Because When It Rains, It Pours. Especially for Parents.

The joys of Monday morning actually began during the preceding weekend, when our entire family got sick with the very typical runny nose/cough/fever/chills kind of cold that comes with this time of year. We spent most of the weekend very….how can I say it….very together, surviving the crabbiness of kids who don’t feel well and boogers and parents who were chronically exhausted long before getting sick.

By the time Monday rolled around, I was actually thrilled to think of getting back to regular, functional life. I woke up to the pitter-patter of little feet and my husband saying, Amy, wake up, we have an issue, and I have to leave for work right now.How convenient. So I cleaned up the mess of a severely exploded diaper, what we like to call an “up-the-backer,” if that brings any clarifying imagery to the conversation.

The morning continued in usual form, with little boy wrestling matches and scuffles, me hollering out rules like a referee between gulps of cheap coffee. I made breakfast and then left the boys playing together while I cleaned up the kitchen and washed the dishes. The kitchen is mommy’s safe space.

Little Theo came scurrying into the kitchen and said Mama – Look!!! (This never ends up well).

There was Remi, toddling towards me, smiling, and chewing on….? The night light? The light bulb!

Still smiling, blood began to pour out of his mouth while his teeth crunched happily on the glass. It dribbled down his chin, splattering on his shirt, pooling at his feet, staining his little white socks. Something like the way men look when they get punched in the face during a boxing match and their teeth go flying. When I reached for him he laughed, and darted away, leaving a red trail of blood.

The good news is that when all was said and done, he is just fine. The bleeding stopped and no, thank God, he did not swallow any glass, at least not enough to hurt him. It could have been much worse.

The day carried on, full of more shenanigans which can only come from having boys. Little Theo broke several Christmas tree ornaments. Both boys senselessly ripped pages out of books. Remi tried to regain my good favor by tossing toys into the toilet. It didn’t work. With my last bit of strength, I resigned to letting them watch a cartoon. Until Remi pounded on the tv screen and pulled the cords out of the wall.

I could see that the only possible solution for them and for me was to send them to their rooms for early naps. Little Theo immediately flew into a full-fledged tantrum. I had to let him scream it out with stomping feet and thrown toys. Eventually, they tired themselves out. Finally, all was quiet.

The evening was comparable. Little Theo refused to paint, color, play, or do anything other than whine and be fickle. Remi ran around pulling cords out of the walls and otherwise causing trouble. He also really enjoys tipping over all of the chairs around the dining table. I have yet to make sense of this.

Neither of them wanted to eat dinner. Theo whined and Remi threw his turkey on the floor while squawking like a stuck pig. Remi went to bed early, but was woken up by Theo’s second grand bedtime tantrum of the day. They both laid in the dark whining and screaming themselves to sleep. Lovely.

My husband and I both agreed that we are probably terrible parents with the most annoying kids ever. He headed out to the garage to his shop to relax, and I buried my head in a book. Seriously though, I swear that they are not brats, and they do not go undisciplined. They are really good kids, but they are kids.

This is a perfect ad for teenage girls who think their lives will be rosy if they get knocked up, like it’s always cute and monumentally wonderful. The truth about parenting in my experience so far, is that you spend the majority of the time feeling like a failure and wondering if everyone else is as terrible at parenting as you are. And other than that you are pretty much changing diapers or cleaning the mold out of the sippy cup you found under the couch. It’s not as cute as the Pampers commercials, folks.

And isn’t that just real life? There are the mountain top moments, and don’t get me wrong, those moments are precious, sacred, holy and incredible moments. The first time you hold your little one, the newborn smiles and gurgles, the first steps, the way they dance, the hugs, the way they need mommy, the way they look in just their diapers, the first words, the way that they learn and grown and become little people of their own. These things are incredible and I wouldn’t change them for anything.

But the moments are just moments. The rest is just life, day to day life. And some days in the day-to-day swing, we don’t get very far up the mountain. Probably nowhere near the top. These are the days when the most incredible thing to me is a bowl of hot leftover spaghetti with a little extra parmesan cheese. Somewhere in the foothills of the mountain, at best.

I would like to recline in a comfy chair in front of a warm fire with a cup of delightful tea in some extraordinary world and say that at the end of the day, the good outweighs the bad. The smiles outweigh the fall-on-the-floor fits. The giggles outweigh the food thrown on the floor. The hugs outweigh the defiance. But in reality, sometimes they don’t. In reality, I plop down on our couch with the smell of diapers in my nose, wipe the boogers and drool off of my shirt, and am so glad the house is finally quiet.

As a parent I think it is easy to heap guilt upon yourself for not enjoying every single little moment with your precious babies. There is some strange expectation that we put on ourselves that says we should cherish every single second. But we don’t, we can’t, it is not possible nor realistic. The purpose of parenthood is not to self-servingly float on a happy cloud of cuteness and picture-perfect need fulfillment of our little people. So maybe we can let that go and give ourselves a break.

Parenting is humbling, in that I have yet to find anything which points more clearly to the fact that I have serious human limitations. Limited patience, limited love, limited ability to give, limited attention span, limited temper, limited self-control, limited gentleness. The list goes on. And on.

This is good, in that it drives me back to God. My prayer lately has been asking God to sanctify my motherhood. I simply do not have enough love for these little people which God has gifted to me, so I ask that He helps me love them with His love. My own is not enough, it runs out, plain and simple.

Oh God, fill all of us parents with all the things we lack, and bless our babies! In Jesus’ name, amen.  

PS - I am too tired to add pictures this time, or to deal with the goofy formatting of this post. 

Gratefulness: Another Millstone?

Definition: Millstone:

1. The circular stones used for grinding grain

2. A heavy and inescapable responsibility or burden.

God Himself took on the form of flesh in Jesus Christ. He stepped into human life in this event of the incarnation, God becoming man. In this event God Himself came down to our level, He made Himself one of us in order to reach and redeem us, to seek out what was lost (which was us), to fill the great and unbearable holes in our hearts from sin and lack of love and alienation from God.

By His death the price was paid, by His resurrection we have hope, today and always. Jesus came and continues to come to us again and again, freeing us from the “law of sin and death” (Romans 8:2).  Jesus deals with our hearts, so we don’t have to be slaves to sin and death and anymore. There is life more abundant, life to the full to have, and it begins the moment we receive that which we lack from Jesus who provides us with healing and wholeness so we can live and love and walk with Christ. We are free!!!!!

What a beautiful God, this God who is revealed in Jesus Christ! On the cross we see our God, who will go to any length to reach and redeem us, His children, His lost and wandering and wounded sheep. We see our God, who empties Himself, pouring out His love to us. We have hope today and always and forever.

Perhaps in light of this, we should be living each day as if there were no more war nor struggle nor death nor sickness nor crime nor darkness of any sort. We know all things are being made right, that all tears will be wiped away, all sorrow will be turned into laughter. We should dance, we should sing, we should live with hearts wide open, so much so that our joy pours out onto those around us.

We should.

Are you one who hears the pressure of THANKSGIVING with dread?

Sometimes, does it feel like we can take the incredible blessing of being a child of God, and turn it on its head, so it becomes a new millstone, reminding us yet again how we aren’t good enough?

Jesus says – child I have made you mine! Stop fighting the battle, I’ve already won it! Just rest.

Then around us we hear – aren’t you so GRATEFUL? A grateful heart is the best medicine. God loves a grateful heart full of grateful thankful praiseful gratefulness!!

Then competing voices in our head tell us – see, you aren’t even grateful for what you have. If you really appreciated the fact that Jesus died for you, you would act more grateful. You would bend over backwards to make everyone happy. You would make sure the turkey is perfect this year. You would travel halfway across the state to four different houses just to make sure all your family members got to see you. You wouldn’t be depressed nor would you be grieving. You wouldn’t be distracted and tired and sad, you wouldn’t struggle, you would do so much better at life if you were more grateful.

And the thing is – this is all true. Gratitude is incredibly powerful. It adjusts our perspective, it aligns us with humility before God, it reminds us what it is important. Much praise and thanks is due to God.

But I do something strange to myself when it comes to gratitude, and I know I am not alone. You see, rather than gratitude happening as an outpouring of God’s love for me, I turn it into something to wrestle with. Am I grateful enough? Do people know I’m grateful? Does God know I’m grateful? Do my actions reflect that I’m grateful? Is my balance good enough in this bizarre balancing act?

So now the gift of a grateful heart turns into another LAW, another RULE which I try to follow (and fail). It becomes another worthless WORK, another way in which I try to be good enough only to find out (again and again) that I’m NOT good enough. Another thing which points to my careless sinfulness and pride and ego. Another one of those shoulds which fill me full of guilt and shame. Another Millstone.

And that’s not all bad, after all, it drives me right back to my need for Jesus. There is only one solution to this kind of nonsense, and it’s Jesus.

You know where gratitude comes from? It comes from simply basking in the truth that I am a child of God. It is hard to be critical or act out on my dysfunctional personality if my mind is occupied with the truth that GOD LOVES ME. Gratitude starts there. Everything starts there. Seek ye first the kingdom.

Perhaps instead of seeking out my gratitude in turkey and stuffing and warm fuzzy socks and naps in front of the Lions Game, I should start with Jesus Christ and His incredible love for me. Because it is only, ONLY when I start there that I can even have eyes for the blessings around me, the blessings which are so, so abundant. Seeking to follow a standard, even a good one like gratitude, without first going to Christ who deals with the issue of my heart, is simply empty religion. I am a Pharisee sometimes.

So to you, dear child of God: 

To you who are exhausted. To you who are grieving the loss of your son. To you who are grieving the loss of a friend. To you who has a sick family member. To you who went through a painful divorce this year. To you who always gets depressed around the holidays, no matter how hard you try to just be normal and happy. To you who would rather hide than make the rounds to see the family. To you who is missing a soldier overseas. To you whose loved one is in prison or in a mental institution. To you who can’t afford to give your children a thanksgiving meal. To you who misses your daughter and grandkids because they live several states away. To you who still misses your parents even though they went to be with Jesus over a decade ago. To you whose loved one is drinking or smoking crack today. To you who has been hurt and wounded in unimaginable ways. To you who struggles with mental health. To you who feels trapped like a rat in a cage. To you who are exhausted…

Give yourself a break. Life is hard, and this world is broken. There is no better proof of this than Jesus’ death. It hurts to be here sometimes; even as He is with us, giving us new mercies always, it still hurts.

 Jesus knows all about our ungrateful hearts, he took them into account when He died for us, and He died for us anyway. Do not add another millstone around your neck by bludgeoning yourself with guilt for not feeling grateful enough! This is not what Jesus wants, he came so we could stop doing that already. Instead, bask in the fact that He is enough. Spend time with Him, fill your mind with His word and His goodness. Seek Him first. Receive from Him the grateful heart which you cannot grant yourself.

O Soul are you weary and troubled? 

No light in the darkness you see…

There’s light for a look at the savior…

And life more abundant and free!

Turn your eyes upon Jesus, 

look full in His wonderful face…

And the things of earth will grow strangely dim, in the light of His glory and grace. (Sing to the Lord 327)

Angels and Holes

There is a little girl, and she is the most beautiful little girl you have ever seen, mainly because she is more like an angel or cherubim than like a little girl. She is exactly the little girl that frolics in a field of perfect flowers in your imagination, the precise way we tend to think the little ones in heaven must look, the way we know everything will look so perfect in that perfect place. 

Her hair is blond, so blond it is almost white, with long, roving sausage curls which fall down her shoulders and arms. Small white flowers are woven through the perfect curls. Her skin shimmers and her cheeks have a perfect pinkish color to them.

Her eyes are incredible, a sea of green and blue waters which never end. She is a child full of childlikeness, but also full of the super-natural wisdom of eternity.

She is sitting on a fluffy white cloud, you see, and the light of God is shining around her and through her. Her slender hands with her perfect tiny finger nails are folded on her lap, and she sits with one leg crossed beneath her, and the other dangling freely off the edge of the fluffy cloud.

She looks down from her soft cloud, and she sighs, a sigh so sweet it smells like peppermint candy.

Below her, she sees us.

She looks down and she sees us, running about.

She looks down and she sees us frantic and scattered around a bunch of enormous, endless black holes.

The holes really are endless, that is no exaggeration on her part nor on mine. They are endless holes.

The holes are everywhere, and in observing from above, she can’t help but wonder at how futile our efforts are when it comes to filling and patching the holes.

She sees some of us, who seem to pretend the holes aren’t even there. We evade them with all the calculated cleverness of a serpent. We stay busy, bustling, moving, and keep our distance from the edge. We are typically the ones who deny the reality of the holes until we fall into one and it hurts.

She sees others who obsess about the holes. All they can think about are the holes. They are chasing after  anyone who can tell them anything about the holes, anyone who will obsess about the holes along with them.  They see how obvious and ugly the holes are, and this fact seems to consume their life. They never get past the holes, they just stare at them and continue to be appalled.

She sees many who seem to have reached a point of total reckless abandon, and they are throwing things into the holes, trying to fill them in vain. They throw strange things into the holes, things which clearly won’t ever fill the holes, but for some reason the people keep trying it over and over again. But the holes just get bigger and uglier for all their efforts.

After some time, she spots an obscure land without holes. When she looks closer she sees that the holes are still there, but somehow the people in this land have found a way to appease the holes. The holes are full of something – what is it? It looks like a soft fog, like clouds with a light breeze. It is the only thing which can fill the holes, why don’t all the other people find out what it is so they can fill their holes?

Upon further quiet observance she realizes, with a gasp, that the holes are all shaped like her Father! These people are looking for her Father but they don’t even seem to know what they are looking for!

 Now some of the people from the land without holes are talking to the people who still live with the holes. The hole-people are laughing at them. They turn back and keep ignoring the holes, or obsessing about the holes, or trying to fill the holes in ways that only make the holes worse.

But every once in awhile, one of the hole-people listens to the people from the land without holes. They follow them. They are exhausted. They take rest in the land of no holes and they are grateful.

The little angel girl smiles, and her teeth are so white it hurts your eyes, it’s so beautiful. She recognizes that the people in the land without holes must know her Father, and this brings her great joy. He is the great filler of holes, He is the one who stops the torture of the endless black holes. She is so pleased to see more of the hole-people coming to know her Father that she flutters off of her cloud, and flies off through the cloud-mist to sit in His lap and tell Him she loves Him and that He is wonderful…..

In his book The Pursuit of God, A.W. Tozer writes, “Every age has its own characteristics. Right now we are in an age of religious complexity. The simplicity which is in Christ is rarely found among us. It its stead are programs, methods, organizations, and a world of nervous activities which will occupy our time and attention but can never satisfy the longing of our heart.”

Tozer goes on to say that “When religion has had its last word, there is little that we need other than God Himself. The evil habit of seeking God-and effectively prevents us from finding God in full revelation. In the and lies our great woe. If we omit the and we shall soon find God, and in Him we shall find that for which we have all our lives been secretly longing.”

Do you know that you have a God-sized hole?

What is it that you try to pour into your God-sized hole to fill it?

Do you know that only God can fill the God-sized hole?

Do you know that the hole will continue to suck the life and joy and peace and rest out of you until God and God alone fills it for you?

Do you seek God, or do you seek God- and? What are your “ands” ?

Jesus and…successful ministry, all As in school, friends with transformed hearts who love Christ but give me all the credit, a husband who is always happy and at my service, kids who aren’t naught or stinky. Jesus and freedom from all the defects in my character, Jesus and no struggle whatsoever.

What do you mean I’m greedy?  Jesus is not like Santa Claus?

Strip me of everything, leave me with Jesus? 

We are busy, and we are complex. I often find myself running around like I am really someone important, like maybe all my running will fill my God-hole, or maybe I myself will even fill someone else’s God-hole. Today I remember that no amount of my frantic activity can take Jesus’ place in my God hole.

Jesus Even If...On fear of cancer and such.

Putting Yourself in Gethsemane: Luke 22:39-46

I stumble into the garden of Gethsemane with the rest of the disciples, following Jesus to a quiet place. Here the air is cold and wet; I inhale the deep, earthy smell and try to rub away the goosebumps covering my arms. He tells us to pray so that we will not fall into temptation. We are all weak and beyond exhausted, unable to even think clearly.

I watch him take several steps away from us. He is only a couple of yards away and he hits his knees and begins to pray. In the dark I can see the outline of his body, and I hear him whisper…not my will, but yours be done. An angel appears as a soft glow, and appears to be wiping his tears.

His voice gets louder as he prays to the father, and in the light of the moon sweat pours down his face, sweat which now looks like blood; and if it isn’t, I know that it will be soon. I am gripped by fear and anguish to see my Lord like this, and I lean my back against a large tree, looking up at the sky, closing my eyes…Father have mercy…

I am startled awake when Jesus sharply asks why we are sleeping, and tells us to pray so that we do not fall into temptation. I don’t entirely know what he means, but I do know for certain that evil is near. I rub my eyes, shake off my exhaustion, and begin praying to the Father to have mercy on all of us.

This passage is so…human. Today it serves as a reminder that Jesus trusted the Father, he deferred to the Father’s will, obedience even unto death. Am I willing to pray that God be glorified, no matter what the personal cost to me?

Jesus had to make the choice to obey and glorify God, even while his very closest disciples fell asleep only feet away from Him. Will I be obedient even when those closest to me are falling asleep instead of praying? Though it’s too much for others, will I persevere? Oh I am far from Christlike….

This week my husband will go to the doctor to receive the results of his yearly CT Scan to check for signs of cancer. He has been in remission for several years from Hodgkin’s Lymphoma. He used to have to be checked every six months, but has now reached the happy milestone where the check-ups are only yearly. Someday, they will be every two years, every five years…

There have been more stressful years, years where I did not handle the fear well. One year I suffered from the emotional neurosis of pregnancy, and lost sleep in the fear of delivering our first baby to a sick or dead husband. A real fear, but one magnified dramatically by pregnancy.

 In subsequent years I find myself asking what we would do if the cancer came back. It is an underlying fear which mercifully is almost always far away, one which only comes out on rainy days. It rears its ugly head whenever someone close is sick or dies. It floats to the forefront as a reminder whenever I am witness to senseless suffering or sickness or anything that reminds me of our mortality. It is with us, but it is only magnified on rare occasion.

He does not say much about it, but we always exhale together and celebrate the good results. My own self-centered fear makes it hard to imagine what his own fears must be like. He always gives me the good advice, the wise words not to dwell or worry uselessly until we actually know the results, good or bad. He is right, and I have gotten better at taking this wise advice.

These fear times are both good and bad for the taking of the spiritual temperature. My greedy heart is ever-present. I incorrectly consider my husband to be mine. I am checked and reminded that he is God’s before he is mine. And so are my children. I am stripped and learn again that my life is not my own. There is a God and I am not He.

But in the stripping down comes the blessing of having to face reality in all of its realness. 

There is something freeing in the realness. There are those times when you are faced with whether or not your faith is a charade, or if you really believe what you say you believe.

My life is not my own. I continue on a daily basis to defer my wants and cravings to God’s perfect will. Time and time again comes the reminder that I am tiny, needy, scared. Hopeless, helpless, and insane with sin apart from Divine aid.

We pray along the lines of Oh Lord, take my life and may it glorify you! But do we ever stop and realize the potential implications of such a prayer? Do we consider the personal costs that may come, and whether or love is great enough? Do we mean it and trust Him with the results?

As I muck around in the fear a bit, the greatest blessing has come in the form of realizing that I actually trust God. We can say it all day – well, no matter what happens, I trust God. Even if it’s terrible. God has a plan! Even if my husband dies next month. God knows what’s best for us. Even if my kid gets hit by a car. Even if…

It’s harder to mean it than it is to say it. We say lots of things that make little or no actual connection to our heart. But today I can say I trust God, even if my husband has cancer again. I trust God, even with all my even-ifs!

It is not an absence of fear. It is not a super-human, super-spiritual courage. It is not feeling in control. It is not clinging to a false notion that “everything is going to work out.”

Rather, it is knowing that my God can manage my fear, that He has taken into account my worst and most out-of-control emotions, and will care for me. It is simply knowing that God the great redeemer will redeem all things, that when I am too exhausted to care for myself, He will make sure I get fed and wrapped up in a warm blanket. It is trusting that He will be present and be enough if all of my worst fears in life come true, and He won’t take away His enough-ness just because I don’t handle everything gracefully or courageously. I will be me and He will be Him.

It is looking to Jesus, to His perfect obedience and trust which was clearly not absent of struggle.  

Lord, you know my heart, you know my desires and my every thought, nothing is hidden from you. My prayer today is that You be glorified in my life, no matter what the personal cost to me may be, not matter how uncomfortable life gets. We know you are with us come what may. Give me the heart of Jesus who said “not my will, but thy will be done…”