Parenting Archives - Kristina Lunde

January 30, 2024 by Kristina Lunde Leave a Comment

Your Child: God’s Strong-Willed Gift to You

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“She’s going to be a leader!” proclaimed a voice from the long line for the women’s bathroom after BSF (Bible Study Fellowship). The strong-willed preschooler again exclaimed, “No!” as she refused to enter the open stall. Meanwhile, the mother adjusted her baby boy on one hip and held a door closed for the older daughter. Middle-child held firm, her stance as resolute as her attitude.

“Yes, she’ll be a leader,” another voice confirmed as the preschooler continued to resist. Mom patiently asked the little girl, “Please try to go.” Finally, strong-willed girl headed into the stall and the battle ended. The mother remained patient and calm, expertly dealing with all three children at once. Hearing that her daughter showed leadership skills probably did not encourage the battle-weary mother.

When middle-child finally obeyed, I felt a collective sense of relief from the waiting women. Like many of us in that line, I had faced challenges raising my own strong-willed children. There was so much I wanted to say to encourage that precious mother.

About five minutes later, I saw brothers M & T bolt toward the exit door without their usual mom-escort. I had met the two-year-old twins during occasional mornings spent helping with BSF leadership childcare. M & T are well-known and well-loved by the volunteers. We enjoy these smart boys, keeping them from climbing while trying to engage them with blocks or mechanical toys.

When we realized that H, their ever-attentive mom, was not nearby, another woman and I started chasing M & T. Silly conversation, turning the boys around, helping them look for Mommy—nothing could distract them from their march outside. H soon arrived and, with a breathless thank you, followed M & T through the exit door. Again I wanted to encourage that dear mother, who probably had a five-second conversation before her sons ran off.

My encouragement for moms of strong-willed children:

1. Your strong-willed child is a gift from God.

Behold, children are a gift of the LORD, the fruit of the womb is a reward. Psalm 127:3 NASB

Your sovereign God has rewarded you with the gift of this child. As Creator God, He knew both you and your child before He formed you in the womb (Jeremiah 1:5). That means He knows what is best for all of you. Sometimes that truth is hard to hang onto. I certainly felt that way when my two strong-willed children overwhelmed me, especially when I parented alone for seven years. I had to trust and obey God, even when my parenting job seemed impossible. Dear Tired Momma, trust your sovereign God with all of life’s challenges, especially with parenting the child He gave you.

2. Your strong-willed child is a blessing to others.

Whoever receives one child like this in My name receives Me; and whoever receives Me does not receive Me, but Him who sent Me. Mark 9:37

Glancing from the boys’ Sunday-school room, I caught a glimpse of the second-grade girls across the hall. To my horror, two girls were jumping on the table—my daughter and her friend! In comparison, our energetic second-grade boys seemed fun, respectful, and manageable. Yet again, that confirmed my strategy. I volunteered to teach children for our church activities, as long as I didn’t have my kids in my class. Because I faced battles with my strong-willed children at home, I didn’t want to do that at church, too. I felt grateful to have help from other teachers who could impact my kids at church.

Twenty-plus years later, I can appreciate those God-given attributes of spunk, tenacity, and adventure in children. When not used in disrespectful or dangerous ways, those traits can be appreciated, nurtured, and guided. But maintaining perspective is tough when battles with your strong-willed child seem constant. Years ago, a woman named Lynne Jackson greatly encouraged me during our conversation. Now, Lynne and her husband Jim have a Bible-based ministry called Connected Families that helps thousands of frazzled parents.

God knows what character traits your children need for the future. Make sure that people dealing with your children do not squelch the very qualities that God created in them. Allow other people to teach and enjoy your children. And don’t be surprised when other people enjoy and are blessed by time spent with your children. Hopefully, that will give you encouragement, perspective, role models, and a respite. After surviving my own children, I now enjoy sharing Christ’s love with children—especially when they’re strong-willed.

3. God will grow your faith as you parent your strong-willed child.

You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. These words, which I am commanding you today, shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your sons and shall talk of them when you sit in your house and when you walk by the way and when you lie down and when you rise up. Deuteronomy 6:5-7

When we teach our children as God instructs, our focus on loving and serving God keeps us grounded in Him. Our faith will deepen as we draw closer to our Creator while parenting the children He gave us.

Dear Tired Momma, may you recognize your child as a gift from the sovereign God who created both of you. May God give you insight into your child’s character as you deal with strong-willed behavior in challenging situations. Even as you cope with parenting frustrations, may God reveal how your child blesses others. May the Holy Spirit grow His gifts in you (Galatians 5:22-23) as you follow His guidance in your parenting. I pray that God will refresh and encourage you in the ongoing journey of parenting.

July 18, 2023 by Kristina Lunde Leave a Comment

Job’s Wife on Grief and Bitterness

Dear Modern Mama,

No, you probably don’t know much about me. I’m not a Bible superstar or good example of faith. In fact, the infamous line I am known for is, “Curse God and die!” (Thankfully, my words are only recorded in one Bible verse, Job 2:9.) Despite that, I hope to encourage you to seek God during the grief and suffering that life inevitably brings.

As my husband Job lay in ashes scraping his painful wounds, I questioned how he could maintain his faith. That’s when I urged him to give up on God and give in to death. I did not mean for Job to take his own life. Instead, I meant that he should blame God and let death take him, since he was half-dead already. Yes, I wrongly said evil things as I wallowed in my grief and bitterness. At the time, I didn’t know what else to do but blame God. Enemy raids, sword attacks, deadly fires, and fierce winds killed animals and people, including our ten children. My precious children! Taken from us in multiple sudden catastrophes. My entire life as a mother wiped out. Farmworkers, shepherds, nannies: all employees gone in an instant. Our livelihood ruined. I felt crushed and overwhelmed by grief and sorrow.

I got angry at God and succumbed to bitterness. Job’s friends sat with him for one week in empathy and mourning. I couldn’t stand being near Job because of his stinky breath and those putrid boils. Now, I am ashamed of my actions and of how I blamed God. I write to you in hopes that you will follow my husband Job’s example instead of mine. Don’t be like me and let grief and bitterness take over your heart until you shut out God. Notice that I am never named, and never again quoted, in the Bible.

Job maintained his close relationship with God. Despite being confronted and accused by his friends, Job kept his faith and integrity throughout his trials. He rebuked me for my comments, but he did not sin. How could he keep trusting in God after all that we had experienced?! Job questioned, but respected God. He challenged God, yet submitted to Him. Job wailed in pain, but trusted God for help. I did none of that. How I wish I had turned to God with my grief and anger like my husband did. Check out my husband’s book of Job to read the laments of his heart as he expressed them to God. Yes, Job maintained his integrity. Regretfully, I did not.

Dear friend, please trust God no matter what you are going through. Know that our God is big enough to handle any anger and emotions you feel. God can help you deal with the trials of your life. When life hurts and death seems like a better option, God can teach you to trust and submit to Him. Our God may not answer with specific reasons why, but He will guide and sustain you through everything you experience. Although I learned these lessons late, I share my story—and what I learned from my husband—with you.

By watching my husband Job deal with his suffering, I learned so much about God. Yes, my man of God stayed married to me, and later we had ten more children. I did not deserve God’s favor. Like He did for Job’s friends, God blessed me because of my husband’s faithfulness to God. How I wish I had trusted God, like my husband Job did, to help me through grief and suffering! My bitterness and resentment against God consumed me. I pray that you would avoid my sinful path and instead turn toward God during sorrow and trials.

Praying for our dear Lord to teach you through my mistakes.
Job’s wife

June 26, 2023 by Kristina Lunde Leave a Comment

Jochebed: Obedience over Fear

Dear Modern Mama,
Obeying God challenged me to face my fears about raising kids in our situation. Both Levites, my husband Amram and I (Jochebed) lived in Egypt with all the other Israelites. The Egyptians had long forgotten God’s miraculous famine relief administered through our forefather Joseph. A new pharaoh, the reigning Egyptian king, felt threatened by our numbers and forced us into slave labor. I worked the fields with the women, and my dear Amram laid bricks with the men. Hebrew children had to fend for themselves as their parents worked for the Egyptian slavemasters. Amram and I feared bringing children into this world; our people had been slaves for generations. God’s covenant promises of a nation and land of our own seemed impossible. Sometimes I found it difficult to obey God and trust His care for our family.

Into that life of slave labor, I again became pregnant. My two other children, Aaron and Miriam, would soon be old enough to start in the fields. The pharaoh begrudged our people’s strength and population growth. He ordered the midwives to kill the Hebrew boys they delivered, but, thankfully, they refused. Into this scary world, my baby boy was born. My beautiful boy, born healthy and whole! But then the pharaoh ordered the Egyptians to kill newborn Hebrew boys by throwing them into the Nile River. They drowned innocent baby boys! So much sorrow and wailing!

As parents, we all think our children are the best and most special. Of course we do! We have the closest perspective of our kids and see them through the lens of our love and support. We are grateful for these precious gifts from God. I felt the same way about all my children, including my newest baby. God gave Amram and me a plan to save our baby boy. Since the Hebrew women avoided the Nile, we thought the Egyptians would never look there for Hebrew boys. I wove a basket to float my baby on the water, hiding him in the bulrushes along the Nile. While Amram and I worked during the day, Miriam watched her baby brother. I feared seeing them both drowned in the Nile! All I could do was trust God and obey what He had asked us to do.

I remember the day Miriam ran to the field, screaming for me to come to the river. I feared that my baby was dead, but as we ran, Miriam told me that pharaoh’s daughter had discovered our baby and had compassion. Miriam told me that the woman wanted to save him, but I feared that this was a plot to kill all of us. When we got to the river, Miriam’s words proved true. The pharaoh’s daughter wanted to save my Hebrew son! Would you believe she paid me to nurse my own baby?!

After purposefully floating my baby boy on the river of death, that became the site of God’s miracle of redemption when pharaoh’s daughter pulled my son out of the water. Actually, that’s what she named my boy—Moses—which means “drawn out of the water.” (Read about it in Exodus 1 and 2.) After I weaned Moses, I brought him back to the royal household to be raised as pharaoh’s daughter’s own son. Sometimes I feared, questioned, and ached in sorrow over not raising my boy.

Thankfully, God helped me push past my fear to obey Him and to trust that He would take care of Moses. I learned that obeying God is worthwhile, even at the risk of my life and my children’s lives. Not until after my death did I find out what God did through Moses—and all of my children, as recorded in the rest of the Torah. God even called my kids leaders (Micah 6:4)!

To our people in Egypt, it seemed like God had forgotten us in our slavery and sorrow. I focused on saving my baby from drowning, but God had a bigger plan. My Lord God rescued Moses from death and into God’s plan to bring life, redemption, and freedom to all of His people.

May God help you with the incredible children He has entrusted to you. May He teach you to obey Him even when you fear for your family, when you do not understand God’s plan, and when you do not know the outcome.

Sending you encouragement from the river of life,
Jochebed

May 27, 2023 by Kristina Lunde Leave a Comment

Sarah: Trusting God through Travels and Trials

Dear Modern Mama,

Abram and I began our lives together in Ur of the Chaldeans (on your map, southern Iraq). I had no idea what adventures, travels, and trials awaited us in our marriage! From Ur, we traveled to Haran (i.e. southeastern Turkey), where God spoke to my husband. That is where our journey of trusting God began.

Abram changed after God spoke those prophetic words. God promised to make my husband into a great nation, bless him, and make him a blessing to others. God prophesied that Abram’s name would be great, and all peoples on earth would be blessed through him. All that for my husband, the nomad! I dreaded moving again, but I agreed with Abraham’s commitment to follow God’s directions. This time, we traveled to Canaan (i.e. Israel and Jordan). All that travel left us exhausted: no roads, no vehicles, and, imagine this, no air conditioning!

Our arrival in Canaan came during the big famine, so Abram decided to take us to Egypt. His big scheme in Egypt made me uncomfortable from the beginning. Abram feared that because of my beauty, he risked being killed. He chose to lie to everyone, telling them that I was his sister, not his wife. That did not help me because, separated from my dear husband, I ended up in a harem not knowing if Abram stayed safe. That scared me! Suddenly plagues affected Pharaoh and his household. (Note: the Exodus plagues happened hundreds of years later when our descendants were Egyptian slaves.) When Pharaoh confronted Abram about the awful plagues, Abram told the truth about me. I thought Abram and I would both be killed, but thankfully, we got sent away and we returned to Canaan.

Children are everything in my culture: joy, purpose, household help, work force, retirement plan, status symbol, and more. Infertility bothered me so much in those first decades, even though traveling seemed easier without the challenges of parenting. God’s covenant with Abram promised as many descendants as the stars in the sky. I ached to bear children those first decades of waiting, but I aged-out of having a family. I assumed that Abram’s nation would not happen through me, because I never got pregnant. In Genesis 16-18, you will read how trusting God was hard for me: I doubted God’s plan and made sinful choices, trying to find a way to bring children into our family. After I realized my sin, I doubted that God loved me enough to give me the privilege of bearing and raising children.

Please read my story for yourself and learn the lessons that took me almost a century to understand: God is faithful and He always fulfills His plans. Expect challenges along the way as God builds your faith and teaches you to trust Him. For me, trusting God involved travels along dusty roads, multiple international moves, and almost three-quarters of a century of infertility. Abram and I experienced tent living, an Egyptian king’s hospitality, and then expulsion from Egypt. I often felt both frustration while submitting to my husband and resentment at my infertility.

One important truth that I learned: God’s perspective is very different—much bigger and grander—than my personal viewpoint. Please learn this from my experience: do not doubt or underestimate God’s plans. I admit that my response to God’s plan included disobedience, disbelief, and laughter. God called my husband into a covenant for all generations and times. God also changed our names to Abraham and Sarah, which confirmed the prophecy that we would be the father and mother of nations. When the angels visited, my own ears heard the prophecy that Abraham and I would become parents. I laughed and doubted, but it happened within a year, just as God promised.

The miracle of Isaac’s birth meant that I had a part in the covenant. These events filled my heart more than I could have hoped or imagined. Following God is not boring or fruitless, but neither is it easy or predictable. God’s plan made my suffering worthwhile. Keep trusting God through whatever travels and trials happen in your life. Don’t be like me and spend decades disbelieving God’s plan! Obeying God is the best and most fulfilling adventure you can pursue.

Love to you from this ancient mama,
Sarah

April 8, 2023 by Kristina Lunde Leave a Comment

Naomi: From Bitterness to Loving Others

Dear Modern Mama,

My parenting advice does not relate to everyday family activities or raising kids. Our family of four dealt with famine, moved to another country, and then my life collapsed. You might not want to listen to a widowed grieving mother, but give me the chance to speak of the love and provision of our amazing God, Elohim, and how He taught me to love others.

My husband Elimelech took our family from Bethlehem to Moab, so that we could escape the famine. In that pagan country, both of our sons Mahlon and Kilion grew up and married local women. First, my dear Elimelech died. Then, my sons also died. Such tragedy! I focused only on my losses, the deaths of my husband and sons. I became bitter against Elohim. How could God take my husband and then my two sons?! I had no sons to support me and no grandchildren to carry on our family line.

At first, consumed by grief and bitterness, I refused to consider anything but my tragedy. I did not appreciate Elohim’s blessing of two incredible daughters-in-law, Ruth and Orpah. God placed these sweet women in my life to love, but my grief blinded me from experiencing that comfort. In my culture, a widowed daughter-in-law would marry one of my other sons. But I had nothing to offer: no more sons, no household, and no money.

Destitute and again facing the threat of starvation, I decided to return to Bethlehem. Both Ruth and Orpah insisted on accompanying me. At the start of the trip, I excused both women from any obligation to me. We professed our love to each other in a sobfest on the road. Orpah took my advice and returned to her family, but Ruth vowed to stay with me.

Ruth’s growing faith ministered to me. Just imagine: this young girl, who came to know Elohim through our family, now encouraged me! As Ruth learned about God and drew close to Him, she motivated me to do the same. Ruth became like my own daughter to me. (Read it for yourself in the book of the Bible named after my dear daughter-in-law Ruth.) The psalmist best summarizes our story, “God sets the lonely in families” (Psalm 68:6a). Elohim gave us hope and a future by placing Ruth in the line of the Messiah!

My advice to you is love the ones God gives you to love. Of course, that includes primarily your husband and children. But also recognize that God places other people in your life to be loved.

If you have experienced tragedy, do not become bitter over what you have lost. Open your heart to the others in your life. Share God with them. Pour God’s love into them. Do not be surprised when God chooses to work through all of you, like he did for me and Ruth.

Love to you from King David’s Great-great Grandmother,
Naomi