Fantasy, Meet Reality

It began when the nurse placed my oldest twin in my arms soon after his birth. In the fantasy I had created in my head (partly based on a circa 1988 made for t.v. movie, and partly on the testimonials of many moms before me) a maternal gush would erupt from my heart toward this child. Reality is, the only things I felt in that moment were relief, fatigue, and thirst (what is up with the ice-chips?) I thought I had maternal gush with my third son, but it was only the Percoset which dropped me into a post-partum stupor the first week I was home. Perhaps the most shocking collision between fantasy and reality was breastfeeding. The fantasy: me and the boys in white, somehow in soft focus; them peacefully partaking of the milk of life, me with a tired smile on my face looking lovingly at my babies. Reality: Rock hard Double D's stretched painfully beyond their 34 B capacity; blisters (who'd have thought you could get them there); pain that made me want to punch something everytime they latched on. Before I continue and cause great concern to all the maternal gushers and lactation experts, I want you to know that even though it wasn't in the hospital, very soon after they were born, I fell madly in love with each of my babies. There are emotions reserved for them that simply can't be described with words. And I even cherish fond memories of milky smiles and warm baby bodies pressed up to mine while I nursed them. But the new-born phase seems to most tangibly illustrate something that characterizes much of my experience of motherhood: fantasy and reality are two very different things. Before I had children I fantasized being some combination of Elisabeth Elliot, June Cleaver, and pre-jail time Martha Stewart (now what in my average-at-best history compelled me to even consider such an image for myself I do not know, but I suppose we'll save that for another post). Reality is I constantly fall short of my own expectations of who I should be. Reality is that I am angrier than I want to be. Reality is I am more selfish than I want to be. Reality is I am more inconsistent than I want to be. Reality is I pray less than I should. Reality is I love comfort more than I should. It seems a classic case of Romans 7:15 "For what I will to do, that I do not practice, but what I hate, that I do." Motherhood keeps me exposed for who I really am, a sinner in need of a Savior. It is the mercy of God that I am seeing the real me. I don't like it in the moment, but seeing my sin has caused me to understand better, appreciate more, and grow in deeper affection for another reality. It is the reality of the gospel. Reality is "It is by grace you have been saved through faith, and this not from yourselves. It is the gift of God, not of works, that no man should boast."(Eph. 2:8,9). Reality is "If we confess our sins He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness." (1John 1:9). Reality is "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me." (Phil 4:13) Reality is "My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness." (2 Cor 12:9). Reality is that "when we are faithless, He is faithful". All of this is reality for me because "God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together in Christ...that in the ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness toward us in Christ Jesus." (Eph 2:4,5,7). How would I understand these verses if I were able to actually be for ten minutes, the fantasy me? When I peel back the layers of the "fantasy" mother I long to be, what I find at the center is a golden me. I want to be perfect, and beautiful, and dare I say, worshiped. But because of God's patience, and mercy, He shows me who I am. But He also shows me His Son. He shows me the reality of the gospel at work in my life. He shows me grace flowing from the cross in forgiving me, and changing me. So the next time I see "reality" and she doesn't look like June Cleaver, rather than spiral down into condemnation, frustration, hopelessness, or discontentment, I pray God will help me to remember the more powerful reality: there is only One who is worthy of all glory, honor and praise, and He has made a way for me to be forgiven, set free, and live for His glory. Now that reality is beyond any of my wildest dreams!

The Smell of Grace

I was listening to a teaching while making dinner the other day when one comment from the pastor caught my attention. He said he used to take his old Bible from highschool (he's now in his fifties) down off of the bookshelf and just smell it to remind himself of grace. The Holy Spirit quickened to my mind my own Bible from highschool. It is a small, burgundy New American Standard Bible given to me by my parents for Easter my senior year of highschool. My eyes filled with tears at the thought of this Bible because, indeed it represents such grace to me. The next day, one of my sons wanted to take the burgundy Bible to Sunday school. I told him no, because it was a special Bible and I didn't want to risk it getting lost at church. He asked me why it was special so I explained to him that when I was a teenager, the Bible seemed boring to me. I didn't understand it very well, and I had a hard time reading it everyday. But one year on New Year's Eve, I was getting ready to make yet another doomed commitment to read the Bible each day, when I decided to just pray ,"God, please help me to want to read your Word." I woke up the next morning and began reading. To make a long story short, I explained to my son that God, being so kind and gracious, had answered my prayer. It wasn't everyday at first, but eventually, as God spoke to me through scripture, and I saw my life changing, I was compelled to read daily. I love the smell of grace on that Bible. It was in that book that I fell in love with the Word of God. It was there that I had experienced for the first time divine illumination. I learned in that Bible how true communion with God really happens. I learned that those words were life to me. Psalm 19:7-10 The law of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul; the testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise the simple; the statutes of the Lord are right, rejoicing the heart; the commandment of the Lord is pure, enlightening the eyes; the fear of the Lord is clean, enduring forever; the judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether. More to be desired are they than gold, yea than much fine gold; sweeter also than the honeycomb. I use a different Bible these days, but the same grace is there in its pages. If anyone actually reads this post, I'd love to hear about when and how you fell in love with God's Word.

Ordinary Heroes: Redefining Greatness

It is an impressive group...including the likes of Elizabeth Elliot, Amy Carmichael, Elisabeth Scott Stam, and Gladys Aylward. These were the heroes of my single years. I dreamed of being like these ladies. I imagined myself in various scenarios like jungle huts, orphan asylums, ministry to other women, and maybe even writing a book to chronicle my adventures. These women made a difference in the world, an obvious difference. Echoes of their lives lived in consecration to God still ring in the hearts of many. Something happened, however, after I was married with children. My heroes changed. I don't know when exactly, but at some point I began to look around me at women in my church. Women whom I would have respected, but not thought of as "heroic". But now, now that I am doing what I am doing, and realizing how hard it is to do well, I view them differently. At the top of my list is my mother. Now I know how she laid down her life for our family each and every day for many years. My new heroes are my friend Kathleen who with three children three years old and younger, patiently cared for them day and night for years while her husband finished an advanced degree. She did it with little complaint. She did it well. Then there is my other friend Kathy who with as much savvy as any CEO creatively runs her house on a limited budget to release her husband to pursue full-time ministry even though it meant a cut in pay. There are other friends who live with chronic aches and pains, yet still do housework and care for their toddler in spite of the pain. The newest additions to my list of heroes are the homeschool moms. One of them homeschools children in high school, junior high, and elementary school, with a toddler under foot as well. Another has homeschooled long enough to graduate two children. The list of heroes is ever growing. What I find heroic about these women is that their lives are composed of hundreds of choices to either obey God and glorify Him, in the mundane, or live life for themselves. These are simple choices in most cases, but hard choices, redundant choices, and unappreciated choices. They don't make one huge grand decision that lands them in a hut in Africa, they choose to get up and make breakfast. They choose to do laundry. They choose to lovingly correct a child. They choose to give baths before bedtime, tell a story, sing a song. They choose to teach a disrespectful 15 year old who would rather go to school. They live their lives primarily for others. This is not to say that the heroes of my single years have become any less heroic. But it is to say that I now understand that even their lives that seemed so deliciously radical were composed of the mundane choices of life as well. They were able to do big things well because they faithfully did the little things well. Perhaps this is not a redefining of heroes as much as it is the redefining of heroic. To all of you ordinary heroes out there (the 3 who actually read this blog), I want you to know I think you are extraordinary! Oh how the grace of God is exquisitely displayed in your lives. I also want to remind you that even though what you do is done in complete anonymity, there is One who sees it all. How pleased He must be.

sleep deprivation preceeds sweet desperation

I have chronic insomnia. The last two nights it has been worse than usual because of a sick child. He wakes up, wakes me up. He falls back to sleep. I stay awake. In these wee hours of morning I am prone to irrational anxiety over everything from, "do my kids brush their teeth enough?" to guilt over not teaching my daughter letter recognition. The last two nights of insomnia included legitimate concern for my son, but with the added irrational fear that 2 am brings. I would love to say that I spent the time in prayer. My husband's great granny used to pray when she had insomnia. He remembers her saying, "God provided extra opportunity to pray last night." That was it. No complaining. No droning on about how tired she was. Well...I remembered great granny's example in the middle of the night. I tried to pray. It lasted 30 seconds. I tried again. When morning finally came I was too tired to have my regular prayer time or Bible reading. All of this leads to the second part of my little story: sweet desperation. I homeschool my twin second graders and first grader (he's the sick one). I also have a three year old daughter. When I came down to greet them this morning, I just thought, "I can't do this today." I was desperate for God's grace to help me. I barely prayed for it, but God answered. It wasn't pretty at all times. I had to ask forgiveness numerous times throughout the school-day. But we did every subject, and I did most of the housework planned for the morning. I know to most people this might not seem like a huge demonstration of grace. But if you knew my tendencies toward complaining, laziness, and self-pity you would say with me, "Wow God! You really showed Your power today!" The sweetest grace of all was the brief time I spent with Him after school while the kids were in the basement playing. In His goodness He provided the right reading material, a book by John Piper called, Seeing and Savoring Jesus Christ. I have read it before, but what a sweet reminder: "We were made to know and treasure the glory of God above all things; and when we trade that treasure for images, everything is disordered." Because I am weaker than usual today, in my brain, in my body, even emotionally, I believe my heart was softer and ready to receive this word from God. Sleep deprivation is humbling. What a reminder of the difference between me and God. I go short a few hours of sleep and I am foggy, irritable, and tired (of course). But God does not sleep or slumber. He has no need of rest. He is the glorious One. It is not sleep that will make all seem well with my world, it's treasuring His glory.