For the love of stripes!

Our little explorer is just a-movin and a-groovin!

He is seven months old today.

I can hardly believe it was seven months ago that he became an undeniable presence in our lives. I have decided that, for me at least, the reality of time slipping away was not truly acknowledged in my heart until my baby was born. Each day that passes is one we will never get back. One that adds to the fullness of my heart his smiles, his tears, his babbling, his quirks. I find myself inwardly panicking that before I know it my baby will be the 25-year-old sitting on his couch in some far away land musing about his baby. The only solution I have found to keep this panic at bay is to take each day as it comes and to love it all for what it is. Some days are good. Some days are hard. Some days are so sweet I don’t think I can bear it. Some days break my heart in love or sadness, and some bring me to my knees in anguish or gratitude.

Each day is a gift I have been given. It is a day with my husband, with my baby, with my friends or family. A day when I live in a home the Lord provided. A home whose spaces we have filled with all of our good and our bad. Each day is an opportunity to grow as an individual, a couple, a family. A day to deepen our dependence on our Savior. Some days we seize that opportunity, some days we miss it, some days we are blind-sided by it, and some days we decide to chuck it out the window.

More than anything I want my baby to know Jesus. I want each day for him to know the peace that is a Father who will not fail him like we will. A Father whose love is gentle, whose love cradles and heals, whose love teaches and disciplines. I want him to see that when Mama holds him close with all the love in her heart, that love is because of Jesus. I want him to know that he does not need anyone else. He will be given others, but he does not need any of them the way he needs Jesus. He does not need me the way he needs Jesus. I pray that the depths of his heart would be touched even now. That the Holy Spirit would be a beloved presence to him. I want him to look at the people around him and love them fiercely, no matter who they are or what they have done. I want him to be saved from the aches of my heart, from the mistakes I know I have made.

Motherhood is a role of aching, I have found. A depth of experience I had never known. From day one, you ache. Physically and emotionally taxing through to the day when you meet the source of all that aching. You hold him in your arms and you ache with love you never knew existed. Love for your baby is like no other. You ache when he hurts, and when his eyes smile to your soul. You ache for the things you know will come, the things you know he will have to endure. You ache for the things you hope he will think, do, say, experience.

There is so much to take in as I live life. So much to lament as I fail again and again. So many apologies in my heart as I let people down again and again. So much joy, there is so much. I long to see it all with the eyes of Christ. To understand with an eternal perspective. To really know my Savior when I finally savor his face, his hands, his feet. To see that my life has been lived for him, and that it has all been for this moment.

I know that each day brings imperfections. In me, in my husband, in my baby, in my friends and family. This world is so broken and seemingly so insurmountable. But it has already been overcome with a love deeper than the ocean and a victory so rich it takes the breath away. We cannot surmount it, but Jesus has. He lived, he ached, he died, and he lives. The day will come when all of the darkness will be put away as far as the east is from the west.

That is the day I want to live for. That is the day I want my family to live for.