Wednesday, October 3, 2012

Beauty and Blessings

Everybody has those moments where for a split second life seems perfect. Maybe your child cuddles up to you in the early morning before the alarm goes off. Maybe you’re a composer and you are conducting your opus. You could be an artist and create your most precious masterpiece or maybe it’s a moment of complete and total worship. I was reading about creation and the formation of the earth and I got to thinking. My house is always incredibly loud. I have a 3 year old who is apparently incapable of sitting still and a 4 year old who is still learning about how to use an inside voice, so quiet is something that I don’t get a lot of. I wonder how quiet it was before creation. We hardly ever experience complete darkness. There’s always the glow of a cell phone charging or some other device. In our house we leave lamps on for the kids because they’re afraid of the dark. I remember when I was in high school we went to Cumberland Caverns to sing every December. We’d take a tour of the cave and during that tour we would all sit down and they would turn out all the lights. We were left in complete darkness that you can’t find in the city for all the lights or in the country for all the stars. It was completely dark and completely quiet, but somehow seemed comforting. I wonder if that’s how God felt before creation. A friend of mine is having a baby today. I remember that feeling scared and excited every emotion all at the same time. It’s almost overwhelming. Did God feel like that? Since creation has he had a chance to close his eyes and put his head back and enjoy his creation. You know like Mr. Holland does when he’s directing his opus. He throws his head back and closes his eyes as he conducts. Does God ever do that? I have 3 beautiful children. I didn’t mention my 7 year old earlier because she’s almost always quiet because her head is always buried deep within the pages of a book. And thinking about creation caused me to think about beauty in a completely different light. I know that by society’s terms I am probably far from beautiful. I rarely wear make-up and I am usually wearing sweats and flip flops, but I do things that I believe are beautiful when I get on my knees and fervently pray for a friend who is having her first child or one who is very sick and in the hospital. I gave birth to BEAUTIFUL children and while I am not rich by any sense of the words I feel blessed. Blessed beyond measure… and in a strange way more beautiful than ever because I am a part of something beautiful. I have my own beautiful family. I have wonderful parents who are an amazing example to me, and a brother who I believe is truly the best in all the world even though I don’t see him very often. All four of my grandparents are still living and I have amazing aunts, uncles and cousins that are blessings as well. My life is not at all how I pictured it when I would swing on my swing set and make up songs, but it is so much more than I ever could have imagined. Today while the kids are sleeping I just feel so blessed. I’m having my hold my head back, close my eyes and just take it in kind of moments that you just don’t want to end. I am truly, truly thankful for all that I have because it’s more than I ever could have dreamed of. I may not have very much, but at times like this I feel like I truly have it all!