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A Prayer for Your Broken Relationship with Your Mom

by Carmen Horne 2 Comments

Do you remember when you said you wouldn’t parent like your parents? Yeah, me too.

Like that time I got a spankin’ for dustin’ myself with the flesh colored face powder (after my bath) and Momma thought I had skipped getting in the water. Or when she would pinch my leg in church service because I was talking too much. Yikes.

Our girl has had a few near traumatic events. Unless she brings up “slip” and “dress”, I never speak those words together in her presence. This is possibly one of my most humiliating moments as a mother. Well, except the time I nearly knocked her unconscious putting her in the car seat, or when I missed the straight pins in the underarms of her little dress. Each time I picked her up to find out why she was crying…yep.

Momma-ing can be terrifying. We love this little thing so much and we realize our messups could possibly land us on a day time talk show. 

Like most families, my relationship with Mom went through a few stressful times. Her actions confounded me and with self-righteousness, I dispensed grace frugally. Writing these words sting my heart because we could have handled those circumstances so much better. 

May 2nd, a year ago, my sassy Momma went to live with Jesus. As I reminisce, my heart is easily filled with grace over her mistakes.  You know, I hardly remember her mistakes. I mostly remember her unique, accepting, and loving personality. I am very thankful God gave me to her. She was my longest and dearest friend.

All relationships have difficult times. As I listen to women discuss their pain over broken connections, I am reminded of how important mommas are to their children.

Is your relationship with your mom complicated? If so, maybe a change of perspective would help. I’m not speaking of negating pain and hurt. I’m speaking of looking at them from a different lens.

These reminders don’t fit every momma, but they might help you see yours in a different light.

A few reminders about our mommas:

♥ She did the best she could with the resources and information she had. 

♥ She didn’t have a perfect momma either.

♥ She regrets her mistakes – even the small ones. 

There are so many factors that shape our response to events and circumstances in our lives. Our upbringing, personal choices, genetics, and spiritual environments form us. Just like you and I, our mommas were molded by their experiences.  These factors don’t excuse bad and unhealthy behavior, but they can help us understand each other better. Here’s a bit of hard truth: We judge others by their actions. We judge ourselves by our intentions. 

I discovered the benefits of this kind of change in perspective with my dad. I asked God to help me see his positive character traits instead of the running list of negative ones I had cultivated through the years. Over time, God answered those prayers. God answers all prayers that are His will. Living in peace is His will (Romans 12:18). Honoring our parents is His will (Exodus 20:12). Forgiving others is His will (Matthew 6:14; Ephesians 4:32). Having an abundant, overflowing life is His will (John 10:10). 

My hope is that we can surround our tender hearts with healthy boundaries and release old hurts to Jesus, the great Recycler of pain. 

How do we release the pain of our past and receive the freedom available to us? Prayer is the best place to start. 

Do you struggle with the words to begin? When we are out of words, a gentle invitation to join in prayer with someone else is comforting and powerful. (Matthew 18:19) 

A prayer invitation for those who have broken relationships with their parents:

Abba Father, My home life was difficult and far away from a “Leave it to Beaver” image. I ask You to be mother and father to me. Hide me under Your wings. Replace hurtful proclamations made by broken people with Your words of life and hope. Heal my painful memories. Guide me into forgiveness. Reveal the good when all I see is bad. Fill my hearts with compassion. Orchestrate divine opportunities for me to use my pain to help others. 

Open my eyes to the deception of Satan, the true author of lies and heartbreak. He is the enemy of my soul.  I invite You, Lord, into the messiness of my life. I release all bitterness, resentment, anger, and pride and lay it at Your feet. Hang on tight to it, Lord, when I want to pick it back up. Forgive my sins and help me be better instead of bitter.

I ask You to break every stronghold and generational sin in my family. I believe and declare our family belongs to You, Lord.

I’m a new creation. I am putting away the old and embracing the new. O Holy Spirit, empower me to rise above my circumstances and live an abundant life. Because of Jesus’ death and resurrection, I am free! My future is filled with hope. I ask all of this in the mighty name of Jesus, Amen!

Photo by Briana Tozour on Unsplash

Grace and peace to you, friend,

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5 Personal Boundaries for a Healthy, Balanced Life

by Carmen Horne Leave a Comment

Y’all, I’m a bit boundary weary. I’ve had lots of boundary practice this month. How about you?

I’m thinkin’ we need a respite. When my daughter is having a tough day, I send her videos of goats in pajamas, playing. It relieves tension. So here we go. We need a reward :)

It’s hard trying to live within healthy boundaries. Last week I gave you five boundaries (out of ten) that are our responsibility. Today, let’s discuss the other five.

5 boundaries that are our responsibility:

✓ Limits

There are two facets to establishing healthy limits:

  • setting limits on others
  • setting limits on our own self – self-control

Drs. Cloud and Townsend remind us in their book Boundaries – When to Say Yes When to Say No to Take Control of Your Life, setting limits on others is a misnomer. We cannot control other people’s behavior. Let’s be real, we have all tried this and we have all realized that it doesn’t work. 

What can we control when it comes to others? Limits on our own exposure to people who are behaving poorly. This is what God does. He does not try to control our behavior. In Carmen’s interpretation God says, “Here are my standards for us to be in a relationship.” He lets us choose to follow His standards. Quoting the Drs., “God says in effect, ‘You can be that way if you choose, but you cannot come into my house.’ Heaven is a place for the repentant, and all are welcome.” 

Internal limits are tricky. Gosh, I don’t know why I think I can control someone else. Keeping myself in line is a full-time job. The Drs. wrote a great article on FaithGateway about Establishing Boundaries With Yourself (they give a self-boundary checklist.)

Learning to be mature in self-boundaries is not easy. Many obstacles hinder our progress; however, God desires our maturity and self-control even more than we do. He’s on our team as an exhorter, encourager, and implorer (1 Thessalonians 2:11-12).

✓ Talents 

This one might give me an ouchy because I have let fear stand in between me and my calling. God has given us all talents and gifts. The scriptures in Matthew 25 where Jesus discusses the unfaithful servant who squandered his talent makes me uncomfortable. Uncomfortable is good. “Not confronting our fear denies the grace of God and insults both his giving of the gift and his grace to sustain us as we are learning.”- Cloud/Townsend

There is risk involved when we step out and use our gifts. 

“Courage is fear that has said its prayers and decided to go forward anyway.” – Joyce Meyer

Y’all, let’s do brave – knee shaking, tummy turning, palms sweating, heartbeat escalating – brave. It scares me to even write those words.

✓ Thoughts

Elvis often said when he was flabbergasted, “My boy, my boy, my boy…” Sounds like it fits here. My girl, my girl, my girl. Paul wrote about learning to take thoughts captive in 2 Corinthians 10:5

We use our powerful God-tools for smashing warped philosophies, tearing down barriers erected against the truth of God, fitting every loose thought and emotion and impulse into the structure of life shaped by Christ. (MSG)

  • Examining the information we are allowing into our minds. We can listen to others but we must think for ourselves. We were discussing this dangerous trend during our last growth group. Beware of people who put information out there with little godly truth to it. Use your gift of Holy Spirit discernment. Does all of the information line up with biblical truth?. The Bible is our compass. Our guide. 
  • Continuing to grow in knowledge is being a good steward of the gift of learning God has given us. 
  • Clarifying our distorted thinking. Whether it’s our rose-colored glasses that mask the truth or our past hurts and painful choices that brings distortion into our relationships. We ask, “What is the truth in this situation?” If we have stinkin’ thinkin’ we take responsibility for it and move forward to change it. 
  • Communicating our thoughts to others. The Apostle Paul said in 1 Corinthians 2:11a, “No one can know a person’s thoughts except that person’s own spirit…” If we want others to know what we think or need, we gotta speak up. 

✓ Desires

We all have wants, dreams, wishes, and goals. That’s good. God places desires within us. 

Delight yourself in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart. Psalm 37:4 ESV

He fulfills the desire of those who fear him; he also hears their cry and saves them. Psalm 145:19 ESV

When we identify what we want, we must then identify the motives in our desires. Our why makes a difference. James speaks to this: “You want what you don’t have, so you scheme and kill to get it. You are jealous of what others have, but you can’t get it, so you fight and wage war to take it away from them. Yet you don’t have what you want because you don’t ask God for it. 3 And even when you ask, you don’t get it because your motives are all wrong—you want only what will give you pleasure.” (4:2-3 NLT)

God is a wise parent who gives good gifts. If what we want is good for us, He’s listening with His giving ear. 

God not only gives, but He also encourages us to work for what we desire, “It is pleasant to see dreams come true…” Proverbs 13:9

✓ Love

Giving and receiving love is the lifeblood of our soul. God is our loving Father. We have the ability to love because He first loved us. 

Our loving heart, like our physical one, needs and inflow as well as an outflow of lifeblood. And like its physical counterpart, our heart is a muscle, a trust muscle. This trust muscle needs to be used and exercised; if it is injured it will slow down or weaken. – Drs. Cloud and Townsend

God is a wise parent who gives good gifts.

Our hearts are our responsibility. Are we giving love? Are we blocking other’s attempts to give us love? When we accept our responsibility, we can work on our weaknesses. We all need love.

Becoming and maintaining emotional health is some of the hardest work we will do. Let me encourage you to not tackle it all at once! This as a process. One step at a time. If we ask God what needs to change, He will reveal it to us. Thankfully, in my life, He shines His light a little at a time. 

Lord, show us our next step. In Jesus’ name, Amen

 

If you were helped by this post on boundaries, here are links to the other posts in this series:

One Good Boundary is a Great Place to Start

Does Forgiving You Mean I Must Trust You?

5 Boundaries That are Our Responsibility

 
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"It takes a depth of pride to accept our way might not be the best way or the only way...' If Carmen had not already made me a follower of her blog, that one sentence would have had me hooked. It's not always easy to find someone who writes in ways we can relate. Carmen makes me stop and take a deep long look at who I am and where I want to be in my walk with Christ. I trust her to be a truth teller and a peace maker. Not only has she encouraged me so many times, but often my heart is pierced to make a change."
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Karen S.

"Carmen writes from her heart and her own life experiences. What she says is always spot on for me. She is a gifted teacher and her love for the Word shows. Carmen is easy to understand and her words always leave me with a deeper understanding of God's love and grace. Her wit and charm make her a joy to listen to. She speaks truth, even when the truth is hard to hear and does it with understanding and compassion."
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"Rarely will you find a woman with such a servant’s heart as Carmen Horne. I have had the pleasure of attending many church events, trips, and girl lunches with Carmen over the past sixteen years. She continues to be one of my favorite mentors whether in North Louisiana or on the beach in Florida, which is probably OUR FAVORITE place! She uses her kind and faithful heart when giving advice or mentoring others. Carmen is truly a light to many and guides you to find the light in yourself no matter how faint it may be. Hebrews 13:7"

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Dianne A.

"Rarely will you find a woman with such a servant’s heart as Carmen Horne. I have had the pleasure of attending many church events, trips, and girl lunches with Carmen over the past sixteen years. She continues to be one of my favorite mentors whether in North Louisiana or on the beach in Florida, which is probably OUR FAVORITE place! She uses her kind and faithful heart when giving advice or mentoring others. Carmen is truly a light to many and guides you to find the light in yourself no matter how faint it may be. Hebrews 13:7"
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"Carmen spoke to us from her heart.  She encouraged us be women of faith. Carmen is very genuine in her love of God and people. Her heart for God is evident in her devotion and also the life she leads."
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Carmen Horne, Life Coach

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