Wow! This little family has had some big changes in a very condensed window. Rolling into the new year has Jeramie and I looking back in thanks to the blessings of 2011. We aren't new years resolution type of people but we always look back to reminisce of God's hand in our lives.
Last we talked Andon had enrolled in school and I had been convicted of my shortcomings as a mom. Since then there has been some spiritual house cleaning going down. Andon is back home and I am back on track with my motherly duties (for right now, today. Tomorrow might be a different story).
There are two things in this world that I will fight for. My relationship with Jesus and maintaining the integrity of my family as a unit. Everything else any one of you can have. I am so motivated by those two things that there is no room for compromise. I have always known that but this last fall God gave me the chance to face it head on and clarify what that means to me.
It feels to me like there is so much noise in the world to perform as a stay-at-home mom from society and even some family and peers. The unspoken expectation is that my house should be spotless at all times, that my kids should always be neat and tidy, and that no one in my family should ever have a melt down. Why is that? I know from speaking to other women and mothers that the feeling is not held by myself alone. So why is it that I allow myself to carry that external expectation?
My first revelation was that it is not an external expectation. It is internal. Inside myself. I may have gotten the idea from society somewhere along the way but there is nothing in the bible that says I have to adopt that thought process. Yes, there are many passages in the bible that give women a model of what a godly woman looks like, namely the Proverbs 31 woman. And as much of a guide as that woman is I still couldn't get away from the story of Martha and Mary. They were sisters living in the same household along with their brother Lazarus. Jesus and Lazarus were very close, much like brothers themselves. When Jesus came to town he often stayed with them. The girls being the domestic keepers of the house embraced their honorable position as hostesses, but they had very different visions as to what that looked like. Martha felt they should be devoted to waiting on everyone who came to listen to Jesus talk, all Mary wanted to do was wash Jesus' feet, serve him and be around him. Not like a little sister with a crush on her older brothers friend but as a servant, 100% devoted to Jesus. Our human nature has us craving black and white, right and wrong, this or that. We have a very hard time with both/and. It is not that women are to be either a Martha or a Mary but rather a balance between both. In the bible Martha pitched a fit that Mary wasn't doing her fair share. Jesus got after her for missing the point of his presence. He basically told her that all of her catering to the needs around her didn't amount to much if she forgot why she was doing any of it at all. My problem was that I crave the times in my day, week, life that I am allowed to be Mary but there is so much demand for me to be a Martha that I started to drown by not knowing how to be both. My problem was that the two things I will not compromise are actually often antagonistic to each other. How do I devote my self to Jesus and my family? How do I be a mom in our American culture and a christian? How do I continue to manage and maintain my responsibilities and not lose sight of why I do any of what I do as it is?
My first answer was to pack it up and move to a different culture where life is less demanding but the fact of the matter is, is that God has not lined that up for us and where we are is exactly right where he wants us... Aberdeen, South Dakota. Since I couldn't change that, Jeramie and I re-evaluated what demands were important and truly God-honoring, what we thought God wanted us to focus on and not what society says we should focus on. Eliminate the chatter of busyness and simplify.
It had to start with accepting the fact that it is ok. It is ok that my kids clothes do not always match. It is ok that I forgot to put on make-up before I left the house. It is ok that we eat off of paper plates. It is also ok that we don't live in a 3000sq ft house and it is ok that people look at us like we are weirdos because we are ok with not living in a 3000 sq ft house. It is ok that we are not from South Dakota and if my kids and I do not want to bundle up and go outside to play in -10 degree weather that we do not go outside to play in -10 degree weather even if everyone else is outside playing in -10 degree weather. It is ok that I disagree with certain aspects of the school system and choose to keep them home for that. It is ok that I value the integrity of the unit of my family so much that I am not willing to let some external activities consume us. My kids are best friends. They love each other so much that they dislike the idea of experiencing certain things in life without each other. Do they bicker, fight and get irritated with each other, sure they do, that is par for the course when you share space with other people, hey that happens even in marriage and guess what, that is all ok too!
The end result to accepting the fact that it is all ok shows up in the evidence of letting go. Knowing it and doing it are so very different. I was reminded of the old hymn "Trust and Obey". So the first thing I did was buy paper plates. Then we pulled Andon out of school and brought him home again. We bought Jeramie a few more necessary clothing items to ensure he would never be out of clean clothes (and there still is no guarantee but the odds are better). We re-focused our desire to buy a house based on the amount of money we had, not based on the amount of money we could pay back and we re-dedicated our kids to our Lord. We didn't re-dedicate them in a public appearance, in fact, we have never dedicated them in our church in a public appearance, but we re-defined for ourselves what it looks like to do that as they grow and change.
All I can say is God is faithful. He honors those who desire to honor him. I have seen it over and over again in those that I know who love Jesus and this time, we get to see it a bit in our own lives. We were blessed with the opportunity to purchase a little house, debt free, no mortgage with the amount of money we have put away in our house fund. This little house came to our attention before it came on the market. We knew the price was going to come in within a certain range, we knew what we were willing to spend on it and we knew what we had saved away. When it finally became available for offers the listing price was less than what we were willing to spend and but more importantly, exactly to the penny what we had saved away. Three weeks later, we own a house in Aberdeen.
After re-defining what it means to surrender everything to God and that includes our kids, we have a seven year old boy who is quickly maturing into a godly young man. Andon came to us, on his own. He started asking questions. He had seen part of the movie "Left behind" with me one night while his dad was working. While we do not entirely agree with the story that movie tells I am not about to get in the way of God using it as a tool to communicate himself to someone. This time he spoke to Andon. The biggest thing that caught his attention was that the pastor of a church was left behind. The movie showed us a good man who said he loved Jesus who didn't get to be part of the rapture of the christians. I explained to Andon that knowing Jesus is real in your head is different then Jesus knowing you. Its kind of like us knowing the President of the United States by name but the President doesn't know who we are. We can't just go knock on the door of the White House and be let in. The President has to know us in order for us to get inside. He needed to see in the bible how that worked. We read John 6:44-47 "No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him; and I will raise him up in the last day. It is written in the prophets, 'and they shall all be taught by God.' Therefore everyone who has heard and learned from the Father comes to me. Not that anyone has seen the Father, except He who is from God; He has seen the Father. Most assuredly, I say to you, he who believes in me has everlasting life." He wanted to know how to be chosen by God to know Jesus. I explained that God gave us his bible to teach us. That God talks to us every time we read our bible and if every time we read our bible he teaches us, then we are chosen. That some people will read the bible and ignore what it says and they will not get to be known by Jesus. We talked about repenting and being baptized. He wanted to be baptized. Oddly enough, we looked back and realized he has never seen anyone baptized. Did he really know what that meant? Did he really understand what that looks like? Where was this coming from? He explained to us that he didn't want to go to hell. That unless Jesus knew him he couldn't go to heaven. He decided long ago to let Jesus to be in charge of him. That Jesus said if you love him you will obey him and Jesus said to repent and be baptized. That if letting Jesus be in charge of you was repenting then the next thing to do was be baptized. Well, what do you say to that? No, no, sorry, you aren't old enough to truly know what you are saying come back in 5 years? I don't think so. I mean we tell our kids to trust and obey, we tell them "That if you confess with your mouth, 'Jesus is Lord' and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you confess and are saved" and when they do proclaim this faith we tell them that isn't how it works. We do not take baptism lightly. Baptism is a very serious declaration of a very serious commitment. Maybe a workbook would be appropriate? Just to verify his understanding. He completed the workbook and all it did was fortify his position. Maybe a visual to go with his heart knowledge? We allowed him to watch "The Passion of the Christ". With his dad by his side, just the two of them, they watched and talked and cried about the disturbing truth of what Jesus had to do just so we could be allowed into God's presence.
The kid gets it. The kid gets it like us adults are suppose to get it but we have to complicate things by allowing the baggage of this world cloud our ability to understand simple truths. Andon knows every single one of us are destined for hell. Andon knows every single one of us are spiritually dead and Andon knows that dead people have no power. Andon knows Jesus died a terrible death. Andon knows that God sent Jesus to die that terrible death so that we could be with God. Andon knows that Jesus rose again killing the curse of hell for anyone who cries out to him. Andon knows that God reveals himself to us. Andon knows that ignoring God comes with consequences. Andon is not willing to endure the consequences. Not only is he not willing to endure the consequences but he wants to make God happy with his choices. That is the evidence of a saved kid. He not only knows what is right but he is empowered to do what is right.
He was baptized in our new home church, in front of 400 people. The shy and quiet little man stood up proud in front of a congregation and with no hesitation proclaimed his love, adoration and promise to his Lord. I bawled like a baby. He was the first person in the church to be baptized in the baptismal. Many people wait until better weather to be baptized in the lake close by here to Aberdeen. The pastors were excited to finally use the baptismal and excited to see what stirred in the hearts of other believers. Deep down they hoped Andon would be an encouragement to others to not wait, to own their faith now. Again, God is faithful. The second baptism within the church baptismal is scheduled for next week and there are a handful of people in line.
Directly after Andon was baptized he shared with Jeramie and I that he could feel it. "I can feel it mom. Its, like... I'm brand new or something. I can feel Him all over me. How did you feel after you were baptized?" He was glowing. He was different and he knew it. "The same buddy. Exactly the same." Although Jeramie and I do not believe it is baptism that saves you "for it is by grace you are saved through faith", we will not deny the power of the promise that God gives of a clear conscience to those who honor him through this simple act of obedience. It is a tangible experience of transformation and when the change is authentic it is addictive. He recently came to me in tears. He woke up today and couldn't feel Jesus on the outside like he can on the inside. To see my son broken, begging to feel the holy spirit all over his body, to crave his presence inside and outside that he has fallen forward sobbing makes me own tears hard to control. "I still love Jesus on the inside but I don't feel him on the outside, I want to go back and feel him on the outside like when I was baptized". My heart breaks for him but its over flowing with joy at the same time. It is a testimony that his salvation is authentic. My son is addicted to Jesus. His parents are addicted to Jesus. And like any other substance a person can be addicted to, unless you have tasted it, you can't know what its all about and like any other substance a person can be addicted to you crave it so much you are constantly chasing it down. I count it as a huge blessing that our son has started chasing after Jesus at a time where we can still very much be a part of his sanctification journey.
It finally dawned on me that I knew exactly how to be a mom in America bombarded by our culture and popular opinion AND a follower of Christ. It is no different then any other person in any less chaotic place in this world. It is no different then what we have been doing for the past 2 years. Trust and Obey. Like Andon, everyday I get up and let Jesus be in charge of me. I owe him that. Everyday I get up and never know exactly what that is going to mean or what that will look like on that particular day. But everyday I do it in a way that puts Jesus first my mind and constant gratitude and humility in my heart. We have enacted the K.I.S.S. principle in our house. Keep It Simple Stupid. For the Jennings, today, that is what it looks like to trust and obey. To keep it simple, clear out the noise of the world and eat off paper plates.
