After 15
years of mothering, I am learning that I am not the author of my family's
story. I always assumed that if I
married a faithful husband and poured my heart into catechizing,
classically-educating, and caring for my children, God would inspire this beautiful
saga of mine and each chapter of my life would neatly unfold into my magnum
opus.
If this were
my story to write, the first thing I'd change is its setting. Some days I'm tempted to hang Spurgeon's quote
in our entryway which says "He who has fixed
the bounds of our habitation, has also fixed the bounds of our
tribulation" just
to remind myself that there is a limit to what can go wrong in a
single house. This home, with its
underwater mortgage, has needed countless repairs from the foundation up. Between the broken plumbing and furnace,
failing appliances, rotting siding and floors, sagging roof, sinking deck, and
aging septic, we've been scrambling to stay afloat. If I had things my way, I'd swap this place
for a more spacious and manageable home. Our basement would
not flood, our oven would never burst into flames, and there would certainly be
two bathrooms.
Next I'd go
back to the most recent chapters of my story and do some serious editing. I'd start with last fall when my beautiful,
athletic daughter was diagnosed with advanced scoliosis. I'd erase those weeks of intense pain,
emotional turmoil, and the rods and scars she'll carry forever.
The conflicts
with my children, when I see the ugliness of my own heart mirrored in angry
faces and words, would be replaced with a theme of undisturbed grace and tranquility. I would be the Proverbial "fruitful
vine" and my little ones the olive shoots around our family dinner table,
rather than the frantic mother handing out paper plates to kids whose daddy has
to work so much overtime.
Most of all, the characters I miss so
intensely would be restored. I'd go back
to last spring when I found out the baby I was carrying had died. I'd erase the memory of my husband's face
when he saw the ultrasound screen - that look of pain, exhaustion and
helplessness I recognized from my other miscarriages. I would tear out every night I've cried
myself to sleep and the gnawing, lonely ache I wake up with each morning.
Last week I read the story of
Lazarus's death with fresh eyes. I
wanted to understand what it was that evoked Christ's unguarded display of
human sadness. He had just finished
talking with Martha who followed up her practical observation that Jesus could
have healed her brother with unwavering confidence that He would redeem what had been lost and carry out
the eternal purposes of God. Then Jesus
moved on to Mary whose overwhelming grief was echoed in her sister's words, "Lord
if you had been here, my brother would not have died…" Yet her words just hung there, and her faith was
choked with bitter and hopeless tears.
It was Mary's agony that moved Jesus, the Resurrection and the Life, to put His most glorious miracle on hold long
enough to weep with her.
Like Mary, I have wrestled with
the knowledge that this story could have turned out differently and with the haunting
suspicion that I might have been abandoned during my greatest time of
need. Jesus, is it true that, your love for me passes knowledge and exceeds
all dimensions, that you are full of sympathy, and pity me in my
infirmities. In my injuries, do the
blows go to your heart, and do you truly bleed in my wounds? (Watson). Did your eyes see the unformed substance of this
child whose life ended so abruptly in my womb, and did you write his story before
the beginning of time (Psalm 139:16)? ). Have you truly numbered the hairs of my
head, known every throb of my brow, each hardly drawn breath, each shoot of
pain…each sinking of the aching heart? (E.B. Pussey). Are you keeping count of my tossings, putting
my tears in your bottle? Are they in
your book? (Psalm 56:8).
When I take
the time to narrate pieces of my family's story, I marvel at the creativity of
the Divine Author. In retrospect, I can appreciate
the humor He weaves into scenes I couldn't have crafted in my wildest
imagination. Like this past winter when my
bedraggled four year old, dressed in a ratty princess gown, dared to interrupt
my work out on the treadmill. When I
ignored her exclamations and gestures, she resorted to drawing pictures in our frosted,
moldy windows. She etched a remarkable
likeness of the brother who had just been duct-taped by his older sister into a
straight jacket and of the screaming toddler who had left a trail of math
manipulatives through the kitchen…
When I am
struggling with discouragement, I bring to mind the tender scenes that followed
up the very challenges I would have left out of my life story. Shortly after my
miscarriage, I was snuggling my toddler, Brandan. He studied my face for a few seconds,
tenderly wiped away my tears, and said, "No more water, Mama." I think of the evening when my teenage son
told me how much he'd miss sharing his crowded bedroom with three brothers, a
gecko, and a fish if we ever moved to a bigger house. And I remember the Mother's Day when my nine
year old gave me all of his birthday money so I could go on a date with his
daddy.
During one
of the most dismal evenings of our parenting, when Siobhan's physical and
emotional anguish threatened to overwhelm us, there was a knock on our bedroom
door. Eyes brimming with tears, Siobhan
handed me a piece of paper with these words, "Mom, I
needed to have my security, health, and self-confidence taken from me. I thought I was strong, but God showed me how
weak I really was. I thought I was able
to take care of myself, but God gently laid me down in a hospital bed, unable
to perform even the most basic life functions.
I thought I had a secure trust in God, but God showed me how unstable my
faith was. He took away, and then He
gave me back so much more. Yes, what He
gave me came with pain, but it also came with the ability to go through that
pain through hope and faith in Him."
As a
mother whose heart is tightly intertwined with those of my children, I have
learned through painful severing that I must entrust my family's future to the
tender Father who has written each of our days in His book. Elizabeth Elliot observed that “God never withholds from His child that which His love and wisdom call
good," She went on to say, “While
it is perfectly true that some of my worst
fears did, in fact, materialize, I see them now as ‘an abyss and mass of
mercies,’ appointed and assigned by a loving and merciful Father who sees the
end [of our stories] from the beginning. He asks us to trust him.”
