I described my day with littles to a friend, and they replied, “I’m sorry that sounds like a not great day, like a lot of tough things happened.” And I replied, “ya know, it was actually pretty good. Not a bad day in the line of motherhood. I’m learning I have to just roll with the punches.”
And to be honest, the day was pretty good. Don’t get me wrong, it was full, and it was hard, but it was fine. In the morning, I brought the boys to campus with me so they could run around outside and I could get some easy work done while we played. After lunch, I put my youngest down for a nap, while a friend came over to watch my eldest as I headed off to a regular OB appointment. I was even able to eat some lunch before my friend had to leave, after which Aiden got some rest time.
Once both boys were up, we headed to the pediatrician to check on a cough my youngest has been having at night. It turns out, he’s totally fine, but as we left, we saw a little girl being taken away in an ambulance. We were a good bit away, but as she was taken down the elevator in a stretcher, my boys and I took the stairs. I could see that she was throwing up as they wheeled her out of the building. And I’ve got to be honest, that shook me. I don’t know what she had, whether it was COVID or something else, but I was grateful for my 3 year old and I to be wearing face masks, and I hurriedly got the boys in the van.
Once we made it home, I made all 3 of us change our clothes and wash hands a couple times before heading to the park. I had checked the weather app before leaving–no rain until 7pm. We were surprised to find (of all things) a jazz band at the park, which my boys loved. But before too long, I started to notice ominous clouds and after about 15 minutes of playing, I ran the boys home in the stroller (in my third trimester, mind you), only to make it home drenched. This was the second wardrobe change for all of us within the hour.
The rest of the evening went fairly smoothly. A neighbor brought over some delicious homemade marinara, and the boys and I had leftovers. We did baths and the bedtime routine, and I spent 30 minutes after bedtime getting the house back in order, and throwing in a load of laundry since we created an entire load after our day.
The morning began for me at 5:45am. Time with Jesus and coffee, followed by a day of chasing littles. 3 meals to make and feed; 2.5 hours of work that mama got in, 2 doctors appointments, 1 park visit and a partridge in a pear tree. All this, with the reminder after seeing a little girl on a stretcher, that life is short, and we truly have so very little control over our days, our health, all of it. It was a full day and a hard one, but God gave me joy. And help too–between my friend who watched Aiden, and a neighbor who shared food.
After all, the day wasn’t as hard as yesterday–where my eldest coughed up a bite of his dinner because he disliked it that much, and my 18 month old fought sleep for all naps and bedtime for 48 hours (why, I have no idea), and where my van battery died and I couldn’t jump it until the next morning because of the sleep strike my son was on, which meant I couldn’t go to the grocery store when I needed to. Yeah, today was alright.
You see, I’ve been praying lately that the Lord would help me to trust Him more in the hard things. That I would respond with faithfulness and obedience rather than anger. My default is to just get mad–“I don’t deserve this,” is my internal voice. “This is too much, Lord,” my heart grumbles.
And yet this morning, I was reading in my quiet time how Paul was shipwrecked 3 times as he followed Jesus’ call to proclaim the Gospel to the Gentiles. And in Acts 27 (the only recorded shipwreck of Paul’s that we get to be witnesses to), Paul’s response is trust in the Lord. Contrast Paul’s response with Jonah for a minute–also a preacher, asked to go to Gentiles, and yet His response is distrust. He runs from God. In both Jonah 1 and Acts 27, the Lord spares the lives of Paul and Jonah as well as everyone on their ships. One man is faithful, the other is faithless. So is there a difference? Does faithfulness and obedience matter? Jesus says in John 15:10-11 that it makes all the difference.
“If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands and remain in his love. 11 I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete.” (John 15:10-11)
A life marked by joy. There it is. I have spent many days of motherhood pushing against the suffering. Pushing against the Lord’s invitation for me to trust Him, to humble myself, to submit myself to the hard thing. And I have missed out on joy. Thankfully, the Holy Spirit is continuing to work through the struggle. And day by day, the good ones and the hard ones, I’m starting to see it. J O Y.
