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For more mom encouragement visit graceformyhome.com
Join My Email List!
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Contact me via admin@graceformyhome.com
Hello friends, welcome back to Grace For My Home. I hope that you are doing great.
Audrey McCracken:Here in the United States we are preparing for the Thanksgiving holidays. Today is the Wednesday before Thanksgiving, so I'm off of work today trying to get my house ready for company, my sister and her family's coming over and my mom. We love Thanksgiving, every one of us. It's the food, but it's more than the food. It's also the family, the people that we share it with. We are just so looking forward to having this time together and just shutting all the outside things off for a while and concentrating on those things that matter.
Audrey McCracken:And I thought I have got to record this podcast. So I ran out to my van where I could have a few minutes of quiet time to do that, because everybody is home this week so there is no quiet time. It's so funny. When my kids were little I thought one day I'll be able to have a few minutes of quiet without somebody needing something. And now I have teenagers and it's still that way. So don't want to discourage you, young moms, but they're always, as long as they're in your house, they're going to need you. And this morning it was so funny. I had just a few phone calls I needed to make for work and nobody needed me until you guessed it. Till I got on the phone and it was funny and I thought I guess that's just the way it is. We keep waiting for things to change, but that's just the way it is, moms. So I'm out here hiding in my van. I'm sure somebody will discover me soon, but I wanted to come to you today and just encourage you and just say mama, what you're doing is so important in the kingdom of God, and I know that you're not encouraged enough. I know that enough people don't recognize what you're doing. But if nobody recognizes what you're doing, if nobody ever says thank you, the Lord sees and he will honor you. What you do in secret, he will reward you publicly for and I've had something stirring on my mind, on my heart, this week I've been working on a book of prayers and I stopped working on it for a long time during the summer as I was trying to get the coffee shop open and I came to a point where I just didn't know what the next step was, and so I put it away because I just didn't have the mental strength to figure out the next step.
Audrey McCracken:Well, I was home some this week. I thought I'm just going to do it. So I dove back into that, trying to figure out the next step, and I hope to have that released the first of the year. So keep your eyes out for that. I'm going to release a book of prayers for moms and their actual prayers that I have prayed over the years for me and for my children. So that's exciting news and what I want to talk with you about today is stirring in my heart, because I've gone back through and I've read those prayers and it's just so inspired me to pray and it's so inspired me of my ideals.
Audrey McCracken:Sometimes we have to be reminded of why we're doing this. You know hard work, you know work is work, right. You know that's the thing about work, is its work? Yeah, the right way to figure that out, right, right, I can work hard, but it really helps me to see why am I working hard, right, what is the point and why am I wearing myself out? And when we can see that we're working towards something, that we have a calling, that we're not just, you know, doing what's expected of us, but that we there's a purpose behind the work that we're doing, then it really helps me to do my work with a, with a better attitude and definitely with a better passion, and do it in love.
Audrey McCracken:And I've had something mulling around in my mind this week about my children and about your children. And you know, when we have these little ones, especially when you know they're, they're little babies and they're just so helpless and they look up to us with those big eyes and they're looking to us for everything. There's something in us that knows this child is special, this child is precious, and I believe that God allows every Christian mom to see that, to see that her child is special, to see her child through his eyes, because that is an eternal soul. It's more than just a baby. That baby is going to grow up, but that baby is an eternal soul for God's kingdom and he is very precious to God. And not only that, but that child has a destiny. God created that child before the foundation of the world and chose you to be his or her mom because he knew you have what that child needs. And I firmly believe that even if you don't feel like you have what that child needs, god knows that you do and where you're lacking he will make up the difference.
Audrey McCracken:And I think back about the story of Moses and when Moses was born. He was born at a very, very difficult time because he was born when the Pharaoh in Egypt had put out an attic that every male Hebrew child would be thrown into the Nile. And Moses was born right at that time. And so the world says he will die, the world says he will be given as a sacrifice to the Egyptian gods. But Jehovah had a different plan. He had a praying mom.
Audrey McCracken:And it says and I want to read it for you because I don't want to get it wrong, but it says in Exodus, chapter two, starting in verse one, and I'm going to read to you this from the message Bible it says the woman became pregnant and had a son. She saw there was something special about him and hid him. She hid him for three months. When she couldn't hide him any longer, she got a little basket boat made out of paper, waterproofed it with tar and pitch and placed the child in it. But especially that verse to it says she saw there was something special about him and hid him. And I know that that was the Lord giving her eyes to see that child through his eyes, that this child has a special purpose. And, mamas, I just want to encourage you that if you've ever felt that, if you've ever looked down at that child or ever, like now I'm looking up to two of my children and thought I know God has a special purpose for this child, I just want to tell you that you're right, he does and you are part of that plan that he has for that child.
Audrey McCracken:And I remember when my children were were young, I almost felt guilty, feeling that way. I thought well, who am I to think that my child is any more special than any other child? And I want to tell you they're not. All children are special in the eyes of God because they are eternal souls. He has a plan for them and you are part of that plan and this is a huge responsibility. You know. God has put you in that child's life to, first of all, to protect him or her, to train them, to teach them the things of God, to point them to God and to help them to see what he's done for them and who he, who he, is to them. And he Wants you to take on that role as a calling, to take it serious, to live into it and to trust him. For the areas where you are weak and where you don't have what it takes, he has what it takes.
Audrey McCracken:And then in this story about Moses, it goes on to talk about how she set him in the river. She put him in the little basket, she pushed him off and he went and found the Pharaoh's Daughter, or I should say the Pharaoh's daughter found him and then she raised him as her own. She raised him in the courts of Pharaoh, but while he was nursing His own, mama nursed him Because Miriam, his sister, followed him. And when the Pharaoh's daughter found Moses and she named a Moses because Moses means drawing out and she drew him out of the water, miriam was right there to say I know somebody who can help you with this baby. And so she went and got her mom and said he, she can help you Feed and take care of this Hebrew child. And so she, even though she had given this child up, she got to raise this child and she got to teach him About the one true God. And then Many, many, many years later it talks about Moses and his mom In the New Testament, in Hebrews 11, 11, 23, and I want to read that to you.
Audrey McCracken:It says I'm going to read out of the new living translation it was by faith that Moses's parents hit him for three months when he was born, they saw that God had given them an unusual child and they were not afraid to disobey the king's command. So because they saw, because they could see Through the eyes of God, that this is a Special child, they were not afraid to disobey. They were not afraid to disobey the king, the Pharaoh. They defied the king. Imagine A little slave woman with no power nor authority, no right even to her own life or the life of her children, defying the king, the greatest king In the world at the time, just because she believed, just because she had eyes to see that I have been given a precious responsibility, and that responsibility means to protect this child Until God can show him what to do next. And I just want to propose to you that we have the same enemy today that Moses had and his parents had, and the goal of that enemy is to stop the plan of God and to destroy God's people.
Audrey McCracken:Now, at the time of Moses, when the time of Moses was born, that enemy was working through Pharaoh. Today, that enemy is working through the culture Of the world around us, and he whispers in our ears things like this. He says do you really think that you can raise up your children today, in this world, the way that the world is today, the way the culture is today? Do you really think you can raise them up to love God? Do you really think that your kids could be holy in a world that is as unholy as ours is today. Do you really think that you can make a difference? Do you think you can make the things of God more attractive to your children that the things of this world?
Audrey McCracken:He says things like I'm the God of this world. You know your children belong to me. Give them, just give them over to me, just give up. There's no reason to even try. It's you or too small to fight against what I have set in place. Now maybe you don't fight those thoughts, but I fight them all the time because there is a strong current. It's a very strong current, and it wants to swiftly take our children with it Somewhere. We don't want them to go, and the best thing we can do for our children is right now, today. Decide. I am not giving up my children to the Prince of this world. I am not a ball obeying the voices of this world that says why even try? It's impossible. I am going to defy the Prince of this world and believe in a God that I cannot see To do miracles in my child's life and to keep them and to take care of them, even when I have to send them out Without my protection into the world to God knows where. And Trust me, god knows where.
Audrey McCracken:She had to release her child. First she had to keep him and protect him and and then she had to release him. And you know, she released him and God brought him back. Isn't that awesome. She trusted God. Lord, I can't keep him forever, but I'm going to push him off and I'm going to believe you to God, this little basket that I've made, and put him in the right hands at the right time. And then she got to raise that child because she trusted God and she got to teach him the things that he needed to know For the purpose that God had for his life. Isn't that awesome? And that is what we get to do Now. We have to trust God and we have to let them go. There's areas we have to let them go because they don't belong to us. They are entrusted to us for a season, they're a calling and it's a huge responsibility, but they do not belong to us. They belong to God. And I believe that for those three months that she had that child at home, as she's weaving that basket, as she's touring that basket, I see her praying. She's praying over that child. Lord, god, show me how to do this. Lord, god, I'm praying for you. Lord, give me the right timing. Father, show me the way to do this. She's weaving a basket of prayer so that when she sends him out, the basket will hold Until he gets where he's supposed to be. And we have the awesome privilege and right to do that for our children.
Audrey McCracken:My oldest son, david. He is a junior in high school this year and he started to think about what am I going to do with my life and all his life? I have said, lord, he belongs to you, lord, he belongs to you and Lord, use him in whatever area you you see you see fit. And this past summer he went to Israel. It was in July of 2023. He and a group of young people from our church Went to Went and toured Israel and they went to Jerusalem. But then they went up into Haifa Different places and they just had a great trip. I was nervous about it because I knew there was some unrest there and, but I prayed about it, me and his dad, and we felt peace and we knew it was a wonderful opportunity. And they went, they had a great time, they had no problems and they just had a very blessed trip.
Audrey McCracken:Well, three months later, war breaks out in Israel and I'm so thankful that he had a great trip. He got home safe. But you wonder, lord, what if? What if he had been there at the wrong time? And as he's thinking about and talking with us about what's next, he's, he's a very good student and I just say that to encourage you homeschool moms. I worried so many years that I was ruining my children by teaching them at home, because who am I to teach them all their subjects? Well, well, he's going on to high school and he's doing fabulous. And he just took his PSATs and did great. So now he's getting all these colleges that are interested in him and and so he's thinking about this you know, where do I want to go to college? And he has great grades.
Audrey McCracken:Well, a few weeks ago, my husband was talking with him about Some ministry schools, because he has expressed a desire to go into missionary work and, for the first time that I remember, I Really wanted to discourage him in that and I'm ashamed to say that. And and I was saying things like well, honey, you know, you really should go for the academics first and then Maybe you should go into, you know, a ministry school, but get your academics first. And it's. I made it sound like I was, you know, concerned about Him or I was trying to use wisdom. But the truth is I was just thinking, lord, with everything going on, going on in the world Right now, I just want him safe and the Lord's, you know, after a couple of days I'm just like why this is like a um, what do you call it? Like an irritation? Why is this bothering me so bad?
Audrey McCracken:Every time my husband would mention this school of ministry or or this other place of ministry, I would just cringe. I'm like no, no, no, no, no. Let's, let's calm down, let's slow down. You know we don't need to go there yet and I've never been like that. I've always wanted, I'd been honored that my kids would choose to go into ministry.
Audrey McCracken:But as I spent some time reflecting and praying, I realized I'm trying to protect him. You know, I want to save him From going somewhere dangerous, where I can't be there, I can't get to him quickly, or, you know, I don't know everything that's going on there. And I realized, lord, I'm trying to do your job, he's yours. Father, just lead him the right place and do, lord, please keep him safe. But there's no safer place to be and there's no safer place for our children to be then in the perfect will of God. And so I just shared this with you today to say Put him in the hands of the Lord, build a boat for them, build an ark for them, pray for them, make a safe place in prayer for them, but don't hold on, let him go. You know, trust that the God who gave them to you is going to keep them. And I'm having to walk through this right now and it's good. You know it stretches my faith. That helps me to really.
Audrey McCracken:You know, it's easy to come each week and to tell you, guys, you should do this and you should do that, but am I doing? It is the question. And that's the same when we teach our children. It's easy to tell my children things you should forgive your brother, you know you should love these who don't love you, you should be gentle and patient and kind. But am I being those things? Because our message is only as powerful as our character and nobody else may know. But he knows. And, guys, I love you and I want you to be so blessed and I want you to enjoy the confidence and the faith that comes with giving your children to the Lord and trusting them in his hands as you're doing the work that he's given you to do. I Just love that.
Audrey McCracken:Moses's mom was not afraid of Pharaoh because she knew I have a special child and I'll do whatever it takes to put him where he needs to be and and to send him there with prayer, because it's not my plan. He can. You know, pharaoh can mess up my plan, the Prince of this world can mess up my plan, but he can't mess up God's plan. And we have that confidence, we have that promise that all things are gonna work together for good, that your children are in his hands as you put them in his hands. He created them for a plan in purpose. It's not yours, it's God's, and we're just working together with God To see it come to pass. And so I encourage you in that this week and I Hope that you have a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday and that you enjoy your family.
Audrey McCracken:Father, I pray right now for my listeners. I pray, lord, that you would stir faith in their hearts and in my heart. I Pray, father, that we would trust that you have our children and that you know better than us. And I pray, lord, god, that you would give us the strength, the courage To defy the Prince of this world and say not this one. And, lord, we just thank you. We thank you, lord, for this high calling of motherhood. That, lord, it's greater than us, but, lord, we can do it by your grace, in you, in Jesus name, amen.