Change and Surrender

Still Beautiful

When Annie brought them home last week, along with an exquisite handwritten note, they were in full bloom. These crimson tulips tumbled together in a vase that matched their cheerful faces. Their song was rich and happy. Now they languish on my kitchen table, some of their heads bent low, some are stretched upward and out. They are spent.  And yet I am drawn to them. They are telling me secrets, revealing truths to me about myself. About God.

Letting Go

For weeks now I have walked around my house sorting through messy drawers and cabinets in an effort to be obedient to what I felt God was asking me to do. It didn’t take long for the tears to come. It was like someone turned on the faucet. I don’t really know why. Perhaps it is the pictures and papers made by little hands spilling out of every crevice. Those little hands that are now grown. Or maybe it is the reality that I am in a completely new phase of my life and I can’t seem to find my footing. It is like the plates of the earth beneath me have shifted, and nothing is in its proper place. It feels like emotional vertigo. I told Chris that I feel like Alice in Wonderland. Am I getting smaller or is this house getting bigger?

I often find myself sitting in the middle of the kitchen floor, just thinking. And praying. And yes, crying. It seems like a safe place. I have spent a lot of hours sitting in kitchen floors, waiting for babies to take their first steps, playing patty cake, finger painting, making drum sets out of pots and pans and wooden spoons. So much of life happens on the kitchen floor.

Open

I look at the flowers again. They are telling me about change, about surrender. Ending a season can feel like a death. Especially when that season has lasted 24 years. That is more than half of my life. I home-schooled my kids so they were with me until they left for college. I am not sure I know how to be anything else.

But I must let go and trust that God still has beautiful plans for me. I will always be a mother, I know that. It runs through me like the deep pigment in the petals of the tulips. It will always be my finest role, my glory. A part of me that is beautiful and delicate and rich. I am a mother, and I have the honored role of being the only one my children will ever have. I am still the very center and heart of my home. It is a mother’s delight. We keep our homes warm with love and bright with color. We dance and sing, applaud and encourage. We believe and pray. We speak in soft whispers and stern tones when necessary. We caress, hug, cry and hover.

And we step away when they move on, still holding them in our hearts.

True Colors

Even as I write this blog, I know I am not done grieving this season. I may do that in some form or fashion for the rest of my life as I have seen other mothers do, including my own. I think we never get over missing that time in the lives of our families.

However I am beginning to believe there is still more for me. My life is not over. It is not the role that I play that defines who I am. It is the God who made me and carries me close to His heart. He defines me. He will have His say as to what is next. And so I, like the flowers, will take the posture of worship and surrender. Sometimes I will stretch my arms to the sky and sometimes I will bow my head low, but in all these things He alone holds me.

And so I will continue to get my house in order, and entrust my heart to my God. He makes all things new.

Psalm 73:23-26 “Yet I am always with you; you hold me by my right hand. You guide me with your counsel, and afterward you will take me into glory. Whom have I in heaven but you? And earth has nothing I desire besides you.  My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.”

Clarity