Security and Legacy

Last week I was in a very familiar atmosphere known as dysfunction. I am in my mother's house where, under her roof there is more than a few spiritual issues that need to be addressed. She has a heart of gold, and I love her; however, our different faith-journeys have taken us to different levels of spiritual maturity. Also there are other people in her life that add to the complication and conflicts.

I absolutely hate that feeling in the place you call home. Security and spiritual covering is so important to me, especially now with trying to create that for my children. I had, (what I thought was), a very protected environment for them before and now I was back in my mother's house reminiscing on all the old drama we had under this roof growing up. I reached my drama-threshold, felt so trapped, and was ready to run FAST.

A few days later I had calmed down and was available to hear God's voice. I heard lyrics from a song that go, "take control of the atmosphere," and that was God's was of revealing to me that I didn't need to run, I needed him to take control.

Then God started to show me the truth. The truth is that I will never feel like I can provide perfect protection for my girls. There is no perfect place here on earth, no matter where I run. Plus, if I do run, I will run right into an Ishmael, (figuratively speaking). What he said I needed to do was pray his authority and control into the atmosphere around me.

This week it is calming down around here, praise God, and a new subject of concern has arrived; legacy. At Natanya's nap times I spend time chatting with little Mikayla. This week as I sat there tickling her, her first real giggles started to become much more pronounced. At first I smiled, but then my eyes filled up with tears.

I realized, not for the first time, the deep pain of not being able to share these moments with their father. I dug deeper. I don't just want to share them with someone, I want to be recognized and appreciated as the caretaker of someone's precious vessels of their legacy. As a woman, the desire to submit to someone's leadership and vision goes beyond myself and into the desire to train up that person's children to do the same. I sat there for a moment, giving this pain to God. I've learned how important it is to really spend time mourning in those moments what has been lost, instead of trying to replace it quickly with (another) "Ishmael."

Yesterday I talked to my wonderfully anointed little brother who reminded me that I am appreciated for building a legacy, because I am raising up children to carry Jesus' legacy. Then I remembered that I can already see that in work in my very small children. Natanya is only two, but she can actually share the gospel. It goes something like, "Jesus nice, people not nice, Jesus get boo boos, die, crying, three days, alive! YAY happy! no more boo boos! Jesus is God." And she even understands that because of his ability to  be healed of his "boo boos" we can also pray to him and be healed of our's. Amazing. So now my prayer is that God will give me an extra boost when I don't receive the more immediate and physical appreciation that a husband and father of my children would normally provide.