Clean-Up on Aisle 12–Mom-breakdown in progress

May 12, 2014Leave a comment

I had a mom breakdown in the ice cream section of the grocery store.

A few weeks ago, we had been out all day in the sun and warmth and I had one of those moments when you feel like an extra-generous, extra-spontaneous, extra-sweet, just extra good mom.

I’ll treat them to ice cream, I thought.

But I wanted to be economical and efficient. Rather than sit and eat at an ice cream shop or run into the convenience store for individually and outrageously priced frozen goodies, we parked the minivan and headed into the grocery store.

I thought surely we could pick one box of ice cream bars to share.

But one child wanted Popsicles and one wanted Klondike Bars and one wanted Nestle Drumsticks…

No one wanted what anyone else wanted.

I have come to appreciate the power of majority rules, of democracy in action, of voting and sticking with the outcome of the family vote.

And I have also come to appreciate the power of the maternal dictatorship.

Either way, this is how it goes with my brood of three older children (the baby has yet to express an opinion on these matters).

What should we pack for our picnic lunch: hard-boiled eggs or sandwiches?

Egg. Egg. Sandwich.

What should we do to enjoy the day: go to the park or take your bikes out riding?

Bike. Bike. Park.

But what I realize after my mini-breakdown in the grocery store freezer section over our complete inability to ever just make things easy for once by being the same….

….is that easy and the same negates the complex and unique majesty of God’s creativity.

God is limitless in His capacity to design and form individuality.

And, oh how breathtaking the view when we see our kids as wonderfully unique.

This month, I’m drawing near to the presence of Christ and the heart of the Creator by dabbling in creativity myself.

I thought that meant glue sticks and fabric, a sewing machine, or recipes, or scissors and paper. But yesterday I celebrated Mother’s Day with my kids and thought what greater honor than this—God asks us to be part of the creating of life and the molding of character.

I may be a hot glue gun failure and hopelessly inept with all things “arts and crafts,” but God still invites me in as a mom to the creativity of parenting.

I see this quote from Mary Southerland in my Facebook feed the day before Mother’s Day and it rumbles inside my head all Sunday afternoon:

Motherhood requires great sacrifice and limitless energy, but to invest your time and beset efforts into a child, and to watch that child grow and develop is to be part of the creative majesty of life itself.

We moms can chatter away endlessly in checkout lines and in the waiting room at the ballet studio and on the sidelines of that soccer field all with this one conclusion: Each child is so different.

I have four little ones and it’s not just ice cream choice or lunch packing at issue. It takes all my mom-focus and mom-energy to know each of my babies, really know them, know those motivations and fears, those funny bones and those tender hearts, know the likes and dislikes.

And then just as I know them, they change. A new favorite color. An overcoming of a fear. A new worry. Now they need me. Now they don’t.

Every day as a mom is made new.

I must roll up my sleeves and dig my hands deep in the soil of their child-hearts—tending and weeding, pruning and feeding, watering and helping them, not just grow, but thrive and bloom in maturity and fruitfulness.

I must change and adapt. What worked for one child doesn’t work for another. What worked yesterday doesn’t work today.

This is no assembly line art. No paint-by-number or dot-to-dot project.

This requires masterful creativity of the highest form, without instructions or samples and with a million voices shouting at you to “do it this way because it’s the only right way.”

I’m not woman enough for that. I can’t even sew a simple project without ripping out stitches and starting anew. How can God trust me with these children?

But God doesn’t ask us to be perfect moms or perfect women.

Instead, He gives us this grace—the invitation to the creative journey of motherhood and the promise of His presence along the way.

And He gives us this mercy of fresh starts and short memories, of brand new days, of forgiving hugs and lay-it-all-out-there-honesty, of goodnight kisses and tiny hands, of godly examples and those who look back and say, “Way to go, Mom. Don’t give up. You are doing a great job.”

And He promises us the help we need:

The Lord is my strength and my shield;
my heart trusts in him, and he helps me.
My heart leaps for joy,
and with my song I praise him.
Psalm 28:7

To read more about this 12-month journey of pursuing the presence of Christ, you can follow the links below! Won’t you join me this month as I ‘Create Beauty’?

Heather King is a wife, mom, Bible Study teacher, writer and worship leader. Most importantly, she is a Christ follower with a desire to help others apply the Bible to everyday life with all its mess, noise, and busyness. Her book, Ask Me Anything, Lord: Opening Our Hearts to God’s Questions, is available now! To read more devotionals by Heather King, click here.

What I Saw When I Took the Time to See

April 30, 20142 Comments

This month I’ve learned some things are worth the stopping…

and the pausing….

and the braking and the breaking….

so I can worship the Beautiful One who made such beauty.

I read in the Our Daily Bread Devotional Bible about this botanical garden on the Canadian side of Niagara Falls and a plaque there:

“Enter, friends, and view God’s pleasant handiwork, the embroidery of earth.”

So He does embroider this beauty, His handiwork: Handmade, God-stitched, beloved creation that glorifies its Creator.

I have dropped my armload of worldly goods right on the ground to take a picture of a butterfly.

I have pulled my minivan over to snap a picture of the sunset.

I have walked with eyes wide open.

I have listened to the symphony and strolled through the gardens.

I have dug in the dirt of my own little plot.

And I have watched these butterflies emerge from the chrysalis and then fly free.

Have you been on this quest for beauty, too? And have you found what I have found?

For God is sheer beauty,
all-generous in love,
loyal always and ever
(Psalm 100:5 MSG).

And have You worshiped in response and isn’t worship the only response when You’re seeking His Presence and You see these glimpses of His beauty in the beauty He has made?

I sing:

You are all my heart longs for
The treasure and the hunger
I’ve tasted and I must have more
Of Your Presence, God

You call me deeper than before
I’m falling further into You God
You are just so beautiful
I love Your Presence, God
(Presence, by Kathryn Scott)

and I sing…

The fullness of Your grace is here with me
The richness of Your beauty’s all I see
The brightness of Your glory has arrived
In Your presence God I’m completely satisfied
(Divine Romance by Phil Wickham)

I posted these pictures all month long on my Facebook page as I took breaks for beauty. Did you miss them? You can follow my Facebook page here so you don’t miss out again!

To read more about this 12-month journey of pursuing the presence of Christ, you can follow the links below! Won’t you join me this month as I ‘Enjoy Beauty’?

What to do (and what not to do) when staring at a STOP sign for more than 5 minutes

April 16, 2014April 16, 20143 Comments

I complained about the road work.

Typically, I zip around this tiny town of mine, back and forth all day every day, transporting children. Pick this child up. Drop her off. Go back and get the other child. Drive her somewhere else. Return to the first location to pick up one child and deposit another.

This schedule has been meticulously planned out. I have charted the routes I travel, timed stoplights, and considered traffic flow.

We have exactly 12 minutes to drive from one place to another and it takes exactly 12 minutes to make that drive. No second to spare.

Then they decide to repave my main thoroughfare.

I sit for over five minutes staring at a man in an neon orange jacket holding a STOP sign. I start out cheerful. It’s a beautiful day. I enjoy the sun. I even feel spiritual and pray, “Thanks, God, for this lovely morning.”

I am proud of how well I’m handling the delay.

Then I start rifling through the papers on the seat next to me. I collect some of the trash that accumulates everywhere in a minivan when you have four kids.

Then I grow impatient. I start sighing and tapping my fingers on the steering wheel.

When that fails, I grit my teeth and talk to the hapless man still standing there with that sign that is halting all my progress for the day, “Come on!”

Eventually, he spins that sign around from STOP to SLOW and I am finally released to normal driving, which at this point means being stuck at a stoplight behind a long line of other cars with equally frustrated drivers for another 5 minutes.

I left my house 10 minutes early because of the construction and I’m still 5 minutes late. I’m flustered and bothered, annoyed, stressed.

So I whine to this woman, and she says to me, “That’s when I know it’s time to stop and BREATHE. God gives me these moments so I just listen to what He has to say for a bit.”

This month, in my 12-month pursuit of the presence of Christ, I’m taking breaks for beauty. I’m seeking out the beauty of the Lord by marveling at the beauty He creates.

And still I got it wrong. He gave me moments to rest in His presence, to enjoy the beauty of a spring day (from inside my minivan) and I fretted and fought instead.

In an hour, I will walk my four-year-old daughter, my baby girl, into a brick school filled with cheerful classrooms and hand over the papers to register her for kindergarten.

She is excited. Every 30 minutes this morning, she asks me if it’s time to go.

I am sad. I decide maybe we can just wait another 10 minutes. Could she just be my baby girl 10 minutes more? And then another 10?

Tomorrow I will place my 6-month-old son on a doctor’s scale and marvel at how he’s grown. I’ll probably come home all proud and tell my husband how big this baby boy is, how strong, how healthy.

But really my momma heart will mourn a little because six months never went by so fast.

So when God gives me 10 extra minutes in that minivan to stop, to rest, to breathe, to listen to His voice…surely I should relax into His presence. exodus33-14

This lesson chafes hard against my driven soul. God brings me here again and again and again.

Rest.

And I wrestle instead.

Funny how 10 minutes of inactivity can be more stressful to me than a whole day of rushing from task to task.

If I want to feel God’s presence in the going and the doing, I must willingly remain in His presence during the resting and the being.

God gave Moses this great task, leading a nation from slavery to promise, but He also gave this assurance:

The LORD replied, “My Presence will go with you, and I will give you rest” (Exodus 33:14 NIV)

The rest is in His presence whether that’s driving from place to place or idling in front of a STOP sign for 10 minutes.

The rest is there because His presence is there.

Today, let us enjoy the gift of time He gives, the gift of quiet moments and unexpected pauses, the blessing of His presence in the rushing and in the stillness, the beauty of His voice in the whisper and in the storm, the time with those we love because that time just rushes right along.

To read more about this 12-month journey of pursuing the presence of Christ, you can follow the links below! Won’t you join me this month as I ‘Enjoy Beauty’?

Five Simple Ways to Remember to Pray for Others

February 5, 2014February 6, 20142 Comments

“The first thing I want you to do is pray. Pray every way you know how, for everyone you know.”
1 Timothy 2:1 MSG

“I’ll pray for ya!”

That’s what we promise.

But do we really remember? When life crowds in, do we keep our promise to pray for surgeries, doctor’s appointments, marriages, infertility, job interviews, ministry events, concerns about children, or direction….not for ourselves, but for others?

Because truth be told, so often we’re selfish, attending to our own needs and forgetting the needs of others.

Or maybe we’re distracted. Far too busy. Simply forgetful.

We need, though, not just to say we’re going to pray, but to truly bow down at the throne of God and lift up our friends, family, and church members, interceding on their behalf.

Oswald Chambers wrote:

“Your part in intercessory prayer is not to agonize over how to intercede, but to use everyday circumstances and people God puts around you by His providence to bring them before His throne and to allow the Spirit in you the opportunity to intercede for them. In this way, God is going to touch the whole world with His saints.“

God does not appoint one person in a group to pray for everyone else or call one person to intercessory prayer and give everyone else a “Get Out of Prayer” card.

He invites all of us to His throne room on behalf of the people we meet in “everyday circumstances and people God puts around you by His providence.”

Perhaps God sent you through that particular line at the grocery store so you could meet and pray for your cashier.

Maybe the hairdresser who checks your name off the list and calls you back to the shampoo bowl was God-appointed so that you could pray for her.

That interruption in your day that sent you to the store unexpectedly may have been so that you could meet up with a friend from small group who needs prayer.

So then, how do you combat forgetfulness and busyness and self-centeredness and make praying for others a consistent reality rather than a broken promise?

Mark it on your calendar: Mingled among doctor’s appointments, ballet lessons, and cookouts, prayer requests dot my calendar. Surgery dates, job interviews, baby due dates, and court appearances are marked on the squares so that I will remember to pray on the very days necessary.
Pray right away: If someone calls me with a prayer request, I may very well pray right there on the phone. If not, I pray as soon as I hang up. I may be cutting onions, stirring pasta, washing dishes or folding clothes while I’m doing it, but I’m praying while it is fresh on my heart and mind. If I receive an email with a prayer request, I pray over it as I read and as soon as I’m finished.
Pray as you read Scripture: As I read, I ask God to reveal Scriptures that I can pray for those on my prayer list and He does. Right there in that moment, Bible in my hand, I pray for the person who has popped into my mind in association with that verse. ” God, place a new song in her heart” (Psalm 40). “God, fill her with the knowledge of Your will through all spiritual wisdom and understanding” (Colossians 1:9). Every time I open my Bible, I begin a conversation with God that often includes requests for others.
Stop, Drop and Pray: We’ve all had those moments when we’re running through our day and a friend appears in our thoughts for a moment. “I need to call her,” we might think. Or, “I need to remember to pray for her later.” I’ve learned to obey the prompting of the Holy Spirit and pray right then and there. I don’t need to wait until my quiet time to lift up a friend to God. I stop where I am, drop what I’m doing even if only for a few seconds, and pray—-before I forget and before urgent things distract me.
Post It: I’ve tried keeping a notebook of prayer requests before and it hasn’t worked for me. What I have done, though, is find ways to post the prayer requests so I see them all day and pray for them often. I have a prayer list for my kids on my refrigerator door. I’ve posted index cards around my desk with prayer requests for others. I have a prayer card in my Bible and another in my car.

Too often we try to confine prayer to specific times, meetings, sacred places and holy moments. But prayer can happen right here and now. As soon as the Holy Spirit nudges our heart, we can offer those prayers up to Him on behalf of others.

Originally posted as Pray for Us, Part II, 5/25/2011

Heather C. King – Room to Breathe

"He's solid rock under my feet, breathing room for my soul" Psalm 62:1-2 (MSG).

Tag: the presence of God

Clean-Up on Aisle 12–Mom-breakdown in progress

What I Saw When I Took the Time to See

I posted these pictures all month long on my Facebook page as I took breaks for beauty. Did you miss them? You can follow my Facebook page here so you don’t miss out again!

What to do (and what not to do) when staring at a STOP sign for more than 5 minutes

Five Simple Ways to Remember to Pray for Others

My devotional for today:

I posted these pictures all month long on my Facebook page as I took breaks for beauty. Did you miss them? You can follow my Facebook page here so you don’t miss out again!

My devotional for today:

My devotional for today:

My devotional for today: