God and Me-Grateful

This week has been long. Maybe it's been the weather-grey, gloomy, drippy, drizzly. Maybe it's been sick, crabby, couped up kids. Maybe it's been me and my sin nature. I'm kind of voting for the last one, influenced by the other things. That's one thing that no one really enjoys talking about. My sin nature. It just sounds weird. It can easily roll off your tongue as you fall into the "Christianese" that sometimes makes its way into Sunday morning Sunday school conversations. Or it's one of those words that you quickly edit out of your vocabulary as you talk with someone who you think probably would hear those words and look at you like you had four horns growing out of your head. It's just kind of one of those words that never sits quite right in my mouth.

Regardless how I choose to articulate it, the truth is I have really felt controlled by my own sin this week. It's that whole "what I want to do, I do not do and what I do not want to do, I do" business. Paul so nailed it. I have really struggled with loving my children in gentle ways. It is much easier to harshly discipline or harshly react. It's easier to yell or have hands that are a bit too rough instead of gentle and tender. I've also found myself seeing lots of angry words coming from one child in particular and then wondering if that is a result of what I'm modeling. And both of my kids have just struggled this week with repeated disobedience for the same things over and over. As I have kept saying the same words about disobedience making God sad because it hurts our hearts, I have found myself growing weary of those words, wondering if it really matters what I say because it all seems to leaving their little heads as fast as I say it.

I also struggled a bit with knowing my role in my husband's life as I have been praying for him to choose to do something with the boys who will be graduating from the soccer team. We've often talked about doing something like a book study or a small discipleship group but I haven't been sure of my role in encouraging him to do that. It kind of came to a head this week in my conversations with him. I've been trying to not say much and to instead pray for him to be convicted by God. But by last night, I had felt like I had pushed instead of encouraged and that I had overstepped my boundaries in our relationship. Another sin issue. Me pushing to get my way, to get my husband to do what I want him to do. (Even though it is really more of an issue of me pushing to get my husband to do what I think God wants him to do. It's still an issue of me putting my desires first.)

But today the grey drearyness of both the weather and the heart things I've been wrestling with have started to lift. I got to spend yesterday with three other three year olds and their moms. It gave me some much needed perspective. I needed to see other moms training and retraining and training some more, to see that my struggles with my kids' disobedience was not unique. I think that helps to alleviate some of the frustration and that helps me be gentler and more full of grace as I discipline.

And today as I spent part of my day wondering if my husband was choosing to pursue a ministry opportunity with senior boys because he was relenting to my pressing and not the pressing of the Lord, I saw God at work in the book my husband decided to use with this group. D revealed his plans tonight at the soccer banquet and without knowing it, picked a book that a popular and respected football coach at the high school has read and relies on. As D announced his plans, his assistant coach stood up and shared this information about the football coach and several of the soccer boys started shaking their head in agreement that this book was an important book. And D had 6 boys sign up. They'll join us for snacks at our house on Sunday afternoons, probably some soccer, and some discussions about life and purpose based on Jim Tressel's The Winners Manual. We weren't even sure if we'd have one boy sign up because let's face it, what high school boy who has just graduated once to come talk about a book, especially one that might be a bit "deep" in thought. It just seemed like a God thing, where I'm not sure if God was validating the conversations I had with D or not but that God was reassuring us that He wants us to get where He wants us to go more than we want to get there. (Love that quote from Mark Batterson.)

So today I'm thankful. Thankful for a God who hasn't left me despite my shortcomings. Thankful for a God who is an ever present hand at my back, urging me to press on but coming back to help me regroup if I make a wrong turn. May you feel that same hand too, believing that no hole is to deep for God to not climb into it with you.