is the launching into a greater realm of motherhood. It is a launching into a calling that God has mandated in His word for the older mothers to teach and encourage the younger mothers. And I think, what are these older mothers doing? “Okay, I'm finished with that, thank you.” Well, are they doing anything to encourage the new generation? What about their own daughters and daughters-in-law? They need Above Rubies for them.

And like in any profession, you have to have refresher courses. I do believe that we as older mothers need refresher courses. We need to come back to the Word. In fact, I, as an older mother now of not only grandchildren but great grandchildren, am still in the Word saying, “Oh God, please show me more understanding and revelation of your heart for women, for mothers, for wives. I want to know the fullness of Your plan and purpose because I have this responsibility to teach the younger mothers.”

I hope precious older mothers are getting a little refresher each time we do a podcast, so you can be life and water and encouragement to the young mothers of this coming generation. I hope all the middling mothers in the midst of raising your families are listening. And the young mothers, like Meadow.

Now, Meadow, I know you have many burning convictions on your heart, about many things our young mothers face in this generation. Tell me about something. What do you want to share about?

 

Meadow: Well, something that really grieves my heart about a lot of women in my generation is that we no longer value this virtue, that everyone used to value more, and that's modesty. I believe modesty is a dying virtue in our culture and especially, it seems, that women of my generation just want to completely disregard it.

 

Nancy: Sadly, Meadow, I have noticed that that's not only in the secular world. I am noticing it in the so-called Christian world.

Meadow: Yes, it's true. I have noticed that modesty has been a very big debate among Christians for a long time, and I don't like it as something that we argue and quarrel about all the time. I believe that it is important because basically it all comes down to respect. It's respecting other people. Basically, what women are arguing about these days is that I should wear whatever I want and whatever I feel like because if this bothers men or if this causes men to stumble, that's their problem, and they should not lust, and they should just look away.

Nancy: It doesn't sound like, “Am I my brother's keeper?”

Meadow: No, because the Bible actually says, well, first of all, it says to let the women dress modestly and that means that we are supposed to dress in a way that is respectful and considerate to others in our culture. It also says that we are not to become a stumbling block to the weak. "Be careful, however, that the exercise of your rights does not become a stumbling block to the weak" (1 Corinthians 8:9). So let's just say that an alcoholic was offering alcohol. I mean, someone was offering alcohol to an alcoholic and that alcoholic became drunk again, and he stumbled back into his sin. Well, he would be guilty of his sin, but the person offering him alcohol is still guilty because he presented a stumbling block. Well, the same rule applies to modesty. Like someone can be guilty for choosing to lust, but another one, the person who purposely created themselves to be stumbling block, can still be guilty for that too.

Nancy: Yes. I think it's something that we have to really face in this hour in which we live. In fact, I think of a story, Meadow, of when we lived back on the Gold Coast of Australia and where your mother spent all her teen years. The Gold coast of Australia is perhaps a playground. It's a place of beautiful weather and beach and surf and sand. We spent 10 years there, beginning and growing a church. It was a challenging place to live, and it was very fleshly, and people wore hardly anything.

In fact, our church was on the right, there it was, and then on the left was the Pacific Ocean and that's where we baptized people. We used to say we had the biggest baptismal pool in the world. But to go down to that baptismal pool, oh my, you'd have to have blinkers on your eyes to pass topless bathers. Then on the right-hand side of our church was Jupiter's casino, so we were in the middle of the devil's playground.

We were always very hospitable and every Sunday we invited people home to our home for a meal. Often, we'd have 30 or 40 people around a dinner table or different tables because my husband and I would invite people and then our children would invite people, and we just filled the place.

One time, I saw a stranger and got talking to her and found she was from the States. So, I said to her, “Come on home, come and have some fellowship.” She was staying at the casino, and her parents had paid for all the family to come and have a big reunion, and they were staying in Jupiter's casino. She was so glad to come and get some Christian fellowship. She enjoyed it, and I said, “Come back next Sunday.” However, during the week, I got a call. “Nancy, sorry, I'm just calling to say that I won't be coming home to dinner this Sunday.” She said, “I'm leaving.”

“Leaving? I replied. “Yes,” she said, “I cannot stay in this place any longer. You see, I come from the south.” Well, I didn't know what she was talking about. I had no idea. Anyway, okay. She's going home. It wasn't until a few years later that we came to the south, to Nashville, to the “Buckle on the Bible belt.”

We came from the fleshly place of the Gold Coast of Australia where people were hardly clothed, and all of a sudden, my eyes met a different sight. Oh wow. People are clothed, and I couldn't believe how, although we hated that kind of lifestyle, it's amazing how you could even get used to living in it. This lady was just there for awhile, and she couldn't take it. She had to get out of it. The sad thing is that we came to the states in 1991 and back then, it was conservative in the church, very conservative and everybody was fully clothed. It was wonderful. It was amazing. We could hardly believe that we were living in such a place. Oh, it was so incredible.

Now, all these years later, goodness me, that is about 27 years later, it is not like that anymore in the church, even in Nashville, in the “Buckle on the Bible belt.” You can go to a church, and you see cleavage, and women are showing so much of themselves, and this is in the church! What has happened?

Meadow: Well, part of it is the change of fashion, and modesty changes with the culture, but that doesn't always mean just because other people are wearing this, I should too. Even though the Bible says that modesty is important, it does say that, it's in there, I know that some people can take this to a very extreme where it becomes legalism. I've known people who have come from a background where they came from a very legalistic family, and they always had to wear shirts to their collar bone or skirts to their toes, and it was like a religion. It wasn't just about respect at that point. It became pride.

The thing is, modesty isn't just about the clothes you're wearing. It's a matter of the heart. If you're not making it a heart issue, you can become one extreme or the other. You can either become super legalistic and judgy and trying to go over the top and trying to draw attention to yourself for the wrong reason, for a self-righteous reason. Or you could go to the other extreme where you dress like the world, and you make yourself a stumbling block, and you don't represent Christ because God says, in everything we do, do it for the glory of God. So that should even account for the way that we dress.

Nancy: I think everything is a heart issue, isn't it? Self-righteousness stinks, and it must be the heart. At the same time, I do believe that when something is a heart issue, it reveals itself on the outside. It reveals how we dress. We're not going to become legalistic and wear long sacks and look so boring and horrible. Because, you know, Meadow, I love that Scripture back when God is telling them how to build the tabernacle and all the furniture.

Then He goes onto a chapter about the clothing of the priests and the clothing of the high priest. I always love the Scripture where God says that He is going to clothe the high priest. These are the words he uses: “For glory and for beauty” (Exodus 28:2). God loves glorious clothes. God loves beautiful clothes because he is a God who loves beauty and color. He created beauty. Just look at some of the animals and birds and the color and the glory of them. It's amazing. The high priests clothing, it was amazing. The breast plate had twelve different sparkling, amazing jewels. On the ephod, there were also 12 beautiful onyx stones, and it was full of purple and scarlet and glory and everything. In dressing modestly, we also dress beautifully and for the glory of God.

 

Meadow: Oh yes, I agree with that. This is coming from someone who has always loved fashion. I love fashion, and I love to wear dresses. Rashida and I, when we were younger, would draw pictures of all these dresses and our designs and fashion, and we just loved it. I'm not saying that if you're going to be modest, you need to be boring and frumpy and never in fashion. You can still be in fashion and wear beautiful and cute clothes, but you can do it in a way that's still respectful.

 

Nancy: Yes, and covered. I do believe that that is very important. In fact, it's interesting, Meadow, that you should be talking about this. Some time ago, I was into the Word and came across a Scripture, and this is how I read the Word. Some people say, “What do you do? Do you read so many chapters a day, or what do you do?” Well, I have to confess, No, I don't keep to so many chapters a day. There was a time when I used to try and read the Word through every six months. I don't do that now because there's too much in it to go too quickly, so I read until I see something that grabs me, and then I pour into it. Recently, I was reading in Genesis about when Adam and Eve had sinned, and of course, they were naked at that time. Then what happened? I then went into this amazing study, and I began to look up all the Hebrew words and then all the Greek words for clothing. Oh my, I was just amazed. Could I have time for a moment to just tell about the beginning?

Meadow: Oh yes, I'd love to know.

Nancy: Yes, just the very beginning. Well, we know that at the very beginning, when Adam and eve sinned, that in Genesis 3:7 it says: "And the eyes of both were opened, and they knew they were naked, and they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves aprons." Now, they did pretty good. “Aprons” is a word that means “to gird yourself around.” They obviously girded their loins, their reproductive area, and they put these leaves around them to cover them. They knew that somehow they had to cover that. That was man's way of doing it, but it wasn't God's way. Because then we move over in the story and we know of how God came and how he spoke to them.

Then what did God do? He did something more than just make aprons. In Genesis 3:21 it says: "Unto Adam also and to his wife, did the Lord God make coats of skins and clothed them." We have two different words there for clothing. These are the very first words that God uses for clothing. Now, in studying the Scriptures, there was a very important law to remember and that is the law of the first mention. Whenever God speaks of something the first time, He is laying a foundation down for that subject. He will add to it, and it will grow more in the Word of God as we read more. This is the foundation from which He never ever deviates. God never deviates from that law of the first mention.

He made them these garments. Now, they were skins. It's interesting that men did it with just putting some leaves around themselves, but God's covering had to come through the shedding of blood. It's only the shedding of blood that can cover our sin, so God had to shed animals. It was the first time that they had been killed and blood was shed so that He could take the skins to make these garments. They had to be covered with the blood of Jesus.

Then it goes on to talk about these coats. Now, let's see, what was the word coat? Let me see if I've got it here. Yes. This “coats” is a word that means “to cover.” That's the first meaning, “to cover, a skirt, a coat, a garment, a robe.” Then it goes on. Oh yes. Let me have a look here. Yes, because that's not all of it. When we look into a Hebrew word, we've got to look into the complete root, and the root of that word means “the shoulder, the upper end of the arm, the place from where the garments hang.” In other words, the garment that God made, it came from the shoulder. Now that's very interesting. God, of course, was the very first clothes designer. Isn't that amazing?

Meadow:  I never thought of it that way.

 

Nancy: God is a clothes designer. He was the first designer of clothes. Now, these clothes were made from skins, but have you ever seen pictures, and you see them going out of the garden with skins around their back? Oh, goodness me. I don't believe it at all. Do you think God, who all His works are perfect, the great Creator of the universe; do you think He had just put some skins around their back? No. He would have made the most glorious garments. I don't think there's ever been any leather garments like these garments that were made. They would have been incredible. They would have been amazing. We can't even imagine what they would have been like. When God designs clothes, when He designed the clothes for the high priests, there was nothing more glorious and beautiful. I'm sure He made these first clothes that Adam and Eve were to ever wear, the most beautiful clothes that you could ever imagine. He clothed them, but they actually came from the shoulder. Very interesting because that is the Hebrew word.

Now, that just makes me think about something that we're all so used to. I want, I know you've got lots to say {Meadow}, but I'd just love to share this bit. It's something that we're all used to in our day and that is wedding dresses. Most wedding dresses today are strapless wedding dresses. They just come over the bust, or if they do, most of them don't. They're hanging off and showing so much, which is so sad. Because they’re so much the norm, that's all you’ve got, and it's so hard. If you want to find something that is a little more conservative, wow, you've got to really hunt. You go to a wedding shop, and they are all like this, so this is what everybody buys.

The bride, she comes to her bridegroom, she walks down the aisle, bare shoulders, half her breast showing, to her husband? And to everybody who has come to see her get married. A bride is meant to come to her husband clothed. The bridegroom—it’s his glory, it’s his privilege, it’s his intoxication to unclothe his wife and see who she is. This is for her husband. It's for him. It's the same even in our marriage. We go to the bedroom and that's where we can unclothe.

Clothing is to hide. The next Hebrew word that I looked at means “to hide, to conceal.” We clothe ourselves to conceal these beautiful, special parts that are so glorious to our husband, but they are not for the world.

Meadow: That is so good, Nana, because I've been wanting to say that. Since I've been married, modesty has become even more important to me now than it was when I was single. I grew up in a conservative family, and it was still important to me back then, but it didn't become so clear to me.

When you're married, and you realize how intimate our bodies are and the purpose that God had them for, to be celebrated in marriage and in the marriage bed, why would you want to share that with the world when it's something so personal between two people? The world wants to take away something that is so special and so personal for two people, and they want to make that normal and expose it to everyone else. Everyone is trying to normalize our body parts which are supposed to be private between a man and a wife. That's why I feel some young girls, who are still single and who haven't been married yet, don't get it. I wish I could explain to them--your body is for your future husband, and all those other men that you're exposing your body to, they're someone else's future husband, and they don't need to be seeing your body.

Nancy: Yes, and they're spoiling it for other men, and spoiling it for themselves.

Meadow: Yes, what it really comes down to is the golden rule. “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” If I wouldn't want someone, this girl, to wear a very provocative outfit in front of my husband, why would I want to do that in front of someone else's husband?

Nancy: Oh, exactly. Yes.

Meadow: It's all about respect. One of the things that people talk about when they talk about modesty, they say that modesty is all about respecting yourself, but Jesus doesn't command us to just respect ourselves. He commands us to consider others. It should really be about considering other people before ourselves. We should be considering our spouse and considering all of the other people who might stumble because of the way we dress.

Nancy: Yes. I often wonder when women come out and they're exposing themselves, you know, not fully, but with cleavage and bare shoulders, even going into church like that, I'm wondering, where are their husbands? What kind of a husband do they have that will allow them to go out like that? Oh goodness me. No, I would never want to, but my husband wouldn't let me out the door. I mean, because he treasures me. A husband is to protect his wife. I think men have just gotten so used to this. They also no longer know what is right. They are missing out. Both are missing so much.

Meadow: Yes. My husband has told me that he is so happy that I am a modest person and that I saved my body for him because it's something special to him, and it's something that's only for him. If I was revealing my body to other men all the time, it wouldn't be special to him anymore.

Nancy: Exactly. Can I say one other thing that's really on my heart too? That is social media, Facebook, Instagram, and people post pictures. Sadly, often I see pictures that are very exposed. Now, on my personal Facebook, I just have family and friends I know well. My Above Rubies Facebook I have over 100,000 people, and I don't even know who they are. On my personal Facebook I'm not having any Tom, Dick, or Harry's, so I'm not even hopefully ever going to see porn or anything like that because I keep it very private.

Oh goodness, my heart is grieving because, even in that little realm, there are times when I see posts that are revealing. What I notice even more, Meadow, is that then I see people who I know who like it, oh, that just grieves me! They like it! What?! They like that exposure. They are then showing to the world, oh, this is what I like. We're exposing who we are when we like stuff like that.

Meadow: They are approving of it, so they are encouraging it.

Nancy: When we see something like that, even if it's our dearest friend, we cannot like it. We cannot stand with it. In fact, I saw a picture recently. It was so exposed. I wanted to get down on the ground with “dust, with sackcloth and ashes.” In fact, it's still grieving me that I still have it on my heart to go out and find some sacks and get out into the woods and intercede about it because it so grieved me. It's so exposed, and it was exposed on social media. How can a woman do that? This is how far we've come. But anyway, our time has gone, Meadow.

Meadow: Can I just say on more thing?

Nancy: Yes, yes please do.

Meadow: I know modesty is an important topic to me, but I don't want everyone to believe that I am pretending I'm the perfect example because I'm not. Even though we can all agree, even if we all agree that modesty is important, some people might have different definitions of what that looks like. I have not always been perfect in this area, and my heart, at times, has not always been in the right place too. I, at least, value this virtue and that is what I'm saying, that I want my heart to be in the right place so that I am trying to be respectful in the way I dress. What I am saying is that even if we don't all agree on exactly what it looks like, we should all agree that it's important to dress in a way that glorifies God and to respect others.

Nancy: Thank you, Meadow. It's been so wonderful to have you with us today. Next week, we're going to talk together again. Just listen for the next episode because Meadow is going to be with me again. Let's pray as we close.

“Dear precious Father, we thank you so much that we can talk together about things that really concern us as women. And Lord, we pray that You will get a hold of all our hearts, that we will have soft and tender hearts toward You, toward Your heartbeat. Oh God, to listen to You, not the spirit of the world. It seems, dear Father, that the more we're getting further away from You, the more women are exposing themselves. Help us to come close to You. Oh God, I pray for each one listening today that You will bless their lives and bless their families and just draw them closer to You. Show them more and more of Your ways. Lead us all more and more into Your everlasting ways. We ask it in the name of Jesus, Amen.”

 

Podcast 10 – ARE YOU RAISING YOUR CHILDREN TO SPEAK?

Allison Hartman and her 19-year-old daughter, Makenna, speak with me on this podcast. Allison shares how she and her husband managed to get out of debt and build a debt-free home. Makenna speaks about her life in a big family, and how she has built strong convictions into her life.

We talk about raising children to speak in the gates. Dear mothers, we are not only feeding and clothing our children. We have a huge task raising them to speak— speak clearly, speak with conviction, and speak with boldness, who will one day be ready to speak with the enemies in the gates! Children who will know how to stand when they face the enemy, and “having done all, to stand” (Ephesians 6:13). Be inspired as you listen.

Announcer: Welcome to the podcast FROM OUR HOME TO YOURS w/ Nancy Campbell, founder, and publisher of Above Rubies.

Nancy Campbell: Good to be with you again. I have Allison Hartman with me again. We've still got more to talk about. Now, Allison, I'd love you to tell the ladies about your home now. You're debt-free now, aren't you?

Allison Hartman: We are.

Nancy: Yes, well, how did you get to that? Was it hard work?

Allison: It was a lot of hard work, and a lot of sacrifice. When we had a house mortgage, my husband really, really desired to pay that off as quickly as possible. He had read a book by Dave Ramsey talking about not being a slave to debt. So we went ahead and paid our mortgage off within about 11 years.

Nancy: Yes, how did you do that? Well, it's so easy to just . . . I mean, usually life just takes all your money. How did you pay it off?

Allison: Well, you only have two options in life. You can either make more, or spend less, and we kind of try to do both. We don't spend money on things that a lot of people spend money on. There's such a fallacy that children, each child you have, you know, you can't afford more. That's not true. That's not what people spend money on.

People spend money on things that they think that they need, or someone else has, that they need. If they don't have the money for it, they just put it on a card, or go into debt or get a loan for it. I think being out of debt is a mentality. It's a decision you have to make. We were talking this morning in family devotions how sometimes you don't feel like doing certain things. Even in marriage, or as a mom, you don't feel like sometimes getting up and doing the right thing.

The same thing with spending money. So many people spend money out of emotion. They just kinda justify it away, but for us, the end result was way more important than having the niceties in this world. We don't ever, don't ever, buy anything new, even to this day.

I think we will continue, no matter how much money we do or don't have, we will still, and we get kind of teased with our family about this, but we are completely okay with buying things at garage sales. Almost everything we own is from a garage sale or thrift store. It's so fun, and you get ten cents on the dollar.

But again, so when we paid our house off, then we wanted to build, obviously because our house was quite small for having six children in it. So, we ended up buying some land and building on that land. That land had a little teeny tiny house on it. We decided to sell our house that was paid for and use that money to build our house debt-free.

We were able to do it. We did it in two years, definitely with a sacrifice. We lived. I had my seventh child there, so we had seven children in about 800 square feet. We had one tiny bathroom that had pretty rough plumbing, and that kind of thing.

But it's so funny, because we made so many memories in that house. I don't think any of my children look back and think we were really missing out on anything. We had a great yard and we had lots of entertainment going on. But, because we did that . . .

Nancy: You know, children don't really care whether you live in some big, flash, palatial home, or in a very humble home. Children don't care about it.

Allison: They don't.

Nancy: In fact, they don't even want a bedroom of their own. Oh goodness, today, in our western culture, oh, we can't have too many children because they want their own bedroom. Well, children hate their own bedrooms. It may be different when they grow older, or if they're being brought up in a two-child family, and that's how they're being catered to.

Most children love company. Yes, they love their brothers and sisters. They want to be with them. They're so much happier! Some parents have a terrible time sending their children to bed because they're going to some lonely room on their own and they don't want to do that. It's so much easier if they're going with a whole pile of other children. They love it! It's so great.

Allison: Yes, absolutely. I agree. So when we finally built our house, then we were able to rent out that little house that we were in, so that provides a little income. But again, when we started our business, a lot of people even encouraged us to get a loan, so that you can buy the best equipment.

We decided as a couple, that's not what we were gonna do. So thankfully we still had income coming Daniel, he used to remodel houses, so he continued doing that while we started our business. We didn't just quit, but we would do a job, and then use that money to go buy a light box. Then we would do another job, and we would buy another camera. And so now we pretty much have the best of the best equipment.

Everything is ours. We own it. No one can take it from us, we don't pay interest on it. We're passing down this concept to our children that is so valuable. If I could get each of them to start their marriages with that concept, that mindset, you know, just not to be a slave.

Now I know, I know. There's times where sometimes the car breaks down, and you really don't have the money. There's times where maybe it's necessary, but for the most part, if you could use that rule of thumb to not buy it, unless you have it, then you're going to be way better off for it.

Nancy: Absolutely. Yes. So, and now with your home, you just did each bit as you were able to afford it?

Allison: We did, we did, and it was frustrating. I mean, there were days where I thought, “Oh, let's just take a loan and finish it,” but we didn't. And my husband said, “Yes, we are not going to.” And I'm glad, so glad that I let him. That was his dream, to build a house himself, debt-free. We had a few helpers. We hired out sheet rock, and we did it ICF (insulating concrete forms). So we, of course, had to hire people to do the ICF part of it.

But for the most part, the plumbing, the electrical, the HVAC, most of it we did ourselves, which is so special and weird. You know, you can definitely take pride in your house, and that you did it all yourself.

Nancy: Oh, wonderful. Oh, it's been just so great having you on this podcast. More, of course, is just having you and your whole family with us this last week. It's just been such a joy, such a joy to have their ten children in our home, because they're all just so amazing. So helpful, so polite. They get” stuck in,” and help wherever they can.

Now I think what we'll do is, we'll interview Makenna. Makenna is Allison's oldest daughter. She is 19 years of age, and I've had to haul her off the volleyball court, because that's where they've all been living this last week. Anyway, we're going to talk to Makenna.

I think it's lovely to talk to young people who have such a heart for God, and know where they're going, and just want to walk in truth. Makenna's one of those young women.

Nancy: Now, Makenna, we have often talked together. Because you've been around so many young people, and you went to college for a while, you notice the mindset of young people today, not even in the secular world, but even in the homeschooling world. So maybe you could share a few of your thoughts about these things.

Makenna Hartman: Yes, I would say I've encountered many, just a couple of my friends, and people that I've had conversations with, Christians at that, and praying Christians that love the Lord so much. But they go, and they say, “Oh, I don't want any children,” or “Oh, I only want two.”

Certain things that they're not letting God have full control of. It saddens my heart that even Christians would have that mindset. So, I know for me, that I don't have any children, and I'm not married, but that is something that's strong in my heart, to have the Lord completely . . . I'm like, give everything to the Lord. It definitely hurts me, and I want to talk about it, and share my ideas and thoughts about how it's not just what the secular world says, but Christ says that we should give everything to Him.

I've heard them saying, “Oh, I don't want, I only want two,” or “I'm getting fixed at two, I only want a boy and a girl.” But that's not ultimately our decision. The Lord has complete control over our womb. I think young people should definitely hear that from their parents. Instead of letting other children explain certain things to their children, I think that parents should have complete control over what their children believe.

Nancy: Yes. Now you're a young person in this world of social media today. How does that work in your life?

Makenna: Social media, I think, can be used for good, and for evil. Sometimes what I've seen, most are evil. It really saddens my heart, seeing Christian girls not think they're beautiful, and not think they're worth anything. Because their friends have posted a picture that they've sort of altered a little bit. That is really hard for me to see, that they don't have any self-worth in that aspect. So social media definitely destroys that.

But it also can be used for good. I've had many conversations on social media that have been beneficial and glorifying to God. It's definitely a way to interact with girls, and men, just being able to talk to each other without being face to face, and keeping up with friends and missionaries. That's very cool and neat.

But it also, the devil is using it to get to, especially, girls. Their self-esteem is lowered, because I guess they're viewing themselves as they should be something else. Really, they just should be glorifying God, who made them.

Nancy: So how much time do you spend?

Makenna: On social media? I try to do it as little as possible. I definitely am very . . . I know the average teenager is like, hours a day. I try to do it only at night, or if somebody personally texts me, I'll try to do that, and I just use it for family. I like seeing the missionaries, and seeing what they're doing, but I would limit it to about 30 minutes a day. No more than that.

Nancy: That's amazing. That's so wonderful. Does that take discipline for you, or you know, it's easy?

Makenna: No, it takes discipline. It's very hard, because social media has developed. They're very cunning in the way that they present it. You can just keep going, and going, and going, and you can waste. I wasted hours at one point! I felt guilty about it. I'm like, I'm not doing this again.

I would just say that desire of, I want to stay pure, and I want to stay controlled in what I'm doing. Because there are so many things that you can see on there, and you can waste your time on. You don't have any control over it, once you've gone far enough. So you just need to be really in control of your mind.

Nancy: Yes, that's such an amazing thing. Of course, as we learn to discipline ourselves in this area, it helps you in disciplining in every area of life, doesn't it? So what are your plans at this moment for life?

Makenna: Well, I have been, sort of an adventurer, going on different businesses that I've gone through. I first started with the chocolate business, but I had to keep going on school, so I had to end that. But right now I'm refinishing furniture. I find pieces of furniture, fix them up, and I resell them.

I'm on Craigslist, and on Facebook, so I use social media actually as a business as well. I use that, and then I'm also helping my parents in their photography business. And then I'm also ISR (Infant Swimming Resource), I'm trying to become an instructor. I'm praying about that, and sort of seeking what I should be doing now.

Nancy: That's so great. It's lovely to hear a young person speak out of the conviction of her heart. Don't you love that? I love that Scripture in Psalm 127, which I know you all know. It's good to read it again, because it's one of the family Psalms.

Psalm 127:3: “Lo, children are an heritage of the Lord. And the fruit of the womb is his reward. As arrows in the hand of a mighty man are children of the youth. Happy is the man that has his quiver full of them. They shall not be ashamed, but they shall speak with the enemies in the gate.”

I love that. I think often we forget what we're really seeking to do. We are training children who will grow up to be those who will speak God's truth. Did you notice that word “speak”? There it is: “They shall speak with the enemies in the gate.”

We have so many liberal enemies in our gates today. The gates speak of the places where the laws are made, the governing places, in the White House and Congress and Senate, and in the governing places of each city, and even each little town. There are all people who are sitting in those gates.

How we long to get more and more Godly young men and women. Mostly men, because as women get older, mostly they will be embracing family, and it's pretty difficult to do a job like that, and embrace your family at the same time. But there are seasons of life, of course, and older women may venture into this area. But we've got to get our young people into the gates, who will speak.

Now, they may not get into the gates immediately, but they can learn to speak, just as Makenna is speaking her heart. And she's not afraid when she's talking with other young people, even if they don't agree with her, just speaking her heart and holding fast to her convictions. So be encouraged today, dear ladies, as you are training your children, and as you are enjoying them.

Did you notice also that it says: “happy is the man.” When it's talking about the man in this Scripture, it's actually a mighty warrior. God intends husbands and fathers to be mighty warriors in His Kingdom. As they lead their families, they're not meant to be wimps. They're meant to be mighty warriors.

Of course, although it says the man will be so happy, “the mighty warriors,” they're so happy if they've got their quivers full, because it's all in the context of war. When you go out to war, people say, “Oh, how many children should you have in your quiver?”

I've heard people say, well, you know, you could have five arrows in your quiver maybe, but quivers are all of different sizes. God gives sovereignly to families different quivers. Some he gives a small quiver, to others bigger quivers. But whatever quiver God gives, we've got to fill that quiver, and be open to the children God wants to put in that quiver.

But I think the main thing we have to keep in our heart is that, when we go out to war, when a mighty warrior goes out to war, he wants as many arrows in his quiver as he can get. Because when he's facing the enemy, he wants to have every arrow that he can possibly have to pull out of his quiver to attack the enemy.

So this is how God reveals the family. Every child is another arrow that we are sharpening, and we are polishing. We're getting them ready to be able to proclaim God's truth and proclaim His ways in the land. It is a powerful thing, and you're getting them ready to speak.

Now when we're talking about speaking, another very important thing, too, is we get used to the way our children speak. We can understand them, we hear them all the time. So we know what they're talking about, but a lot of children don't speak clearly. A lot of young people don't speak clearly.

Now I'm getting a little older. I never say I'm old, because I feel so young. But as I'm just getting a little older, I find it a little more hard to hear a lot of young people today. Now, some of it could be the fault of my ears, But I know it's not all the fault of my ears, because they mumble, they talk so quickly, and they just muh-buh-buh-buh, and I truly don't know what they're talking about.

I believe we should train our children to speak clearly. If they're not speaking clearly, get them to say it again, clearly! I believe a lot of the success of our children, as they grow older, is the way they speak. As they go out into the world, people are going to perceive who they are by the way they speak, if they speak clearly, if they speak knowledgeably. So we're training our children how to speak clearly.

We're training them with Godly knowledge, and good knowledge, and that which will enable them to speak amongst people, even those who are in the gates. They can speak with anyone. They can speak with those who are poor, and those who are from the humble places in society. They're not too mighty and proud to speak to them, to show them love, to bring the Gospel to them.

But they are also prepared to speak to those who are in the gates, and those who may have their master's degrees. We can prepare our children with good knowledge, Bible knowledge, good conservative political knowledge and understanding. So they understand how life works, how a country should work. They can speak knowledgeably, and they will also have understanding of the times.

I love the description of the tribe of Issachar. It said the tribe of Issachar, one of the Twelve Tribes of Israel, that they “had understanding of the times, to know what Israel ought to do” (1 Chronicles 12:32). Don't you like that? Now, that's something we are training our children for.

We are preparing them to have understanding of the times, the times we're living in now, 2018, to understand these times, to understand what's going on, to understand politically, and to have God-knowledge, to have His Word. Because He is the ultimate Truth, and people can learn all the things they want at colleges, but it's nothing compared to God's Truth.

God laughs at the wisdom of men. The wisdom of men is foolishness in God's eyes. His Truth is eternal. His Truth is the only true Wisdom. We've got to fill our children with His Truth.

There comes a day when they are going out into this world, and they will speak like Makenna has been speaking to you today. Speak, and they will speak to the young people, they'll speak to whoever they meet. They won't be ashamed to share their convictions, and to share the truth, the real truth, God's Truth.

I think this is another little thing that parents often are concerned about, when we think about homeschooling, I get some people who say, “Oh, if you're homeschooling, you're just sheltering your children. And I send my children into the school to be witnesses.”

Well, that sounds so good, but sadly, most often those children are not witnesses. Sometimes they may be, but mostly they get witnessed to. They get, what would be the word? Brainwashed. They get their brains filled with the things that are not Godly. They get their brains filled with liberalism and socialism.

In the public school today, we are now facing so much of the gender neutral teaching, and the bringing in even of the gay agenda, and the bringing in even of Islamic culture. All this is coming into our public schools. Our precious children go there for so many hours a day to be indoctrinated, and to be brainwashed.

No, we have the opportunity to pour into them real true Godly knowledge, and wisdom from God and from His Word. They are going to be ready, because we're not going to keep them sheltered forever. Yes, we are going to keep them sheltered when they're young, because they're not ready yet to go out.

They are too vulnerable. They can be too infiltrated with things that, wow, they don't get them out of their brains. They're never going to be able to know true Truth. But we don't hibernate our children forever. No, we are training them to send them out. We are training them to send them out into this world to impact this world for God.

But we're going to get them ready first, because as the Bible says, that Jesus Himself said, He said, “I send you forth as lambs among wolves” (Luke 10:3). Now, what do wolves do? They tear lambs to pieces. They'll tear them to bits.

There'll come a time when our precious young people will have to go out and face things in this world. Even as they speak the truth, they can have those who will be trying to tear them to bits. But they can stand their ground if they are prepared, if they're filled with Truth, if they're filled with God's Word. If they know, and they have the boldness to speak, speak, speak. This is what we're preparing them to do: to speak, to get them ready, so that when they go out and face the wolves, they can do it.

So be encouraged today, dear mothers. You are doing the greatest job in this whole nation. Oh my. You are preparing children to go out, and to speak and proclaim truth. And you are determining the future of this nation. There is no greater career than what you are doing. Nothing. Nothing is greater than preparing children.

Now, I've still got Allison here in the room. She is preparing ten children, and hoping the Lord will give her some more. She's got Makenna prepared and ready to go out. Anything more you want to say, Makenna or Allison, that you'd love to say to the ladies?

By the way, ladies, were not in our normal podcast room today. I hope this is going to be clear and you're going to hear it, because Arden who does the podcast, all of a sudden, he had to go to hospital because of an infection in his PICC. So, we are also missing him today.

Allison: We were out at a park one day, and we saw some children from a school. They had these shirts on, and the shirt said,  “Follow” and then on the back it said, “the leader.” Their whole school motto was to teach these children to follow the leader. I just looked at mine, and I thought, “No, I don't want to teach my children to follow the leader. I want to teach my children to be the leader. “

Nancy: Amen! Don't you love that?

Allison: We're gonna raise world-changers, and I'm not going to be able to do it if they're all running around and going here and there with their friends. There's nothing wrong with having friends, but be the house that all their friends come to. Let your children be the leaders and the ones that other children want to follow. Of course, you want to be instilling in them good things, so that they are leading other children to things that are Godly, and not leading them to things that they shouldn't be doing, or looking at.

I am so encouraged this past week to be able to sit in y'alls home. You know, I've been to many retreats where you get up and talk about having family devotions, but we've actually got to sit at the meal table and watch Mr. Colin. Even if he's not feeling well, or he's tired, he still just continues to stay steady with the family devotions.

He has been such an encouragement to Daniel to take that role. Sometimes it's hard when you're raising a family, to really practice what you've been preaching. And every time I come here, I think, “We can do this, because the fruit's worth it.”

Nancy: Yes. I think sometimes we had about 16 people squashed around the table while you’ve been here.

Allison: And they loved it! They loved it.

Makenna: I would say that, just being a part of a big family, I can see the benefits of what my parents have instilled in me, and what my parents have done. So, if you are a mother with little children, you can see the end result.

I would say that one thing that my parents have always said, and Miss Nancy has said, is that you're not training children, you're training leaders. You're training children to go out to the world, and you don't want to force them to go out until they're ready. But you'll know when they're ready.

I think the greatest thing that my dad's ever done, is he just has conversations with us. And he asks us what we believe. He is wanting us to have an opinion, and he's wanting us to have . . . We debate, we debate, we love having our own opinions, but that's training us to go out and fight for what we believe is right.

And I think some people, they might be pacifists, and they don't like to get into a quarrel sometimes. But I know my family, we have something we strongly believe in, and my dad has taught us to fight for what we believe, even as young children.

Sometimes it gets crazy. My dad and I have had wonderful, very long conversations about politics and religion. Just being able to go to my dad and say, “Hey, this Scripture says this, and I'm not really sure what it is.” But he always gives me his opinion. And then he says, “Go, you need to read the Scriptures, and you need to find out what you believe, rather than just listening to me.”

I think that's probably the greatest thing that my parents have done, training us to be leaders, and just giving us the responsibility that can grow us as an accomplished adult.

Allison: One thing Daniel says all the time, and probably one of his favorite sayings is, “Ideas have consequences.” What you put in, you will get out at some point. It's so important to make sure that the ideas that you're putting in your children's heads, or ideas other people are putting in their heads, are ideas that you want them to hear. Because it will shape who they are.

Think about little things that I've picked up along the way, good and bad. Oh, it's amazing. I mean, just the size of our family, or what we've done with our family, is just a little idea that you planted in me years ago at a Ladies' Retreat. Had I not gone to that? It's just amazing how we can really shape our children by putting good ideas in their heads.

Nancy: Absolutely. And this is why I love the family meal table, because it's the time when we are together as a family. You have other times throughout the day, but sometimes you're not altogether. The family mealtime is somehow, food brings us together, because we all want to eat.

Allison: And you're a wonderful cook, a wonderful cook!

Nancy: Oh, thank you. Well, I love the fact that you were talking about debating. At our table, especially when we were raising our children, I would bring a question, or a subject to talk about at the table from the Scriptures, or political, or geographical, or just every subject on earth. So then we would begin to debate and discuss.

But I guess it really was a little bit of debating, true, because every one of our children were always very opinionated, and they all wanted to say their opinions. Colin would have to be the umpire. Sometimes I've seen them get up on their chair, waving their fingers, to get across their belief in what they believed about the Scripture, what they believed about this subject. It was so exciting, and so wonderful, and nobody wanted to miss the family meal table.

It was where they could talk out their ideas, and get them straightened out if they were wrong, but enforced if they were right. So, we need to give our families these opportunities for this dialogue together, and discussing, or perhaps, even debating.

Well, may the Lord bless you again, my dear precious mothers. Let me pray for you.

“Dear Father, we thank You that we can have these beautiful opportunities to talk about family, and about Your ways. I pray that You will give each mother a vision, a vision beyond what she's ever had before. To raise children who are leaders, not followers. To raise children who will influence others, rather than being influenced by the crowd. Lord God, to raise children who will be strong in the Truth, and even when the Truth is attacked, that they will stand, and they will continue standing!

“Oh God, I pray that You will help all of us, as mothers and grandmothers, to become stronger in the Truth ourselves, and bolder in the Truth ourselves. That we will pass that onto our children, and we will raise children who will come forth to speak Truth in the gates of our cities, and of our land, and wherever they go.

“Oh God, I ask Your anointing on every precious mother today. Strengthen her, and enlarge her vision. Fill her with the joy of God as she mothers and trains her children. In the Name of Jesus, Amen.”

P.S. Makenna was chosen to become an Instructor with ISR (Infant Swim Rescue) to teach babies 6 months – four years to self rescue. She is the youngest instructor who has ever been chosen. The people were so impressed with her.

P.P.S. You read of how Arden got an infection in his PICC. Praise the Lord, it healed. And more than that! After nearly three years, he now has a full healing from Hodgkin’s Lymphoma. We are all rejoicing, and he is looking great.

From Our Home to Yours w/ Nancy Campbell

 

Episode 9: Pound your Stakes Deep!

 

Rocky: Welcome to the podcast, FROM OUR HOME TO YOURS w/ Nancy Campbell, founder and publisher of Above Rubies.

Nancy: It's lovely to come into your home today, and I send you love from our home. Now this is actually July 4th week. I say “week” because we usually have July 4th day, don't we? But it seems that, in our home, it's a whole week. We've just had such a wonderful week, lots of wonderful folks staying with us and staying with some of our other families on the hilltop. I have with us today, Allison Hartman. She and her husband and their beautiful family of 10 children have been staying with us for the week. They came for July 4th, and we've had a wonderful time together. This morning, they're packing up, ready to go. But before they left, I said, “Allison, you've got to come and talk to the ladies on the pod.” I know you're going to enjoy listening to Allison. They have, as I said, 10 children, such beautiful children, ranging from 19 years down to five months.

Nancy: How did you come to have 10 children? Did you plan that when you started?

Allison: Oh, definitely not, definitely not. When we first got married, we had pretty much agreed to limit it to four. That sounded like a good, reasonable number. And then my mother-in-law actually introduced me to the Above Rubies' magazine. I went to a ladies retreat, and the whole concept of letting God decide the size of our family was new to me, but it made sense. We trust God with everything else in our lives, but most people don't trust Him with the size of their family. That's a little scary to do. So when I went home and shared that with my husband, he was completely on board, and he said he actually had wanted 12 children, but he didn't want to scare me off when we were dating. So we pretty much, at that point, decided to not worry about the numbers, whether we have a large or small family but just basically leave it up to God.

Nancy: And you have been blessed. They have the most wonderful children. Anyway, Allison came to a number of Above Rubies' retreats and then she decided to organize some herself because she is an organizer. I think you put on about three ladies' retreats, and they were just so great because when Allison organizes something, wow, it's power-packed. And now, her and her husband, Daniel, have organized four family Above Rubies retreats down in Panama, right on the beach. And they have just been the most beautiful, wonderful time of families coming together. In fact, they've becomes so popular now. And our Above Rubies family retreats and our ladies retreats are usually just for a weekend, but now this family retreat, it's not enough for them, just a weekend. Although we have the main part of the retreat for the weekend, a good part of the families . . . How many would you say? About 80 percent?

Allison: I would say about 80 percent.

Nancy: Yes. They all come for a whole week to enjoy the fellowship together and enjoy the beautiful sunshine and the beach. You're ready to go for next year?

Allison: We are. We already have probably 20-25 families that have reserved their cabin.

Nancy: When is it next year?

Allison: The end of April. So it'll be April 25th through May 2nd if you're staying the whole week. But the conference itself will be Thursday through Sunday.

Nancy: Yes, it's going to be an exciting time. We had people in this last retreat, this year in April, we had a family that came all the way from New Zealand, right down at the bottom of the world. And they brought, I think they had seven children. Yes, all the way from New Zealand. We had a family drive all the way from Idaho.

Allison: Four days driving.

Nancy: And they want to come again.

Allison: They want to move. They want to move down here.

Nancy: Yes. So anyway, maybe you should start thinking about coming. It'll be such an amazing time. Anyway, now that your children are growing, your oldest daughter is 19, and you also have a family business. Tell the ladies, how do you keep the family together? I know you and Daniel have such a vision to keep your family together. Tell us how you do it in the midst of your busy schedule?

Allison: I think you definitely see a trend with families nowadays coming and going, and one parent takes one to some sport, and another parent takes another. Everybody's everywhere, and there is no unity. And that has been something that Daniel has felt like is so important that he's almost made it like a rule in our house that we will have dinner together. It may be at a restaurant. Very often, it is. It may be just grabbing something quickly, sitting down and eating. But we always try to eat as a family.

We also limit extracurricular. We have three boys that would love to play just about every sport because they love sports. But we've just decided it's not going to work. It's not going to be worth it to have every child on a different ball field at dinner time.

We do let our girls. They're really good in volleyball, so we do play volleyball, but we go as a family. We go and watch them as a family. They go to the same practices and that sort of thing. The other thing we do is, if they come to us and ask, “Hey, can I be a part of this? Can I be a part of that?” My first question is always, is it something we could do as a family? Is that a reasonable activity that isn't going to pull them away from our family for too long? And that's just really been something we have, Daniel has taken it very seriously because we see it's very much a problem I think in today's families.

Nancy: Yes, I agree with you Allison. I do believe, dear ladies, we should make every decision regarding our families or what we're doing with our children or what they want to do while they're under our roof, that every decision we make, we should make it in the light of strengthening families. We should say, “Now, is this going to weaken our family? Is it going to fragment our family? Is it going to make us go in all directions?” If it is, I would say, don't do it. That's your answer. But if it's something that will strengthen your family togetherness, keep you together as a family unit, yes, do it. And I believe we should use that criteria for making the decisions of what we do in our family lives. It's so easy to get pulled by what everybody else does.

We truly are like sheep, aren't we? We follow one another and, of course, what does everybody do today? I mean, in public education, they promote the extra-curricular activities, but same in homeschooling. I see homeschooling mothers totally, oh goodness me, they are so overwhelmed. They're driving their children here and there, to this, to that, to everything, and the family gets fragmented, and I don't believe we have to do it.

Now, maybe you're right in the middle of raising your children, and you think, wow, if I don't do this, my children are not going to grow up well-grounded. They're not going to have all these opportunities. Well, I'm looking at it from a different angle. My children have grown. We're now having great-grandchildren. In fact, we had another little grandbaby born to our family this July 4th week so that was exciting. I'm now looking at it at the other end.

I look at my children. Some of them are in their fifties now. And I see, oh, are they okay because I didn't take them to all these extra-curricular activities? And actually, I didn't, because back in those days I didn't even have an extra car, so I was stuck. I couldn't take them if I wanted to, but if they had to go to something, they had to walk. And, of course, I wouldn't have allowed them anyway if it was going to fragment our family life.

And I look at them today, they are all doing, they are fulfilling what God intended them to. They never missed out on one thing and so don't think you have to do these things. I found that choosing to do that which strengthens the family is the most powerful thing that we can do. In fact, even for family meal times, as Allison said, they make sure they eat together as a family.

I am such a believer in this. And even as our children grew, they left school, they went out into the workforce, but some of them were still living at home. While they were under our roof, they had to be home for the evening meal unless it was something special. Oh, you don't live by rigid rules. There can be special things that happen, and you change the plans. But on a whole, the family habit was we all came together for that evening meal, to strengthen the family.

Let me read you a scripture. I love Isaiah 54:2: “Enlarge the place of your tent and let them stretch forth the curtains of thine habitations. Spare not, lengthen thy cords and strengthen thy stakes." Now, those people were living in tents. I guess you have done a bit of camping. And if you camp in a tent and you don't pull those ropes tight and lengthen them, the tent sags doesn't it? It sags in the middle, and you haven't got much room. To make the most of the room, you've got to pull those ropes really tight and lengthen them as far as you can and strengthen your stakes.

Oh my. I love that word. Can I just give it to you in one or two other translations? I love the New English Translation, and it says: "Pound your stakes deep." I like to take that for my goal in establishing family life. Every decision I make, the way I plan things, it's all POUNDING MY STAKES DEEP. What do you think about that, Allison?

Allison: So good. And I was just thinking, you know, if you do allow your children to get a part of other curricular, they're building relationships with other people outside their family instead of going in the backyard and spending time with their siblings or their cousins or their parents. And those are the relationships we want to strengthen. There's nothing wrong with having friends, but if you're spending so much of your time, you're not strengthening your own family walls. You're strengthening maybe some childhood friendships, but we don't know whether those will even last. Sometimes they do, but very often they don't. I mean, I don't keep up with people.

Nancy: I don't remember one . . . well, I can remember them, but I don't have any association with one childhood friend. But it's family that keeps together.

Another translation, the New English Bible says: "Let out the ropes to the full, drive the pegs home." I like that too. And the Holman translation (HCSB): "Drive your pegs deep." Do you think you could take that today, ladies? Take it as a goal. In everything you do, pound your stakes deep. Make that the motto of your family life so that in everything you do, it's something that strengthens the family.

Now, that actually hits home. You know, many times we think, oh goodness me, I just need time for myself, and I want to get involved in this, and I want to get involved in that. Well, that's okay to a limited extent, but when we're raising a family, we have to be careful, I believe as mothers, not getting too involved so much in all these other outside things that we're pulled to get involved in. Because that takes us away from the family, that fragments the family, and sometimes women are involved in things that take them even away from family meal times. Sometimes they're even working at a family meal time. My, that's when the mother needs to be there. This is where we're pounding our stakes in deep, and this is what we've got to do. Oh, you have a lifetime. Your children are going to grow. This time of raising them, you may think it's going on and on at this moment. But my, as I look back, it was just like one blink of my eye. Oh, I am just so grateful that I was there with my children, and I just wanted to pound the stakes in.

And so be encouraged to do that today, precious ladies. I've got to ask you another question, but before I do, I must tell you, we had the greatest July 4th. The night before we finished putting in a volleyball court. Over the last five days or so the young people haven't gotten off the court until it is pitch dark. I mean, I look out in the morning, and they're playing; they're playing there until it's dark. And Allison's children are pretty good volleyball players. We had all these Floridians with us, and we had the competitions between the Tennesseans and the Floridians, and it was pretty hot competition, but they just played often. I mean, I think yesterday I was out watching them in the afternoon, and they were just teams going back and forth, and they had to make up teams because there were about 36 young people who wanted to be on the teams.

In fact, Friday night we had a potluck, with just our families on the hilltop and those staying with us, and we had counted 84, and then we had a big quiz which was so fun and then we had improv. The young people have been having a glorious time together. It's so wonderful, isn't it, for young people to meet with other godly young people?

Allison: Those are relationships that were built from the Above Rubies' family camp.

Nancy: That's true.

Allison: They've been going for years and years and really building friendships with these other people.

Nancy: Can I tell you a secret? My dream is that at our Above Rubies' family camps, there will be young people who meet one another, and God brings couples together. I can't think of any more wonderful place and that's why we encourage the families to bring their young people. Our grandson, Zadok, gets with the young people and inspires them. Colin and I met at a family camp, and I guess that's why I think, what a wonderful place to meet.

Now, let's talk about other things your children do. You really encourage them to get into businesses, don't you? Even at a young age. Tell us about some of them.

Allison: Yeah, we do. Obviously, we are self-employed, and we own a photography business, which they all help out with that, and it's become a real family business.

 

Nancy: It's amazing. The whole family goes?

Allison: We do. As they get older, I get more employees out of it too because this past Easter, which is one of our busiest seasons, we didn't have any employees outside the family. All of my little ones, from our seven-year-old on up, they had a different job.

We really encourage them to, if they're interested in something or they feel like they have a product or a service that they can market, we try to encourage them to do that. So one thing, we have a lot of chickens, so we have a ton of eggs. Well, we can't eat all those eggs, and it teaches our boys responsibility that they have to feed the chickens, they have to gather the eggs, they have to wash the eggs.

Nancy: And they give you the dirty ones.

Allison: Yes, I get the ones that are not cleaned. But they will take them to a market or to our business store front, and they'll sell them for a reasonable price, but they still get the concept that money doesn't grow on trees. The Bible says if you don't work, you don't eat. Well, most young people like to eat, so we let them know if you're going to eat, you need to help out. There's nothing wrong with that. We're a team. Our family is a team, and we can't do it without one of them. So we've done the eggs.

Nancy: And then how did the boys help you or how do they all help with the photography? Do they all have certain animals or something they look after?

Allison: They did. Well, we do Easter portraits with live animals. We will have bunnies and chicks and ducks and a baby lamb, and all that is a lot of work. So even the little ones will help by running and getting daddy a baby duck or a baby chick. Maybe the younger boys will help with feeding the animals, making sure they all have food and water and their cages are clean. My big girls, wow, I couldn't do it without them, the 14 and the 16 year old. They are amazing at getting smiles out of little ones and that's important. I mean, parents don't want their pictures unless their little ones look happy. So they are the best smile-getters. We even have customers that request them. I have to make sure Eden's there, make sure Hally's there, and they love these children.

And then Makenna is my little saleswoman. She's pretty much taken my job of showing people their pictures and then letting them decide what package they want, but she's wonderful at it. She’s very confident, but yet, she's very kind and patient to customers, and she answers their questions. And people are really starting to respect that my children know what they're doing. They don't think, oh, they're young, so they don't know what they're talking about. They do know what they're talking about because they've lived it their whole lives.

Nancy: And I think you told me about them picking mistletoe?

Allison: Yes, yes. When I was young, my brothers would go, we would go up in trees and get mistletoe, and we've kind of carried on that tradition where Daniel will climb up an incredibly high tree and get mistletoe and then we'll break it into sections and put little red bows, and they'll go to a couple of grocery stores in our town, and they'll sell it, donation only, and that's what they use for Christmas money for each other. This past Christmas, there was a struggling grocery store in our area, called Apple Market, that everybody loves. Well, because of the nature of Publix and Walmart, they were pretty much putting them out of business, and it was so sad because this is a grocery store we went to as a kid. So my children said we want to do the mistletoe this year and just give it to Apple Market. You know, the owner was in tears. Seriously, it was amazing. It's a neat thing; they're learning how to work as a team and then they get to enjoy buying people presents. Everyone enjoys that, but it's a lot more fun when it's your money and not mom just gave you money.

Nancy: We did that too. Our children never got money to buy gifts. They had to earn it.

Allison: And I don't really believe in giving them money for doing chores. That's part of living in our house.

Nancy: I don't believe it either. You know, to think you have to get money for everything. It's not teaching our children. There's so much we do in life that we just do out of love and out of giving, and they need to learn that too, especially being part of the family.

Allison: I'm completely okay with them making money on something that they do. My girls have started doing furniture. They will get up early on Saturday morning, and they will go look for furniture at garage sales, and it's so neat because they do it together, which I love. Then they'll come home and show all the family their findings and oh, look at the bed I got for $5. And then they'll spend time. They'll gather their paint and all their supplies, and they'll basically redo these pieces of furniture, and they can really make good money on them. You know, they may spend two or three hours, but they'll sell them and then they have money to do what they want.

You know we're probably going to try to put a sand volleyball court in. Well, they can use their money to put that sand volleyball court in. They're the ones that are going to enjoy it. There's no reason they can't take care of paying for it.

Nancy: Oh, and you also told me about the Moringa trees.

Allison: We did a beach photo shoot for a family a couple of years ago, and the guy was trying to talk us into joining his network marketing where he would sell this Moringa powder. Well, we don't normally do stuff like that, but my husband researched it and discovered that Moringa is just an amazing superfood and that you could grow them just from seed. So he ordered hundreds of seeds and started planting them, and we grew trees that are now 30 feet tall that are only a couple of years old. So it's a fast, fast growing tree. It's amazing, but he would eat the leaves, and you could eat just about everything in them. You can eat the seeds. Well people started hearing about them and thinking, well, I want them for my family. So he and the boys started planting the seeds, and we took about 90 trees to a farmer's market, and they sold every one of them and made about $900 one day. Just my seven, nine, and eleven year- old boys, all by themselves. They had no help from us. Well, not many boys that age can make that kind of money, but it was amazing. I mean, they prepared their soil together. And it's a good thing. It's something that we're teaching them, not just good work ethic, but we're also spreading good health tips to people.

Nancy: Yes. Oh, that's so great. And another thing I think that you've talked to me about, you know, different times when we've been getting together, is the whole concept of college. What are you going to do? Makenna, she's nineteen and you're facing that. What are you coming to?

Allison: Well, you know, Makenna is 19, and she just finished a year in college. And, you know, it's funny. I've been going to your retreats for years, and you've mentioned that, you know, college is just not the end all be all. And I kind of would put that in the back of my mind that, Oh, that's not for our family. We are college people. We went to college. I went to college. My husband almost got a Masters, and we were just assuming that that's what we would do for our children. And then I guess it was last year, it just kind of dawned on me that my whole life, as this family I'm growing, our goal is to be counter-cultural, not go with the flow, not follow what every other family is doing just because every family is doing it. And I realized that that's all college was for us, for teaching our children. I'm not using my college degree. We make great money, and we didn't go to school to be a photographer. Daniel was an engineer, and I was a communication major, and honestly, I think I would do just as well without a communication degree.

Nancy: Oh, that's just your personality!

Allison: It's just the way God made me. I didn't learn anything from a state school that's helping me today.

Nancy: See this is the thing, I believe the Word which says that a man's gift will make room for him and bring him before kings (Proverbs 18;16). It is so true. And I think, dear mothers, we have to learn to trust God and to know that He has put in our children the gifts that He chose for them, that He has put in them. We didn't. I look at my children now because they have grown, and I see the giftings in their lives. They have giftings that I don't have. In fact, I couldn't have even put them into them and no college could have put it into them. In fact, none of them have ever been to college. Even one of my sons, he trades the future markets. He could never learn that in college; that's something you don't learn at college. And in fact, all the things they are doing.

Allison: Well, Serene and Pearl. Serene encouraged Makenna last year that college really would have been a detriment to her because it would have put her in such a box. You're not going to learn how to write an amazing recipe book that's going to become a lifestyle for so many. You just can't learn it there. Now college, you know, there are reasons that some people will go to college and that's okay, if they need the degree; they're wanting to be a doctor or dentist. But as far as putting your children, putting that over them saying, you will go to college before you get married. I just feel like we're limiting our children, which is opposite of what culture says. Culture would say, you're limiting your children by not letting them or encouraging them to go to college. But I say that's just a bunch of junk because I think that what Makenna learns from our business is so valuable.

 

Nancy: Yes. And she's really like you. She's born with marketing ability and organization; it just comes out her ears. In fact, she could go to college for five years and never learn another thing that she's not already doing.

Allison: It would almost inhibit her. It would almost make her, like I said, put her in that box that I don't want her in. I want her to do bigger and greater things than ever I could have.

Nancy: Exactly. That is the thing. We have big visions for our children. Although I have to say, as I was growing my children, yes, I wanted them to do well in life, but I really didn't have any vision for them to be famous or anything like that. I just wanted them to walk with the Lord and to be faithful to God.

But he has done more than that because he has raised them up to do great things. Amazing things. Things that other people have never done before because they were never put in a box, and they just thought that they could do anything. And I think that is even a greater thing. I often like to say that encouragement is the rich soil in which we grow our children to their full destiny. And I think that there's nothing like encouragement and affirming. And being aware of the giftings God gives to our children and opening up opportunities for them, and they're fulfilling who God created them to be.

So many people are in jobs that, oh goodness me, they really are not happy, they're boring, and they're not doing what they were born to do. And sometimes it may be going to a college, especially for a man, a young man, because he does have to be the provider of the home. And there are some things he will have to get a college degree, which can be done online or even he may have to go. But especially our daughters, I think they are the most vulnerable place to send a daughter. And we see so many sad things happen when daughters go to college. I've talked to women all over the nation and they've said, “You know, the worst things that happened to me were at college,” and it really didn't benefit them at all.

So let's not get in the box. That's the thing. Not just on this issue, but every issue. We are so much like sheep. Well, God calls us His sheep. We're His sheep to hear His voice. But let's hear God's voice, not the pull of the world and not follow society and what they are doing. Let's be those who seek after truth and to seek after what God wants. And let's be those, as we close this session, let's be those who will POUND OUR STAKES FIRM. We'll drive them into the ground, and we will do everything that strengthens our family rather than fragment it.

Can I pray for you today?

“Dear father, I thank you for every precious mother listening, every daughter, every young child, every older woman. Father, I pray that You will lead us all closer to Your heart, nearer and nearer to Your truth. Lord, we're so surrounded by deception and what everybody else is doing. Help us to be those who seek Your ways, seek Your truth. And Lord, I pray for everyone today, everyone listening, that they will be those who will pound their pegs deep into the ground and into the home, and they will do everything to strengthen their family. Help us all as grandmothers, mothers, daughters, children, to be family-strengtheners. Oh Father, I pray that this anointing will come upon everyone listening today, in the name of Jesus. Amen.”

Be blessed, dear family-strengthener, today. This is a most powerful thing that you are doing. As we strengthen our marriages and we strengthen our families, we are strengthening the nation.

 

Episode 8: ANY JOYFUL MOTHERS LEFT?

FROM OUR HOME TO YOURS w/ Nancy Campbell

God equates JOY with motherhood (Psalm 113:9). How do you become a joyful mother when you feel overwhelmed? How do you break through self-pity? How do you move from being despondent and in despair to being delightfully happy? You’ll find the answers in this episode.

I got to share things in this episode that I never meant to talk about. But I believe it is a message that every mother in the world needs to hear. Please don’t miss this one. It’s a little longer than usual, but you’ll want to hear it over and over again to get it into your very being. Share it with your friends too.

Announcer: Welcome to the podcast, From Our Home to Yours, with Nancy Campbell, founder and publisher of Above Rubies.

Nancy: Hello ladies, how are you today? Today we're going to speak about another dwelling word. On the my very first podcast. I told you about the word, “dwell.” That word occurs 468 times in the Bible, just in the Old Testament. Actually, there are 26 different Hebrew words for that word, “dwell.”

On the first podcast I told you about the word, naveh.  Today we're going to look at another word. This one is yashab, spelled y a s h a b. This word occurs over a thousand times in the Bible. Sometimes it's translated “dwell,” but it's translated many other different words as well. The Hebrew word occurs over 1000 times.

It's a very important word. What does it mean? It means “to marry, to settle down, to remain, to continue, to keep house, to inhabit, to endure, and to sit down.” It contains all those meanings, so we'll look at a couple of Scriptures today with that word.

The first one we'll turn to is Psalm 113:9 where it says: “He makes the barren woman to keep house.” There it is. That's the word. Yashab, meaning “to dwell in a house, and to be a joyful mother of children.”

As we read this Scripture, oh, by the way, I didn't read it all. The last phrase of this Scripture says: “Praise ye the Lord!” This is worth praising the Lord about! It's talking about the woman in the home, keeping her house, managing her home, living in her home, and making her life in her home.

How is she to do this? Well, it tells us how! It says that she does it with a joyful attitude. God makes her to be a joyful mother of children. Joy is the attribute that God equates with motherhood.

Now, dear mother, did you know that sometimes you don't really feel very joyful, do you? You feel overwhelmed, and you feel despondent, and you just wonder how you going to manage everything. But God wants you to . . . He wants to bring you into a place of joy. He wants mothers to be joyful.

I wonder why so many mothers are not joyful today. I believe it's because of the attitude in society toward mothering. It's the attitude in our education system toward mothering. It's the attitude we hear from the feminist and humanist agenda.

It all puts down motherhood, so we see it as something insignificant and not important This is the enemy, who is robbing us of the truth. Because we've got to learn to see motherhood, not as society looks upon it, but as God looks upon it, because precious mother, God is the One Who designed motherhood.

He's the One who created us to be mothers. He put this mothering anointing deep within our hearts. Every mother has a mothering anointing in her heart. She has a nurturing desire that is in every female person. Every female created by God has this nurturing instinct within her.

Now you say, “Hey, I know some mothers who are not motherly at all, and I know mothers who don't even want to have children.” Yes, that is true. Because many of them have been brainwashed. They've been propagandized. They have been infiltrated with lies. So, they have suppressed this instinct, but they never can truly suppress it. Because if they say they don't want motherhood, and they deny motherhood, they don't even want children, you will find that they will have a pet. Oh yes, they will, because they must nurture something!

They'll nurture a little dog or a cat because it is within them. This is how God created us. Not only did He create us with this instinct innately within us, but He created our bodies for the very purpose of motherhood. He created us with a womb. Why do we have a womb? A man doesn't have a womb.

That's the difference between male and female. There are only two types of people in this world; a man without a womb, the male; and a man with a womb, the woman, the womb-man. This is who we are, dear ladies. How sad to go through life, and not embrace who we are, and who we were created to be.

You see, the devil is a deceiver. The devil is a robber, and he has robbed so many beautiful women of the truth of who they are. We have women today who have been brainwashed with feminism who are denying their womb and their womanhood.

They are denying who they are. It is totally ridiculous. In fact, the foolish, the so-called wisdom of man is so foolish. It's foolish to God. God gave us a womb, a womb to be used, a womb to bring forth life, a womb to continue the generations. For if all women were to deny their womb, civilization would stop!

We are the continuers of civilization. Not only do we bring life into our own precious families, and into this nation, but we bring it forth for the generations, and ultimately for eternity. In fact, just the other day, a lady commented on one of my Facebook posts. She was saying how, “Oh, it's not about having children. I believe God wants us to be saving souls. We don't have to be having children. We just need to be saving souls.”

That sounds very spiritual. But if we, as mothers, don't bring forth children, there'll be no souls to be saved. My, we can actually . . . Do you know, precious mother, sometimes we don't really think things through. Do you know that we can deny precious babies life whom God has destined before the foundation of the world, because every life is destined?

God knows every life before the foundation of the world. We, because of our selfishness, or our ignorance, we can stop them coming into this world, who God intended to come in.

More than that, we forfeit them from experiencing eternal life. Now on this earth, we cannot, even with our wildest imaginations, understand the glories of the eternal Kingdom. They are beyond what we will ever even imagine, the glories of the eternal Kingdom. And, we can deny lives being born to experience that. Unless they are born and they come into God's Kingdom, they will never experience it.

You think, “Oh well they weren't born, they won't know!” But, oh to deprive them of the glory, which is beyond all glories. Why would we want to deprive someone of the glory of the eternal world? This is what we do when we stop a child coming into the world. We don't only deprive ourselves of the greatest blessing that we could ever enjoy. Because that's another thing, the enemy robs women of the greatest blessing they can ever receive.

I'm in the process at the moment of printing the new Above Rubies, Number 95. It's rolling off the presses now. In my editorial, I have a picture of four new babies already born into our family this year. I got each mother to write a little sentence about how they felt about motherhood. So beautiful to just read how each one felt, and how, oh, this is the greatest blessing that could ever, ever happen to them.

I think of Serene now, her new baby, little Solly (Solace Ling), she is number nine biologically to Serene. Although there are 14 children in the family. Now you could think, “Okay, number 14 in the family coming in. Well, we're used to having babies. It's lovely. But, you know, this is old hat.”

Oh no! Oh, when little Solly was born, Serene said, “Mother, I am smitten!” She is in total love with this baby. What did Sam say? “I am besotted.” I mean, this is the joy of a baby, and Satan wants to deprive women of this joy. All their precious babies.

They not only deprive themselves but deprive grandparents. They deprive the church. They deprive the world of the influence in the image of God. They deprive future generations, because when we stop one child, no, no, we don't. No, we stop a whole dynasty. A whole dynasty. How many children? How many amazing children who would impact the world for God come from one child? Then we deprive God, and we deprive eternity.

So not only has God created us with this womb, but with breasts, to nurture this life. This is who we are as mothers. We must understand the truth. When we understand the truth, and we know that motherhood is mandated by God, it's the highest career He has given to women. When we understand this and embrace it, then we can walk in the joy of it.

There is something that I often say to women: “Every mother loves her children, but not every mother loves motherhood.” I think this is where it comes down to the core, because it is true. Every mother loves her child. She would die for her child, but there are so many mothers who don't actually love motherhood.

They love their children, but they think they could be doing something more exciting, more powerful, whatever, and they really find, “Oh, this motherhood! Oh goodness me, yes, I love my child, but, oh, I've got to keep on with my career. I've got more important things to do!” So, there is confusion, and you never ever really come into the fullness of motherhood when you have this attitude.

I know because I was there when I started off mothering. I didn't understand all the beautiful truth I share with you today. I didn't know. I so intensely loved my children, but all this motherhood business, oh goodness me. I just wondered what had happened to me. Help!

In fact, there was a time when I wondered whether I should have even got married. I wondered whether I was out of the will of God because I could no longer serve God in the way I thought I could serve God.

Because my husband and I, we went out full time for God when we were engaged. We were ready to change the world. We went out to the mission field, and we were going to do great things for God! Then, babies came along .  . . Well, my husband carried on doing great things, but where was I? Stuck in four walls at the very beginning with three screaming babies!

I knew nothing about motherhood. I had my first baby. Seventeen months later, I had another two babies, unexpectedly! Didn't even know! That was way back in the days when they didn't have ultrasounds. Nobody checked me.

I knew I was having something pretty huge. I thought, how am I going to get this baby out? I didn't know it was twins. Actually, I have to confess, well, I didn't really get much attention. We were in the Philippine Islands doing missionary work when I conceived. We didn't get back to New Zealand until I was eight months pregnant, and I went to a doctor in the hospital.

He checked me over and said, “Oh yes, everything's fine. I’m going off to England, so when you're in labor, just come in and whoever's on duty will attend to you.” I didn't know anything about home birth in those days. And so, I thought I was in labor, went into the hospital. They checked me all over again and it was a false alarm. So away I went home again.

Still nobody had even detected twins. I went in, I got right to my due date. I went in, and the nurse was just listening to the heartbeat with the old Doppler. She says, “That's interesting. I can hear another heartbeat, but it just might be an echo. We'll wait and see.” So, we still don't know anything.

Then came the time and Evangelina was born. She was born breech as often twins are. I really didn't notice any difference between her breech birth and a head birth. They checked my tummy. Oh yes, there's another one there. So that was the very first moment that I knew I was having twins. He was born about five minutes later.

Here we were. Oh, with twins! Oh, we were so excited, my husband and I! My husband went home to my parents who were looking after my son at home. He was on cloud nine. He had brought forth twins. Well, he was the father of these twins.

He went into their room, and he said, “Guess what?” And they said, “A son!” He said “Yes, and a daughter!” Well, there was stony silence. My mother had always said to me, “Nancy dear, never have twins.” And I went and had twins!

Why did she say that? I think she thought they would be a lot of work. So, we didn't really get any great congratulations from them. My dearest mother, who stayed with me for a few days, was not very well. She couldn't really take it with these three little babies. We had nothing. We just come back from the Philippine Islands and we were living out of suitcases.

She couldn't take it any longer. She left me and went to stay with a friend. So here I was with these three screaming babies all on my own. I knew no one. We had just come back from the Philippine Islands. Oh, I hardly survived those days.

I think it was in those days I wondered what had happened to me. Would I ever be able to serve the Lord again? What have I done? Is this my life? I had to cry out to God: “Oh God, oh God, what have I done?” Oh, but as I cried out to Him, He was so faithful. He began to show me, little by little, that I was in His perfect will. This is who He'd created me to be.

Yes, I was fulfilling my destiny. Little by little, the revelation came. I began to understand who I was, and the power of mothering. As I embraced it, instead of living in the confusion and the torment, I came into the joy of mothering. Because it's all in our attitude. It’s all in our understanding of what it's about.

So, precious mother, if you're in this state of confusion today, and you know, oh yes, you love your children, but, wow, you're not really loving this motherhood business, you get up each day, and it's just another day to face. Oh, can I encourage you? Come into the truth. The truth sets you free. Yes. And when you know who you are . . . “I am born to be a mother. I am created physically to be a mother. I am created to nurture with all the mothering hormones to be a mother.” Oh, we are so blessed, precious mothers!

Oh goodness me! Fathers, they don't have the blessings we have. When we have a baby, we have this beautiful little baby and God just fills us to overflowing with motherly hormones. Every time we put the baby to the breast, oxytocin flows, that beautiful hormone, oxytocin, which is the love hormone, and the cuddle hormone, and the bliss hormone, and the stress-free hormone.

God gives it to you, precious mother, so that when you're facing all the tensions of caring for a new baby, and other little ones, and maybe older ones, He gives you this stress-free hormone, so when you nurse your baby . .  .  sometimes you just want to go off to sleep.

You just have this relaxing hormone, and He gives you prolactin. The more you nurse your baby, every time you nurse your baby, presto, prolactin operates. The more you nurse your baby, the more prolactin you have, and prolactin is a motherly hormone. You become more motherly.

You see, in the doing of these motherly things, we have the hormones that make us more motherly.  This motherly love pours out upon you, not just for your baby, but for all your other children. God is so amazing!

Do you remember when you had your first baby? Oh, I just couldn't believe how much love I could have for a person, for this baby. The love was so incredible, and I used to think, well, how could I have another baby because I could never love another baby like this baby. It would be impossible!

But then you have another baby, and that love pours in. You love these babies. Then you have more love for your other baby, and it happens with every baby. Another baby keeps a mother flowing with love, even for her other children.

And for her older children, who are, maybe, getting a bit stroppy, and she's perhaps not feeling quite so loving to them. She has a new baby and this motherly hormone just flows out on the whole family. God is so good, isn't He? So, embrace your motherhood today, darling ladies. Oh, and as you do, you will be filled with joy.

What kind of joy is this? Well, the word in the Hebrew is sameach. If you want the spelling, it is, s a  m e a c h. It's the very same word that's used in Proverbs 15:13: “A merry heart makes a cheerful countenance.” And again, in Proverbs 17:22: “A merry heart doeth good like a medicine.” It means to have a merry heart. You're full of joyfulness and merry-heartedness.

It's the same word used in the Bible when people drank wine and became happy. It's the same word when you're celebrating. It's the same word that was used when the people celebrated, when Solomon was made King. In 1 Kings, Chapter 1:39-40, it says: “And Zadok the priest took an horn of oil out of the tabernacle, and anointed Solomon. And they blew the trumpet; and all the people said, God save king Solomon. And all the people came up after him, and the people piped with pipes, and rejoiced with great joy.” 

Here is that same word in 1 Kings 1:40 that's used to describe the joyful mother: “They rejoiced with great joy so that the earth rent with the sound of them.” I beg your pardon? What happened? The earth broke open? Yes, that's what it says. I checked out the Hebrew because when I read that I thought, Oh, that couldn't have happened, so I checked out that word.

“Rent” is baqa in the Hebrew. It means “to cleave, to break, to rip open, to make a breach, to divide.” The Holman translation says it correctly. They rejoiced: “with such a great joy that the earth split open from the sound.” Did you ever read that before in the Bible? Well, it's there. That's how much the noise of the joy was that it actually split open the earth! Amazing.

Now that is the same kind of joy that is spoken of in Psalm 113:9, that the mother in the home who is yashab (living, dwelling in her home), will be a joyful mother of children. So dear mothers, as we live in our homes, let's do it with joy If you just don’t have any joy, and it's all flown out the window, and you are just a mess of self-pity, well, what are you going to do?

This is what you're going to do. You're going to confess it to the Lord. “Oh God, I am so sorry. I confess my self-pity before You. Lord, It's a sin. I confess it. I thank You, Father, that You fill me with joy, because You are joy and You dwell within me. I thank You for Your joy that fills my heart. Thank You, Lord. I'm going to live in Your joy today. I thank You in the Name of Jesus.” And appropriate it!

Now, does Christ dwell in your heart? Well, if He does, joy fills your heart. Jesus, who lives in us, is not filled with self-pity. He's not filled with despondency. He's not filled with despair. He is filled with joy, because He is joy. This is where joy originates, in God, and now He is in you. So appropriate it!

I love that Scripture in Philemon 1:6 which says: “That the communication of your faith may become effectual,” how? “By the acknowledging of every good thing which is in you in Christ Jesus.” Now what is this Scripture saying? It's that King James language. How can our faith be effectual? We want it to work, don't we?

In our home, in our kitchen, with all the children screaming at once, how do we make it work? Well, we acknowledge the truth. That's what it says, “by acknowledging.” We acknowledge, we appropriate the truth, that is “Jesus Christ lives in me. Every good thing that is in Jesus also lives in me, because if it's in Him, it's in me.”

Are you getting it? If Christ lives in me, His joy lives in me, and I can thank Him for it. If I'm getting angry and upset, and, whoooo, “look out, everybody!” Hey, just a moment, stop and thank the Lord Jesus.

“Thank you, Jesus, that Your patience dwells in me. You are patient. You are long-suffering. You live within me. I thank You for Your patience now. Thank You, Lord. Thank You. I'm the most patient mother in my city. Thank You, Lord!”

Now you're not confessing lies, because who is more patient than Christ? He dwells in you. You see, dear ones, we've got to acknowledge the truth, that every good thing that is in Jesus is in us. You either live according to the flesh, and by your feelings, or you live according to the truth of the Word of God.

“Man shall not live by bread alone,” Jesus said, “but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God.” This is how I learned, I should say, gradually learned, to live as a young mother. I started off living by my feelings, up one day and down the next.

It's a terrible way to live, isn't it? But I learned to live by the truth of the Word of God. What God says, whether I feel like it or not, I'm going to live by it. I'm going to confess it. Now, the amazing thing is that when you confess the truth out loud, your body begins to line up. Even your attitudes begin to line up.

Confession is powerful. So, confess the truth! Don't confess lies. Your feelings are lies! If you live by your feelings, you're going to live mostly in the downs, rather than the ups. Oh yes. Sometimes you'll feel up, but most of the time you'll feel down, because feelings are deceiving. You cannot live by them. They come and go and they're a lot of rubbish. You live by the truth of the Word of God.

This is how you come into the joy of the Lord. I remember one time, this is a New Zealand story. I started (we are New Zealanders), and I started raising my children when we were in New Zealand. I remember one time feeling overwhelmed. I didn't really feel I could keep going. It was just all too much. Everything was on top of me, poor me, and I'm just getting into a state of self-pity.

Anyway, I got up to have my Quiet Time in the morning before I faced the day. I was reading Second Corinthians, I'll turn to it here to remind myself, yes, it's Chapter One. I was reading verse eight: “For we would not, brethren, have you ignorant of our trouble which came to us in Asia, that we were pressed out of measure, above strength”.

Oh, I stopped. Wow, this is amazing. I'm reading about me. Wow. I just feel I'm pressed out of measure. It's more than my strength can cope with, “insomuch that we despaired even of life.” Well, I hadn't got to that, of course, but then I read on.

Paul says: “But.” But! “We had the sentence of death in ourselves, that we should not trust in ourselves, but in God who raises the dead: Who delivered us from so great a death, and does deliver: in Whom we trust that He will yet deliver us.”

As I read those words, I was convicted. Oh, my. I realized, what was I doing? All this self-pity junk. I was trusting in myself. “Poor me. I've got too much to do. I can't cope.” Well, what's that? Trusting in myself, in my flesh, in my capabilities! I wasn't trusting in God!

That's what Paul said: “We should not trust in ourselves, but in God, a God Who raises the dead!” Wow! No matter how low I get, He's able to pick me up. And so, I said, “Oh God, I am so sorry. I confess my sin of trusting in myself. I'm so sorry. Cleanse me with Your precious Blood. Lord, I trust in You. I give it all to You. All these worries and concerns, and Lord, all my weaknesses, I give them to You. I thank You. I trust You. You are my strength. You are my portion. I trust You, Lord. Thank You. In the Name of Jesus.”

Well, it left me. Wow, all that self-pity was gone! I remember, I can still remember later in the day, thinking, “Now what was all that? What was I in such a state about?” Do you know, I couldn't even remember what it was all about? It was just in my mind, it wasn't even real. I was able to come out of it because I was trusting in God.

Can I pray for you as we close today?

“Oh Father, we thank You. Thank You for Your beautiful plan for us as mothers. Thank You that You have created us for this glorious anointing, and that You love for us to dwell in our homes and love mothering in our homes.

I pray for every precious mother today, that You will bless them, and encourage them, and lift them up out of the doldrums, and their self-pity, and into the truth, and into trusting You. Oh God, save us, each one of us, because we're all tempted to trust in ourselves, which is so ridiculous.

Lord, how can we trust in ourselves when we can trust in You, the God Who raises the dead, the God Who delivers. I pray that You will bring each one into that beautiful place of trusting in You and living in the Truth. You will make them joyful mothers of children in their homes today. In the Name of Jesus. Amen.”