The World

Frankly I have no words for what is going on in the world right now.  A part of me wants to try to describe something so, in future years I will remember what was going on in the world when I wrote this, but another part of me doesn't want to in any way commemorate what is going on in the world right now.

For the sake of history, policeman are getting shot -- frequently and brutally.  Our country is completely divided -- on everything, and sometimes, it feels, just for the sake of being divided.  I fear for my children, almost all the time and for actual evil around every corner.

I saw a quote yesterday that put everything I am feeling into one sentence.  I wish it was a sentence about God and joy overcoming evil and how having strong faith leads to peace... but it was not.  It is, however, a quote that perfectly articulates what I'm feeling:

 

My Heart as a Mother

Sometimes I wonder if I have what it takes to be a mother.  I know, it's a little late to wonder, as I've now been one for over a year.

But the longer I am a mother... the more I wonder if I'm cut out for the job.  I don't know if my heart can take being the heart of a mother.

When Tracey Ann was a newborn, we just focused on learning how to keep this precious baby, this life with which we had been entrusted, alive.  I have joked that her turning one year old is such a celebration because we have kept her alive for an entire year -- and people laugh because, of course, it is said in jest... but it also said with a great deal of sincerity.  We are fully rejoicing that all of our mistakes as parents -- all of my mistakes as a mother, and I made many mistakes during that first year, were not fatal mistakes.  It is truly a miracle and blessing from God that our precious baby is one year old, and healthy and thriving.

Now that she is no longer a baby... I mean she is... but she's not, she's a toddler, I'm beginning to see more of the road ahead, and I look at the year behind us, and I wonder... can my heart withstand the joy and pride and discipline and training and growth and turmoils that lie ahead.

I have always cared what is going on in the world -- through wars and terrorists and political policies with which I disagreed -- but I knew the Lord was directing my steps, and my future was with Him in Heaven.  Now, I see the world differently.  Our world, our country, our military, our freedom has to last beyond my lifetime because I now have a child.  When I see horrible things on the news, now I do not just grieve and pray for the situation as I used to... I have within me a very deep smoldering fear about the world in which I have to raise my daughter.

The Bible tells us hundreds of time not to fear... but I really feel like there should be a mothers version, because I have more fears now than I ever knew existed.  I know some will pass... but others might be there forever.

I know I am called to put my faith in the One who loves Tracey Ann more than I do... which I can't even imagine, but God does.  And yet, when I think of the future, when I think of our world so full of evil, I am overwhelmed with emotion in my heart as a mother.

People said being a mother would change my life.  People said there is no love like it.  Some may have even said that it would change the way I see the world... but no body told me what it would mean for my heart to become the heart of a mother.

Joy and Fear

These days I am learning first-hand that fear robs joy.

The Bible tells us to give thanks in all circumstances, be content in all things, and have a joyful Spirit.  It specifically tells us NOT to fear.  It tell us not to fear something like 365 times -- that number has always stuck in my mind, because it has a different verse every day telling us not to fear.

I am using the word "joy" much often these days, because when people ask me how my baby is, I tell them the truth -- she is an absolute joy.  I have been happy before... but, for me, motherhood is a JOY like I have never known before.

Since I am experiencing, and acknowledging joy more often in my life, I am trying to become a more joyful person in general.  It is in this effort that I have realized that fear robs joy.

I have said it before, and I will say it again, that my hope and prayer is to, eventually, be home with our children full-time.

I am realizing when I am joyful in my job, I am filled with fear about feeling it.  If I am joyful in my work, then I might not get to stay home someday.  If I am joyful in my work, God (or my husband) might not enable me to stay home, and I will have to work outside the home forever.

As I have noticed these feelings, I remembered back to when I was single and I knew I was supposed to be "content" with my life before marriage -- but I never felt joyful about it.  If I was joyful as a single woman, then God would never give me a husband.

All of these years I have discouraged joy in my heart and my spirit for fear that it will mean something else won't bring me joy.

Here's my revelation -- joy in one area of life is not mutually exclusive.  In fact, joy breeds joy!  When I am joyful at work, I am a more joyful mother.  When I am a joyful mother, I am a more joyful wife.  When I am joyful wife, I am a more joyful teacher, etc.

Fear that I won't get what I want (a husband, the ability to work from home) has robbed me of feeling joy where I am now, and, let me tell you, that stops NOW.

Tracey Ann is such a joy -- but, from now on, I will be on a quest to find joy in the students I teach, the colleagues with whom I work, and the long commute that I make.

Welcome, Joy.

 

Every Generation...

I have been reflecting on past generations lately.

More accurately, I been trying to imagine the fear that past generations had when looking ahead at the future of their world and country and the obstacles that their children would be made to face.

I don't like where I was born in history, I never have.

Even as a child, I imagined about being a child pioneer in a covered wagon with my parents headed west.  I imagined living in the Victorian age and wearing dresses every day and having to sit still and sew and "be seen and not heard". I imagined living during the Civil War on a big plantation in the south. I imagined that my bicycle was a horse because horses were the means of transportation. Whatever my imagined scenario, I was always in another time.

I still feel out of place in my current generation.

I have manners, etiquette, modesty, propriety, privacy. I enjoy hand-writing letters. I expect to be called Mrs. Miller. I wear skirts to work every day. I could be happy in a place like Mayberry.

When I think about the future, I am fearful.  The Bible tells us not to fear for the future, but I do.  I can pray over my fear, and even surrender them some days -- until I imagine having children and then my fears are bigger, bolder, more terrifying than ever before.

The only thing that brings me any comfort is that every generation of wise parent has had these same fears for the future of their children (which is really sad that every generation had cause to fear for the future instead of feeling hope for the future).

I think the most fear-filled time for parents in our country was during the Colonial time.  Colonists were less and less happy being under the rule of the King of England and war was coming.  This war would be fought in the back yards of families.  If my history is accurate, this was the most dangerous war for women and children.  I fear for the world my children will inherit -- mothers in Colonial times wondered if their children would live to inherit anything.

How did mothers who were slaves look to a future of hope for their children when their children were born into slavery.  Born as property that could be bought and sold?  What fear those mothers and mothers-to-be must have carried.

Mothers in the south after the Civil War, when their world and everything they knew had been completely shattered, taken, burned.  How can you teach your children to survive in a world that is unrecognizable to everything you've ever known?

My father was born during the Great Depression.  Did his mother wonder how and when the country would ever recover?  Did she fear for the world after the war?  Did she see the hints of change coming?  Fatherless children, Polio, drugs, sex, rock-and-roll, women's "liberation", children without stable homes, divorce, and abortion?

The Cuban Missile Crisis and the Cold War? Swine Flu, and Bird Flu, and Aids, and Terrorism, and Cancer...

Every mother throughout time has worried about the world her children were inheriting... and as the examples above indicate, justifiably so.  Yet generation after generation has survived (for better or worse) and found a new batch of fears regarding their own children.

Maybe that's why God told us so often to fear not.  He knew, generation to generation to generation, fear would be a constant.