TBOC: The Moore Family part 1

As many of you know I posted about the Moore family having their video Children Are A Blessing free to watch during the month of April. Well I've had the privilege of getting to communicate with Edee Moore via email and she has so graciously agreed to answer some interview questions for The Blessing Of Children series. I won't tell you too much about her, but rather let her tell you herself...

1.       How long have you been married?   

Shane and I have been married for almost 21 years!  

2.       How did you meet your husband?

We met in our Sophomore English class when he was a new student in our high school.   I was a "home-town" girl, and he and his family had just moved to the area.     However, we didn't date each other until we "just happened" to go to the same college.   I'm not advocating dating, just admitting that we did!  :)

3.       How many children do you have?

We just gave birth 6 days ago to our 11th blessing! 

4.       What are their ages? (and names if you’re willing to share)

Since we have freely volunteered our children's names in our films, I don't mind sharing them here:   

Demie - 20

Dane' - 19

DeLane - 16

Darbie Lee - 14

Dain (our oldest son) - 12

Daylie Grace - 10

Dobson - 8

Dandle - 6

Delight - 4

Dabney - 3

Dulcie - 6 days! 

(No, we didn't plan on going with all D's in the beginning.   By #3, we thought we'd better name her with a D too, though.  Just in case she were our last, we didn't want her to feel left out!  :)  )  

5.       Did you ever think you’d have this many children?

The question is:   Did I ever think I'd have children at all, and the answer is NO!   Before Shane and I were married (our last year in college), I had always said that I never wanted children.   I didn't want to "waste" the talent and skills the Lord had obviously (chuckle) blessed me with.   Then, when Demie was born, the Lord began to slowly but surely change my heart and Shane's.   To Him be the glory!!

6.       Is your family involved in any ministries?

It depends on what you define as a ministry. Teaching and training our children is the most important ministry we can have at this season of our lives, so we aren't volunteers for a formal "ministry."   After years of volunteering as children's choir directors, men's quarter pianist, Crisis Pregnancy Center counselor, youth group teachers, Bible study teachers, etc, the Lord gently began to show my husband that the most effective form of ministry (outside of the family) is one the family can do together.   This "ministry," if you will, began with forming one on one relationships with other folks and families, having people into our home often with the hopes of sharing with them the things the Lord was teaching us, and eventually helping to plant a church in our area.   Really, I guess you could say that "discipleship" became our ministry, keeping in mind that as we "ministered" to others, we were still learning many things - still are learning many things!  

Over time, the Lord also began to plant into our hearts the idea of making a film about the blessing of children.   Thus, Moore Family Films was birthed, and we continue to make films to encourage and edify families, for the glory of God.   This has become one of our family's main "ministries."  

7.       What made you and your husband decide to trust God with your family size? Did you both agree at the same time or was one of you ready before the other?

So often, we see that for whatever reason, the wife is the one who first has the desire to trust God with family size.   Fortunately, in our situation,  I was only a little bit ahead of Shane in our convictions.   At the time, I thought I must be losing my mind, to be even thinking of not using birth control.    God used several things in our lives to begin to dissolve the scales that blinded our eyes.   First, we absolutely loved our precious little girls, born 12 months apart while Shane was still in college, even though others thought we were so irresponsible, and even though they "kept me from finishing college."   Then,  when we moved to a neighboring state for Shane to finish up his degree, we met a family with 6 children - "6 children!!!   Can you believe that???    I'd go crazy!!!!"      These words actually proceeded from my mouth as I told my mother over the phone about this family in our church.   Not only did they have all these kids, but they also homeschooled!    I really was flabbergasted.    I had never heard of such a thing.   But, as I watched this family from a distance, it became so obvious that they were happy, they took care of each other, and the children stood out from the other public schooled children in mine and Shane's little choir.    That was the tiny seed God planted in my heart, and soon afterward in Shane's.   That tiny seed blossomed and grew, even after we and the other family each moved to other states and lost touch.   To this day, I don't think they have any idea how God used their quiet influence on the hearts of a very young couple.   Hi Radosevich's, wherever you are!   :)    A while later, just when I thought all these ideas were unique, the Lord led us to a couple of resources (Nancy Campbell's book Be Fruitful and Multiply being one of them), and crossed our lives with a couple of other families who were actually being led in the same direction.    These resources and families were planted by the Lord to affirm what He was already telling us in His Word.    I looked up the word "womb" in the Bible and was astounded at the number of times it said that "God opened the womb" or "God closed the womb."    It had actually never occurred to me before that God was actually in control of such things!    

8.       Was there ever a time when you questioned your decision?

Absolutely.   As many of you well know, there aren't many folks who get out their pom-poms and start cheering when they realize you're having more than 3 children, especially on purpose!   When we first decided to trust the Lord with the womb (i.e. not using any form of birth control - not even natural family planning), I suppose you might say our faith was a bit shaky.  Often when we encountered financial hardships or especially hard days (which happen more than not with so many small children), I would silently wonder if we were doing the right thing.   Especially since the church leaders and most of our family and friends didn't hesitate to verbalize their disapproval.   Those were trying days that served to confirm and strengthen our convictions over time.   Each of us must look to God's Word for the answers to everything in life!   Certainly, having a Godly husband who shared my convictions was paramount in our sticking to it!  I have seen many times, however, when a wife prays for her husband in this area (without nagging her husband), God is usually faithful to open his eyes as well.  

9.       What advice would you give to a young mom just starting out with maybe one or two children?

As far as family size is concerned, I would encourage her to rest and trust in the Lord, come what may.  If God is convicting you about things before your husband, then commit those things to prayer. 

 Make time for the Word and prayer everyday.  However, don't fall into the self-condemning trap of thinking you have to have hours on end of uninterrupted time in Bible study and prayer.   In this season of life, those times will be rare.  Snatch little moments when you can.  If you happen to have had a good night's sleep, and all the little ones are still in bed, then by all means, get up a bit early for this intimate time with the Lord.   However, if the needs of the family simply prevent this time, then don't grow weary in doing good.   Gather your children around you as you read a Psalm aloud to them and then pray together about your day.  The Lord will use this time to grow you.  If your husband isn't leading your family spiritually through daily time in the Word and worship as a family, then I would encourage you to pray that God would gently open his eyes to this responsibility and need in his life.   You may even gently and lovingly encourage him to consider how invaluable his role as spiritual leader and teacher of his family is.   

 Also,  I would advise her to enjoy every moment with her little children.  One problem I see in this generation of young moms, is too much time on the computer.   Especially on blogs and facebook, and similar things.   Although there is a place for it, and I'm sure many young moms find the networking extremely encouraging and the long days less lonely, your young family is growing up and needs your attention desperately right now.   I frequently tell young moms, "They'll be grown tomorrow."   And they will.  I can hardly believe how quickly time has flown.   My little piggy-tailed girls are now grown women, making films to encourage other families.   Kleenex, anyone?   :)  I'm actually thankful we didn't have internet when we began our family!  

Be on the look out for part 2 of this post were Edee discusses things like scheduling, finances, and finding alone time with her husband.

Worth Fighting For

My family and I have never had it all together, we still don't. My husband got saved after I did (but before we got married) and he's been slow to come around. In the beginning it was just me taking the girls to church and trying to teach them the things of the Lord. But God came in right on time and my hubby is on fire for the Lord!

We've been studying together, praying together, and going to church together. I love getting to sit in church with my man. I used to be so jealous of those women who got to sit in service with their husbands by their sides. That was something I had to repeatedly go to God and ask forgiveness for. But since just giving it all to Him so much has changed. We have family worship time, as well as a time for just my hubby and I to get alone with God.

I don't want to give the impression that we're perfect, because we are FAR from being perfect. FAR. But I do want to give others hope. If you're a wife whose husband seems to be not stepping up to the challenge of being the spiritual leader of your family, there is hope. Let Proverbs 21:1 be your hope: "The king's heart is in the hand of the LORD, as the rivers of water: he turneth it whithersoever he will."

God can turn the heart of your king. You just have to be willing to put the time in on your knees. Prayer is the most powerful weapon that we have. In church on Sunday our pastor said "it is in prayer where the battle is won!" And it's so true! When we try to make things happen in our flesh we will fail. every. time. But when we step back and wait on God to work, we can witness miracles.

Now that doesn't mean that we don't have to work, we do. We most certainly do. But our work is not to nag our husbands and try to change them. Were are supposed to follow the admonishment found in 1 Peter 3:1-2

"¹Likewise, ye wives, be in subjection to your own husbands; that, if any obey not the word, they also may without the word be won by the conversation of the wives; ²While they behold your chaste conversation coupled with fear."

The word conversation in those verses isn't referring to our speech. It's about the way we carry ourselves what our husbands see in us. When we're at church or around other Christians its so much easier to "act right". But when we're at home and the dishes are piled up, the kids aren't behaving, and your husband has left his socks all around the house, that's when our true character comes out. That's when our husbands need to see us demonstrating the love of Christ. That is when we must extend grace.

It's not always easy but as you are praying for your husband, pray that God will show you anything that you have going on in your life that is hindering His work. Pray for any hidden sin to be revealed. Take your focus off of your husbands short comings and ask God to show you your own. When you take your focus off of your man, things will change. It won't be over night, and there will be set backs. It will be hard. But it's worth fighting for. 

I'm linking up with Women Living Well, Proverbs 31 Thursdays and A Wise Woman Builds Her Home

God's Unwavering Faithfulness

Around here lately money has been tight. Well actually it's usually tight, but lately it's been even tighter than usual. We've been doing our best and by the grace of God we've had everything we need and some of the things we want. Our method is to focus on food and then fill in the blanks after that.

We keep a somewhat vegetarian diet with fish being our main Source of protein. I try not to fry things, but when I bake I still use a little bit of oil to keep things from sticking to the pan. Because of this we buy large gallon bottles of oil. That way we'll have it for awhile. Well, a month ago I noticed that the oil was getting low. Pay day came and we decided not to get another bottle of oil just yet, and instead buy more food.

Now these bottles of oil aren't that expensive. It's not like we strain to buy the oil normally. But this time around we just thought it best not to purchase another bottle. I watched as the oil got down to almost the last bit and I just figured we'd make it. I knew that God would provide, because He always does.

I made dinner and went to get what I thought was the last of the oil. I poured out what I needed, but the bottle didn't empty. I made dinner another night, and the bottle did not empty.  It has been close to three weeks and that bottle of oil still has not emptied!

I can't help but praise God for this. I can't help but share this with other people. For some this may be a small thing. But for me and my family, that oil not running out has been a huge blessing.

I'm reminded of the story of the widow's oil in 2 Kings 4:1-6. Now of course the widow wasn't using her oil to cook with, but, God still gave her all the oil she needed. How great is His faithfulness!

"Now there cried a certain woman of the wives of the sons of the prophets unto Elisha, saying, Thy servant my husband is dead; and thou knowest that thy servant did fear the LORD: and the creditor is come to take unto him my two sons to be bondmen. ²And Elisha said unto her, What shall I do for thee? tell me, what hast thou in the house? And she said, Thine handmaid hath not any thing in the house, save a pot of oil. ³Then he said, Go, borrow thee vessels abroad of all thy neighbours, even empty vessels; borrow not a few. ⁴And when thou art come in, thou shalt shut the door upon thee and upon thy sons, and shalt pour out into all those vessels, and thou shalt set aside that which is full. ⁵So she went from him, and shut the door upon her and upon her sons, who brought the vessels to her; and she poured out. ⁶And it came to pass, when the vessels were full, that she said unto her son, Bring me yet a vessel. And he said unto her, There is not a vessel more. And the oil stayed."

TBOC: Planting the Seeds

My blessings on Resurrection Sunday

We parents are given a promise from God: Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it.- Proverbs 22:6

I don't know about you but I rely on this promise. I don't want my children to turn out like the many Godless and pagan children of our day. I want them to be Godly, and Set-Apart. So that means that I have to put in the work now. I know that it's not all about me though. No matter how hard I work with out God being the focus for it all, I labor in vain. See if I don't do anything then I can't hold God to His promise. Because it's not an blanket promise, it's not your children will turn out fine. It's a promise that starts with me doing the work. I have to plant the seeds so that I can reap the fruit. A verse that I hold on to and meditate on for encouragement is 2 Corinthians 9:6 "But this I say, He which soweth sparingly shall reap also sparingly; and he which soweth bountifully shall reap also bountifully"

Now if you're like me, then you're not sure how to go about this. I've got some ideas, but I'm still trying to figure it out. Occasionally I will see fruit from my labors, and that's when I know I'm on the right track. I take my very first cue straight from scripture.

Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God is one LORD: 5 And thou shalt love the LORD thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might. 6 And these words, which I command thee this day, shall be in thine heart: 7 And thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up. 8 And thou shalt bind them for a sign upon thine hand, and they shall be as frontlets between thine eyes. 9 And thou shalt write them upon the posts of thy house, and on thy gates. -Deuteronomy 6:4-9

These few verses tell us so much about how to train up our children. We are supposed to teach them diligently and constantly, verse 7. We are to bind them on our hands and between our eyes, verse 8. And we are to write them on our door posts, verse 9.


The way that we apply verse 8 is by memorizing scripture and using it daily. I try to teach my children that we are to do everything "as to the Lord" {Colossians 3:23}. The way we apply verse 9 is to have scripture all over the place. Especially in places where I need the encouragement like above the kitchen sink! In our living room we have a portion of Joshua 24:15 painted above a window so that we can be reminded of our family goal. Which is to love and serve the Lord. We also have a mezuzah on our front door post. A mezuzah is a small box like case that holds scripture and is affixed to a portion of the door frame.


As our children grow they will see these things and hopefully they will be aids in teaching them to obey the Lord. But I don't stop my training there. I still have verse 6 to apply! We do this through our family worship time, as well as during our homeschooling, and just for fun during play time.

We sing songs, read stories, and memorize scripture together as a family. We have some old hymnals that we got from church and we pick one song to sing for a month. This month we're singing He Lives. It's only been around two weeks and my three year old already knows most of the words. 

I also sing Sunday school type songs with my girls randomly through the day. I make sure to sing ones with a message that's easy to understand. Now my three year old can be heard singing a variety of different songs that are all pointing to God. My one year old will do the hand motions when she's thinking of a specific song.


When we do memory verses I try to think up hand motions that are easy to follow along with (and for me to remember lol). We usually keep repeating the ones we've learned in the past so we don't forget them. Also I had my oldest memorize verses like Ephesians 6:1 "Children, obey your parents in the Lord: for this is right" Then when she needs to be corrected for disobeying I make her recite the verse. I want to make sure that everything I do is pointing back to God, especially correction. When I praise my girls I want to use scripture as well but I'm still trying to figure out good verses to use. Obviously each situation would need different verses. 


These are the ways we choose to plant the seeds of God's word into our children's hearts from an early age. I won't know how this pays off until my children are grown. But I have seen that when I am consistent with them and really work on feeding them the Word of God then they have better attitudes and are more consistent with behaving.


But even with the best laid plans things can fall apart. That is why I pray for my children, our day, and that the Lord would show me what He wants me to teach them. When I pray for my girls I pray that the Lord would give them hearts that are like the "good ground" {Luke 8:15}. I know I can not do it on my own. I'm not patient, or gentle, or even very good at being consistent. But with help from my Heavenly Father I can do all things!


What ways do you plant the seeds of God's word into your children's lives?

I'm linking up at The Better Mom

TBOC: GIVEAWAY!!!!

It's giveaway time! I am giving away A Love That Multiplies by Michelle and Jim Bob Duggar. This book is one that has been a huge blessing to me and my family. I'm just hoping that it can also be a blessing to you. I'm actually starting to read it for a second time!

TBOC: Submission

Boy this one is a biggie and no one ever likes to talk about it... But The Lord has laid it on my heart so I'm going to go ahead and put myself out there. This is so important for more reasons than most of us usually think about.

According to scripture there is a chain of command.

But I would have you know, that the head of every man is Christ; and the head of the woman is the man; and the head of Christ is God. -1 Corinthins 11:3

As you see it goes God, man, woman. Not that man is superior to woman, but that man covers the woman. It's been said that this is because Eve told Adam to eat the apple, and women needed to be "put in their place" so to speak.

Unto the woman he said, I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception; in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children; and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee. -Gen 3:16

 That verse is after God confronts Adam and Eve about eating the fruit. The second to last part is so important; that our desires shall be to our husbands. So it's not about just him being our leader but also about us wanting him to be. Wanting him to help keep us in a relationship where we are obeying the Lord. I think for women submitting to men can be so against our nature. But God knows what's best and having us in a role of submission allows us to have a better relationship with HIM. I believe that is why scripture says:

Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as unto the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church: and he is the saviour of the body. Therefore as the church is subject unto Christ, so let the wives be to their own husbands in every thing. -Ephesians 5:22-24

Marriage is supposed to be an earthly example of Christ and the church. So husband submit to God, and wife submit to your husband "as unto the Lord".  Do with that what you will. You can love it, or hate it, but I'm not one to argue with the Word of God.

I know there are always questions like "what about if your husband is not a believer", or "what if my husband isn't submitting to God"? To that I say if your husband isn't telling you to do anything that goes against God, then you still have to submit. The only time we can step out of "line" is to prevent sin. But even with that we should be in prayer about it. We should be asking God to take care of it so we don't have to. Because the important thing in all of this is obeying God.

How submission looks in every family will be very different. There is no cookie cutter way to submit, and the best thing for every woman to do is sit down and have a talk with your husband. Because no one else can tell you what's important to him.

Here is the part that you might not have thought about. I once heard a sermon on how God sometimes uses the relationship that we have with our children (or our parents) to teach us lessons about our relationship with Him. That really stuck out to me in so many ways, especially when I think back on my relationship with my parents.

Now that I'm a parent I spend a lot of time thinking about my relationship with my children. I've been thinking about the families that I've seen who have children who are well behaved and joyful and USUALLY the parents of these children are totally submitted to the Lord. The wives are joyfully submitted to God in their role as wife and mother, and the husbands are totally submitted to God in their role as husband and father. Then it hit me. That's it!

When we are submitted to God, doing His will, and seeking His heart that's when were are able to really "train up our children in the way they should go!" Unless our hearts are turned to God and seeking His will in our lives we can't teach our children anything.How can we expect our children to listen to us when we aren't listening to our Heavenly Father? We have to demonstrate joyful obedience and submission for our children. As moms that means we need to be joyfully submitting to our husbands and dads need to be joyfully submitting to God.

Some practical ways we can demonstrate this are:

• Talking with your children about decisions you are praying about
• Praying with your children about things you feel led to do. 
• Praising God with your children, especially when you have answered prayers. 
• Giving your children examples of how God has led you to do things that, and you did them.  

*Disclaimer: if you are being abused seek counsel from someone who is submitted to God. A pastor, pastor's wife, or just a godly women that you know. I am in no way advocating staying in or defending an abusive situation.*


I'm linking up at: Time-Warp Wife, Women Living Well, and A Wise Woman Builds Her Home

Happy Resurrection Sunday!

¹Now upon the first day of the week, very early in the morning, they came unto the sepulchre, bringing the spices which they had prepared, and certain others with them.
 ²And they found the stone rolled away from the sepulchre.
 ³And they entered in, and found not the body of the Lord Jesus.
 ⁴And it came to pass, as they were much perplexed thereabout, behold, two men stood by them in shining garments:
 ⁵And as they were afraid, and bowed down their faces to the earth, they said unto them, Why seek ye the living among the dead?
 ⁶He is not here, but is risen - Luke 24:1-6a