Now that my babies are tucked into their beds for naptime, the sounds of a quiet afternoon and the smells of a steaming hot chocolate swirl deliciously together into some sort of Motherhood Home Spa treatment (the kind you can wear a ponytail AND a lunch-stained shirt to).
There remains, out of its swirly vapors, the ahhhhh feeling of a life-altering lesson those very same babies have taught me since they first arrived on the scene:
LOVE.
At first the love was like eggnog at Christmastime --- i couldn't get enough, and i felt almost desperate to soak up every possible moment of their little lives before they morphed into teenagers.
Yet ... I was almost afraid to love them too much -- to place in their pudgy, gripping hands too much of my love, of my very soul. A bad case of the "what-if's" had set up camp my soul and threatened to push out the love already camped there.
What if something happens to them? What will happen to them in the future? What if something happens to me and i'm not there to help them grow up? What if i love them more than i love God or more than serving Him?
I did spend a great deal of time in the first year of both child's lives simply loving and delighting in them. Everything about their sweet little bodies and their emerging personalities, developments, milestones. I also began to see my hormones aligning into a more normal arrangement and sleep patterns drifting back to their usual, wonderful, unbroken schedule.
And God gently soothed and massaged, worked on and finally revealed the final product better than any Spa treatment ever could.
Love is not about me. Or how I feel. Or what I want.
Love is about the other person. And entrusting them and the whole Life-Love Game to God. He IS love, after all.
So. Even in the very most recent of days, God and the children He's entrusted to me have taught me several things about LOVE.
There is no room in love for fear. Well-formed love banishes fear. Since fear is crippling, a fearful life—fear of death, fear of judgment—is one not yet fully formed in love. I John 4:18
- Without holding too tightly.
Love ... Doesn't force itself on others, I Corinthians 13:5
My second child has helped me to understand this one and apply it! He's a Cling-On. He clings to me. Most times, if I leave the room - even when he's absorbed in something - his radar picks up my movement and follows me, usually with huge tears in his eyes. He has a mindset, which is under remodel, that if he and i are downstairs together and i am coming up regardless of the laundry piled in my arms, i should carry him. We had a day last week of working through that, and finally i had to tell him,
"Momma can't always help you. You can do this. You have to do some things on your own. But Jesus will help you." From a mother's heart that does take delight in being able to help her children, that was a step for me to love freely and point him in the direction of the love & care of Jesus, which is even better than mine. Speaking of....
I do love the children God has placed in our home very much. But as I've been able to slowly release them a little more and curl just a finger or two around their sticky ones, more of my fingers are now free to wrap around God's hand, too. We are all holding hands in this Life-Love Game, but it's as a cord of three strands. One day they will release even that final finger of mine and grasp onto His totally.
I then took a deep breath and moved my earthly maternal love to the side so as not to block the view of her heart's vision, and told her that Jesus loves her very very very much too --- even more than Momma & Daddy love her.
Too Much
I love these children God has placed in our home. But i love them too much to hold them too tightly to myself and, thereby, too far from the love of God, from learning to trust and know HIM.
You Win
So because I love them, I am asking You, God, to help me to daily point them to You and to Your love for them. You are the winner in this Life-Love Game, and i want them to play on Your side always.
Thank You for sharing them with me for a time. I am having lots of fun. But I love You more and trust You because You already know them better than I ever could.
4 comments:
Hannah phycially moved her miracle son, Samuel, to the temple to live to be raised in the presence of the Lord. Thankfully, we can raise our children in the presence of the Lord without having to move them out of our home!
Thank you for being such a beautiful, godly woman/wife/mother! You are a miracle baby given to Dad and me. I am so thankful God gave you to me to raise for Him. I am blessed beyond words!
Enjoy your blessings as you continue to hold them lightly, not tightly. They grow up toooo quickly.
Letting go is a learned art, and God is our teacher! When the time comes, send them off to fulfill God's plan & purposes for them . . . kingdom purposes!
Yes, Hannah's story popped into my head the other day. What a story she is of love and faith! I can't imagine what it'd be like to give up a child so soon, especially after trying so hard to have one! But the joy of that child being called to serve in the temple would be so wonderful1
Ah yes, letting go IS a learned art, one i am already trying my strokes at. Even in little ways, i encourage them to do things here and there without me. And i take joy in their joy of doing fun things and even some "firsts" without me. I'm just so happy that they are happy in those things, and i revel in the stories that follow about their fun.
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