We may not be the moms we thought we’d be, but in Christ, we can be moms who cling to the cross and rest in God’s sufficiency.

Motherhood extends countless invitations for us to recognize our inability, acknowledge God’s ability, and lean on him to meet our children’s deepest need.

What happens when we feel more like we’re wilting than blooming in motherhood? We remember God is our strong helper, and we trust him with the blooming fruit.

Feeling overwhelmed by your responsibilities and commitments? There is glorious hope for you in Christ.

Yesterday, my husband said, ‘You’re going to be a good mom.’

I was making up bunk beds with the new bedding I’d agonized over for weeks. ‘Can dots be gender-neutral?’ ‘What if they’re scared of jungle animals?’ ‘Do girls like blue?’ He knew I needed to hear it.

I’m a soon-to-be foster mom who’s admittedly unfit for the task. I can count the number of diaper changes I’ve completed on one hand. I’m too young to parent a teenager. I’m not good at pretending or diffusing tantrums. I know nothing about the trauma. I don’t usually say the right thing.

I’m unprepared and unqualified, but the Lord called me anyway.

God called Jeremiah to be one of the great prophets, faithfully serving for forty years in the face of great persecution in a society that lived in complete moral failure. Jeremiah almost said, ‘No.’

He really was just a boy with no resume to support this appointment to prophet. He faced a nation overcome by apostasy—a calling that included great physical abuse and imprisonment. Jeremiah was a boy unprepared and unqualified for the task, but the Lord called him anyway.

God promised that he would give Jeremiah the words to speak, and he would be with him as his deliverer when the nation of Israel turned against him. He was a man who spoke with the words of God.

We sometimes forget we’re living every day with the power of the Holy Spirit inside of us. While the rest of the world tries to face marriage, careers, social injustice, and motherhood on their own, believers are filled with the spirit of the living God. We’re not enough, but our God is more than enough.

Motherhood is a huge calling, in whatever way you face it. Whether you’re navigating the teenage years, struggling in pregnancy, filling out state-mandated paperwork, or in the weeds of waiting, the Lord goes before you to help you accomplish the tasks to which he appoints you.

Even when you feel unprepared and unfit, even when you are unprepared and unfit, the Spirit of God can use you to accomplish his good plans.

I looked at my husband across the couch and heard myself say, “I’m tired of blowing it, of sinning the same way over and over again with our kids. Can’t I trade this in for another sin or something?!”…

Motherhood is an opportunity to come to the end of ourselves every day and run into the arms of a Savior who delights to work through the weak and needy.

As Christians, we know that God’s heart is for adoption. We rehearse to one another that pure religion looks after the orphan (James 1:27). We believe he sets the fatherless in families (Psalm 68:6) and that he will not leave us as orphans, but that he’ll come to us (John 14:18). We know the Father lovingly adopted us, paying an unspeakable price to make us his own (Ephesians 1:5-7).

We rightly apply the gospel to our lives when we acknowledge that we are adopted sons and daughters and we set out to adopt as well. It is a high and holy calling to be an adoptive mom. It is a right response to the love the Father has freely lavished on us.

But when we adopt, there are limitations to this gospel application, which are not always acknowledged. You and I are not God. We are far from perfect, sinless saviors. And our children don’t fit the mold of repentant and grateful sinners expected after a salvation experience. The parallels do break down.

Every adoption is birthed in brokenness. When you and I step in, our children have already endured losses we will never fathom. They carry pain we cannot heal.

Today I'm reminded of how far I am from being a good mother, a good friend, a good wife / sister / daughter / church member / volunteer – a good anything! I feel split in two, like I live in the in-between. I want to do better, oh how I long to do better. But the needs keep coming at me and I fail over and over again. I just can't seem to get it together.

At times, it can feel pretty bleak. Why can I not live out what I know, I know? If I have Christ, why do I sometimes feel lost? If I know his promises are true, why do I act like they don't exist?