Lost

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We walk with angel armies. Think about that for a minute. What does it mean to you?

I’ve been thinking about that a lot over the past three weeks as my family has been throw head-first into turbulent waters. Helpless, unprepared into murky waves with a wicked undertow.

My child was hospitalized for a week. I don’t know that I had a bigger fear than that before this month. The care of my child was in others’ hands because I don’t have the expertise needed. Back and forth each day to the hospital, bouncing between work, my parents’ house and home, I started to lose track of the hours.  Eating meals at wacky times, emailing updates late at night. Waiting long days in the hospital, at my desk, in my car, I felt lost. Caught in the turbulence. Lost in a battle I didn’t know how to fight.

Mid-way through that hospital week, I answered my front door, car keys already in hand ready to drive to the hospital to be with my child, and there is a man canvassing from one of the neighborhood churches.

“Can we pray for you, ma’am”

A medic for my broken heart.

Emails come in from family with assurances of prayers and love.

Balm for my wounded heart.

Breakfast is passed into my hands by a hospital volunteer.

Food for me; for the body that carries me through.

With great love, others cared for me. These works of mercy made that time bearable as I waited for my child to be discharged; waited to be home.  After that week, I am more keenly aware that my heart longs for home; and God is “Home”.  God is Love. God is Mercy. In my lexicon, God is Home.

But, oh, my heart aches for God, when life gets HARD like it did that week, and works of mercy alone are not enough to comfort me.  Especially when the doubts seep in and the fear takes holds.  That is when I am reminded that we walk with angel armies.

What do I mean by that exactly?  I don’t know a whole lot about what theologians say about angels, but my little Sunday school child’s heart knows this:  Angels serve God. They’re guardians and sometimes, messengers from God. They fight in battles when necessary.  That sliver of knowledge about angels points me back to who God is.

God, Who-is-Love,  God, Who-is-Mercy, is also God, Who-defends-and-protects.  And in that knowledge, there is no more room for doubts or fear.  No matter how lost I feel or how turbulent life gets,

God’s got my back.  And legions of angels at His command, if necessary.  So, I turn to God, Who-is-Home, and I am not lost anymore. I can see Home from here.

Trust In The Lord

You never know how prepared you are for a crisis until you’re in the middle of one.   We had a family crisis earlier this month, involving one of my children.  That child is doing better now and getting all the right care, but your prayers would be much appreciated. Had you asked me a month ago, if I was prepared to deal with a crisis like this, I would have laughed at you, at myself.  No way did I think I was prepared.  Yet, we go through it. As a family.  With Grace.

As my shock has subsided, it gave way to the anger and grief that comes when life is irreversibly changed.  It’s one of those parenting moments I fear will be marked as before and after.  As I took him from doctor, to hospital; consulted with counselors, cried with family, begged in prayer, the common refrain was “You’ve done all the right things.”  It took a while for those words to sink it… when it felt like there should be something more I could do.  Now that they have taken root, my heart moves with a grace-filled peace.

“You’ve done all the right things,” my heart echoes, “trust in the Lord.”

I’ve struggled so much in the past year to trust in the Lord.  As I started a new career, job searched, changed jobs, planned vacations, planned menus on a budget, washed countless dishes… from the big to the small, I struggled to trust in the Lord.  And, yet, when it was my child in crisis, it was easy.

“Jesus, I trust in you.  Keep my child safe in your loving hands.”

If only I could place myself in God’s hands, the way I placed my child.

God loves me like I love my children, only with a more perfect love.  A love that doesn’t get tired or irritable, or impatient, or doubt itself like I so often do as a mother.

God holds me as I cry, like I held my child.  God holds me closer when I’m angry, doubtful, sinful, bitter; like I held my child close through tantrums to keep him safe.  I know all this.  I have experienced this awe-inspiring unconditional love of God and I still doubt.

At one point, my child said quietly after a tantrum, “What have I done.” Then turned to me, “I’m sorry mom.”  Tears filled my child’s eyes. “I’m so glad that you’re my mom.”  It felt like there was not enough love in me in that moment to tell my child how proud I am to be his mom.  As my child took my hand, it was with total trust in my love for him.

As my child’s anxieties have eased over the past few weeks, he has been quietly slipping with his hand in mine when no one is watching.  He’s been “too big” to hold my hand for months, but something’s changed.  He knows it’s okay to grow up and still want to hold mom’s hand sometimes.

No matter how much I rage, doubt, sin, tantrum, want to run away, as I live my “grown up” life, I can always, always reach for the hand that loves me unconditionally.   The more often I tuck my heart in God’s hand, like my son tucks his hand in mine, the easier it becomes to trust in the Lord.  I trust in Him and I love Him.

“You’ve done all the right things. Trust in the Lord.”

Now a song and a prayer.  May God lead you also, to a “peace that is past understanding”:

Rosaries and Random I Love Yous

Enter Child, Stage Left.  “Mom…”

Mom: “Yes, honey…”

Child: (sighs happily) “I love you.”

Child grabs mom around the legs in a hug.

Chaos ensues.  The frying pan on the stove starts spattering grease.  A cup on the counter gets knocked over.  Milk goes cascading down the cupboard door and seeks out the low spot in front of the fridge.  Child 2 enters kitchen, stands in milk, opens fridge, closes fridge without taking anything out.  Child 2 sees Child 1 embracing mom and joins in.

I call these moments “Random I love Yous.”

I survive parenting because I pray rosaries…lots of rosaries.  Usually in bite-size pieces, like the chocolate hidden in the cupboard.

A decade at a time is all I can manage these days, of what was once my favorite and default way to pray.

Praying a rosary is like being wrapped in the arms of family while I pray.  It’s different than prayers from servant to Lord, which are good too, and have their own time and place.  But with a rosary, it’s like sitting at the family table, sharing stories, after a filling meal.  And my life is very full right now.

Full of laundry and messy floors.  Sticky fingers and “What’s that in your hair?” School drop-offs and workdays and weekend plans.  Groceries, meal planning and vegetable peelings stuck to the inside of the garbage can.

The time to slow down and contemplate the stories, the familiar stories, is a refuge in the chaos.  Remember the time when Jesus got left behind in Jerusalem.  Or the day Jesus was baptized.  Remember that trip to see Elizabeth…oh, the things we women do when we’re pregnant!  What a wedding that was in Cana!  Or that day on the mountain, with your friends Lord, just wow!

Because our lives are made up of stories.  The best ones are told over and over again.  In knowing the stories, in contemplating them I’m reminded of Christ’s humanity and God seems less far away.

The glory of God can seem so abstract, remote, dissimilar when juxtaposed to my messy life.  That’s often when the doubts creep in.  Are you really here God?  Do you care about the tiny details of my life, the worries, the little stuff? Why care about me?

He cares about me because I’m part of His story.  The amazing story God is writing through the artistry o creation.  The story wouldn’t be the same story without me.  Supporting role or footnote, I’m written in and won’t be erased.  God is the author and storyteller extraordinaire.  Love is the hero.

When contemplating the mysteries of the Rosary, l try to listen with my heart for the “I love yous.”  The little memories, the snippets of stories that resonate with what I am struggling with in that very moment.  What drove me to prayer is answered with an echo of a story from Jesus’ life, and the moral of the story is always the same, “I love you.”

And a song: