Wife and Mother: Power to Grow or Destroy

 The following post is taken from the devotional, Devotions, Advice & Renewal for When Motherhood Feels Too Hard..

I read this devotional last year, but I find myself daily coming back to it. It refreshed my soul and refocused my mind on what is most important in life.  May it be the same for you.

"Motherhood has the greatest potential influence in human life."

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"Lord, I want to be a wife who causes her husband to flourish, and a mother who causes her children to grow."

This was my earnest prayer after weeks of battling some emotional issues that strained our family.  If you are a wife and mother, I have good news and bad news: but it is the same news.  

You profoundly affect the atmosphere of your home.  There is no way around it.  

My emotional, spiritual, and physical response to daily life can snowball to the rest of my family and bring peace and life or bring stress and destruction.  

So when I prayed that prayer, I cried it from the depths of my soul. I have been brought to a place that is the end of myself.  "Nothing in my hands I bring, simply to thy cross I cling" has become the song of my soul.  

But the very good news is that the God of all our needs IS sufficient. But He's waiting for us to realize there is now power in ourselves. He's waiting for us to "draw near to Him" so He can draw near to us.

There is a tidal wave of peace when we finally throw up our hands and take hold of His our helplessness without the indwelling of Christ.  

The prayer I prayed evoked a gentle reminder from my Father...I heard it..."His wife shall be like a fruitful vine about thy house"...

 I had always thought this verse referred to fruitful as in "child-bearing", and it may have those connotations.  But today I saw something else: a fruitful vine is something out of which fruit grows and flourishes and abounds.  The power of my position as a wife and mother is LIFE-GIVING nourishment to my family!  Or, it can mean death is the Life-Giver is not pouring through me.

That's heavy!  But we all know it's true.

I am to be the vine-the lifeblood of the fruit that God wants to produce in our home.  Does my husband flourish or wilt from my influence?  Do my children grow and mature or do they shrivel under a harsh spirit?

Oh ladies, our role is so crucial and what's more, our dependence on the God who placed us here is even more so.

Run to Him each morning, each moment, and beg for His mercy and wisdom and spirit.  Meet with Him when you wake up and commit your words, your thoughts-your whole day to Him.

"Faithful is He who called you who also will do it".

**Words written in BLUE are taken from Devotional