confessions of the spiritually impoverished

i have to confess that after years of being at home with four kids, sometimes homeschooling, sometimes just trying to contain the chaos, i thought that putting our four kids into school would magically transform me into a more patient, less frazzled, all-around better version of myself.with a wave of the magic school bus wand, i would become, basically, an entirely different person.

while the kids are loving school and i am enjoying adult lunches and major closet reorganization projects, the whole amy-transformation aspect of full-time school has been rather disappointing. i am only with them for a few short hours in the afternoon and evening, most of which is filled with piano lessons, soccer practices and time with friends. and yet somehow i manage to be just as impatient, frazzled and all-around disappointing as i ever was. plus now, i don’t have the “hey! i just spent 8 hours educating  your rear ends so cut me some slack!” excuse. sigh.

all this failure and bottom of the barrel-scrapping, this cycle of falling short, confessing and picking up where i left off has me doubting. not doubting God’s grace or mercy. or His acceptance of me despite my failures. what it has me doubting is exactly what i am supposed to be striving for. i always thought we were supposed to work toward being the best, achieving great things for God with our lives. maybe not a the grand world stage but each in our own quiet way working towards perfection.

but what if my best isn’t all that great? what if i am the minor league, single A player dreaming of the big leagues when in truth i just don’t have what it takes? i used to think that acknowledging one’s spiritual poverty would open up a treasure trove of spiritual wealth. that i could pray and try and read and then one day God would entrust me with His spiritual credit card. with access to His  righteousness and an ever-creasing credit limit, i would purchase storehouses of patience and maturity.

i know that whatever i achieve in this world is singularly, utterly, entirely dependent on God’s work on my behalf but is it biblical to consider the possibility that He is calling me to be mediocre? not giving up, not living in defeat but more accepting this thorn in the flesh and praising God despite His unwillingness to remove it. can i somehow glorify Him through all my failings rather than glorifying Him by overcoming them? does a life of repentance honor Him as much as one of obedience?

as i sit surrounded by almost innumerable material blessings, from my wool socks and comfy lounge pants to my well-stocked fridge and overflowing pantry, there are millions waking up to live a shivering day of hunger pains and emptiness. they were born into this poverty and will most likely die in it. who am i, in all my greed for God’s greater blessings, to assume that i deserve more than i have already been given? He has given me His love, His forgiveness, His righteousness. perhaps it is my fate to hunger for more and not be satisfied this side of heaven. maybe it is better to live in God’s ghetto where at least i know how much i lack than to keep dreaming of mansion i wasn’t destined here on earth. maybe it isn’t a longing for God that i hunger for. maybe i am looking for scraps to feed my pride rather than food to feed my spirit.

so this is my prayer “not my will, but yours be done.” that will, that perfect Holy will lead Jesus to a life of deprivation, to a cross, to pain and humiliation and dying. it lead Him through those things on His way to the throne of Heaven, to a place of great honor. may that same will bring me to my knees, Lord and someday bring me home.

Square Peg

for the last several months, i have been wanting to write a post on being a square peg in a round hole. i have been counting down the days still school was done for the year and i could confess what a long academic road it has been. it was my first year teaching four kids at once. first year with a new and much more demanding curriculum. it was overwhelming and there were honesty days when i didn’t think we were going to make it.

i wanted to confess to feeling out of my depth, over my head. i wanted to say that i felt like God brought me to this place where i needed to do something that i just couldn’t do. i kept thinking if i prayed harder or worked harder, He would wave His magic wand and suddenly i would be transformed into the serine, unflappable mom who always keeps her cool or the fun mom who says “the heck with the laundry! let’s play monopoly.” instead, i was the overwhelmed mom hiding in her room watching “antique roadshow” cause she just couldn’t take it anymore.

when i went to write this post about how God obviously mis-assigned me, i couldn’t quite do it. it sounded whiny and ungrateful. ungrateful for all the amazing times we had this year. ungrateful for the experiences i got to share with my kids this year. we laughed, we cried, we conquered pre-alegebra.

when i was preparing to have our first baby, jim used to tell me that trying to get away from the pain only made things worse. if you focused on, looked it right in the eye and called its bluff, it wasn’t as bad. it still hurt but you didn’t get lost in it; you didn’t let it win. i think that’s what i did this year. i kept trying to wiggle out from under the discomfort i was in, trying to reorganize my way out of it rather than accepting it as a natural part of the process.

i often hear people talk about how moms need to make time for themselves because if they are happy and fulfilled then it will trickle down to their kids. i am not so sure that happiness should really be our end goal. what if i am called to be happy in the pain rather than looking for ways to kill the pain altogether? what if God doesn’t give us the luxury of happiness but calls us to something higher? maybe all this time i was making the pain worse by not accepting it as what it really is, God’s hand molding me to His own purpose, the smoothing out of my sharp corners. after all, who is the pot to tell the Potter what shape best fits His purpose?

don’t take this as “therefore, we should be at home full-time, making ourselves (and our children) as miserable as we possibly can. i think God calls moms to all sorts of uncomfortable places, in and out of the home. in an imperfect world there are no perfect choices. only faith in a perfect Creator who we can trust to work on those rough spots out in our ultimate favor.

 

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Faith never prospers so well as when all things are against her: tempests are her trainers, and lightnings are her illuminators.

-charles spurgeon, redefining prosperity

Minor Crisis of Faith

Today is the first day of school. Not the first day of “Okay, kids time for school! Don’t forget your lunches.” and we all rush out the door school. But “Okay, kids time for school. I’m your teacher. Here we go.” school. I wish I could tell you that I woke up this morning feeling confident and peaceful. I wish I could tell you that I jumped out of bed full of energy, ready to face the day. I did jump out of bed but only to escape the chest-crushing anxiety I had woken up with hours before.

So many voices are going through my head and most of them aren’t from my happy place. Most of them boil down to “What the heck do you think you are doing, crazy lady?!?”

Maybe you can’t identify with the specifics of my current self-induced crisis of faith (in myself). Whether you homeschool or not, have kids or not, we all doubt ourselves, right? (If I am the only one, please humor me.) Can I really do this job? Will I ever find Mr. Right? What do I do now that I have retired?

Yesterday in church, while my minds was miles away, making lists and rearranging schedules, I was struck by the fact that I was putting this all on myself. I don’t know if I can do this, emphasis on the I. But the reality is whether I can do it or not really isn’t the point. I could run my school of four with military precision, produce four shining examples of stellar academics and make muffins on the side but if it is only “me” doing it, it is meaningless. On the other hand, this year could be full of failing moments, where patience is wearing thin and nothing ever gets done when it is supposed to and somehow succeed. If only…if only I will remember. Remember to be humble. Remember to grateful. Remember to breath and show us all some grace.

It is strange that as Jesus made his way to die, someone else had to carry His cross. Strange that someone had to carry His burden in order that He might carry mine. I know I trust Christ to carry the burden of my sin but do I trust Him to carry the burden of my success? Am I willing to hand it all to Him and let Him make of my life what He will?

I guess my little of crisis of faith (in myself) was really no crisis at all. Just the realization that I can’t do it, I can’t do anything outside of Christ. But then again, why would I want to?