I'll never forget the moment I first laid eyes on my beautiful baby boy and how I felt in that moment. The excitement. The shock. The fear. The overwhelming feeling of just wanting to be the best mom that I could be to him, but also doubting if I could live up to that title. I immediately went to the place that I believe a lot of first time moms go to after giving birth. I immediately went to the place of depending on my own strength and my own abilities, rather than depending on the strength and the power of the Lord! I immediately allowed my imperfections to overshadow God's grace. I immediately minimized God's presence in my life to not being big enough to lead me. I allowed a new season, an unfamiliar season, to make me forget how faithful God has always been to me. I allowed fear to male me forget the power of choosing to lay down everything I am, and even everything that I'm not, to become everything that God is! In that moment I forgot the power of surrender.
I forgot the benefits of choosing to surrender. I forgot how surrender heals. I forgot how surrender delivers. I forgot how it delivers us from false expectations of ourselves, and how it heals the broken parts of us that keeps us from truly seeing who we really are. Surrender not only introduces us to the God who lives on the inside of us, but it allows us to be free from the burdens, and the pressures of having to live, and overcome, on our own. The more we surrender, the less pressure we feel! God never intended for us to do life alone. He never intended for us to navigate seasons void of His wisdom, and in our own strength.
New seasons require a new surrender! It didn't take me long into my motherhood journey to realize that the surrender that I gave to the Lord in previous seasons wouldn't be enough to sustain me in this season. This season required a new surrender. This season required a new dependency on the Lord. It required a little more of me to die, so that God could live through me. I realized that I could never truly be the best mom to Terrence void of a lifestyle of surrender. I had to surrender my thoughts to the Lord in those moments when I felt anxious and overwhelmed. I had to surrender my fear to the Lord when I was afraid to fail. I had to surrender my child's life, purpose, and destiny to the Lord. I had to remind myself daily that God knows the plans that He has not only for me as a mom, but for my son. I had to trust that if God called me to be his mom that I already have everything that I need on the inside of me to fulfill that calling. I didn't have to strive to be anything, all I had to do was submit to what was already on the inside of me. In order for me to be the best mom, the mom that God called me to be, I simply had to surrender!
In the midst of fear.
In the midst of doubt.
But with a heart full of faith. A heart that believes that God is who He says He is! A heart full of trust. A heart full of confidence!
A mom of surrender isn't a mom who gets it right every single time. She isn't a mom who never makes mistakes. She isn't a mom who never feels overwhelmed or who never have doubts. But she's a mom who even in the midst of feeling overwhelmed, and even in the midst of doubts, mistakes, and imperfections, makes the bold decision to believe God and to be totally dependent on Him!
You may be a new mom or you may have been a mom for many years now, but where ever you are in your motherhood journey....dare to surrender to the Lord! Dare to be totally dependent on Him. Dare to trust Him. Dare to believe that He is who He says He is, and allow Him to be who He is to you and your children!