Some days my responsibilities leave me tired. I remember earlier this year when a friend was helping me do Sunday School stuff she remarked, "How do you do it? These kids wear me out!"
I feel you.
Some Sundays I just feel spent. It is ridiculous, of course, because it's only a couple of hours a couple of times a weekend, but the constant chaos has a way of wearing you down. Like a rock in a creek. No matter how innocuous the creek seems, eventually that rock is going to be worn down whether or not it wants to be.
Like tonight, driving the kids home from gospel. Definitely had to pull over and do the, "Whomsoever does not sit down and stop fighting won't come or get cookies ever again." It works for a few blocks, anyhow.
But.
But.
Let me tell you a story that starts a while ago. A story that begins on a different thread, but leads back to the subject at hand.
Earlier this summer I started a book called Get Lost. I started it and realized that it was going to be good, good enough, in fact, for me to *gasp* buy an actual copy for myself, instead of just using the library version I had. (I don't prefer to use money for... anything. I avoid purchasing things unless it's ABSOLUTELY NEEDED. So to think that I should buy something is a Big Deal in my life.) So I bought myself a copy and... then put the book on hold for a while. But earlier this month I picked it up and devoured the book (in the literary fashion, not the rumble in my tummy fashion). It's rather good. Note to self: if I have daughters, I'm pretty much getting them copies. (Unfortunately, the tagline is about finding true love. The author did that to be clever, because she urges you to find true love in Christ, but it's awkwardly misleading when discussing it with others, because I'm not on a quest to find true love, but I would like to read more about deepening my relationship with the Lord.)
Anyhow, it was so good that I bought a copy for a friend who I thought might appreciate it. Three days after I gave it to her she came up to me and told me she'd purchased seven copies, to give to her friends. (Then of course I was all like, "Ugh, must I?" but the Lord urged me to buy even more copies, and now five additional friends are gifted with copies.)
A few days later, the same friend came to me and said there was a line in the book that had gotten her to thinking. The line was something like, "Allow the Lord to use you wherever you are, whether it be in raising children for the Lord alongside your husband, or as a single woman on Wall Street." The author, I'm sure, meant, you know, the stock market version of Wall Street. But... in my neck of the woods a lot of our Sunday School work originated on a street called Wall Street. So, after reading this line, my friend came to me and said she wanted to be more involved in the Sunday School effort.
"Oh, hey, perfect timing. I'm having some girls over for supper this week, can you come?" She made time, and she came.
Insert the night of the dinner. I was stressed. I'd forgotten to make cookies (a tragedy worse than DEATH to these kids) and more girls came than expected (which is to be expected, but sometimes I foolishly forget such things), and I was sort of running around like a headless chicken, helping girls make pizzas, keeping them from breaking the trampoline, that sort of thing.
The evening progressed, and I was much occupied with keeping things moving smoothly. I talked to everyone, tried to get personal conversations in, but... with a dozen or so (more? I already don't remember) girls running around, it was rough.
My friend, however, felt the Lord urge her to talk to one of the girls specifically. To just sit down and get to know her a little better. To see if she was enjoying the evening and see if she had any questions about the Bible reading we'd had.
"Yeah," the girl wondered, when prodded, "what does it mean exactly to be born again?"
An hour later, I was inside watching the least sensical play EVER, as staged by the girls (I have several versions recorded on my phone, but have no idea how to upload them to Blogger--any advice?) and my friend and the girl wandered in. My friend rejoicing with the angels; the girl freshly saved.
My friend told me she might not have come but for reading that line in the book. I wouldn't have thought to invite her except that she brought it up first. And I honestly don't think I would have made time to talk to that one girl myself. All these little things work together, and now we rejoice (me with actual tears, because I ALWAYS cry when our kids get saved, haha) because of the reminders of God's abiding faithfulness.
So when I get worn down (interesting note--when I first heard that song I was particularly tired and worn--I begin to see a pattern in my life--and I'm pretty sure I cried. I seem to cry a lot in these featured stories, sigh) I just have to remember that it's worth it.
Not for my own life, but for their lives, and for His eternal glory.
