Oreo covered faces: Fulfillment on Earth

That moment when a hollow aching from deep within rises up and searches for more.

More what? I can’t help but wonder.

More is a word that generates many images.

More stuff: fancy cars; bigger homes; trendiest fashions; and latest technology.

More fun: vacations; day trips; dinners out; living the life…

More money: to fund everything listed above.

More fulfillment.

Is there such a thing being more fulfilled?

The definition of fulfillment: satisfaction or happiness as a result of fully developing one’s abilities or character.

This is the more that I have been searching for; at the same time, though, this is the more that I will never achieve.  I don’t think total fulfillment will ever be reached until we stand in the presence of God.

Certainly we can, and should, develop our character and seek knowledge here because our calling to Christ is to back up our faith with these things:

Knowledge, virtue, self-control, brotherly affection and love. (2 Peter 1:5-9)

All of those things revolve around character development, but what we must realize is total satisfaction, happiness and fulfillment will never be achieved while we are still fighting our sinful natures.

Until the day we stand before Christ, we will never fully know who we really are.  When we look into the face of our Creator is when we finally understand that who we are is nothing more than HIS.

Which in reality is a whole lot.

We belong to Him and what this means is that an eternity of true contentment—fulfillment—awaits. It is there that our questions will finally be answered.

Still, there must surely be depth here in this place where I have temporarily made my home.

That through the dishwater my hands sink into, I can pull out joy and understand that this is my earthly calling and that in reality I do not need more.

So instead of total fulfillment here, what I am looking to is purpose.

To find purpose in the small duties I so often dread is the closest I will ever come to true fulfillment because they are the same ones that make life better for the ones I love.

My boys.

I have been given what will seem like only a moment in time with these two.

To teach them. To mold them. To give them the tools to serve God.

The willingness to put my own desires underneath their needs.

In this, perhaps the closest we can come to earthly fulfillment is through sacrifice.

I believe that is the example that Christ set for us. He purpose on Earth was sacrifice for His children.

I truly believe that during my time in the world I will never come closer to the face of God than I am right now—as I look into their beaming Oreo covered faces.

Wait…OREOS?! From my under the bed stash.

Some sacrifices are easier to make than others.

Humility: thy name is burnt pizza

I am not a cook.

Well, I am not a good cook at least.

My poor family suffers through my calling of motherhood as they grow up with dinner time fire drills. That’s no joke, either, the smoke alarm honestly goes off every single time I cook.

I don’t know why cooking is such a struggle for me…

Honestly, though, my mothering has taught me much about life and not just in the mothering area.

These are the two things I always thought I had down: faith and family.

My high opinion of myself came with absolutely no experience of either things.  From the looking glass, motherhood appeared romantic and sing-song to me.  My visions were matched with reality once I married and started my own family.

My perfect self-sacrificing Christian mom dream painfully collided with who I am.

The actual work involved in parenting hit me like a diaper filled Mack truck. I found out I mostly suck at all the tasks required to be a good, selfless and faithful mom–ouch that hurts to even type.

It is 100% true though.

I was never taught to value someone else’s needs over my own, not that my parents didn’t love me or teach me correctly but my life never really required a lot of self-sacrifice–and NEVER any cooking.

I also found out that I misunderstood what parenting is supposed to be about; it is about the baby and not about me.

Hmmm…I sure do hope that someone else out there has experienced this redirection from God, otherwise I am even worse off than I think.

I thought my little baby would provide me with all the fulfillment I needed, and you know what, that kid couldn’t do a thing for me–I had to do everything for him!

I never gauged my selfishness before someone was totally reliant on me.

• Selfish with my time.
• Selfish with my sleep.
• Selfish with my chocolate.

So instead of leaning on God–which is truly where the fulfillment of motherhood should come–I just kept leaning on myself.

Everyone suffered.  Not just through my burnt food but my moaning and groaning about everything that is required of me.

God began working on me through my frustrations, though. The guilt of not feeling joy through motherhood was a load to bear, and I called out to Him to show my why.

It was then He began revealing to me that motherhood is a guided and directed role–I constantly needed seek Him out. I wasn’t doing that, and as a result this is what would happen:

and then it escalated to this…

I mean there is a dying pizza in there for heaven’s sake.

Well, okay, this kind of thing still regularly happens, but God uses this smoke-filled room as a teachable moment.

Parenting has taught me humility and a willingness to keep serving no matter how bad I think I am at it.

We must first understand that our fulfillment comes from God rather than the unrealistic expectations we set for ourselves.

He will take our strengths and hone them into something beautiful–our weakness though, that is where we really shine because God uses them in ways we never dreamed possible.

Dinner in my house might always be announced by the smoke alarm, yet God still gathers our family around my meek offerings for nightly bonding time.

It is in this that I realize my imperfections do not keep me from doing exactly what He has asked me to do, in fact, my burnt cheeseburgers are regularly requested around here.  I mean, who doesn’t love burnt cheese?

Inadequacies are God-given opportunities to seek Him and grow in our faith.

And always remember to laugh along the way, because truly, He is laughing right along with you.

The Pants Incident

I gave up this morning.

Face down on the steering wheel and driven by pure exhaustion, I thought, well I gave it a good run. For the good of the kids I was ready to turn in my resignation before they fired me.

I have been verbally warned several times already, but today at breakfast I thought I had nailed my coffin.

It was the pants incident, and it went like this.

“Connor, please hurry up because as soon as you are done, we have to go.”

I had that tone; it was the annoyed mother tone.

“Mom, we can’t go yet because…”

And I jumped in, mad before I even had a good reason to be.

“Connor! We are going to be late! I told you to have everything ready!”

The kid jumped out from behind his cereal to reveal his Spiderman boxers and stood next to the table with his hands up.

“PANTS Mom! I need pants!”

I stood there as a freight train full of guilt made its impact. I forgot to get his pants out of the dryer after i told him not to get them himself because I didn’t want him in the laundry room.

So I grabbed a spoonful of humility, apologized and got the kid some pants. He was sure to let me know the knees were still slightly damp.

Meanwhile I lost the five year old who was also without pants, but he didn’t want any. He was discovered under the table with a piece of toast.

“I don’t think Becky (his babysitter) said I need pants today.”

That was a whole other incident.

So finally, after a stressful drop off and two return trips to his school due to forgotten items, I sat in the school parking lot and thought that someone else must be better suited for this job.

Then my boss chimed in.

God gently reminded me that He gave me this job and He expects me to step up to the plate even though I sometimes strike out.

I thought about the way their faces light up when they see me. That’s the thing with kids, they really don’t expect or want a perfect mommy, they want the one who loves them–the one God gave them.

And sometimes they just want pants.

Mom Against Mom

The hardest part of parenting for me has had nothing to do with the kids.
Moms are hard on each other. Seriously brutal.

From breast feeding (I didn’t) to bottle feeding to that solid line drawn between stay at home moms and working moms, parenting is often a battle against the exact people we should be battling with.

Here’s the thing: I have been in many positions. I stayed home full time and then attended college full time, and both are hard.  I now work both in and out of the home as a writer.

Every position I have been in has been both exhausting and rewarding.

However, each are full of questions, fears, and guilt trips. Wars break out and motherhood becomes a battlefield over personal choices and the fight to prove just who has it the hardest.

My question is why are we are always trying to prove we have it so rough?

There are several truths we need to always remember.

1) You have it harder than some but not nearly as hard as others. Within the last two months my community has been rocked by three deaths; one young girl committed suicide, another one overdosed on drugs, and one young boy died in an ATV rollover.

Life is messy and it hurts really bad sometimes without us perpetuating pain through harsh and petty judgement calls.

2) The challenges you face are meant to strengthen you and you are made to overcome them.  Even in the devastating events above, these obstacles are meant to draw us closer to God.

3) Looking into someone else’s life and pegging it as easy is small minded.  You have no idea what lies behind their closed doors.

My solution is to look up and ask God to guide us each through the lives we have been given. They will all look different because God created separate plans for us all. We will struggle and we will grow.

Hopefully the end result will always be we grow closer to God and closer to each other.

Because He Knows Karate

Right now that is Logan’s answer to everything.

“Go clean your room!”

“I don’t have to, because I know karate.”

“Brush your teeth!”

“I don’t have to, because I know karate!”

He says this with great emphasis. “Because I know…………(wait for it)……………KARATE!”

Well here’s the thing: he does not know karate, but he does know how to annoy his mother.

A Boy and his Dog

Logan: 

I believe that dogs should not be treated with meanness (he says while squeezing the dog’s head.) 

Kindness is what a dog should be given (dog’s eyes are now bulging.) 

Dogs are our pets forever (dog is turning colors a dog should not be.)

We will love them forever (he releases the dog who falls to floor in a pile, gasping and hacking at his feet. Logan looks down and joyfully clasps his hands together.)

Aww see, I made her cry!

*The strangling of the dog was greatly exaggerated in this story, as some of you might have guessed.

Breakfast with a Five Year Old

Logan: Mom, I wish you woulda named me something cooler, like Captain America!

Me: Well, it’s just that there already is a Captain America, so we thought Logan would be better.

Logan: Well, I already know three other guys named Logan and only one other Captain America.

Me: ……

So, Captain America is now in the living room watching Dora.