O
Ophelia23
Guest
I have spent the past two hours with my 8 month old in my arms. She has been screaming, crying and wriggling for these two hours. I know that this is not usual for her. I know that something is wrong–most likely that she is overtired and is fighting sleep. At the two-hour point is where I found my breaking point and I just got my husband to leave his game and take the baby. I have never reached this point before where I felt like I needed–needed–to walk away. Now I can hear them in the other room… and now that my mind is having a chance to clear and to calm down, my only thought is: I am so inadequate.
I can’t help but think of Christ’s suffering and what He so willingly endured because of His love for us. Then I look at myself. Listen, I know as a mom that a crying baby is just about the worst sound to our ears. Add the fact that baby’s fingernails are little daggers of wrath, and her usually sweet little hands were balls of fury seemingly directed toward me, and you have a pretty unpleasant experience. Now, I can rock hours and hours with a fussy baby or a sleepy baby or a sleeping baby. But for a screaming, crying baby–a baby who really needs me–my breaking point was 2 hours. 2 hours before I needed intervention.
When I look at the cross and remind myself that Christ died for me, that He thought of me, I feel ashamed at my frustrations and angers and grievances because in the shadow of the cross they are so unimaginably small. But in the quiet of the nursery in the middle of the night, or in the hallway while trying to get everybody’s coats zipped on the way out the door, or before dinner when everybody is in meltdown and I just want a moment to sit, or in the evening when I have walked a little one back to her bed for the 4th time–during these times, they feel so big! Perspective is so much easier to have when your surroundings are quiet and you have a moment to breathe and think. But in the midst of the anxieties of daily life, perspective can be a difficult thing to have.
In Christ’s ever beautiful paradoxical way, the shadow of His cross sheds light in all of our darkness. Let us sit in that shadow of light. Dwell in it. Swim in it. Look to it when we are feeling overwhelmed. And, for crying out loud, don’t wait until your breaking point to ask for a little bit of help from time to time.
I can’t help but think of Christ’s suffering and what He so willingly endured because of His love for us. Then I look at myself. Listen, I know as a mom that a crying baby is just about the worst sound to our ears. Add the fact that baby’s fingernails are little daggers of wrath, and her usually sweet little hands were balls of fury seemingly directed toward me, and you have a pretty unpleasant experience. Now, I can rock hours and hours with a fussy baby or a sleepy baby or a sleeping baby. But for a screaming, crying baby–a baby who really needs me–my breaking point was 2 hours. 2 hours before I needed intervention.
When I look at the cross and remind myself that Christ died for me, that He thought of me, I feel ashamed at my frustrations and angers and grievances because in the shadow of the cross they are so unimaginably small. But in the quiet of the nursery in the middle of the night, or in the hallway while trying to get everybody’s coats zipped on the way out the door, or before dinner when everybody is in meltdown and I just want a moment to sit, or in the evening when I have walked a little one back to her bed for the 4th time–during these times, they feel so big! Perspective is so much easier to have when your surroundings are quiet and you have a moment to breathe and think. But in the midst of the anxieties of daily life, perspective can be a difficult thing to have.
In Christ’s ever beautiful paradoxical way, the shadow of His cross sheds light in all of our darkness. Let us sit in that shadow of light. Dwell in it. Swim in it. Look to it when we are feeling overwhelmed. And, for crying out loud, don’t wait until your breaking point to ask for a little bit of help from time to time.
I’m sure you knew that, but as I wrote, it really hit me yesterday that our children need His salvation too–and He died for them too.