“Do not yield to your fear, Mary, for the Lord has found delight in you.” 

Luke 1:30 TPT

Mary’s gut-level response to the message that she would bear a son for God was fear. She was “greatly troubled” (NIV), “bewildered” (TPT), “confused and disturbed” (NLT). Scared out of her mind! 

Fear: Emotional foreboding or dread of impending distress or misfortune.

And like every mother ever since, she had reason to fear: Raising a son in an enemy occupied country. Rebellion and upheaval in the daily news. Inadequate health care. Sketchy birth story. 

Eight days after her son was born, a priest looked right through her with piercing eyes and prophesied that “a sword will pierce your own soul too.” (Luke 2:35) 

Every mother since the beginning of time has been plagued by fear, anxiety, dread. 

We push it down, try not think about all the what if’s in this world gone wild. Our glaring deficiencies stare at us in the mirror. We hear the bite of our outbursts— and cringe. In our honest moments we look down deep and know our every inadequacy. Like Mary, we are greatly troubled, confused and disturbed— scared out of our minds!

When those all-too familiar emotions of ‘foreboding and dread of impending distress or misfortune’ choke the joy right out of this high calling of raising a son or daughter to love and follow Jesus, feast on these words from God that apply to every mom— and every dad as well. 

Do not yield to your fear… for the Lord has found delight in you.

This is the only truth that helps. 

My faults and flaws will hurt my kids! I will say things and do things I’ll later regret. And so will you! Your kids, just like mine, will be mad at you at some point—and for good reason. 

We are deeply flawed people raising deeply flawed kids in a deeply flawed world.

It’s the story of Christmas that gives us the courage to stand up to our fears and not give in. To be steadfast in the face of our failures.  Christ’s birth, His willingness to live in our world and be hurt by our hurts— to be hurt by his own inevitably flawed human parents. Why? So that He could be with us as we navigate the fears, dreads, and impending doom we all live with. Because… crazy at it sounds, the Lord has found delight in you. 

The early Christians faced their own entirely legitimate ‘emotional foreboding’ for their families and their safety with a word from this Word whose birth we celebrate:

“I will never fail you.
    I will never abandon you.

So we can say with confidence,

“The Lord is my helper,
    so I will have no fear.”

Hebrews 13:5,6 NLT

Now, take a deep breath, carve out a moment to come near to this One who loves you and delights in you. Do not yield to your fears. Instead, fix your eyes on Jesus and His indescribable love. His no-matter-what love. And let Him love your kids to Himself— through you. On Christmas… and every day. 

From My Heart,

Diane