This past week, a dear friend of mine sent me an excerpt on motherhood that shook me to the core and really challenged me when it comes to parenting. I’ve read books on parenting and God’s calling through it, but something clicked and the Lord began to reveal more to me through Scripture as I began to delve a little deeper. 

Some parents just naturally transition into mom and dad roles and life without much hiccups. It’s smooth, it’s beautiful, and they find such joy in those little toes, nose and even big poop blows! While other parents struggle in finding beauty in the day to day. They love their children so much, but a grayness rests in their soul. It’s as if they have fallen in a well and are trying to climb their way out but every attempt is met with the walls and debris sliding and caving in and the wet grounds sucking them back down as if telling them that this is their new permanent normal, just get used to it. Yet other parents may be in between and are struggling with aspects at intermittent points with parenting instead of as a constant. But those jabs are still painful and annoying and disrupting to life’s pure enjoyment as God so desires.

Throughout all of Scripture, we see the heart of God and the heart of Satan. We have no difficulty learning this: God wants to give us life to the absolute fullest. Satan wants to steal, kill and destroy us completely and will deploy his workers to carry out his goal. (We know Satan is not omnipresent nor all-powerful, thank God!, so he has to rely on his underlings. For the purpose of this post, “Satan” will be representative of him and all his workers) One brings light, one brings darkness. Satan is also famous for his methods of twisting the truth, taking concepts to an ungodly extreme and attacking ever so ferociously God ordained roles. And two such roles are mother and father. Let’s do a small contrast:

God	Satan
A good parent is compassionate.	“Your father was not compassionate. It’s all his fault, and now you have to bear the weight of his failure as a father.”
A good parent disciplines.	“Aww, your child is too cute. And do you really want him to not like you? It’s not like he really means to be that way anyhow.” OR “You better beat the tar out of him! He should NEVER have done that! You have every reason for your anger to get out of control and you don’t owe him an explanation or apology or even to talk to him about what he did.”
A good parent protects.	“Don’t let him get hurt. You have to protect your child from EVERYTING so he doesn’t have to deal with any emotional or physical consequences.” OR “You couldn’t protect no matter what you tried. It’s all your fault. You failed.”
A good parent gives good gifts.	Your child deserves to get anything he wants.” OR “You can’t give your child any gifts, you fail once again.”
A good parent will sacrifice much.	“If he despised you, you just despise him right back. It’s only fair to treat him the same way.”
The mother is the giver of life.	“I will attack everything about her that gives her life so that she can’t give life.”
The father is the head of the home.	“I will make everything in his life cause him to feel like a failure so that he is too weary to lead at home and will search for things to make him feel good about himself.”

Do you see what is happening in our homes now (for the most part; sometimes it is our bodies, fallen creation that they are, and not spiritual attacks)? “We do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places.” Ephesians 6:12 tells us. But why is it so hard to see that sometimes?! It’s so easy to become overwhelmed, depressed, sunken into a terrible pattern in life. Satan loves to attack in those impressionable first moments and first years that greatly impact the child as well as setting the course for the parents and what patterns they will form in the coming months.

Let’s allow God to unveil our eyes for a hypothetical moment like he did with Elisha’s servant in 2 Kings 6. A couple discovers they are going to be parents for the first time. Satan is not allowed to attack that life forming and the baby is born healthy and strong…so he sets his teeth into the mother (I have a later post developing on the attack on fatherhood).

“I will steal the love and bonding she should have with her baby in these first moments. She will look at her baby with an emotional numbness. I’ll let her have some joy so she doesn’t know anything is really wrong, but she will wonder why she doesn’t feel as bonded and all ooey gooey in love with her baby as she thought she would feel.”

“Then I’ll give her a painful recovery, keep her from being intimate with her husband, keep her up all night, keep the chores super high and her husband needy so that she is either having to take care of the new baby, her husband or the house and cannot find any time to spend with God. Oh! And when she does sit down to read or pray, I’ll wake the baby up or just make eyes so heavy she falls asleep instantly.”

“Let’s make the first few weeks and months so hard, that her unhealthy routine for self-care and staying connected with Jesus and her husband has become a new normal and she doesn’t even know how to get out of it.”

“I’ll make her lose herself so that she is confused as to who she is anymore.”

“I’ll make it hard to find a good baby-sitter and keep family busy at the times they need help most. I’ll also add an extra dose of frustration and make the baby hate bottles so she can’t get away to recharge at all!”

Any of this resonating with you? I wish I could say that it didn’t for me and that it was a natural transition in parenting for me. But it wasn’t. What’s worse is that the post-partum depression, disconnect from my children and the extremely slow recovery time became such a “new normal” for me that even though I sought counseling regularly and help from doctors, it still hasn’t completely gone away. Physically yes, but emotionally my spirit has been wholly wrecked and I know so many young mothers in the same boat. No matter how much I strive to be close to the Lord and thus a better woman, wife and mother…I constantly find myself failing.

It wasn’t until this week that it hit me so hard that of course I’m struggling!! Satan does not want me to succeed as a mother! He does not want my husband and I raising arrows to aim directly at his kingdom to destroy it in an instant. He wants to destroy me as the giver of life and my husband as a leader of the home so that we cannot be the powerhouse team we need to be in order to set our eyes on the right target (not at each other), square our shoulders back, take those strong sturdy, handcrafted arrows and aim them to the heart of the kingdom of darkness!

For years I have read Psalm 127 thinking that we were aiming arrows towards God, but that’s not the imagery created. It’s all about building the house, standing watch, preparing for the enemies that want to come in and destroy. As parents, we are crafting our children into God’s image. Allowing the Lord to do the building using our hands. And letting Him stand watch over our homes as we entrust everything over to Him so that we can rest knowing they are safe. And when the enemy does come, we know they are prepared and we are prepared and can stand together to contend the enemy. He paints a picture of parents as warriors at war, not just target practice.

And Satan doesn’t want us to know that! Why do you think so many people quote this Scripture and say you’re aiming the arrows towards God?? He has masterfully twisted Scripture once again and made it sound spiritual when in actuality it is the exact opposite of God’s message in the Scripture! We aren’t piercing God’s heart with our arrows, we’re attacking Satan’s dominion! God is the trainer, training us and placing His hands on our shoulders and hand to help us guide that arrow into the vulnerable points of our enemy. He’s behind and beside us! Psalm 139:5 says “You have hemmed me in both behind and in front and laid your hand on me.” Throughout all of Scripture He is right there leading with His right hand. Holding us, surrounding us. Our arrows do not have far to go to reach Him. However, to defeat the enemy there must be strategy and skill and we must be on the offense before he even crouches at our door!

So, beloved mother and father, if you are struggling in parenting…let’s shoulder together and take on a new purpose and vision! Let’s stop getting annoyed and frustrated with each other and ourselves and let’s start sharpening our tools! Let’s ask the Lord how to craft our arrows and let’s aim them STRAIGHT AT THE ENEMY!!! Let’s see our children rise up in this next generation so on target, so focused, so ready to knock the kingdom of hell down that he is terrified at the very sight of our children!

Are you ready for battle mighty warrior?!