Bringing Ginger Ale Home

It’s the message that everyone knows the real meaning of and I can assure you is most dreaded by parents:  Can you bring home ginger ale?

The three of us mamas sat together over ice-cream where no small hands were trying to steal a bite.  We really covered much in our brief conversation, women have a way of doing that that’s fit enough for an Olympic sport.  We happened to be talking about sickness and the two others shared how their girls had recently been sick while I was utterly thankful that so far our kids had skipped out on this.  But no sooner did the thought cross my mind did the text for ginger ale come through.  My husband updated me briefly on the situation at home, our littlest was the one in need but for the moment everything was under control. 

The girls and I continued our evening, but my mama heart was concerned for my little fella and for Daddy who was holding down our fort.  I trusted he would let me know if I needed to come home right away and I also trusted that he was fully capable of handling our children, even if one was sick.  But after some time passed I checked in to see how things were and received no response, then that trust began to waver.  I wondered why I hadn’t heard from him and imagined that if he hadn’t reassured me everything was okay, then everything clearly could not have been okay! 

I headed home and picked up ginger ale on my way, all while picturing the scene that might unfold as I walked through the door.  I was preparing myself to be scrubbing floors, juggling buckets and up all night.  I thought for sure there would be a huge sigh of relief when I walked through the door because help had arrived…

Instead, they were all watching a movie together.  They were at-ease and completely under control. 

I was greatly relieved but could hardly believe how unnecessary all my worrying, anxiousness and preparing had been.  I had every reason to trust my husband’s ability, which I do, but nevertheless my desire to be needed and to intervene caused my trust to seem faltering.

It didn’t take long for my Heavenly Father to open my eyes to see my heart reflected in this momentary scene of another day in parenting.  God has never given me any reason to not fully trust in His ability to work for my good, to come through, to amaze me…in fact He’s gone above and beyond to reveal Himself in God-size ways just how much I can trust Him.  Yet I falter. 

We tend to pick up the pieces and try to figure out the puzzle in our own way, create our own picture, do it ourselves.  We rush ahead and insist on intervening with our own help when our Father is completely under control, unphased by the circumstances that tempt to distract us.   How often do we take the part we are to do, think it may not be enough and from that point try to make it more elaborate and complex, more seemingly necessary to building the Kingdom? 

In Mark 4:35-40 Jesus asks his disciples to get in the boat to cross to the other side.  Without question they obediently follow but when the storm hits and waves break over the boat they panic.  They wake Jesus and accuse him of not caring if they drown, they allow a momentary trouble to distract them from their destination. 

“Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, make your requests known to God.  And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.”  Philippians 4:6-7

His Word makes it clear that we are not to worry or be anxious about anything.  We need to trust Him fully, knowing that our purpose and our position not only matter but make an eternal difference in the Kingdom of God.  It’s not up to our limited opinion to decide what needs to be done or how we should do it.  It’s up to our minds made up to follow God’s lead and be alert to the work of God surrounding us as we invest ourselves in His plan. 

So for the heart that feels like the “ginger-ale picker upper” in the Kingdom: Your part matters.

It may seem insignificant, unnoticed and unseen but it’s what the Father has asked and called you to do.  God doesn’t call you to busy you or keep you occupied until Kingdom come. He calls you in order to equip you to bring the Kingdom here to earth.  

God doesn’t need us to fulfill His plan, He wants us to be a part of His Story and to help lead others Home.  God desires for us to partner with Him and He will never turn away from a heart crying out to Him and for the soul pleading to be used by Him.  So don’t count yourself out, because when you feel purposeless you need to know that is a lie from the enemy who is out to destroy you.  You are loved by a God who created you on purpose, for a purpose and positioned you to live a life that impacts eternity.  Take care of the people and the things He has given you to care for today; love those He has surrounded you with in this moment; use your gifts, talents and abilities to bring glory to His Name; be present, be alert to His moving and follow His lead. 

 “Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain.”  1 Corinthians 15:58

The Changing Table

It wasn’t planned and the decision wasn’t extraordinary, it was just a typical day and a realization that it was finally time.  Months ago we talked about how the day would soon come, we anticipated it and came real close to going through with it but it just wasn’t time and deep down inside my mama heart I didn’t want to rush it.  Life caught up with us, our attention was consumed with big boy undies, dashes to the potty and over-exuberant cheers of victory.  In the midst of it all, the changing table stayed right where it has been for three years – taking up much of the one bathroom that five of us share, holding washcloths, wipes and whatever anyone decided to throw on it. 

But one day, I knew it was time and that we didn’t need it anymore. 

The moving of the changing table came as a great relief until I began to scrub the wall behind it.  In that moment, in a pile of dust and random objects, the memories came flooding.  I remembered the moment it was given to us and how I imagined all the sweet-smelling babies it would hold.  With each swelling of my belly, I would anxiously, tediously set things in place upon it in preparation of their lives filling our own.  It was there through the late nights and long days, the dirtiest of messes and the added-up hours of leaning in close to smell soft skin.  It was where our babies would coo and squirm as we’d “ooo and awe.”  As they grew they would crawl up to the top to get a little closer as they’d tell us stories.   They’d stand on top to admire haircuts and wait for kisses. 

So much life and love had happened surrounding the changing table.  I sat down on a stool, looking around at a bathroom now completely undone in the process of change and in that moment joy and sorrow abided.  As my mama heart went through snapshots and years gone by, the gentle whisper came that this really is going to be alright, that better things are ahead and life requires adjusting from time to time.  God was using this picture of a parenthood milestone to give me a glimpse at the transition He’s asking us to make in our lives. 

Parenting is a thing I could understand from my human perspective.  Our children are growing and in that there is out-growing of things they once needed, things we depended on to care for them and raise them.  Many memories were made in those years of raising babies but much is to be anticipated as we transition out of the baby-phase of parenting.  Even as my heart aches at those days becoming only memories, I am rejoicing at the beauty of my children growing strong and the changing roles we take on as parents as they do. 

For months, God has been working in our hearts to trust Him beyond a perspective we can understand.  He was asking us to let go of things that we once depended on and in ways needed, places where there was certainly life and love surrounding, but places that were now in the way.  There’s an eternal perspective that we can’t quite grasp due to our humanness, a perspective that requires faith and trust in a God who knows our hearts and everything that we need. 

This day on a bathroom floor, in the midst of undoing I saw my heart.  A heart that has allowed God to mold and shape, to move out big things to make more room for Him, to rearrange and shift but also one that can get anxious in the process.  A heart that at times can slam to door shut and scream “WAIT! Are you sure?” as though God is anything other than sure. 

How silly it would have been for me to get up from that stool, get the changing table and place it back claiming I wasn’t ready for my children to outgrow it and that I liked the way it restricted our space.  What would I have looked like if I took all the things set aside to throw away and put them back, let the dust cling fast to the wall and slumped down in pride that I got it all back where it once was?  Instead I rose up from the stool and continued forward.  I cleaned.  I purged.  I made room.  Not only in our bathroom but in my heart. I decided that my small steps of considering when the day would come were no longer enough.

  “A child of God is never out of the notice of God” – Pastor Tom Sprowls, Jr.

“Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past.  See, I am doing a new thing!”  Isaiah 43:19

It is time.  Time to let go of the old, to allow memories to be enough and to open our hearts to changing.  Although we may not fully understand and it may look like an upheaval of a mess, it’s time to trust that there is freedom because of the process.   It is time to have confidence in a Father who will meet our every need as we adjust our lives to what He’s calling us to.  Time to believe that the same God who spoke creation into existence is creating another chapter of our story. 

There comes a time in all our lives when we can choose to stay in what we know or embrace the unknown where God calls.  A place that requires adjusting and changing, possibly unknown to us but certainly known to Him.  A place that is good, wholesome and revives the soul.  

And without planning and no extraordinary measures, you somehow just know it is time.

“My help comes from the LORD, the Maker of heaven and earth.”  Psalm 121:2

"She wasn't born for greatness, she didn't go to school for it, she just learned that sometimes God has a plan so big only He can see it and all she had to do was believe.. yep, she was just a regular kid, just like you.”

-Veggie Tales

The kids were watching this movie as I was finishing writing and this was what I heard in the background.  That may just be extraordinary...