Living before a mirror

With enough kids, two usually does it, every parent has a mirror. The child that acts just like us, reflects our childish faults that we hide behind social filters.

Big one is mine.

I sit in the playroom watching her interact with her friends. She doesn't know which way to turn in her frustration. Three two-year-olds, none of them are playing correctly with her toys. Don't they know that you can't pour tea into the baby doll cups?! And boys aren't supposed to cook! Even her sister, who has been carefully trained for years, isn't following procedure.

I see that day in college when I realized how other people saw me. An ice breaker that I'd played before, so I took charge of the 20 man group and told them exactly how to beat the game. Everyone blew me off, and I didn't understand why. Days later, I introduced myself to a new employee who responded, "Yeah, I heard about you... You're the one who told everybody how to play the game."

I was devastated - I was bossy. I was cold and controlling. I wouldn't let other people use their skill and imagination to solve a problem. My way was the only right. I wouldn't be friends with me.

I'd like to say I've outgrown that side, but DH can quickly refute it. Even if I don't say anything, my face contorts every time I hear a word mispronounced. I might go along with his plan, but my attitude lets him know my plan was better.

Parenting is the same devastating encounter. The heartache my kids approach weighs heavy on my momma heart. The mirror child reminds me of the sins I managed for years without repentance. Of the heart change that still has to occur in both of us.

Big one and I snuggle at nap time. I brush her hair with my fingers and pray. Lord thank you for the way she... how she... Everything that comes to mind brings frustration. Frustration because I know how much sin and hurt those same characteristics have wielded in me.

God, is there nothing in her that doesn't have to be redeemed first?!

Softly I hear my answer, Of course not. I must make all things new. Her entire personality must be made over. Every part of her can glorify me or idolize herself.

The same is true of me, of small one, of all of us. Nothing is born perfect, until it is reborn.

My heart calms. He planned every part of her, every part of me. And when he makes new, he can use every part of her, of me.

Peace in the stacks

We have days: Monday grocery shopping, Wednesday library {most weeks}, Friday day off with Daddy. Weekly rituals give something to anticipate and add structure to lives that lean towards the reactionary, which wheel squeaks the loudest.

This morning, after two years of library trips, I realized I was breathing easily at the library. A little girl was crying and whining, her mom trying every trick to calm her. My girls kept giving her the 'seriously, get a grip' look while I browsed the non-fiction shelves for school material. Small one sat with a modest stack of board books, happily flipping pages, pointing out animals. Big one lost herself in the Illustrated Grimm Brothers. They sat like that for thirty minutes{!}. I finished before they did. A family milestone.

How did this happen?

Our first library trips were nightmarish. Big one emptied the board book bin all over the floor and ran circles around the circulation desk while we checked out. Small one wrapped her body around a book and screamed torture if you tried to remove it - we worked out a system where I held her over the counter and the librarian scanned the clutched book. We barely made it to the library once a month because momma couldn't take it.

Even a few months ago, small one ran the stacks in a peace disturbing game of hide and seek. Big one sat down next to a stranger and told him she wore 'big girl panties' all the time. And I snatched books of the shelf without cracking the covers hoping a few would prove school worthy.

A peaceful library trip is such a small thing, yet my heart sings. The library is one of my happy places - all those books that I don't have to pay for. Made even better by sharing it with the girls. Especially if we can enjoy the literary wonder without ruining it for others.

At least until little man discovers the board book bin...

The library is our greatest home teaching resource, even over free coloring pages. I want more for my family than an education. Recognizing the ABC's is not enough, a subgoal really. What good is reading if you hate opening books? My homeschooling hope is that they become life-long learners, seeking information after degrees are earned, when no one is testing their knowledge or offering career incentives.

A questioning mind complemented by a library brimming with answers are true tools of learning. When the girls bound for and squeal over new books, curiosity sprouting, we're on the right track.

Love in hard phases

I'm adding chicken to the soup pot when big one waltzes into the kitchen. What are you making?

Good dinner. I heard years ago never to tell your menu to a toddler so they couldn't decide beforehand that they didn't like it. My trick failed.

I hate it. I'm not eating it.

That's where we're at right now. A very difficult three year old stage. She hates mac n' cheese; she hates the Veggie Tale movie Sister picked out. She is so hungry, but she can't eat that. She wants to play, but there's nothing to play with in the brand new play room.

I think this stage is usually called adolescence. But I'm learning that adolescence starts as soon as baby can exert his/her will. It just climaxes in the teenage years {we can only hope}.

The family sits at the dinner table. PoppaDaddy and Momma stirring cheese and spinach into chicken chili. Small one eating like a recently rescued refugee. Big one staring at her bowl in disgust, whining that she is hungry.

She calls my bluff and loses. At 6:30 she is in bed for the night with no book, an empty stomach, and the promise of chili for breakfast tomorrow morning.

Meanwhile, small one is chatty and cuddly. In the midst of the best phase of two - past the tantrums when the world is opening up. She and I have the evening all to ourselves, just mommy and baby girl. We giggle and snuggle and sing together and read all her favorite books. And I enjoy her crooked smile and her growing heart.

Some days, I don't know how to balance my favor. How to enjoy the child in the difficult phase as much as the one in the sweet phase. I love them the same, but how do I like them the same? How do I show the obstinate child that I wish I were spending an evening singing and reading to her too?

Moments.

Bursts of my sweet little girl.

That's what I have with big one right now. A glimpse of sun behind clouds, and when the rays shine, I must run and celebrate them.

Watching for those sunbursts requires patience and diligence. And mostly presence. My hardest fought gift for my family. So busy caring and serving that I forget the people I serve. In trying phases, the  hard-liking phases, she needs my attention to her detail. She needs to hear, 'yes.'

Yes, Mommy can put off writing to cuddle you to sleep.

Yes, Mommy will hold you accountable to your poor choices.

Yes, Mommy can put off washing to read one more book.

Yes, Mommy is serious that we don't tear down those we love with hurtful speech.

Yes, Mommy can still see that you are my beautiful girl through all the ugly words you're throwing.

Yes, Mommy loves you and likes you just as much today as I did when you were 2 1/2 years old and discovering the world.

Yes, Mommy will love you and like you just as much tomorrow when your heart hasn't softened yet.

Yes, Mommy is praying for you, today and every day.

The painful looking glass

I watch a Godly woman anointed and prayed over. Her body attacking itself and causing endless pain. Forced to quit her full-time ministry job for surgeries and therapy. Where is God in her pain?

Or my dad. Almost daily migraines for decades. Stare at a computer until he physically can't sit up any more, lay down in a cold, dark closet until the pain subsides enough to earn the next pay check for his family. Where is God in my dad's pain?

Or my friend whose pastor husband unexpectedly died, leaving her a widow in her 30's with two young sons. Where is God in my friend's pain?

And please don't tell me it's sin. That we live in a broken world, and pain is part of it. If pain is brought on by sin, I feel like the child molester should have the debilitating auto immune disease, not my college pastor. Can't God alleviate that suffering for the faithful? Why are we declared righteous in Christ and still suffer? Why heal some and not all? For every blind or lame or bleeding person Jesus healed, hundreds of others must have believed that Jesus could heal and simply never ran into him. For every Godly person who lives a peaceable day in the West, there are ten who are martyred in the East. Is God's relief random chance? Does he leave some to suffer the consequences of a fallen world and deliver others?

Surely God is bigger than that.

Above all, how does suffering because of a sinful world explain Jesus? If pain is only the product of human sin, how could sinless Jesus face pain? How could sinless Jesus die?

Unless pain is bigger than we know. Unless God is bigger than we know.

I can't speak to every example, but I can speak to two:

1 My own pain - Without chronic migraines, I would remain firmly convinced of my own ability to parent my children, love my husband, serve the church, and build our home. I spend hours, sometimes consecutive days in bed, ice on my head, watching all my hard work give way to time. It only takes a couple hours for the dishes to pile up, for the girls to turn feral, and for Tim to wear down. Not because I'm so good at spinning plates. Because my work on Earth is meant to unravel, so I recognize that my toil under the sun is a breath.

God does the real work in our house. I change sheets. He changes hearts. I point out stains. He convicts of sin. I present basically clean, half-mussed children one day a week. He presents his Son with a spotless bride.

I wouldn't see this without the pain. I know I wouldn't because I didn't for years. Could not see the futility of my work for my efficiency. Years of migraines showed God's work.

And I wouldn't take pain free years in exchange for a glimpse of the glory of God.

2 Without the cross, we would remain firmly convinced of our ability to make up for our shortcomings, to earn good.

Christ's pain was the plan before God said, 'light.' Through his pain, we see God's perfect justice, no sin in his holy presence. And we see his never ending mercy, complete forgiveness, unfailing love. Who else can be both just and justifier? How else can we see his character except through our pain and his? In the ultimate miracle, sin and pain and death serve to reveal God's nature. As the girls' Bible storybook says, "everything would be better for once having been so bad."

We wouldn't see our fallenness without Christ's pain. We wouldn't see His grace without Christ's pain. I know we wouldn't because we don't. Because every other religion is based on our earning. Every other religion says that our condition is one we can atone for. Only Christ says, You didn't earn, you can't earn, I gave. He gladly shouldered the pain of the cross for God's glory that would be revealed.


God's glory gives my pain purpose. Redeems the effects of a fallen and broken world. I'm not just a victim of meaningless suffering. He doesn't withhold his power to heal and abandon me to pain. Suffering can be a looking glass into the glory of heaven. As Christ's suffering was.

And as a mother endures labor to hold her newborn, I wouldn't trade the suffering for the glory.