Don’t sweat the small stuff…God already is

 

This past Saturday night, just before Bug went to bed, I was rocking her in the rocking chair.  I feel so incredibly blessed that she still lets me do this from time to time, even at 5 (and a half!).  

Suddenly, she burst into tears!  She said “I don’t want to grow up.  I want to stay a kid forever.”  I assured her that she had tons of time to enjoy being a kid, and when it was time for her to be a grownup, she would WANT to be a grownup!  She was worried about outgrowing her bunk bed (a twin!), so I told her about how I slept on a bed that size until I was a much older grownup and it fit just fine.

Then the conversation got around to us moving (ahhh! the real worry!).  We know that about a year from now our family will be moving.  We don’t know where yet.  Most of the time, Emily is super excited about it.  God blessed her with an amazing sense of adventure and curiosity.  She wants to visit more countries and states than I think I even knew existed at her age.

However, this time, she was bawling.  She was scared and worried about the move.  I held her close and told her she could ask me anything.  That Daddy and I had both moved many, many times in our life, so we could tell her all about it.   She’s moved before, but she was too young to remember it.  Now, she’s starting to process the concept of moving, and trying to figure it all out.  See, she’s a detail person and a planner.  That’s who she is.  So, rather than focusing on the adventure of it, right now she was focused on the little details.

What was she worried about? Well, here were a couple of her questions.

* What if my new bedroom doesn’t have a window?  I assured her that her bedroom, would in fact, have a window!  She loves to look out her bedroom window!

* What if we are driving to our new home and we have to stop, but we can’t sleep in the van….where will we sleep?  Obviously she had forgotten the many times we’ve slept in a hotel room on the way to a destination!  I reminded her of the hotel stops when we went to Florida this past year, and that settled her mind.

 

Last time she did this, she was concerned because she “would never get to go to the zoo again!”, but was fine once I showed her that there are zoos in or near most cities, and that she would definitely get to go to the zoo again!

She was also curious about having a yard to play in, and since I don’t know if we’ll be in a house or apartment at first, I couldn’t promise that.  But once I told her that apartments have swimming pools, she said she wanted us to live there!

Our sweet girl is not a big fan of change.  She likes to plan ahead and know what’s going to happen….exactly how it’s going to happen.  So this first move will be challenging for us.  We’ll have to give her lots of details, without giving her ones she doesn’t need to know at her age.

 

As she was worrying about whether or not her bedroom would have a window, I was reminded of Christ in Matthew 6:25-39.  He tells us not to worry because he will take care of us, even more than he does the birds and the flowers.  He’s already in the details.  He sees the big picture, when we only see what’s right in front of us.

Just the same, I can worry about where we are going to be stationed, what our house will look like, if it will have a microwave built in, whether I’ll have a bathtub or just a shower…..Or I can just relax, take it as it comes, and trust that God has it all planned out for us.

 

“Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.  And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” (Phil 4:6-7)

Are you comfortable?

I am, all too often.  But God doesn’t call us to be comfortable.  He calls us to step out of our comfort zone and follow HIM.   No matter what. 

Then Jesus said to his disciples, "If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. (Matthew 16:24)

It’s scary sometimes to think “Where will I go?”,  “What will I eat?”,  “What kind of house would I live in?”,  “What would I have to give up or do without?”, “What will THEY think?”.

God’s word tells us not to be anxious about these things.  To let HIM be our PROVIDER!  One of my favorite group of verses is Matthew 6:25-37 (click to read) where He reminds us that we do not need to worry. 

What is God calling you to do? Something that seems impossible? Something that seems HUGE to you and way out of your comfort zone? Something that makes you think “No way! That’s crazy!”  No matter how big it seems to you, it is small in the hands of God.  He’s got it covered!

I wonder how Noah felt when he was told to build a huge ark…especially considering it had never rained before.   

What about Gideon when his army got cut down from 32,000 to 300?

Or Joshua, who was told to use marching, trumpets, and yelling to knock down the Jericho walls?

Think about little David, a young teenager, who was called by God to kill a GIANT with just a stone and a slingshot?

God calls us to do uncomfortable things! Things that require us to depend totally on HIM for our strength, courage, provisions.  

WHY?

Because HE did big things for us!! His only Son came to earth, suffered and died for our sins!  He was born in a stable and placed in an animal’s feeding trough for his bed.  He never lived in a palace, or even had his own home.  He didn’t travel around in the fanciest of chariots.  He was uncomfortable…for US!

You can do it for Him! 

To be like a child

The Bible tells us that unless we become like a child, we will not enter the kingdom of Heaven.

"I tell you the truth, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. ~ Matt 18:3

I learn so much from my little girl each day!  God uses her to teach me about His character, and the qualities He wants in each of us.  I find that I do much better when I strive to be more like her, than when I focus on trying to make her more like me.

Yesterday, I talked to Bug about her play kitchen she’s had since she was 2.  She played with it for a couple years and thoroughly enjoyed it!  However, now it just sits in our kitchen taking up space and she never plays with it anymore.  Her interests have taken her elsewhere, and she prefers to help Mommy cook in the real kitchen than to pretend to cook in a pretend kitchen.
So, I gave her some choices. 
1) She could move it outside and see if she played with it outside differently. 
2) She could sell it and use the money to buy something else. 
3) She could give it away.
She chose option #4 – “I want to sell it and give all the money to God because helping other people is more important than toys.”
WOW.
Why is it that my first (sinful) reaction in my mind is “Are you sure?? You don’t want the money for something else? You could tithe on it, but then buy something else, you know. “  Thankfully my brain-to-mouth filter was turned on, and I didn’t say any of that out loud.    Instead, I told her how proud I was of her choice and of her generosity.

Right now, I’m spending my quiet time in Psalm 119.  This morning, I picked up where I left off yesterday and read verses 36-37,

“Turn my heart toward your statutes and not toward selfish gain.  Turn my eyes away from worthless things; preserve my life according to your word.”

We don’t need to raise our kids to be grownups who seek to “have it all”.  We need to cherish our children, and look to them as examples of what God wants us to be like.