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I woke up at 3 a.m.  That’s not unusual for me.  It’s when I do my best worrying.  Nothing like trying to be a good mom after a good long night of sleepless worry.

Worry. This is one of those things we mommas do well. We worry about our kids—the decisions they make and the hardships they face. We worry about most of the parenting decisions we make and whether we’ve got it right. We do this, even though we know, in the words of Corrie ten Boom, that “worry does not empty tomorrow of its sorrow. It empties today of its strength.”

When we are in Christ, God can’t stop loving us! The real us. The rebellious us. The unfaithful us. But, believing that can be so hard! Why? Well, for starters, there are simply too many parts of us that feel too unlovable. I know you know what I’m talking about. We know the mess that lies beneath our well-manicured outsides. Also, let’s not negate the power of the persistent message our culture bombards us with: “A little more perfect = a little more lovable.” Everywhere we turn, covert and overt messages assure us that our lovability is riding on our performance.

I recently found myself tiptoeing toward trying to rescue my son from a hardship, until, that is, my husband gently reminded me, “Unless you plan on living in his dorm room in college and going on his honeymoon when he gets married, you need to stay out of the way and allow him to navigate this and grow. You have to trust God to use this for his good.” He’s a smart one, that man of mine.

As moms it’s natural and normal to want to ensure our children’s happiness and protect them from all of life’s hardships. My heart has broken in ways I didn’t know it could break as I’ve walked alongside my boys through some pretty hard stuff.

Can we be real about this? It’s so hard to watch our kids navigate the “gift” of hardship, even though we absolutely know that it’s essential to their growing into responsible and resilient kids.

A common question people ask me when they discover I’ve written another book is, “What led you to write this book?”

Well, the truth is, God wrote this book on my heart first. He knew how much the truths held within the pages of Mom Set Free needed to be embedded in my own heart.

And the reason I am so excited to share it with you is because I’ve discovered this:  I wasn’t the only mom who’d been trying to parent with grace without living in grace—without first accepting the grace of God for me, in all of my weakness, sin, and shortcomings. And I discovered I wasn’t the only one who struggled to believe God wasn’t disappointed in me(and even mad at me!) when I failed to reflect His heart to my children. 

It was that discovery, along with the clear nudging from God, that inspired me to write Mom Set Free.