What We've Left Behind

It’s quiet in my house.


This rarely happens. Right now it is because of the extreme good will of a man who knows me better than I know myself, a man who looked at me last night and said, “I’m taking the kids out tomorrow and you’re staying here.”


So at the end of a blur of a week, my three kids and my husband and my mother-in-law are sitting in a canoe on a lake while I am just sitting.


Two of my babies had birthdays this week and I am not that old, surely not old enough to have been a mother for a decade, surely not old enough to have moved completely past the “four years and under” stage.


As far as Wednesday I still had a nine year old and a four year old as my bookends. But at the end of the week I find myself wondering, what have we left behind?


On Thursday the sweet girl who first made me a mom left behind the single digits. Soon I think she’s going to leave me behind as her head is now up to my ear. On Friday my favorite little boy left behind the “preschool” years, and I tell him every time I pick him up that I’m not going to be able to this much longer and soon he’s going to have to pick me up instead. We have left behind the days of potty training (praisethelord) and squeezable applesauce packets. I don’t have to dress anyone or bathe anyone (praisethelordagain), and even the expectation of feeling a little hand in mine as we walk is not a given anymore.


Yes, time seems to be gaining speed. I’ve always heard “the days are long but the years are short” and I always knew it was true, but it seemed like a cruel trick. Yes, I am aware that these moments are fleeting but I am powerless to make them slow down, and now my children range from ten years old to five years old and I feel the weight of that.


But even as I thought about what we have left behind, what we are leaving behind each time the sun sets, my gaze and my breath are caught by the sunrise. Instead of being afraid and trying so desperately to hold on to what time seems to steal away so quickly, maybe what is ahead is even better.


Double digits may leave behind the simplicity of childhood, but they hold the promise of deep conversations and the earliest seeds of shifting from mother/daughter to friends. Five may look so much bigger than four but it opens the door for greater adventures and discoveries. In early seasons we focus on knowledge but as we press forward, knowledge becomes understanding and understanding becomes wisdom. We plant seeds of faithfulness and character and hope, and as time flies by we are beginning to uncover the fruit.


Rather than weep over what we leave behind, I’d like to “laugh at the days to come.” Because as surely as His mercies have been enough for ten and seven and five years, I know that when the sun sets tonight and rises again tomorrow, His mercies will still be enough.

The Not Fair Day, and How You Are Known

At 9:14 this morning you missed three words on your spelling test, and from there the day was over.

Also, the guitar case pinched your finger. You fell on your head while trying to do a back walkover. The cereal box was empty. You accidently kicked your sister completely off the couch and had to have all couch-sitting privileges removed for the morning. And at least 18 arguments erupted in which you were involved but that were most definitely not your fault at all.

It’s really just not a fair day.

I know you – not completely and not perfectly, but better I think than you know yourself. I know that you light up the room, that you want more than anything in the world to be helpful, that you have the most contagious laugh, and that you feel things more deeply than perhaps people would imagine. I know that it bothers you to death when the picture you drew doesn’t measure up to your expectations, or when someone doesn’t want your help, or when you miss three words on your spelling test.

Being known doesn’t change the not-fairness of this day. But it might just be better.

For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known.

Though I wish I could tell you differently, not fair days will continue to happen. They’ll just move from seven-year-old concerns to thirty-six-year-old worries. They’ll be full of mistakes of your own making and things that are completely outside of your control. I know because I face them too. And sometimes I understand why things are the way the are, and more often I don’t. It feels like I’m looking through a foggy window. One day all of the questions will be answered, and loose ends will be tied up and the tapestry will be complete. One day it will all make glorious sense.

But today.

On this very not fair day, while the glass is still foggy and the mirror is still dim, we are fully known.

You in your meltdown and I in my inner turmoil are fully known…accurately, intimately, lovingly known.

Formed by the Creator

Recognized by the Shepherd

Acknowledged by the King

Understood by the Savior

And though we may not have answers or closure or understanding yet, we can be assured that there is One who sees, who cares, who knows.

When I tell you that I love you, you always tell me that you love me more, and I always say that’s not possible because I’m so much bigger than you. Maybe, even and especially on the not fair days, we can both learn to rest in the love that is bigger than us all.