Lessons in Nourishment

It has been one of those weeks... the kind where you wake up on Friday and it feels like Monday!  Hands in the air if you took the week off from schooling just to enjoy the Thanksgiving Holiday.  Hands up if Friday came and you found yourself asking, "If this is a break then I need a break from the break!"


Yup, that was me.  And I didn't even host the holiday dinner... for the first time in 20 years.  It was a strange feeling.  The whole week was a strange feeling.  Focusing on RV work/hoping for completion to be ready to go in a week's time.  Cleaning, sewing, etc... etc...  yup.  And I gave my kids leave to not only help (how nice of me, right?) but also to take it easy... no basic structure like most days.

I forget, my kids don't do well with no basic structure.  It doesn't matter that they are older now.  Direction is a good thing for them.  Especially in their Bible Study.  If we are to "train up our children" is it not first and foremost to train them up in the ways of the Lord?  Not just in speaking but also in doing?  If I take time each day for my Bible study, shouldn't my children be learning to do the same?

I pray for them to have a love for God's Word... and He has answered my prayers.  Each school day I rarely have to tell them twice (let alone once) to start their devotions... they just do... and they love it!  But if we don't have that structured, "Do your Bible Study before you start your other work" set-up... it flitters to the side and then this happens...

Ok, other than the fact that I took blurry pictures on Thanksgiving... and Brooke is smiling, notice Ashley.  That isn't an engaged look.  That is an "I'm trying to hold it together but I feel like I am ready to loose it" look.  As a matter of fact, she nearly did loose it.  Why?  Stress and no living water.

If you put these instructions before the brothers and sisters, you will be a good servant of Christ Jesus, nourished on the words of the faith and of the sound teaching that you have followed.  
1 Timothy 4:6 

Stress in our current environment was eating at her.  No Bible Study since last Friday was making her dry up.  If the words of faith and sound teaching are nourishment, then the lack of is... malnourishment.  We starve, wither and eventually die.  

It isn't just adults that need this nourishment.  Children too.  And I saw that so clearly (even with that blurry picture!!) on Thursday as she had a hard time engaging family, so removed from the Spring that gives life.  Our first lesson each day this week shouldn't have been sewing or cleaning or making good use of time unstructured.  No, it should have began with our devotions and prayer and discussion of heavenly things so that all these earthly things can become more bearable.

for, while physical training is of some value, godliness is valuable in every way, holding promise for both the present life and the life to come.

1 Timothy 4:8

That was my big "take-away" this week.  Lessons in Nourishment... not the turkey and dressing kind of nourishment.  No, the living water kind that gives deeper life and deeper meaning.

I pray, as turkey left-overs are gobbled up and Christmas preparations are beginning... that you are nourished from the start of your day to the very end!

Blessings,

Linking up today with:

 Titus2Tuesdays, Growing Home, Women Living Well and Internet Cafe