Pillars

This is a drawing that one of my boys did this week that I promptly whisked away and stuck to my fridge. I wanted to keep it because it so closely resembles how I often feel as a Mom :) Let me describe to you an example...

On Saturday afternoon I got the bright idea that I would (shhh!) *scrapbook* during the kids' nap. I love to scrapbook, but a  handful of kids later I don't often get the time (or have the leftover energy when I DO have the time). It was a really full week, and I was truthfully a bit giddy about the possibility of taking my coffee up to my cozy little space, spreading creativity all over the floor, and most of all enjoying each sweet moment of quiet :)

I had just gotten settled when baby Roo cried. I snuggled her, rocked her, nursed a bit, and settled her back into her bed. Back to my little haven. I pulled out a stack of photos, and began spreading sheets of vintage-colored printed papers... 8 1/2 minutes later, a bedroom door opened and out came two ((very grumpy)) little boys. They plopped themselves down almost-on-top-of my creative spreadings, and my irritation began to grow.

"Mommy I want..." began.

In my head I drew an imaginary line across the doorway of my hideaway space, and in my head I transported the boys to the other side of that line, and pressed a magic button that released a sound-proof barrier in which I could see what they were doing but not hear them. In my head I tuned out and went back to my project.

Baby woke up for good.

I put Roo on a blanket next to me, and sent the boys to get their own project (pencils and drawing books) to work on nearby, and informed them that my project corner was a "quiet space", and that if they wanted to play loudly they could play in a different space. But in my head I was still pouting that my time had been interrupted, re-arranged, and was no longer focused and silent. I began to pout that it is difficult in this season to do anything hobby-ish for more than 8 1/2 uninterrupted minutes... I laid out a few pages to be finished later, closed up shop and got back to "reality".

Later on that day we were in the car and a song came on the radio,

"Your love never fails, it never gives up, never runs out on me...

Higher than the mountains that I face
Stronger than the power of the grave
constant in the trial and the change

One thing remains

Your love never fails
It never gives up
It never runs out on me

Because on and on and on and on it goes
It overwhelms and satisfies my soul
And I'll never, ever, have to be afraid

One thing remains

In death
In life
I'm confident and covered by the Power of Your great love

My dept is paid
There's nothing that can separate
My heart from Your great love"


God never gets tired of me. He never wants to hide away in a quiet corner and put up His invisible sound barrier. His love never fails, never gives up, never runs out on me. On and on and on it goes...

What peace, what continual grace we are given being loved by a God like that.

Today during the music at church I had a picture flash through my head. It was of a single, stone pillar. The pillar was holding up an enormous load- a wide, tall platform of rocks and dirt. The single pillar began to crumble, but before it toppled many, many pillars rose up around it, catching the weight of the load the single pillar was bearing.

I asked God what it meant and He whispered to me that He sees me when I feel the weight of parenting and feel that I am beginning to crumble. He whispered to me that He will not let the weight of it crush me, He will rise up pillars beside me to help balance, help carry, to share in the weight.

Thank you to those of you who are those pillars rising up beside me! Thank you first to my husband, who is the pillar nearest to me, committed to me and our kids for life. Then to my parents and his parents, to the aunts and uncles in my kids' lives, to those of you that pray silently for our little family, to the junior high and high school role models that love on my kids every week, to the women that come to my house every couple weeks for playgroup and bless me, to the bold, gentle women that consistently speak valuable truth to me. On, and on, and on it goes...

His love never fails, never gives up, never runs out on me.