Today I WILLenjoy teaching my children. Today I WILL complete some laundry. Today I WILL start our new chore system. Today I WILL bake some banana bread. Today I WILL enjoy serving my family in these ways.
You see, I should consider myself richly blessed. Beyond still being snowed in, beyond craving some woman conversation, and beyond the fact that the work is never really done, I am blessed. I have so much.
My eyes have been opened to this even more as my parents are in Haiti now serving at an orphanage (this is my Dad’s second time). When he returned the first time the stories he told took my breath away. Sure, you read about them, you hear them on tv, and might even hear a missionary speak of them. But he put names and faces with these facts.
He told the story of a young mother that could only feed one of her children, so she had to choose which one to feed. The other? She had to watch as she slowly starved day after day getting weaker and weaker. All the while feeding her other child. How could you choose? Thank you Father that I don’t have to choose!
He told of a young girl, now in the orphanage that lost her arm and her entire family in the earthquake. Such pain, such loss, such a little girl.
(I just want to scoop up these little ones to come live with me, truth be told. They have stolen my heart!)
And yet these children have such joy. Though they have so little, they have such joy. Man, talk about conviction!
Here I am feeling sorry for myself at the start of the second week of being snowed in. Fighting within myself because I don’t want to teach school, do laundry, cook, or clean, because those things are so ordinary and I am tired of the same old same old.
At least I have a home, healthy children, clothing and food.
While these people and children have stolen my heart and I think about and pray for them often, they have taught me so much, from their so little.
For now I feel so guilty having a pity party when I can’t get out of the house, or when I have to cook and clean. For there are other mother’s who are watching their children die right before their eyes and they are having to choose which child it will be. It takes my breath away and leaves me speechless.
It changes my focus and burdens my heart. I will serve my family with joy and gladness. Because I am richly blessed.
James 1:27 Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.
That is a beautiful post. This is exactly how I feel sometimes. My children are in public school now(we were homeschooling) and at times I can’t get everything done that I need too for me it’s the internet that I’m addicted too and I know it’s wrong and I’m working on it, I hope you don’t mind my sharing. I have 5 little ones as well, ages 7,6,5,3 & 1.
That is a beautiful post. This is exactly how I feel sometimes. My children are in public school now(we were homeschooling) and at times I can’t get everything done that I need too for me it’s the internet that I’m addicted too and I know it’s wrong and I’m working on it, I hope you don’t mind my sharing. I have 5 little ones as well, ages 7,6,5,3 & 1.