I saw this quote yesterday, and it has stuck with me since:
It is a privilege denied to many. That is the part that has been spinning around on repeat in my mind.
How many times do I complain about what is a privilege, taking for granted that I deserve only hell but receive only grace?
Seeing things as privileges changes everything:
I'm stressed about how much there is to read and learn about being a new mom? The fact that I can read is a privilege denied to many.
I'm feeling overwhelmed by the number of doctor's appointments that have been added to our schedule? Accessible medical care close to home is a privilege denied to many.
The internet is slow and a browser keeps crashing? Having access to internet puts me among the richest people of the world; it is a privilege denied to many.
I don't feel like tackling the dishes in the sink? Those dishes are evidence that I had a good meal last night and went to bed with my stomach full -- a privilege denied to many.
I can't go on walks (my favorite thing) this week until my fluid levels prove they're safely high enough? I have a life spinning inside me. This (let me never forget), and my ability to be home instead of losing a day's wage, is a privilege denied to so, so many.
Even our access to Jesus is a privilege that, before he came, was a privilege denied to all but Jews. If we gain nothing else or lose everything but, Jesus' presence is a privilege denied to many. We are a privileged people.
May "thank you" be on our lips every moment this week.
I think she's a pretty beautiful reason, don't you think?
Baby Weaver at 30 Weeks (we think she has Patrick's nose :) )
I usually only post one thought each week, but I was trying to weave these two into one post, and it just wasn't working. I realized I was working out two ideas, and that each needed it's own space to breathe. Here is the second, another gentle reminder from a Father who wants me to be a whole lot less crazy :)
I recently quoted, rather smugly, to a friend, "Comparison is the thief of joy." I assured her that she had to stop looking at others' lives. It just isn't right. Of course, comparison isn't something I ever struggle with Never.
While I might not worry about comparing myself to people around me, I have a serious problem with comparing myself to people I've never met whose shiny blogs blink with ads for eco-friendly companies and glow with moments captured on a Nikon 10,000 (I'll let you decide which is more worrisome).
Yesterday, I was actually stressing about not having a meal planning menu. "Patrick," I cried, trying to make him understand the gravity and despite of myself, managing to laugh at the ridiculousness, "some of these ladies online have monthly meal planning menus. They document their meal-planning experience in a scrapbook made from scraps from their grandmother's quilt. While you're reading about it, you can check out the link to pictures of their children wearing clothes they personalized with buttons from goodwill at the fairy-themed birthday party where they hired their cousin to do fancy face paint!"
While it might seem silly, this is pieced together from several actual blogs or websites I've seen. How is a woman ever supposed to keep up?
Sarah Groves describes social media in her song, "Obsolete," like this: "Walking through a hall of doors/looking through a million portals/everyone is having fun/everybody seems immortal./ And you don't know where you stand/and did something pass you by/and if you are dismissed/will you get another try?
It terrifies me to think that at times, I stress more about if I'm making Martha Stewart happy than if I'm making Jesus happy. In the end, who will matter more?
Yesterday, after another tirade about not having everything nailed down as I would like, Patrick and I paused to watch an ocean-rippled sunset sky behind our house. As I quieted I heard, "you are worried and upset about many things, but few things are needed—or indeed only one (Luke 10:41-42)."
The story of Mary and Martha, one you think I would have internalized by now. Martha was fuming in the kitchen, probably trying to get her olives in the shape of a lamb like she saw on Pinterest and angry Mary wasn't helping. Instead, her sister was sitting at Jesus feet, listening and soaking in his love. She had chosen what was better, and it wouldn't be taken from her.
My to-do lists, my blog-compare-and-despair need to be named for what they are: idolatry. For if I am bowing down to them instead of to Jesus, that is precisely what they are.
I am called to one thing and to one thing alone: to know Jesus, experiencing his love more and more deeply each day. Everything else can be wonderful, but needs to be counted as loss in comparison. May you rest today at his feet today.
My birthday is coming up on June 17th. As people have started to ask me what I want, I've come up with a few things: supplies so I can learn to knit, a pedicure, a bathrobe. I love gifts, giving and receiving them, so these lists are fun to make. I'm learning, however, that sometimes, the gifts that are the most precious, the most necessary, are gifts that didn't make the list: gifts that are cut-to-the-bone painful and ones that I would have never asked for myself.
Yesterday we had our second trip to the hospital for unexpected and very scary bleeding. The first trip was last Tuesday, 3 hours away from home in Williamsburg. I was with some friends at a timeshare, resting after a girls' day out shopping. I was terrified and shocked. But the gifts were there, equally surprising: friends holding my hands in an ER at night, my first ultrasound and the baby moving wildly, Patrick making the drive fast enough to be with me as I was released, a friend who had woken up in the night to pray for me--moved by the Spirit to remind me He was aware, a message from a former teacher praying for us.
The days that followed were a blur: a lot of resting, reading, crying out to God, and experiencing various degrees of pain. A group I'm part of is currently reading 2nd Corinthians. Reading it for the first time in the Message, I found my next set of gifts:
We carry this precious Message around in the unadorned clay pots of our ordinary lives. That's to prevent anyone from confusing God's incomparable power with us. So we're not giving up. How could we! Even though on the outside it often looks like things are falling apart on us, on the inside, where God is making new life, not a day goes by without his unfolding grace. And now, isn't it wonderful all the ways in which this distress has goaded you closer to God? You're more alive, more concerned, more sensitive, more reverent, more human, more passionate, more responsible. Looked at from any angle, you've come out of this with purity of heart. I was given the gift of a handicap to keep me in constant touch with my limitations...I quit focusing on the handicap and began appreciating the gift. It was a case of Christ's strength moving in on my weakness. Now I take limitations in stride, and with good cheer, these limitations that cut me down to size—abuse, accidents, opposition, bad breaks. I just let Christ take over! And so the weaker I get, the stronger I become. (All from The Message, 2nd Corinthians)
That brings me to yesterday. We had our follow up appointment in the morning. The gifts there were evident: clearance to go back to my normal routine, a wonderful midwife setting up a consult with a specialist at UVA who knows about autoimmune diseases and pregnancy, my first walk in almost a week under the trees at the Arboretum. We had a restful, hopeful day.
Right before Patrick went to work (another gift), I began bleeding again...a nightmare on replay. We were checked out at the hospital and sent home to rest. I have another follow-up this afternoon. We are feeling a little like shipwrecked sailors: battered and worn, waiting for a break in the storm. YET, there are gifts still. Today as I rest while Patrick is away at work, I hold on to a special gift from prayer-gifted Kate, the amazing sister of one of my best friends, Kristen. In praying for me, she was given three images: the word Elohim (the name of God that means Creator, strong one), a light bulb, and a house with three roofs. She wanted to let me know that I am sheltered, extra protected by the strong God we serve. When I shared this with Luke, my father-in-law, he said quickly, "The three roofs-- The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit!" What a merciful God we have!
I thought about writing this post later today, after we know more at our appointment, after things were more stable. But I felt led to give God glory NOW, in the midst of another scary day of waiting. I have been given another day to be this sweet baby's mama. I will thank God for that, and whatever other gifts that might be coming my way, asked for or not.
I recently bought a brand-new teal planner. As seems fitting with my transition at work, my Skyline planner is about to run out. In July, I can start scribbling dates on pages topped with little tropical scenes. It was the best $6.97 I've spent in a long time. As I started to fill in appointments for the next several months, I was struck by how far away December seems. Some days it seems as if we'll never make it. For those of you who don't know, I've struggled since winter with unidentified connective tissue issues, mainly pain/numbness in my hands, feet, and/or chest. I'm working with a rheumatologist, but it has been a scary journey for someone so high control (and high anxiety!). Pregnancy has made some of the symptoms and a lot of the fear worse. My body no longer "plays by the rules."
As many pregnant women probably do, I began thinking about Mary. About how she was a mother, yes, but more how she was a teenage Jew. She had grown up hearing whispers of the Messiah, the one who would restore the oppressed nation of Israel to the glory intended for it. God had been silent for 400 years. Now, she and Jews everywhere were only nine months away from the realization of their dreams. She was not awaiting just her child, but the birth of an entire new era. How long those months must have seemed!
However, as I kept reflecting, I wondered how Mary felt when she held an impossibly fragile Messiah. When she fled to Egypt with his hot cheeks against her chest. When she watched her son executed, blood of her blood draining from a hole in his side. I wondered if she longed for the days she had wished to pass quickly, the days when the Messiah spun quietly in the safety of her womb. Did she wish then for the nine months of waiting, seeing the time as blessing instead of curse.
I wonder if I will wish the same when this time of pain and anxiety is over. Is there blessing in this time that I will long for? Will I miss the nearness of God, the knee-bowing humility that has fallen over me, the feeling of smallness and desperateness that has helped me understand for the first time in my life Jesus as burden-bearer and man of sorrows? I've noticed it already. On days when I have been pain free, I often did not think of Jesus until the end of the school day. He can slip to the fringes of my consciousness. On days when fear comes thick, his name is on my lips almost constantly.
I told Patrick last night that this was a scary ride and that I wanted to get off. But, I think God has more for me than this. My friend Kristen once told me a story of her friend who had lost her husband. A mutual friend of theirs had asked the woman what the hardest time of the day was for her. She replied the nighttime, when the kids had gone to sleep. The friend had said, "Then God has something special for you in the nighttime. Don't miss it."
I am going to believe that God has something special for me in this time of pain, of waiting, of uncertainty and lack of control. Instead of praying for this time to pass quickly, I am going to ask for eyes to see what gift God is giving me right now. I do not, do not want to miss it.
