It is often said that her parents' love for her children is the closest picture we will gain God's love for mankind on this side of heaven. A few years ago, when motherhood was even on my radar, my mother told me that when my first child was born, I would feel God's love for me more deeply than ever before.
Last spring, that day came and my son was placed in my arms at the hospital. Yes, this is exactly what I thought I would feel – Love beyond understanding, I'm loved Beyond understanding.
But what I didn't expect was the parallel (although imperfect) of mother's love for mother and God's love for us, and the sweetness of the first newborn had disappeared. The harsh reality of this was that it would continue to evolve. Set it.
In the most difficult and best year of my life, God has used Motherhood to show us not only how much he loves me, but how that love actually looks. Ta.
Stay still and know
My son is like a battery-equipped toy, and continues going until the battery eventually dies and the toy stops. Similarly, my son will not stay motionless until he falls asleep. He was able to lift his head, so he does this. Movement, activity, stimulation – this demands every second of the time he awakens.
You shouldn't be surprised. He is a prototype for a small wild boy. My husband was the same as his children.
Still, this made me sad as a mother. If I'm honest, I feel a bit cheated.
I want to rock him and sleep. However, he prefers to lie down and leave him alone. I want to snuggle him – wrap him in my arms, kiss him on his slutty head, and tell him everything I love about him. He likes his legs (or his hands and knees; he hasn't walked yet). I long for him to sit on my lap and flip through the picture book. He rather wants to get into something he's playing with his toys or that he doesn't (potted plants are his latest obsession).
I cried at this resistance. Children, I'll love you for good 'oil! I want to tell him.
A loving parent for her child hurts to pour her love.
My thirst has been temporarily relieved this Christmas. After a long day filled with family, gifts and feasts, we pulled into our driveway late at night. I always did what I did when I got home. I got my son back out of my car seat, took him inside, turned him into pajamas, fed him, put him in my crib and prepared to leave.
But like I had put him, he did things he hadn't done since the early days of newborns. He placed his head on my chest. All the tension left his small body and he collapsed in my arms.
Christmas miracle.
Tears grew in my eyes. I sat in the unused rocking chair in the corner of his bedroom and tried to breathe as softly as I could, fearing that he would wake up and slip off from me.
A faint voice of my spirit whispered as I sat there crying quietly, I feel what you're feeling.
what?
I feel what you are feeling.
The meaning was gradually unraveled over the next few days. The sudden change in my son's behavior was due to fatigue and overstimulation from days of constant activity. Only when he was taken away from all his energy would he allow me to lovingly bring him closer.
And suddenly, I couldn't see it: I'm not the same way? Like my son, I have a busy body. Until I wake up early and go to bed, my days are filled with productivity. Rest doesn't really indulge in my life. In fact, a rushed life is where I feel safe. I respect God. His son Jesus is my Savior. The Bible is where I find the truth. But like so many Westerners, I'm obsessed with what John Mark Comer calls “The Hourn Drug.”
When I am at the end of my wisdom, when I crashed, burned, bone tied, and soul tired, I sit in the presence of my father and sit without agenda, my parents love precious children He loves me like that.
I now realize that this is saddening him for the exact same reason that my son's resistance makes me sad. A loving parent for her child hurts to pour her love.
Again, my eyes are often tears.
Become like a little child
My son is a busy bee, but he is not an independent child of imagination. He sheds as much tears as I leave the room and grabbed the ringing phone. When I cook dinner he clings to my legs and cries until I pick him up. He then archs backwards, begs him to be suppressed again. This process is repeated until the cooking is complete. He really doesn't want to be restrained. He doesn't want me to pay attention to anything that I am not him.
He loves to play with toys, but only if I'm looking at him. Car rides are a disaster as he can't see me (and yes, we have mirror gadgets. That doesn't help). A stroller walk is short-lived as he can't stand in my opposite direction. I pray that the sky and trees will soon become interesting to him. But so far, there's no luck.
Complete transparency: This aspect of his personality was difficult for me. I feel connected to him.
He's very troubledOne day I cried to my mother while drinking coffee.
He's just in harmony with youshe said the matter of fact.
The words of Jesus in Matthew 18:3 were flashed to my heart – “Become a child.”
Humbled, I registered that what I found annoying about children was a beautiful image of how we should be with God. poor. Tether. Adjustment.
I heard somewhere, from a friend, a book, that I am not sure – God has given us the children our hearts need. That certainly seems to have been the case for me: independent, independent independence that forgets that God's resources are prayers. My son's claim to my undivided attention is a mercy, kindness, gentle reminder to adjust my attitude to heaven. I'm grateful.
White like snow
All parents can be associated with cleaning up the mess.
One day my son had one of the magnificent blow-off diapers that didn't fit with a changing table and some wipes. He suddenly sneezes as I stripped off his dirty clothes and put him in the bath. He went all over his face and all over us because there was a wind at the time.
This is what God sees when he sees us. Covered with the confusion of our own work, and still covered – Beloved.
He threw it all over himself before I could even pivot to grab a tissue. In a few seconds, the child was covered in three most nauseating bodily substances.
A strange moment like God reaches out to tweak me.
When I took the image of my son in the filthiest state he has ever had, I could see it very clearly: this is when God saw us is what you see. Covered with the confusion of our own work, and still covered – Beloved.
However, parallelism continued to evolve.
Despite the incredible confusion before me, I was not strict with my son. I didn't let him sit there with his filth. I also plunged him into the icy bath water, grabbed a sponge and began rubbing him cleanly while complaining about how inconvenient this whole ordeal was.
No, I bathed him gently, patiently and systematically – all of his before rinsing him in warm water, dry him and put on fresh clothes and then dry him and dress him. I made sure the inches of the product were washed cleanly.
Again, I was impressed by the emotional image of God's kindness towards us. He looks down from the throne of heaven, sighing at the rage that we have ruined ourselves once more. He is not hesitant to start the process of cleaning us.
He is kind and kind, and no matter how big our mess is, please do not withhold blessings. It is faithful to wash us off again and again forever until the final glory where there is no confusion.
I feel the same way about my son. The day will come when the season will end to wipe out his chaos. But until that day, I will meet him with him, whether it's his own, or it's a mud and mud thief on the playground.
When I reevaluated my son – it was slippery and smelled like soap – God tweaked me once more, this time the question: Why?
Why are there kindness, patience and kindness? Why is there an unflinching response to clean up this huge mess?
easy. Because he belongs to me.
that's right.
