Chip off the old block...

Are the holidays as crazy for you as they are for me? This weekend has left me with no energy, but full of the Christmas spirit! We have had something going on all day everyday for the entire weekend. I have to admit I love it though. I am not one to sit around and twiddle my thumbs. I love to be going somewhere, even if it is some little nothing errand. The thing is...when I had one child I could run all day. Now that there are five, I seem to be moving in slooooow moooootion! When I use to be able to run five to six errands in a morning, now I am really having a good day if I can run three. I wouldn't trade it for anything though.
I was trying to remember if I had a good kiddo story for you, but nothing is coming to mind right now. I am still studying Job. Yep, I am in slow motion on that, too! But, I am trying to absorb as much as I can. The main conviction I am getting out of it right now is that we need to be careful not to allow Satan to use us to hurt those we love. It seems like Job had enough sadness with loosing everything. Then the more you read about his wife and his three friends, you see that it just gets worse. I just so happened to read about his third friend, who also was the most critical of Job, the night after I had the most embarrassing thing happen. I was trying to take the kids to church to drop them off for a choir rehearsal when they all started bickering. I am a pretty patient person. Okay. Maybe I am just a somewhat patient person. We all have our limits and my limit was officially met when we drove up to church and they were still fighting. Just when my horns sprouted and I officially lost my temper by yelling at the kids, wouldn't you know that Ty just had to open the door. We were in front of the church and there sat one of the ladies that filled in for my MOMS small group leader several times. The look on her face could make me miss a few Sundays of church just from the shear embarrassment I felt! She blew it off and was quite nice considering I was verbally abusing my kids in the church parking lot! As I came home that night and was reading Job, my eyes were opened to how I am given moments with the kids to lift them up and make them grow emotionally and/or spiritually or to break their spirit and make them lose focus on God just from my lack of self-discipline. Can I just tell you how convicting that was? Satan allowed Job's wife to help at attempting to chip off pieces of Job's foundation of faith. Satan continued with his friends. Do I want to be that for my kids? Absolutely not! Yet, how easy is it for me to fall in to my old carnal ways. Please pray for me as this is not something I see just disappearing overnight. I need to be and plan on being in constant prayer over this issue. I think we, as moms, fall in to this quite often, so I will pray for you, too! I don't want my kids to follow in my footsteps either. How I desire to grow up great children of faith. Please stop right now and bow your head in prayer. Allow God to open your heart to this issue and let Him show you how damaging it can be.