Christianity Archives - Page 20 of 41

The Trouble with Rest

*100 Beautiful Days of Motherhood: 33

Two. That’s the number of times this week I set the tea kettle on to boil and walked away, only to return some time later to find it bone dry and smoking. The second time, the handle, which was made to be impervious to absentmindedness, melted off in slow agony and dropped onto the burner.

The children smelled the burning plastic and asked if I was making dinner.

I was not.

I stared at my tea kettle. The heat had caused the metal to swell abnormally. It was as fat as a little piggy and much more likely to explode. Black smoke drifted lazily up from the tar-like goo on the burner.

This was concerning to me, not just because of the fact that I very nearly gave my children an unplanned lesson on shrapnel, but because it said something about me that wasn’t good. A woman who burns her kettle dry two times in five days has issues.

My issue is this: I have trouble resting. I have so much trouble resting, I can’t even slow down long enough to brew a cup of “Quite Moments” tea. I run around like the house is on fire (which, ironically, was very nearly a reality) because I feel like I have to work my way to a place of rest.

But the work is never done and rest is always elusive because I live at work.

My “office” is strewn with socks and dirty dishes and way more Thomas the Tank Engine tracks than is professional. And while my coworker is cute and my boss is great, the subordinates tend to run around half naked and spill milk. Everywhere I turn, I see reminders of the things I have yet to do, have not done well, or have not done at all.

Sometimes, I just want to put on a pair of heels and commute. Preferably to Hawaii. Perhaps then I could find a way to be done at the end of the day.

But of course, being done is not the point and work is not the problem. The problem is not the dishes in the sink or the floor that needs mopped. The problem is I lack the faith to rest the way God commands. I lack the faith to be still, to be quiet, and to pursue the things that are more important than dusting the furniture.

I lack the faith to trust that my identity in Him is secure, even if my work is not done.

There will always be work. But here in the middle of the mess, I am commanded to rest. Rest, true rest, is what I need. Not like when I go to bed and dream about cleaning my kitchen. Not like when I finally get all the rooms straightened up on the same day and I collapse into the couch, exhausted. Not like when I finally check everything off the to-do list and feel like I’ve earned it.

True rest is a grace. It sees the work left to do and nourishes me anyway. It sees that I am not yet done and rewards me with strength for the course. It resets the priorities that have gotten scrambled and brings my focus up from the temporal to the eternal.

I forget that sometimes, and I fight against it. I act like God is punishing me, somehow, by calling me to a place of rest. I kind of think that if He wants me to rest, He should find a way to clean my kitchen first. But He doesn’t do that. He leaves the mess, and asks me to leave it too.

So I put the kettle on, but I struggle with the fear that if I take some time off, my entire world is going to descend deeper into chaos and disorder. Who is going to do the dishes while I sip my tea, God? I sneak off and try to put away some laundry while I wait for the water to boil and pretty soon, I find myself face-to-face with a charbroiled kettle.

The truth is, I can never work my way to rest because rest is an act of faith. It requires me to act on the promise of God that one day, the meaningless repetition of earthly work will end. All that is lacking in me will be filled up, and all that is undone will be completed. I will no longer live at work.

I will live at rest.

So tonight, I am putting the kettle on. It’s a little rusty now and I can’t quite pry the lid off because the knob burned off. I am not done with my work. I guess that’s why it’s the perfect time to act on the belief that even in my imperfection, God’s promises are true. Not being done is the best reason to practice being at rest.

True Love (with Bonus Valentine’s Day Craft)

Today, the beautiful women over at Kindred Grace invited me in to pull up a chair and put down my pen at their place. You can read my guest post, Love is Like That, here. It’s all about the tough words of 1 Corinthians 13. If you’ve ever grappled with the definition of true love–and found yourself lacking–you’ll want to join me there.

The beauty, and challenge, of 1 Corinthians 13

Part of the requirements of this post was providing a graphic to go with it. So I stole some of the kids’ puffy heart stickers and quickly made a little Heart Art to use as the background of the graphic above.

I don’t have a lot of Valentine’s Day decorations, so this was a nice addition to our sparse red-and-white themed mantle. And, it was super quick and easy (read: cheap).

Here’s what you need to make one of your own:

Foam heart stickers (I got a tub of these at the craft store)

1 5×7 canvas

Spray paint (I used white, but I’m kind of itching to do one in pink or turquoise)

Ribbon (optional)

1) Simply arrange the puffy heart stickers however you like. I could fit two rows of three hearts on my canvas. I doubled up some heart stickers because I wanted a nice shadow effect on the canvas.

2) Once you’re satisfied with your arrangement, peel off the backs of the stickers and affix them to the canvas.

3) Spray paint! You may need several coats. Try not to breathe.

4) Once the paint is dry, you can finish the canvas by framing it out with ribbon. A little dot of glue on the corners is all you need. I added a little button on top because I got a little sloppy with the glue. Some people should not be allowed to handle molten glue.

That’s it! Happy Valentine’s Day to me!

All Things New: 100 Beautiful Days of Motherhood {26}

Halfway through the morning, the weather changed. The lazy grey clouds were thrown off over the mountains like covers, and sleepy-eyed sky appeared.

Kya had already drawn a fluffy cloud on her weather chart, but no one minded the inconvenience of erasing it and starting over with a yellow-rayed sun.

I was going to have to find my sunglasses.

It was warm enough—just—to play outside without mittens and take one more stab at winning the argument with Mom about running around outside without a coat. It turned into the kind of day that makes the early lambs jump around in the field and compels dogs to roll in things they shouldn’t.

It was a day that felt new, like mercy.

Mercy is something I need. I have felt a little bit brown around the edges lately, a little too tired and buried a little too deep. I am back to my old mistakes of taking on too much and saying no to too little. All week I struggled to keep up in a race I never should have been running in the first place.

Little things got under my skin, like rocks, and I felt gravely. I said things to my husband I shouldn’t have said and didn’t really mean. It’s always easier if it’s his fault than if it’s mine. It’s always easier to feel trapped by him than to acknowledge the fact that I’ve imprisoned myself.

But I don’t think he knows how to build a cage as well as I do.

If there’s one thing I am good at, it’s walling myself up with too many commitments. I am good at finding ways to chain myself to the clock and the calendar and the to-do list. I am good at scrambling my priorities and fighting him when he tries to set me free and straighten me out.

I think that if I can build a cage, then I can get myself out of it. So I clench my teeth and set my resolve and make everyone miserable while I try to prove that I can do it.

The truth is, I can’t do it. Not well, not godly, not in a way that is healthy.

This last past week was not healthy.

But today was the kind of day that forces me outside. I have to hang something on the clothesline, even though nothing will dry. I untangled the bed from the flannel sheets and extra blankets which have held us captive since sometime in October. They hang head-down and penitent on the line.

It is good to be aired out, I think, and to start fresh.

I stand out in the yard and fill my lungs with the smell of the waking earth. I notice that the deeply hidden daffodils and tulips are beginning to push their way up through the dark and the dirt and the dead of winter. Their tender green shoots push aside the brown fallen leaves and stretch toward the new mercy of spring. They are dirty, still, from being so long in the ground.

But they are growing again, even after a season of dormancy and darkness.

I am a little dirty too, a little rough around the edges. But on this beautiful day of motherhood, I cling to the hope that God is not done with me yet. My sins may be chronic, but so is His mercy. He coaxes me out of the dirt and into the light. I am well aware that I have not done everything right or well or good. But I am also aware that God is in the business of making all things new—including me.

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