BRAVE: A MOTHER/DAUGHTER FLICK

Today was great!!!  I took the kids to Y.  Dalton was suppose to have a basket ball clinic @ Patterson Park. We get all the way over there & it was canceled.  So, after swimming a practicing basket ball, we got to go to the movies.  The boys saw "The Dark Knight Rises", of course; and Bobbye Sue's been dying to see "Brave", so that's where we went.  I must admit; I wasn't expecting much from the previews...it looked kind of boring.  However, it turned out to be really good!  It's a princess who is being groomed by her mother, the queen, to be perfect.  God's timing is awesome!!!  As part of The Titus 2 University this month, we are reading the book Grace for the Good Girl by Emily P. Freeman.   I love, love, love the book.  It was like Mrs. Freeman just picked my brain & wrote down all the things I'm thinking, but I'm too afraid to say; Good girls are not suppose to think this way!!!    The book is just totally making me reevaluate how I think and do things.  (I hope to write a few more blogs about Grace for the Good Girls in the coming weeks.)  
      Anyway, what was so astonishing was how God revealed that I am "encouraging" Bobbye Sue to be a "Good Girl" too.  While yes, there are things that I need to teach her; am I truly teaching her God's ways or am I imposing my expectations on her?   Too often, I feel like I do the latter one.  I want my kids to love and obey God because they have a relationship with God; not because the are in fear of Him or feel like the have to preform for Him


Proverbs 22:6 says 
"Train up a child in the way he should go,
And when he is old he will not depart from it."

I remember having a conversation with a good friend of my, Becca Harrison, a few years ago and she told me (I think) that the original translation went something like;  "Train up a child  in the way in the   way  he is bent..."  She explained to me that God has a path set for our children to go and that is not our job to force them what to do but to guide them.  I am not responsible for the route my children take.  I can train, advise and pray fir them,  but at the end of the  day, they will have to be accountable for their own choices.  Like in "Brave" (not to spoil the ending), the daughter begins to understand the mother a little better and the mother starts to accept  the daughter for who she is.  This was a great lesson  for me; not only as a mother, but also as God's daughter.  As mom, I need to be  able  to step back and realize that this is  their   life and they're going to have to live it the way they see fit.  As God's daughter, I need   to strengthen  my own relationship with Him and not always try to please others; thinking  that this is how I am to pleas God.