Do you ever feel like you are running a rat race? And you just can't seem to win? For me that looks like flying around trying to get all the lunches packed, breakfasts made, folders signed, hair fixed, barely making it and wishing I had time to do more than just pray with my kids on the way to school in the morning. Even when I'm in a good rhythm of getting up uber early and walking and praying, I can't seem to make devotionals with the kids happen in the a.m. At night we are trying to make sure everybody reads to us for 15 minutes each, gets a book read to them, squeezes in a bible story and says prayers before I'm too grumpy and tired from sitting on kids beds in the dim light and trying to keep myself awake.
The goals I have in my mind are so lofty. I envision what it looks like to keep the main thing the main thing. But then reality comes screeching in, and what I feel is it's not enough. And when I am not paying attention, that little feeling can begin to whisper something subtly different. "You're not enough." Just a sly, seemingly insignificant switch of pronouns. Such a profoundly different implication. One that can keep me up at night. Or open the door for that opportunist called guilt who is ever lurking just outside my thoughts.
A few Sundays ago I thought I pretty much had everything under control. Until the girls and I pulled into the church parking lot, and I decided to back into a spot. Just before I did
Eliana, my three year old, said "Mommy, you are a good driver." About three seconds later I heard the crunch of metal as my giant tank of an SUV smashed the rear tail light of a tiny, silver car. The worship pastor's car. I walked around my vehicle in disbelief- thinking how great this was. Pastors wife smashes worship leader's car during first service. I just couldn't believe I did it. As I am saying that over and over, Eliana pipes up and says, "Mommy, you're still a good driver." "No I'm not!" I exclaim. "Don't you see what I did?" But she holds firm and repeats herself again.
Now fortunately for me I hit the most gracious person ever. I mean, she couldn't have been kinder. I don't advise running into staff members cars at your church just because they are nice about it though! So anyway, a little later in worship, the whole conversation surrounding the fender bender floods my mind. It's strikes me that it's so strange Eliana said I was a good driver just before I hit that other car. And that she kept insisting it was still true afterwards. While I'm wondering, a little heart tug interrupts me, and all of a sudden I get it. There is a picture here. A lesson if I will see it.
God calls us His beloved. Everyone of us is the one He died for. Even if we don't know it yet. And if we have wrapped ourselves in the gift of Jesus, then all He sees when He looks at us is goodness. His goodness. His loved ones. His destiny over us. His beautiful, unmarked creation. And when we wreck things, when we do something that seems to scream we are someone different, what He says about us Does Not Change. Because it doesn't depend on us. It depends on the finished work of Jesus on the cross. He is enough. Enough to cover us from everything we have or ever will do. Enough make us new inside if we will let him. Enough that our new identity is impenetrable. Enough to fill in the gaps with our family. Enough that when that little feeling starts to whisper I am not enough, I can shout back with confidence that He is enough, and I am His!
And I feel lighter and a little more free. Knowing that it doesn't all rest on what I do but on who and whose I am. And humbled that he would use my littlest one to paint me such a clear picture of this deep truth. Lord, help us to hear your voice and not the voices that try to distract. Focus our hearts on the truth of your word and help us believe we are who you say we are!
"The LORD your God is with you, the Mighty Warrior who saves. He will take great delight in you; in his love he will no longer rebuke you, but will rejoice over you with singing."
Zephaniah 3:17
The goals I have in my mind are so lofty. I envision what it looks like to keep the main thing the main thing. But then reality comes screeching in, and what I feel is it's not enough. And when I am not paying attention, that little feeling can begin to whisper something subtly different. "You're not enough." Just a sly, seemingly insignificant switch of pronouns. Such a profoundly different implication. One that can keep me up at night. Or open the door for that opportunist called guilt who is ever lurking just outside my thoughts.
A few Sundays ago I thought I pretty much had everything under control. Until the girls and I pulled into the church parking lot, and I decided to back into a spot. Just before I did
Eliana, my three year old, said "Mommy, you are a good driver." About three seconds later I heard the crunch of metal as my giant tank of an SUV smashed the rear tail light of a tiny, silver car. The worship pastor's car. I walked around my vehicle in disbelief- thinking how great this was. Pastors wife smashes worship leader's car during first service. I just couldn't believe I did it. As I am saying that over and over, Eliana pipes up and says, "Mommy, you're still a good driver." "No I'm not!" I exclaim. "Don't you see what I did?" But she holds firm and repeats herself again.
Now fortunately for me I hit the most gracious person ever. I mean, she couldn't have been kinder. I don't advise running into staff members cars at your church just because they are nice about it though! So anyway, a little later in worship, the whole conversation surrounding the fender bender floods my mind. It's strikes me that it's so strange Eliana said I was a good driver just before I hit that other car. And that she kept insisting it was still true afterwards. While I'm wondering, a little heart tug interrupts me, and all of a sudden I get it. There is a picture here. A lesson if I will see it.
God calls us His beloved. Everyone of us is the one He died for. Even if we don't know it yet. And if we have wrapped ourselves in the gift of Jesus, then all He sees when He looks at us is goodness. His goodness. His loved ones. His destiny over us. His beautiful, unmarked creation. And when we wreck things, when we do something that seems to scream we are someone different, what He says about us Does Not Change. Because it doesn't depend on us. It depends on the finished work of Jesus on the cross. He is enough. Enough to cover us from everything we have or ever will do. Enough make us new inside if we will let him. Enough that our new identity is impenetrable. Enough to fill in the gaps with our family. Enough that when that little feeling starts to whisper I am not enough, I can shout back with confidence that He is enough, and I am His!
And I feel lighter and a little more free. Knowing that it doesn't all rest on what I do but on who and whose I am. And humbled that he would use my littlest one to paint me such a clear picture of this deep truth. Lord, help us to hear your voice and not the voices that try to distract. Focus our hearts on the truth of your word and help us believe we are who you say we are!
"The LORD your God is with you, the Mighty Warrior who saves. He will take great delight in you; in his love he will no longer rebuke you, but will rejoice over you with singing."
Zephaniah 3:17
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