christie & thad 

The middle child, the oldest boy, starts kindergarten in just a few weeks.  Not only that, but he will ride the bus (which is, possibly, a bigger deal for both of us even than kindergarten itself).

I’ve been a mother long enough to know that the days are long but the years are short.  These summer days drag (how to fill the time between dinner and bed?), but I will wake up tomorrow and watch my son graduate from high school.  I know this, and it has prompted me to wonder: what do I want this boy to grow up to do?  To know?  To be?

Like most parents in these enlightened days, I say, “I only want him to be happy.  Whatever makes him happy.  If that means becoming a doctor, great.  If it’s an auto mechanic, fine by me.”  Unlike most parents, I suspect, I really do mean it. 

I’ve spent enough time around highly-educated Ivy-leaguers to know that the things which spell success in our culture (straight A’s!  a University of Chicago degree!) are not necessarily markers of either success or happiness. 

Not only that, but I know that there is some kind of Murphy’s law of parenting: whatever I plan for my child, the opposite will happen.  My father gave me only this bit of advice as I prepared for college: “Study anything you want, but be practical.  Don’t major in English or History.”  I was never a rebellious child, but Murphy’s law kicked in and, by the end of college, I was graduating with a double major in English and History. 

What then do I want for my boy?  For his big sister?  His little brother? 

Only this: to know deep down in their heart of hearts that God loves them.  Truly, that is all.

Unfortunately, there is such a big chasm between head knowledge and heart knowledge, between assenting to an idea or concept and feeling the truth of it deep inside.  I tell them over and over: you are loved.  By me.  By others.  But, most importantly, you are loved by the Love who created everything beautiful and that Love is vaster and more intimate than you may ever know.

I heard that too as a child.  I sang these words in so many Sunday school classes: “Jesus loves me, this I know.”  But I didn’t know.  I nodded my head and agreed, but I didn’t really know.

Praying that my children know God’s love is sometimes difficult.  It is as if I am praying that they suffer.  Maybe I’m wrong.  Maybe there is some other way in which this knowledge can travel from head to heart, but the enormity of God’s personal love was only revealed to me in some very dark places.

Looked at another way, I am not praying that they suffer.  I am praying that they be comforted.

And this is what I want for my babies?  Yes, this is what I want for them: that, like Hagar, they will one day say, “I have now seen the One who sees me.”

This is my prayer:

“I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge – that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God”  (Ephesians 3:17-19).

I’m afraid that it will hurt, but I promise you: it is worth every tear.

“My ears had heard of you but now my eyes have seen you.” (Job 42: 5)

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