"Joy isn't happiness,
it's an unshakable confidence in God's Grace."
The joy I have in my children is a confidence in what my Savior did. What He did for a girl who would have rejected Him if it wasn't for Him calling me. My Savior designed this world around His Glorification and not by my selfish, prideful, sinning self.
I have been reading a book called,
"Gospel - Powered Parenting." by: William P. Farley
It is a book that doesn't give advice on if spanking is right or wrong. What to do if you have a strongwilled child. What's the best education for your child. This book digs down and gives you meat into what God's word says about a born again believer. What us parents have in the responsibility of raising our children. Showing God's grace in our actions.
The author talks about the difference in when parents actually get this. How children respond so much differently. He talks about something that Dennis and I feel so strongly about and that's
. We do not want to guilt our children into obeying. We want them to see such a strong love we have for our Savior and how that's what drives us to strive to obey or do good things. It's not through our own strength.
Dennis and I have a pure joy! As we continue to study God's word our eyes are opening more and more to seeing His truths. This pure joy that won't ever be shaken gives us confidence in our marriage and our children. No matter what God sends us through our joy for Him will always remain, because He loved us and called us before we even existed. This is the Savior we serve.
"Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God,
To God’s holy people in Ephesus, the faithful in Christ Jesus:
Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ. For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love he predestined us for adoption to sonship through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will— to the praise of his glorious grace, which he has freely given us in the One he loves. In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God’s grace that he lavished on us. With all wisdom and understanding, he made known to us the mystery of his will according to his good pleasure, which he purposed in Christ, to be put into effect when the times reach their fulfillment—to bring unity to all things in heaven and on earth under Christ. In him we were also chosen, having been predestined according to the plan of him who works out everything in conformity with the purpose of his will, in order that we, who were the first to put our hope in Christ, might be for the praise of his glory. And you also were included in Christ when you heard the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation. When you believed, you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit, who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance until the redemption of those who are God’s possession—to the praise of his glory."Ephesians 1:1-14