When I was in high school, I'd babysit for some spending money. After the kids had gone to bed, I would sometimes straighten up. No, not just dirty dishes: literally I would straighten crooked picture frames, piles of magazines on tables, etc... I felt so much better when everything was exactly right, exactly how it should be.
I've been the same way about thoughts: constantly straightening, adjusting, perfecting. I've wanted my beliefs to read like mission statements: Well, what I believe about caring for the environment is precisely... Why, I'm glad you asked what I believe about prayer. You see, I know for sure that...
I am learning that whatever extremes in personality I had before pregnancy are amplified by the large amounts of hormones that are currently running through my veins. If my thoughts were vying to escape any gray areas before, my brain now feels like a middle school cafeteria dismissing. It's not pretty!
The day after our stay-cation, Patrick had to work and I cleaned up at home. I was bombarded with seemingly life-altering dilemmas. I read Matthew 5 for my quiet time. When I got to the part about "turning the other cheek," I was torn. But what if someone attacks me on a dark night? What then? This one had my mind running for hours.
That is, until I heard a radio broadcast about how homeschooling is a great way actively parent and disciple your children. I hadn't even thought this far yet, I despaired, and now I have to figure out what I believe about educating a baby I haven't even met yet!
The broadcast also brought up how we need to teach our children why we do things like get jobs, play sports, study hard, etc... This is a great point, something I want to remember. As I put things away in the bathroom, though, my eyes locked on my makeup bag. What would I tell a daughter about wearing makeup? Oh, no! "Patrick, why do I wear makeup?," I asked him desperately when he got home. Poor man!
This frantic kind of thinking, this desire for a cut-and-dried response ready for anyone who'd ask what I believe about spiritual warfare or eating well or solutions to poverty, leaves me harried and stressed. It leaves me joyless and worried. And guess what? It leaves me trying to be GOD. Yikes.
God has been speaking gently into this black and white girl's heart about my fear of existing with a degree of grayness. At church on Sunday, Pastor April read this from Psalm 131 (NIV, emphasis mine):
"My heart is not proud, Lord,
my eyes are not haughty;
I do not concern myself with great matters
or things too wonderful for me.
2 But I have calmed and quieted myself,
I am like a weaned child with its mother;
like a weaned child I am content."
I do not have to have a tabulated manifesto of everywhere I stand on every subject. Let me see, FASTING, that's page 23. I believe... Doing so reveals a fear that the Holy Spirit will not speak to me, that I need to know all and NOW! Jesus didn't even expect this of his disciples, “I have much more to say to you, more than you can now bear. But when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all the truth. (John 16:12-13, NIV, emphasis mine).
I might not know exactly what to tell you about great matters, things too wonderful for me, but the Holy Spirit does. I might not know how I will react to one of the thousand hypothetical situations I can imagine, but I do know I can rest, contentedly, on my Father's lap. When the time comes, he will whisper what needs to be done, he will guide. My job is simply to listen. That is black and white enough for me.
I might not know exactly what to tell you about great matters, things too wonderful for me, but the Holy Spirit does. I might not know how I will react to one of the thousand hypothetical situations I can imagine, but I do know I can rest, contentedly, on my Father's lap. When the time comes, he will whisper what needs to be done, he will guide. My job is simply to listen. That is black and white enough for me.
You don't always know what you will say to your kids when certain problems arise. The wonderful thing about children is that you get to grow WITH them. When your child is a baby, you are also a baby. You learn, you adjust, you do things you said you never would. You mess up, you fix it, you don't ALWAYS fix it. The wonderful, beautiful thing about children is that they love with unconditional love. Even when I mess up, my babies still love me, no matter what. You don't have to have parenting worked out before the baby gets here, it will come to you as you go. And believe me, even if you have in your head how you want to parent, how you will approach certain circumstances... you will end up with an Evie, who tests every single nerve in your body. But it is 100% totally worth it.
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