Let's Cuddle

Today my son smiled most of the day.  This afternoon he sat next to me and said "let's cuddle."  He really has the most endearing personality.  Those of you who know him know how sweet he can be.  Just a few nights ago I was crying and I told Matt, "I really miss him."   And it was so true, for the last month or so, he has been intensely different from the child who was with me today.  Sometimes, parenting Storm is like parenting Jekyll and Hyde.  Each morning, I wake up and I'm not quite sure what I will get.  Sometimes this is hard, I try my best to be ready for it, but sometimes it takes me by surprise.  When we have an extended period of stability, sometimes I get so comfortable with the boy that I had today, that I forget that the other side of him is there.  Or the opposite happens, sometimes, when we've had several weeks of roller-coaster emotions, non-stop energy, and low frustration threshold; it is a welcomed surprised when the boy who wanted to just "cuddle" came and sat with me today.

In that moment I just took it in.  I stroked his hair, he said "I love you mom, you are the best mom."  We tossed the football, and he didn't yell or get mad at the way I threw it.  He was patient with himself and with us.  He wasn't worried about anything today.  He wasn't very sad or angry or frustrated.  He was just a boy.  He rode his scooter.  He played with some neighbors.  It was mostly quiet.  It was a good day.  Tonight I'll just keep it close to my heart.  I know the Lord knew I needed this day.

At Church this morning we talked again about surrender.  About the book of James and how we should "consider it pure joy, my brothers, when you encounter trials of many kinds, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance."  James 1:2-4.  That true worship, is just that, surrender.  The laying down of ourselves.

God speaks to me so deeply through song.  Here is the new song of my heart, take a moment to listen. There is such freedom in this song of surrender, the words are so true and exactly how I feel right now.  I wept so hard,  in church today, I could have laid down on the floor and not cared if anyone was near me because in that moment, it was just me and my God.  Not a distant God that sits high in a cloud, somewhere looking down on me.  But the God of the Universe, the Maker of everything, The God Who Sees, The One who knows me in and out, and loves me personally.  A God that I am coming to know so deeply in the darkest of places as He has reached out to me, and walked with me through this pain.   I offered Him my tears; tears of praise to a God that is holding me in the midst of my pain, not because I am strong--but because He is!  He loves me, and He loves you.  If you are broken inside, as the song says, give Him your life; He will not fail you.

From Elevation Worship:
"Give me faith, to trust what you say,  That Your good and Your love is great.  I'm broken inside I give You my life... I may be weak, but your Spirit is strong in me, my flesh may fail, but My God You never will"

"You have taken account of my wanderings; Put my tears in your bottle.  Are they not all in Your book."  Psalm 56:8