Love and Enabling

It has become my goal to stop for one minute a day, to try to find quiet. To think on grace or love or compassion. To meditate on God, loving us, holding us. To imagine a picture of God enveloping me in a hug, or me resting on a cloud of his love and protection. I do this for one literal minute. It's not much. Some days I can manage more, maybe even ten. Some days I can't do it in quiet, it's to the background noise of kid music, or while I'm in the shower, or while I'm doing dishes. I sometimes pray the Jesus prayer: Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me, a sinner. But I usually come back to one sentence that I think on, over and over: My worth stems from the creator.

Like most things, my battles with control and insecurity usually boil down to me--trying to gather my worth from other people, from myself, from accomplishments, productivity, efficiency. And then failing, of course. This is a familiar battle. One of trust. Me not trusting God to be faithful and kind. My age-old, life-long struggle.

But taking even this one minute a day has been helpful. Restorative.

A new-found favorite writer, Micha Boyett, wrote about how so often we miss God's soft voice because we are too afraid to listen, afraid we'll hear his harsh conviction instead. You can read her wise words here.

I have those fears, too.

In college, when going through this same battle, the same fear of tragedy, of losing control, fear of trusting that God's best would be too painful to bear, I spoke my worries to my friend. And I always remember her response. She said, “God is not bound to teach you by calamity. He can teach you in many ways.” (That was you, Karli Cash.) :)

Having previously learned dependence on God by way of hardship, it was difficult to accept that God might teach me about himself with love and kindness, peace and stability, with faithfulness that endures.

I'm not saying that God doesn't give us trials, he does, to be sure. But there is also gentleness in the Father that sometimes I forget about.

I am noticing differences in myself. My patience is thicker, my empathy and compassion for the boys is closer at hand. Our day-to-day living is exciting again, instead of a burden. I'm feeling pleasure at listening to their stories, their working out of their emotions, their wonder at how things work, the explorations. I feel a lot more peace. Not because I think there won't be hardship, but because I know God goes with me. And he is a loving Father.

One of the most memorable and most impacting lessons I ever had was when my professor taught on the first time in the Bible that God describes himself, in Exodus. Obviously God revealed himself in many ways before that time, but the first time in scripture that he chooses to talk about himself to Moses, he says, “The Lord is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger, and rich in love.” Of course, he goes on to say that he is just and powerful. Love isn't the only attribute. But it was very significant to me that those were the first words God said about himself, that his forgiveness is paramount. That he does not leave us as orphans, and that he remembers that we are dust. He has compassion for me.

Another thing that is transpiring is my feelings about the future. I am very excited for Seth to go back to school, and for that season of living, even though it won't be without its difficulties. And for the first time, I feel the openness to have another baby, but without any urgency behind it. I don't feel like it's a decision being made out of fear or desperation or... absence. In fact, I don't feel like I'm making a decision at all. I'm just feeling something. Peace.