Kristen Anne Glover

Five in Tow

What Micah Taught Me

Micah, age 1

Micah and Paul were born at the exact same minute.  They were the exact same height and almost the same weight.  They were both tongue-tied.  They both had the same blue eyes, and even though Paul had a shock of red hair and Micah’s was mousy brown, it was obvious they were twins.

But by the time the boys were six months old, we knew Micah was behind.  By the time they were a year, we knew something was wrong.  It was painfully obvious.  By then, Paul was crawling all over everything and was on the verge of walking, but Micah couldn’t follow him because Micah had yet to crawl.  He didn’t even slither.

Our pediatrician was at a loss as to what was wrong.  She said all kinds of scary things before scribbling out a referral to Children’s Hospital in Seattle where Micah was examined by a team of neurologists.  They wrote lots of notes on little pads of paper while Micah smiled at them and tried to find the Cheerios they’d hidden under brightly colored cups.  “Micah does not play with his toes,” they wrote as they watched him.  “Micah does not roll over.  Micah does not bend his knees.  Micah can’t right himself if he falls over.  Micah can’t grasp a finger.  Micah can’t…Micah can’t…Micah can’t….”

Then, the doctors went out to talk about their findings.  I waited a long time while Micah sat on my lap and played with my necklace.  I wondered what life was going to be like for my sweet little boy.  It is one thing to be behind.  It’s another thing to be behind when you’re a twin. He had a built-in reminder that he didn’t measure up.

Finally, the chief neurologist came in.  She shook my hand warmly and told me what a delightful child Micah was.  “He’s very bright,” she said, and I breathed a sigh of relief.  “His delay is not cognitive; it’s muscular.”  It seemed that every muscle in Micah’s body was weak.  Every muscle was behind.  “He needs a personal trainer and a baby gym,” she concluded.

We were assigned a physical therapist who told me to write goals for Micah.  “Micah will learn to hold my finger.  Micah will learn to roll a ball.  Micah will learn to stand unassisted.”  I wanted to write, “Micah will learn to climb up the steps all by himself!” because at 16 months old, he was heavy.

But Micah could not achieve that goal.  Paul was climbing steps like a monkey, but it didn’t matter what Paul could do, or what any toddler could do.  It didn’t matter what was normal or expected or even desired.  Micah was not any toddler.  He was Micah, and I had to adjust my dreams, wishes, and goals for him based on who he was, not on who I wanted him to be.

Months passed, and then years.  The progress was painfully slow, but still, it was progress.  I quickly learned that achieving the goals was not the goal.  Success, for Micah, was about making steps in the right direction.

I watched Micah and I wondered if I was willing to accept that definition of success.  I like goals.  I like reaching goals even better.  I am not so good at being content with progress, especially when it seems like everyone else is running and I’m just crawling along.  It seems like I should be able to do it!  I should be able to keep my house clean and my kids dressed like they just stepped out of a magazine.  I should be able to make that creative birthday cake and look like I didn’t eat a piece of it.  I should be able to write two blog posts a week, for heaven’s sake, and keep all my kids happy and well-fed and educated.  After all, Facebook and Pinterest tell me that other moms can.  Why can’t I?

Every day, I get up and I aim for that goal.  I do the best job I can.  It’s not always Pinterest-able, but it’s generally a step in the right direction.  So why do I feel so guilty when I am still so far away from the goal?  Why do I feel like everyone is staring at me, writing down notes on their little pads of paper, Kristen can’t…Kristen can’t…Kristen can’t…?

It’s because I forget that I am me.  Not my mother.  Not my sister-in-law.  Not the other mom of five kids who does everything better.  I’m just me, the me with gifts and the me with shortcomings.  Like Micah, I must accept that some things are just going to be hard for me.  It doesn’t matter what is normal or expected or even desired.  I can only do so much.  Some things I will do really well.  And then there’s the rest.

Motherhood involves such a myriad of skills and abilities; it would only stand to reason that I would stink at 50% of them, maybe more if you count sports.  Some things I am just not naturally able to do.  I am deficient.  I am broken.  Sometimes, I really mess it up, and I wonder why I’m the only one who can’t get it all together.

But God did not give these children to the woman who has it all together.  He did not give them to the woman who is better.  He gave them to me.  He didn’t even check out my Facebook profile to see if I qualified.  He didn’t look to see if I am good at planning birthday parties or if I know 50 ways to sneak vegetables into macaroni.  He did not ask me if I felt adequate because it’s never been about being adequate.  It’s about letting God be adequate enough for the both of us.

At the end of the day, when I’ve poured myself in to these lives God has given me, and I am tempted to think that I haven’t been or done enough, I remind myself that I am a lot like Micah.  When I first became a mother, I could not even crawl.  But by God’s grace, I have learned to walk.  His hands have steadied me, and now I can even run.  I may not qualify for a marathon, but then, I was not made for marathons.  I was made to walk with Someone holding my hand, and that is enough.

Micah is now four.  He still struggles with significant speech issues because he can’t seem to get his tongue to do what it should do.  I can’t always get my tongue to do what it should either, so I understand.  He will never be the star of the soccer team.  I understand that, too.  But every day, he continues to try.  He lets me help him make steps in the right direction.  That is something I understand best of all.

He has said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness.” Most gladly, therefore, I will rather boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me.  —2 Corinthians 12:9

Success

The Apple and the Ark

*These are not Noah’s hands

The news was completely unexpected.  For the past five years, my husband has been teaching Bible and theology at a small private school in our area.  But the economy has taken a toll on the school, and enrollment is down.  The board was forced to make cuts, combine classes, and let a teacher go.

It made sense, in a way.  All the other teachers are responsible for core classes.  Latin.  English.  History.  Math.   My husband has two master’s degrees in Bible and Theology, but he couldn’t tell you five things about Shakespeare or explain why x equals 3, or how the alphabet got mixed up with the numbers in the first place.  It really was the most logical decision: Jeff should be the one to go.

The principal was very kind and even apologetic about the decision.  He gave the typical “it’s not you, it’s us” speech that one would expect in a situation like this.   They didn’t want to let him go.

Still, when I got the news, it felt like a punch in the gut.  It felt personal, even though I knew it wasn’t.  I spent the day feeling nauseous and fighting back tears and trying to make the rational side of my brain sit on my emotions.  What are we going to do now?  I thought about my kids and my mortgage and the school books I had just ordered and wished now that I could return.

Then my husband came home from work.  He walked in the door with a huge smile on his face but stopped when he saw me.  I burst into tears.  “Kristie!” he said, wrapping his arms around me.  “Don’t you see?  God is about to do something!  It’s going to be okay.”

“I know,” I sniffed.

“Really?   Because you know He’s going to take care of us.  He’s always taken care of us.”

“I know.”  I did.  Really.  I was crying because I was just so…happy.

“Then be excited!”  He looked like he was enjoying this.  “We’re about to find out exactly where God wants us next.”

I smiled and said, “Yeah!”

But inside, I was thinking about how much easier it would be to be excited if I didn’t know a thing or two about God.  I know that God sometimes has a funny way of making everything work out for the good of those who love Him and have been called according to His purpose.  Sometimes, the working out for the good takes the long road.  Sometimes, it doesn’t make any sense at all.  Sometimes, it even hurts.

That night, after I’d finished crying and eating some conciliatory ice cream, I settled down in the rocking chair with the book of Hebrews, chapter 11—the great Hall of Faith as it’s sometimes called.  I got through Abel and Enoch and came to verse 7 where Noah caught my eye.

Noah.  Everyone knows the story about Noah.  He’s the one who built the ark, collected the animals, and floated around with them while the rain came down and filled up the whole earth.  You know, that Noah.

This time, one little phase about Noah struck me.  The writer of Hebrews said, “In reverence, Noah prepared an ark…”  Reverence.  Awe.  Fear.  Praise.  Worship.

Suddenly, I pictured Noah up there on his ladder, banging away on his ridiculously large boat, praising God while his fields went to weeds and his goats broke through their fences.  He already knew the “working out for the good” was going to hurt.  It was going to hurt like nothing he’d ever known.

In fact, when God came to tell Noah about the flood, Noah’s father was still alive.  His grandfather was still alive.  The Bible doesn’t say it, but he probably had brothers and sisters and most certainly a slew of cousins and friends and neighbors.  He didn’t know that his dad would die before the ark was finished.  But he did know that there was only room for eight.  He did know that almost everyone he had ever met in over 500 years of living was not on the list.

The years came and went and Noah kept felling trees and planing boards while the people he knew and loved came and stared and pointed at his ark.  Maybe they even looked inside and gave advice about the size of the windows.  Maybe they laughed.  Maybe they praised.  And all that time, Noah looked at their faces and listened to their words and thought about how much it was going to hurt.

But he didn’t stop working, even when his wife came out after washing up the dinner dishes and said, “Really, Noah?  An ark?  You haven’t even finished my kitchen cabinets!”  Noah just grinned at her with a nail between his teeth and kept on banging, but in the secrecy of his thoughts, he knew that that the woman he loved was going to have to watch her world wash away.  And it was going to hurt.

But somehow, Noah also knew that God was at work, and Noah believed that any place where God is working is holy ground.  The whole world was degenerating into apathy and filth, but this, this was holy ground.  He took off his shoes and smeared pitch all over a house of worship that looked like a lot like a coffin, a coffin that might just save the world.  He chose not to fear.  He chose to stand in awe.

With reverence, he loaded up the wife and kids and all the animals, including the ones he didn’t particularly like and the ones that didn’t particularly like him.  He double checked to make sure he packed food for the lions.  Then he herded in the sheep and the goats that he knew would be a sacrifice to God when this whole thing came out all right.  Because the whole thing was going to come out all right.

When the time was full, God slowly shut the door, and the last glimpses of blue sky melted behind a door Noah and his family could not open from the inside.  In the dimness, they waited.

The animals felt it first.  They shifted their weight against the splinters on the floor, uneasy as the barometer fell.  Then he heard it.  The rain.   They listened, and everyone jumped when they felt the wood scrape against the earth and bump into the rocks as the water rose and lifted them away from the only home they had ever known.

It’s funny how you can think you’re brave when there’s nothing to be brave about.  In the darkness, as the wood of the ark groaned under the weight of the water, Noah had something to be brave about.  More than likely, Noah discovered he wasn’t brave at all.  But he had faith, and he held on to the expectation that he was right where he was supposed to be because he was right where God had told him to go.

So here we are, my husband and family and I, feeling the floorboards creak underneath us and wondering where God is going to lead.  It might not be easy.  It might hurt.  But we have a firm expectation that God is at work, and God is leading us right where He wants us.  With reverence, we are waiting for the ark to move, fully expecting everything to come out to the praise of His glory.

Just like Noah.  The waters did not stay.  They raged and foamed but they did not stay. The ark came to rest and the door was opened from the outside by the hand of one who is Mighty to Save. Noah walked out into the blinding light, knelt down on the earth still swollen with water, and began to dig out rocks for an altar using his bare hands.  He built it up and brought out the animals he had preserved for such a time as this.  Out of the reverence of his heart, out of the expectation and belief and faith that was in his soul all along, Noah prepared a sacrifice for the realization of what he fully expected to happen.  God would make all things work together for the good for those who love Him and have been called according to His purpose.

It hurt, no doubt about it, but God had made it good.

A red apple award for five years of teaching and the book of Hebrews