Confession: What I’m about to say is going to sound an awful lot like self pity. But I’m going to take a moment and speak some personal truth.
Sometimes, in moments of exasperation and exhaustion, I fantasize about what it must be like to live a “normal life”. To have children with two, involved, living parents. To have a calendar filled with piano lessons, school dances and track meets instead of visits to specialists, therapists and hospitals. To have a phone ring, and it be someone other than the school nurse or autism support room teacher reporting on the latest issue. To explore colleges with your kids, and focus on available majors and activities and location rather than availability of quality food that won’t poison them.
I’ll confess, that sometimes I’m tempted to resent the life and story line that God has given me and my kids.
But there’s a verse in Ephesians which keeps rearing its head. It tugs at my brain, grabs me by my spirit, and pulls me out of this self pity pit and resentment spiral.
“For we are God’s handiwork, His masterpiece, His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.”
Since my earliest days of Sunday School, I’ve heard about God the Creator. That I am “fearfully and wonderfully made” and “created in His image”. So for the longest time, I would look at that verse in Ephesians through the lens that I’ve been designed with certain physical capabilities, talents and skills that God has given me to do good things in this world.
But in the face of my resentment, this verse has been making me dig further lately to consider that the way God has designed me goes beyond my genetic makeup and resume. That His creative work in me is ongoing as he carves experiences into me through the very life story line I sometimes resent. What if those moments of discomfort, pain, sorrow...the non-normal living that occupies space in my story...what if that’s where his handiwork, his mastery, his workmanship really shine?
And what if the result is a specially designed, one-of-a-kind, perfect instrument custom-built to do a specific, targeted, unique work in this world, as no one else could?
It stops me in my tracks to think that when it comes to completing the good works God has prepared for us, the most powerful and effective tools we bear could actually be those painful experiences and deepest hurts we endure. That the very best chances I have to make a difference in someone’s life, in my community, in my world are made possible by the qualifications I’ve received through these most difficult points in my story line.
When I consider the experiences and circumstances God has chosen to weave into my life, I can see I am custom-built for laser-focused empathy, comfort and encouragement for the person who has to
Sometimes, in moments of exasperation and exhaustion, I fantasize about what it must be like to live a “normal life”. To have children with two, involved, living parents. To have a calendar filled with piano lessons, school dances and track meets instead of visits to specialists, therapists and hospitals. To have a phone ring, and it be someone other than the school nurse or autism support room teacher reporting on the latest issue. To explore colleges with your kids, and focus on available majors and activities and location rather than availability of quality food that won’t poison them.
I’ll confess, that sometimes I’m tempted to resent the life and story line that God has given me and my kids.
But there’s a verse in Ephesians which keeps rearing its head. It tugs at my brain, grabs me by my spirit, and pulls me out of this self pity pit and resentment spiral.
“For we are God’s handiwork, His masterpiece, His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.”
Since my earliest days of Sunday School, I’ve heard about God the Creator. That I am “fearfully and wonderfully made” and “created in His image”. So for the longest time, I would look at that verse in Ephesians through the lens that I’ve been designed with certain physical capabilities, talents and skills that God has given me to do good things in this world.
But in the face of my resentment, this verse has been making me dig further lately to consider that the way God has designed me goes beyond my genetic makeup and resume. That His creative work in me is ongoing as he carves experiences into me through the very life story line I sometimes resent. What if those moments of discomfort, pain, sorrow...the non-normal living that occupies space in my story...what if that’s where his handiwork, his mastery, his workmanship really shine?
And what if the result is a specially designed, one-of-a-kind, perfect instrument custom-built to do a specific, targeted, unique work in this world, as no one else could?
It stops me in my tracks to think that when it comes to completing the good works God has prepared for us, the most powerful and effective tools we bear could actually be those painful experiences and deepest hurts we endure. That the very best chances I have to make a difference in someone’s life, in my community, in my world are made possible by the qualifications I’ve received through these most difficult points in my story line.
When I consider the experiences and circumstances God has chosen to weave into my life, I can see I am custom-built for laser-focused empathy, comfort and encouragement for the person who has to
- Write an obituary for a parent.
- Process the news that someone she loves took his life.
- Attend a 50th anniversary party weeks after signing divorce papers, fully cognizant that she will never have such a celebration.
- Sit in an IEP meeting by herself, hoping desperately that the eyes of others in the room will open so they can truly see that her child is so much more than a diagnosis.
- Press for one more blood test for a child, because gut instinct and incessant googling won’t let her drop this suspicion that something’s wrong.
- Face a spouse who tells her he’d be happier without her.
But I am going to try like crazy to trust that they make me more complete and perfect to do the work God’s prepared for me. And I'm going to trust that my kids, because of their specially crafted story lines, are going to be super-powerful, custom-built instruments to complete the works God has for them as well.
It is my prayer that the experiences of our deepest hurts are not wasted. That they are redeemed and made useful in bringing real, authentic, laser-focused comfort to others.
Because that’s a good work that is worth it.
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