You Are A Life Giver!
God is the originator of life. He loves life. It is precious to Him. And wonder of wonders, He has given to us women the awesome privilege to conceive life, to nurture it in our womb and birth it into the world. A new life! It is a life that is not only destined for this world, but also for eternity. What joy! Oh yes, I’ll admit it takes sacrifice, but it is the most powerful thing that we can do as a woman. Everything else we spend our time on in this world will one day be left behind, but if we lead our children to know Jesus, we’ll take them into heaven with us as well as the future dynasties that follow. To bring life into the world is not something we do today and it is gone tomorrow – it is a forever work. Even if a little child leaves this earth before we are ready for them to go, we will have them forever in eternity. And eternity is the real world!
Life to the World!
Take a moment to think about it. “Life-giving” is the most powerful, influential and eternal thing that you’ll ever do in this life. It is who we were created to be. Adam called his wife Eve which means “the life-giving one.” Eve was the prototype of all women to come. Our primary purpose and greatest privilege s married women is to give life. Oh I know there are many women who will resist this statement, but in doing so they deny whom God created them to be.
God’s kingdom is a kingdom of life. Satan’s kingdom is a kingdom of death. He comes to “steal, to kill and to destroy.” He comes riding his horses of “contraception, sterilization and abortion” which effectively eliminate the life God wants to come into this world. In this age where life is disregarded, we need to be reminded that God is on the side of life. God challenged the Israelites as He challenges us today.
Deuteronomy 30:15-16, “See, I have set before you today life and good, death and evil, in that I command you today to love the Lord your God, to walk in His ways, and to keep His commandments, His statutes and His judgments, that you may live and multiply; and the Lord your God will bless you in the land which you go to possess… I call heaven and earth as witnesses today against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing: therefore choose life, that both you and your descendants may live…”
When we choose life, we choose that which is good and that which is a blessing. We choose blessing for us now and for our descendants to come. When we refuse life, God says it’s a curse. God’s words! I’m sure glad I didn’t say them or you’d be throwing rocks at me.
Life-Giving Words!
God gives us the privilege of bringing life into this world, but this is just the beginning. He wants us to be “life-givers” in every part of our lives. He wants us to continue to pour life into the children He gives us. He wants us to speak life into them. What about your words, mother? Are they pouring life into your children? Proverbs 18:21 says, “Death and life is in the power of the tongue.” What do your children receive from you?
What kind of words do you pour into your husband? Are they sweet, kind and uplifting words? Or are they down-pulling, negative and nagging words?
As you wake up each morning, can I encourage you to confess out loud, “I am a life-giver. I will speak life-giving words to my husband and children today.” Throughout the day, confess out loud, “I am a “life-giver”.
This will prompt you to speak life-giving words, encouraging words, positive words, wise words, nourishing words, faith-building words and loving words to your family. Instead of a deathly, gloomy atmosphere, your home will become charged with life and vitality. Jesus said, “The words that I speak unto you are spirit, and they are life.” (John 6:63) He still wants to speak these life-giving words, but now He wants to speak them through you.
Proverbs 10:11 reminds us that “The mouth of the righteous is a well of life.” And Proverbs 15:4 says, “A wholesome tongue is a tree of life.”
Life-giving Looks!
Have you heard the adage, “If looks could kill I’d be dead by now”? The countenance of your face can also minister life or death. You can crush your child’s spirit by the scornful expression you give them. You can discourage them by your frowning countenance. You can wound their heart by your look of rejection. Or you can ignite the spirit of life within them by your happy face.
One day when I was taking our daily walk with my daughters, I asked them the question, “How can you have a heavenly atmosphere in your home?” Evangeline immediately replied, “Have a happy face!” I didn’t expect that answer, but as I thought about it, I realized how important it is. Your happy face will impart life and security to your children. Your gloomy, scowling face will provide the basis for their difficult and negative behavior.
I like Proverbs 15:15 in the Living Bible, “When a man is gloomy, everything seems to go wrong; when he is cheerful, everything seems right!” And what about Proverbs 17:22 in the Good News Bible? “Being cheerful keeps you healthy. It is slow death to be gloomy all the time.” Gloominess not only brings death to you, but to your whole family. It casts a shadow over your home.
Dear mother, just as you look to the Lord and are changed into His image, so your children look to you and their lives are affected by your countenance. They will grow to bde like the expression on your face. What a challenge!
When you get up in the morning, try smiling. You may not feel like it, but do you live your life by your feelings? That is a very shallow way to live. Put on your happy face anyway. That action will change how you feel inside! Smile at your husband. Smile at your children. Smile at them when you get up. Smile at them all day long. Smile when you feel bad and smile when you feel good. You will be amazed at how different you will feel and you will be even more amazed at the difference in the behaviour of your children.
Life-giving Health!
When God gives His children to you, He gives them to you created with life-giving cells. He now entrusts you as “the life-giving one” to nourish these cells and to keep them filled with life and vitality. It is your responsibility from God. You fall short in your mothering mission if you feed your children dead foods. All cooked foods are dead foods. Of course, I’m not telling you that you have to eat all raw foods, but you should try to feed your family at least 60 percent raw foods. Eighty percent would be even better!
I am actually dumfounded when I observe the dead foods that mothers pile up in their shopping carts. I can’t believe they are taking them home and feed them to their precious children. Instead of “cell-replenishing foods”, they fill their carts with dead foods – packaged cereals filled with sugar and refined “stuff” (you can’t call it food), soda pop, white bread and buns, pop tarts, packaged dinners etc.
“But I’m not into all that alternative stuff,” I hear you say. I beg your pardon? Is God alternative? No, God is the originator. He is the Creator. He is the One who provides an amazing variety of delicious fruits and vegetables, nuts and seeds for us to enjoy.
He set out His plan for us in the beginning, “See, I have given you every herb that yields seed which is on the face of all the earth, and every tree whose fruit yields seed; to you it shall be for food.” (Genesis 1:29)
We read also in Genesis 2:8-9, “The Lord God planted a garden eastward in Eden, and there he put the man whom He had formed. And out of the ground the Lord God made every tree grow that is pleasant to the sight and good for food.”
Can I give you a couple more Scriptures to convince you? Psalm 104:14-15, “He causes the grass to grow for the cattle, and vegetation for the service of man, that he may bring forth food out of the earth.” Psalm 103:5 tell us that it is God “Who satisfies your mouth with good things, so that you youth is renewed like the eagle’s.” It is God’s original food that renews our cells and renews our youth.
But many people today have the attitude, “God, I don’t really like the food that you created. I’d rather eat a hamburger any day!” or “I hate fruit and vegetables. I’d rather eat fries.“ Another interesting phenomena is that when people get sick, they want God to heal them, but they don’t want to embrace God’s original plan to heal them. It’s much easier to receive a zap from God than to use discipline to eat God’s healing foods.
When I was a young mother I read that it was important to prepare the body physically at least three years before becoming pregnant. I have now changed my opinion. I believe that we should start preparing our daughters for childbirth when they are born. We start by nursing them at the breast until they are ready to wean.
Once they start on solid foods, we feed them life-giving foods – whole foods and a high percentage of God’s raw foods. When it comes time for pregnancy and childbirth, they will not experience complications and problems, but will enjoy this beautiful and natural experience as God intends it to be.
At the turn of the last century a health survey was taken of 110 nations. The United States ranked 13th from the top in good health. Recently another survey was taken and the USA ranked 79th in poor health out of 79 nations surveyed. We are the most overfed and yet the most undernourished nation in the world.
Next time (in fact every time) you go to the supermarket to restock your pantry, write on the top of your grocery list, “I AM A LIFE-GIVER” to remind yourself that God wants you to arrive home with life-giving foods to feed your husband and children.
The Greatest Life Principle!
We cannot have life without death. It is a kingdom principle. It has been a joy to reap a life-giving harvest from my garden this summer. My tomato plants (nearly 60 of them) grew taller than me and I am 6’! But before I could receive all this luscious life-giving fruit, the seeds had to die!
Jesus said in John 12:24, “Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit.” We can’t avoid it. We have to die to bring life to others. Paul confessed in 2 Corinthians 4:10, “Always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body.” As you die to your flesh and your rights, the life of Jesus will shine through you and touch the lives of your family. This is abundant life.
NANCY CAMPBELL
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