Knowing You, Jesus

I have a homeschooling schedule that I try to follow each day as I teach my three blessings.  By "schedule," I mean that there are subjects and lessons that I aim to complete with my kids each day any time during our waking hours.  We do a good job of completing assignments for the most part and I have learned not to get frazzled if things don't go as planned.  Sometimes my kids learn far more during the orderless days than they do when I meticulously plan.  This week, my sweet daughter called me into the living room, declaring it was time to worship the Lord.  I am pretty sure this girl will be a worship leader or pastor some day, as she is always setting up church and forcing us to sit and listen to her preach and pray and sing.  On this particular day, she had the radio on and was twirling around, eyes closed, arms in the air, singing, "Knowing You, Jesus."  How could I not join in this time of praise and worship?  She is an enormous interruption much of the day, but times like these I am glad she interrupted. Who needs to know how to convert decimals to fractions anyway? ;)

I am fortunate to have a few moments alone with God throughout every day.  This time might not be at the beginning of the day or when I would have planned it, but somehow I always find myself with chunks of time when things are going smoothly enough for me to sit alone with the Lord.  You might think that a homeschooling mother must be so busy that it's unimaginable, but I have found that this is far from the truth.  Sure, I could place unrealistic demands on myself and my children and fill our time so full of curriculum that none of us could breathe, but why?  There are times when my daughter is occupied with her doll house people and my older kids are completing their hour of independent reading or when Max and Ruby are entertaining my daughter while my sons finish their math assignments, when I find myself able to read my Bible or pray for longer than thirty seconds.  I haven't always made this time for prayer and studying the Word part of my life.  In my twenties, I strove to be the perfect wife, the ideal mother, the invaluable neighbor, the productive employee, the supportive friend.  All of that striving didn't produce perfection and instead left me feeling empty, discontented and exhausted. I was still lacking something, but it wasn't clear to me what that something was.

I know much of this need for perfection came from being the wife of a man who was lost in an addiction to prescription drugs, whose continual health issues left him in a constant cycle of abusing drugs to cope with the chaos inside his heart.  My twenty-something self needed to feel like everything was okay, that I was in control of something, though my life was out of control, unpredictable and unhappy.  I had to prove to my children that we were going to have a happy family and a happy childhood, regardless of our circumstances.  I had to prove to myself that I would not give up on my marriage, just because it was hard, just because I was miserable.  During that time, though, I didn't make room for Jesus.  I believed that Jesus died for my sins, I believed that I was going to Heaven, but I didn't cling to Jesus with all of my heart.  I had no idea what I was missing and how different my life could be, if only I would surrender completely.

Sometime in my mid-twenties, I finally found what it was I had been searching for to fill this emptiness in my heart: Jesus.  Jesus, for real. To know about Jesus and to know Jesus personally are two entirely different things.  Up until this point, I was unaware there was a difference.  I thought that as long as I had "heard the good news," I would avoid going to hell.  What I hadn't realized was that I couldn't just hear this news and push it to the back of my mind, continuing to harbor bitterness toward my husband and his addiction and continuing to live my life independently, apart from the will of God.  This knowledge of an all-powerful, loving, merciful God hadn't consumed me and given me the hunger for more.  I had felt the same way about this information that I did knowing my address or knowing that my kids preferred their PB&J cut into triangles instead of squares.  I knew the information, but it didn't change me.  I thought that I could know God was God, but that I could live for creating a perfect life instead of living for Him.

A decade after I first heard about Jesus, I understood what it meant to follow Him, to live for Him and to be loved by Him.  I was no longer enslaved by my feelings of inadequacy and the constant struggle to make life better, more rewarding, and happier somehow.  I no longer felt that it was necessary to pick up the pieces after my husband had produced yet another path of destruction for himself.  I could finally see that his addiction was his problem and his responsibility.  I was free from that massive burden of making perfection my true god.

Now, almost two decades after I first heard about Jesus, I am in awe of just how incredible our God truly is.  I still want to be a good neighbor, a supportive friend, a God-honoring wife and mother, but that want isn't what I live for and it is something that I know isn't possible on my own.  I try to do everything God sets before me with the desire to honor Him.  As I think about how different the circumstances in my life are compared to what they were even ten years ago, I cannot help but praise the Lord for what he's done.

John 14:6 says, "Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me."

Kidney Stones and Caterpillars

A couple of Wednesdays ago, my husband woke me up at 3am, telling me he had a kidney stone and needed to go to the Emergency Room.  I'd been asleep for approximately four hours.  In an effort to get just two or more hours of sleep, I plugged in a heating pad and gave him some Ibuprofen.  Doug gets kidney stones frequently, thanks to his Crohn's Disease, so this was not a new thing for us.  Usually, he is able to pass them on his own, but occasionally, he has to have surgery to remove them.  Five minutes later, he insisted this was not helping and was not going to help and he needed to get to the hospital.

Still in denial, I got in the shower and started getting ready for the day.  I knew an ER visit would take hours with testing, scans, etc. and I was hoping that with a little time, the kidney stone would make it's way out.  As I was stepping out of the shower, Doug came in the bathroom puking.  Fun times.  If you've never gotten dressed and dried your hair with someone hurling their guts out three feet from you, you're missing out!

We arrived at the emergency room and were ushered into a room where an IV was started, blood tests and CT scans were ordered, and Doug's pain and nausea were alleviated, sort of.  The CT scan revealed not just one stone, but a massive stone blocking the ureter, along with several other large stones close behind it.  His entire left kidney was approximately 1/3 full of kidney stones.  His urologist decided that the best way to remove these stones was by a Percotaneous Nephrostomy.  It would involve two surgeries: the first one to insert a tube through his back into his kidney and the second to use that tube to remove the stones.  The first surgery was scheduled for Thursday and the second would be scheduled as soon as a special team of radiologists and doctors was in place.  Apparently it is a tricky, surgery that takes three or more hours to complete.  He was admitted to the hospital for what we thought was an overnight stay.

Throughout that night, an infection was causing Doug to have a fever of 103 degrees.  It was a scary time of high doses of antibiotics and lots of prayer, but two days later, the fever finally came down.  The surgery to put the nephrostomy tube in his back was complete and as soon as he was rid of the infection, he would be allowed to come home before the second surgery two weeks later.  Thankfully, that happened on Monday, so now we just wait for phase two.

While all of this was happening, I had some custom orders placed.  One of these orders was for a baby cocoon that looked like the caterpillar from the Eric Carle book, The Very Hungry Caterpillar.  I have seen these adorable cocoons, but didn't have a pattern for one.  My mind was kept busy with figuring out how to make this thick, warm, wonderful cocoon and little matching hat.  I love it so much that I want to make more, so I created a listing for one in my Etsy shop:  https://www.etsy.com/listing/123077460/knitted-the-very-hungry-caterpillar-baby   I am always grateful for these projects, so that my times spent in hospital waiting rooms seems productive.  My husband felt how soft and cozy the cocoon was and wondered if I could make one for him.  It may have been the Dilaudid talking, but it might not be such a bad idea!  If you visit my husband in the hospital after his second surgery next week and he's wrapped in a cocoon, you'll know what I was doing in the waiting room while he was being operated on.  But more than likely, I will just stick to knitting hats or a set of golf club covers!