{"id":14085,"date":"2017-06-28T01:00:37","date_gmt":"2017-06-28T08:00:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.doorposts.com\/blog\/?p=14085"},"modified":"2017-06-28T04:26:07","modified_gmt":"2017-06-28T11:26:07","slug":"14085","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.doorposts.com\/blog\/2017\/06\/28\/14085\/","title":{"rendered":"It’s Possible to Be a Mother and Still Study Your Bible"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"My<\/a>
My old Bible from my early mothering years<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I really enjoyed reading and studying my Bible in my single years. As a school teacher, I had summers free and I have fond memories of early morning hours with my Bible and notebook in our sun-filled \u201cdining room\u201d (a generous term for the eating space in our little hovel). The Word was \u201calive and powerful\u201d to me in those days.<\/p>\n

Something happened when I got married. In my newlywed excitement, I naively viewed my husband as the \u201cspiritual leader\u201d who would take care of all my spiritual needs. Why would I need to spend my own time in the Word? We were also weathering a season of church homelessness as we wandered about trying to find the right church home. And married life was filled with a whole new array of distractions and time-and-energy consumers, especially as babies started joining us.<\/p>\n

My Bible sat on the shelf until it was time to grab it for church on Sunday, and then when our firstborn came along, I was too busy walking him back and forth in the foyer to even sit down, let alone open my Bible and follow the sermon for more than a minute or two at a time.<\/p>\n

Of course, my perspective on life, without the nourishment of daily feeding on God\u2019s Word, became distorted. Marriage was harder than I expected it to be, and I was discouraged. The baby was fussy \u2013 really<\/em> fussy \u2013 and I wavered between anger and despair much of the time. We lived in the city, a huge adjustment after my small-town single life, and I was lonely \u2013 no friends nearby and, without a commitment to a church, very little encouragement and support from my brothers and sisters in Christ.<\/p>\n

When our second little guy joined the family, with his own set of health challenges, I spiraled down into one of the most discouraging seasons of my life. My days held the many joys that come with early motherhood, but also the frustrations, the cluelessness, the isolation, and the exhaustion that can be a real part of mothering as well.<\/p>\n

When our second-born faced some feeding issues that threw us into an almost never-ending, sleepless cycle of just trying to keep him nourished and alive, I eventually looked into the mirror of our circumstances and realized that they reflected my own spiritual condition. I was starving. I was trying to function on my own in a state of constant spiritual low blood sugar, unable to see the goodness of God because I barely saw Him at all. <\/em>The strength I so desperately needed from His Word was not there.<\/p>\n

So, out of desperation, I took my Bible off the shelf and opened it to the Psalms.<\/p>\n

And that\u2019s when God started breathing life back into my spirit. My circumstances certainly weren\u2019t as dire as David\u2019s, but his words comforted me, and helped me voice my discouragement and need to God, my Father, who had been waiting for me to turn to Him for help. I was reminded anew of His active, loving, sovereign presence in my life.<\/p>\n

I took my colored pencils out and started marking words in the psalms that told me who God is and what He is able to do. My study was in little snatches, and it was definitely not a quiet <\/em>time, but I was finding nourishment and strength for the job God had given me to do. I had a renewed joy and a new perspective on my role as a mother and wife, serving my Lord.<\/p>\n

Eventually God led me to what is now called The New Inductive Study Bible<\/a>, <\/em>and I found that, even with two needy little boys, I could <\/em>study the Bible, and that studying it was actually easier than just reading it. I had something to look for, something to keep my overwhelmed mind from wandering, and something that made me want to come back to the Word over and over.<\/p>\n

I know I\u2019m not the only mother who has experienced this sort of struggle. While we give of ourselves twenty-four hours a day, it\u2019s easy to think we\u2019re too busy to even eat breakfast, let alone feed on God\u2019s Word. Even if we want <\/em>to spend time in the Word, we can\u2019t read more than a sentence or two before we get interrupted, or before we start thinking about what\u2019s in the fridge for dinner, or before we just plain fall asleep from exhaustion.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s why the Busy Mamas Bible studies <\/em>exist. Mothers need help. <\/em>They need help with laundry, with cooking, with child-training, with cleaning. And they need help finding the time to be fed and strengthened from God\u2019s Word.<\/p>\n

The study of John 15 that we are about to begin is about abiding <\/em>and about our inability to bear fruit in life unless we\u2019re abiding <\/em>in Christ. Just as the branches are completely unable to produce fruit unless they abide in the vine, we will certainly wither and become fruitless if we\u2019re not abiding in Jesus, the true vine.<\/p>\n

Come and join me.<\/strong> Let\u2019s draw close to God through His Word and learn from Him. Let\u2019s gain a renewed perspective on the life that only He can give. We\u2019ll be reminded of why we need to abide in Him, why He does His pruning work in our lives, and why we should expect the world to treat us the same way it treated His Son.<\/p>\n

We start this Saturday, July 1<\/strong>! If you subscribe to this blog, you\u2019ll receive a new 5-15 minute lesson in your email inbox<\/strong> every morning. If you don\u2019t think you can manage that much time, be sure to read this<\/a> and this<\/a> for helpful ideas. You don\u2019t need an official, uninterrupted quiet time<\/em>.\u201d You just need a desire to be in the Word, the determination to grab the snatches of time you can and make them count, a Bible, a handful of colored pencils, a notebook (if you want), and a heart that is ready to hear and obey. <3<\/p>\n

I’ll give you a few more details tomorrow!<\/p>\n

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