(Because when you wake up at 5am with words heavy on your
heart, you shouldn’t waste it. Because laying there in bed wishing for sleep to
return isn’t going to make those words go away. Because some other people are lying
awake this morning with heavy hearts and your words might help them.)
This one is for my dear friends in the mama waiting zone.
Maybe there’s a guy out there who could benefit from this too, but I’m writing
for you girls. For those who this “Mother’s Day” feels a bit like Valentine’s
Day used to when we were single. Today, when breakfasts are balanced in beds and cards attempt to express unspeakable
feelings, and flowers are handed out, you are empty handed.
You read other words of sympathy and compassion for you, from
other mamas who spent a long time in that waiting zone and other mamas who have
babies they never got to hold or not hold long enough. And when the ever
brilliant Ann says, “Real Womanhood
isn’t a function of becoming a great mother, but of being loved by your Great
Father,” you nod and try to swallow away that lump in your throat, because
you know it’s true but you still feel that emptiness growing until it feels
like you just might burst.
I imagine what I have to say to you here being something like
what one character says to another at the climax of a movie, where truth is
told in words that they don’t really want to hear, but need to hear, and then
they can let go or grab on to something (or someone) to get their resolution.
So please hear this in love:
If today is hard for you because motherhood has become an
idol, it’s time to lay it down.
An idol is anything we set up to be bigger in our hearts
than God. Though it’s super hard to admit it, even good things can become
idols. Even that good, God-given thing of dreams, longings, desires of
motherhood, can become an idol. When the pain of the not-having becomes
stronger than the faith-act of thanksgiving for what you do have, you may have
an idol. When an ideal presented in edited, filtered digits by someone else
becomes more desirable than the breathing flesh directly in your reach, you may
have an idol.
I’m telling you sister, lay that idol down now. It only gets
heavier and stickier when it gets a face and a name. When you have that baby
and you get those cards and now you can really celebrate this day, if
motherhood is still an idol, you may not be able to smell the sweetness of
those flowers. Because what you have still won’t be good enough. In all
likelihood, you won’t feel good enough. The voices that said you were
incomplete before being a mom will start saying you could do more, be more. And when your kids get older and make their own choices, you might still hear that you weren't good enough. And Mother's Day still won't be a day of joy.
When I was in the waiting zone, more than one well-meaning,
loving person suggested I lay down the desire to become a mother. God knows, I
tried. Through altar calls and tear-soaked pillows, I tried to lay it down,
only to find it again the next day in a baby’s cry the aisle over or a news
report of yet another one hurt by someone who was supposed to take care of him
or her.
So that’s not what I’m telling you, to lay down your
desires. Maybe you need to do that, but what I’m pleading with you is to
consider where this desire-turned-pain is in relation to your view of the
Giver. If the desire has become an idol, there is no better day to get it out
of the way (or start to, it took longer than a day to get there and might take longer to get rid of). And how might you do this, you might ask.
Make God bigger.
Or in Psalms-speak, “Magnify the LORD!”
Ask God to examine your heart and inmost thoughts, ask that
gentle Counselor to show you where things are off. Ask Truth to show you the
gifts and the work that are present in you right now, things you don’t have to
wait for but can partake in now. If you have trusted in God and are on the path
of discipleship to enter His Kingdom, then these things abound, I promise you.
I’m praying for you, friend, this morning and throughout
today. Will you pray for me, too? I can write this because I’m living it. No
pointing fingers here, unless it’s just to show you my own scars and tell you,
“Me too.”
Tasty bites to get you started:
Psalm 34:3, “Oh, magnify the LORD with me, and let us exalt
His name together.”
Psalm 34:8, “Taste and see that the LORD is good, blessed is
the man (or woman) who trusts in Him!”
Psalm 34:15, “The eyes of the LORD are on the righteous, His
ears are open to their cry.”
Psalm 69:29-33, “But I am poor and sorrowful;
Let Your salvation, O God, set me up on high.
I will praise
the name of God with a song,
And will magnify Him with thanksgiving.
This also shall please the Lord better than an ox or bull,
Which has horns and hooves.
The humble shall see this and be glad;
And you who seek God, your hearts shall live.
For the Lord hears the poor,
And does not despise His prisoners.
(And because there are still more words before I can click
save and post: If today is hard because of your relationship with your own
mother, can I gently ask if your ideal of what she should’ve been is the idol? Maybe
you deserved better, I’ll trust you on that, but maybe what you do have--God’s
goodness, love, forgiveness, grace--should have a bigger headline.)
