It’s amazing how little we know about our parents growing
up. I mean they are raising us. It’s
(hopefully) not like they are those distant aunts or uncles that live in, like,
Delaware and randomly send you stamps or something. (Why would they send
stamps? Who knows? That’s why you keep your distance).
I’ve known my mother, Bamber, for my entire life, but not
really as a person. For most of my life, she has only been defined as my mother
– i.e. the Giver of Life, Food Provider, Bank System, Home. She hasn’t really
been a person. She hasn’t been herself. An individual. A person who had a life
before me or besides me and my siblings. She was always just My Mom. However,
she is so much more than that. She has a life besides mothering the three of us
and wifering Joshua or doing chemistry for the government (thanks, Obama). She
had a life before me that kept on going; I just only saw the part literally
right in front of me.
My mother has a story, and it’s a great one. She has hopes
and dreams that go beyond raising me (gasp) and, here’s a curve ball, she’s
still learning. Today, she drove me two hours to the train station. We talked
about all sorts of things: God, friends, life, sin, traffic safety, etc. The
older I get, it’s like the more she shares with me, which makes sense. It’s
also a blessing, a huge mega super one.
My mother is an amazing woman; my mommy is pretty
spectacular.
There’s so many reasons as to why this is true, and I would
love to brag about how she raised me and worked so hard and sacrificed and
believed and learned, but that’s for another time. Instead, I just wanted to
share a little tiny bit of our conversation via van. Two parts, actually,
because I think they are both really cool/helpful/hopeful. They have to do with
God, like most of my blog posts seem to have been lately (thanks, Christian
Private School. Just kidding. God’s just doing stuff - doing His thang and
whatnot - which is always nice . . . and always a thang).
So you know how you can know
something but not really believe
it? Like I can know what the derivative is but not really believe in its
existence until I can properly find it using triangle symbols and sheer dumb
luck. That was an awful example, just like Calculus.
But, do you know what I’m saying? I can turn eighteen and
know that I’m a legal adult but not really believe it until months of living on
my own/paying my own bills/voting/getting married/winning the lottery/going to
big people jail. Or, in the case of our conversation, I can grow up knowing
that I am loved by God, but not really believing
it for eighteen years.
You’d think I would know. The first song I ever learned was
probably “Jesus Loves Me.” I even learned it in Sign Language. The idea that
God loves me was hammered into my brain at Sunday school and at church, but I
didn’t truly believe it until my freshman year of college, three years after becoming
a Christian, eighteen years of being alive.
God chose to reveal His love for me at a time when I really
needed it and in a way that it just changed my life.
At church we grow up learning and being taught about God’s
character, but it is only when He reveals it to us in little bits and pieces
that we can truly know it and have it mean something bigger than just something
handed to us. He gives it to us so we can make it our own and fall into a
deeper love with Him and make it our own.
Idk, I just thought that was pretty dang cool. So did
Bamber.
The other thing Bamber and I talked about that I
wanted/needed to write down had to do with our “Thing.” We started talking
about how, as we grow older, we can start to see just where our weak area is:
our really deep sin struggle. (I’m totally making up these terms on the fly, so
bear with me). I mean, we all sin TONS every single day and we break every
single commandment probably every day, too. However, I think God does give us
each our own unique struggle in a specific area. I also believe it is for a
reason.
Really quick examples. One is a man who seems like one of
those stereotypical Great Christians (you know whom I’m talking about. You also
know, truly, that there are no such things. We are all hopeless sinners, made
beautiful by a King humbled to die on a cross). He is a leader and super nice
and, like, the perfect grandpa, but he struggles loving people. What? How can
he struggle loving people; he’s supposed to be perfect? Or it’s a dad who gives
up everything for his family but struggles with anger. It’s the mother who
raises her kids to love Jesus but questions if she’s saved or not.
We all have something. Mine is definitely control. I have to
be in control. Of myself, of my body, of my time, of my life. It’s a sin. It’s
been the struggle of my heart for so very long.
As we grow older, we can see them in others and in ourselves
more and more so.
Bamber also pointed out that these things are not something
that we just chose to have or get.
God puts circumstances in our lives or plans our stories in a way that makes
these challenges develop. Like the dad whose dad was always angry and that’s
all he ever knew so he grew up like that, too. Or the grandpa hurt by the
people he loved and has trouble loving anyone else deeply and genuinely ever
again.
It’s not like we are given these struggles as a punishment
or are randomly overcome by them; they were developed by our worlds, over years
of living and being human and living in a sinful world.
They are part of a Plan.
A glorious, glorious Plan that we are a part of. And that
gives so much hope, I think. God knew what they would be; He knows every
circumstance. He also gives us the power to overcome. He gives us bits and
pieces of His character to guide us, even when we might not be seeking after
Him. He gives us Himself in little spoonfulls at a pace we can’t control. He
gives us it at the right time to make it matter.
He gives us moms, like Bamber, who, after years of living,
are still learning who He is and, loving fiercely, blindly hoping, and willing
to admit they struggle.
I just think it’s all really cool.
Lord, You are good. So, so very good.
And, Bamber, I’m so thankful God gave me you.
