The last few weeks God has been making me go back to my roots - my spiritual roots. To be honest it is a vulnerable, difficult, uncomfortable process. Sins and habits I thought I was done with, that I had moved on from, suddenly popping up again. I realise that I need to reaffirm my faith - to fight again - to get the enemy off my promised land. And at the moment I am still in that fight, which at times can be very discouraging. I am really having to remember that the sun shines beyond the clouds! And one of those things has been writing. I never expected the marriage month stuff to affect me in the way it did - being vulnerable made me vulnerable and addressed areas in me where I still have a long way to go to trust God. It sounds depressing, but actually, it is difficult but it is good! I know that this is just a deepening of my faith and I am looking forward to those sunny days again - because they are coming! If I am in a desert now the only way my roots can go to find water is down deeper into Him! And as I was talking to God about my insecurites this last week, he reminded me of a story from my childhood...
It was my Dad's birthday. I was six or seven at the time and I accompanied my Mum to a local shopping centre to choose a card. I was convinced that he would love a card with a kitten popping his head
out of a teapot, tail poking out of the spout. (The actual one had the kitty looking forward with the lid of the teapot in his head if I remember rightly!) To me the card was cute and funny and he would love it.
My mother
tried to encourage me to choose something else.
You like the card, but he might
like something more manly, with cars on it or something, she urged.
I insisted
on the card and my Mum gave in.
I remember
giving my Dad the card. He laughed out
loud – he thought it was hilarious and I was pleased with my choice.
My
suspicions were further confirmed when my Dad framed the black and white photo
card and hung it in the downstairs bathroom. Now, every time I did my business
I looked up at that cat (next to the plaque which read ‘The battle is not
yours, but God’s.’) and felt pleased that I knew better than my Mum and had insisted on the card.
As I became
older, and less self-absorbed, I realized that he probably wasn’t into cats and
teapots so much. Yet, why had he framed
that card?
I asked him.
And the answer I got was simple:
I asked him.
And the answer I got was simple:
Because you gave it to me.
And as I
sit here and write and try to impress God with something (I don’t know what!) – He laughs and tells me that it
doesn’t matter what, but that it is the heart behind it. My choice to love Him, my offerings which are
so often childish and self-absorbed. And
he tells me that He frames them. Not
because they in themselves were necessarily stunning, but because I am His
daughter and He just loves it when I try to love Him.
‘I have loved you with an everlasting
love;
I have drawn you with unfailing
kindness.’
Jeremiah 31:3