The Warren & The World Vol 3, Issue 37

The Warren & the World is Story Warren’s weekly newsletter, providing a round-up of our favorite things from around the web as well as a review of what was on our site over the past week. We’re glad you’re here!

Around the Web

I’m a Mother, Not the CEO of My Household

Haley Stewart begins to understand that being a stay at home mom is not the same thing as a professional career. The rules are different.

There’s no award for being the best mother. You never achieve enough and the job is never done. Because mothering is an entirely different animal. And if I obsess over productivity and efficiency, I lose sight of the real point altogether.

Dear Moms, You Do More Than You Know

Kevin DeYoung reminds moms that God has used women in incredible ways throughout history–women from many walks of life, doing what was right in front of them to do. He begins by looking at Moses’ mother, sister, and adoptive mother:

Three woman of different ages, different nationalities, and different social standings all doing their part to fulfill God’s great plan of redemption, though none of them knew the part they were playing and one of the three did not even belong to the people of God.It’s true: there are many more men mentioned in the Bible than women. And yet, more than often than not when a women shows up, something good is going to happen.

What I Want Most of All

At Courage for a Better Story, Alison reflects at the change of seasons on who she has been and who she is becoming. Her reflections and goals are helpful to all of us who think through who we want to be and what we want from life.

I feel like the start of a new season always leaves space for reflection for me. Who was I in the past season? What things do I want to be different moving forward? The return to school and the end of summer has always felt like the perfect start of a new year to me, more so than January’s new year resolutions.
Even though this is one of the first times in a long time that I’m not directly part of an academic year, I’m still showing up to reflect and make some goals. I typically spend time with the Lord every fall, asking for direction and heart change and this year is no exception… In the meantime, I’m working on showing up and asking these questions:Who do I want to be? What do I want?

Your Child Is Your Neighbor

At The Gospel Coalition, Jen Wilkin notes that the Bible doesn’t give a whole lot of direct parenting advice, until we remember that our children are, after all, people:

Because if children are people, then they are also our neighbors. This means that every scriptural imperative that speaks to loving our neighbor as we love ourselves suddenly comes to bear on how we parent. Every command to love preferentially at great cost, with great effort, and with godly wisdom becomes not just a command to love the people in my workplace or the people in my church or the people at my hair salon or the people on my street or the people in the homeless shelter. It becomes a command to love the people under my own roof, no matter how small.

Around the Warren

The Most Horrible Thing: A Child’s Perspective

Guest Carolyn Leiloglou reminds us that our children do not see the way we see, and that perspective is good to take in.

We were listening to On the Banks of Plum Creek on the way to piano lessons, and we had just heard the scene that I had dreaded (spoiler alert!): the grasshoppers descend like a plague and devour the Ingalls’ wheat crop and every other green thing for miles. I parked the car, and as the kids began to trundle out of it with their piano books, my oldest daughter (10) asked me, “Remember the most horrible thing that happens next?”I didn’t. I thought the most horrible thing had already happened. Grasshoppers eating all your food and livelihood is, after all, pretty terrible. In fact, from my grown-up perspective, this was certainly the most horrible thing that could happen!

Leaven Bread by Rain for Roots

S.D. Smith shares a video from Rain for Roots. Sandra McCracken introduces it this way:

I love the collaboration that happened on Leaven Bread. It was a rare moment of us being able to gather in the room together, to talk about the text. To wrestle with the implications and to try to honor the context in which the words were written. This one made a full circle by the last verse and as we were writing it and singing together it felt like trumpets went off when we were able to fit all the pieces together. Songwriting is like catching lightning sometimes. ~Sandra

The Dining Habits of Polonius Wheeler

S.D. Smith shares his poem, “The Dining Habits of Polonius Wheeler” with us.

Something to Do with Your Kids

The folks over at The Artful Parent made a list of their top ten materials to work with with kids…and then added 15 more favorites as an addendum. Maybe you can find some new materials for your budding artists to try.