Living Above the Laundry Pile

Last week we finished putting in new plants and putting down mulch before the temperatures began to soar.  We also moved some plants to new locations in the garden.  Some were getting crowded out by neighbors, while others lacked the sun or shade they so desperately needed.

Don’t you wish kids came with those little labels you find inside all the pots at the garden center?  You know, “this one needs things quiet and calm,” or, “this one can stand firmer discipline,” or, “spend some extra one-on-one time with this one.”

We have three children and they are all so incredibly different that it amazes me that they all came from the same parents.  Oh, sure, they look like us.  They have some common characteristics.  But they are all so very different.

There is no “one-size-fits-all” in parenting.  When we try to handle a second or third child the way we did the first, we will usually be met with great resistance.  This is even more pronounced when we expect our kids to be just like us.

As I told you last week, my oldest daughter is in Korea for 2 months teaching English this summer.  She’s one who needs a much bigger pot!  (This is the same daughter who clung to me for an entire year of 4 year old preschool, begging me daily not to leave!)  How this daughter came from my body and temperament is beyond me–I was so anxious whenever I left home!   But somehow she became immune to home sickness, and somehow my husband and I have learned how to adjust our parenting style and expectations to suit her needs.

On the other hand, the other two are nothing like her.  They need a little more shelter and attention.  Someday they may also need bigger pots, but for now we must pray and ask God how to best meet their needs so they, too, can be fruitful.

That’s what parenting does–it drives us to God.  And this is a good thing.  The fruit of our efforts, in prayer, in discipline, in love, will soon bring Him the glory He deserves!

“How do you put them on a school bus?” my former room mate inquired, deeply concerned.  It was a phone call we had more than 10 years ago when she was still single and we were living our lives vicariously through one another.  She was a well-traveled businesswoman, and I was a worn out mom of two at that time.

“Well,” I answered, “the bus drives up, the doors open, they get on, and the bus drives away.  That’s about it.  It’s hard, but you have to let them go.”

“I can’t imagine ever being ready to do that.”

Diane has since become a mom, so I am certain she has learned, as we all do, that we have to let them go.  Into the arms of another so we can get some rest.  Into the nursery so we can enjoy a church service.  Into a neighbor’s house so we can get a date night with our husbands.  Into a friend’s house without us.  And onto a big, yellow school bus.

From the moment our children are placed on our chests and breathe for the first time on their own, they begin to separate from us.  The doctors (or our husbands) cut the umbilical cord, but they don’t destroy the special attachment we feel to our children.  Indeed, motherhood is just one long series of letting go, of cutting that cord again, and again, and again.

This morning my first born left to teach English in Korea for two months.  She is now almost 20 years old and has learned to spread her wings and fly from the nest.  But it’s still hard to cut the cord.

All I can say is that God Himself must have put that special attachment into parents’ hearts so we would know how much He loves us, and how much He loved His Son, whom the Father sent from Heaven to die for us.  That attachment is divine in nature.  It is part of what makes us, by design, like Him:

So God created mankind in his own image,  in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them (Genesis :27).

This month, whether we are facing preschool, kindergarten, high school or college graduations, weddings, trips, job relocations, military orders or any other separation, God knows how parents feel.  He bonded us together with a love that just won’t let go!

At the same time, He has also created us as separate beings.  We are privileged to take responsibility for the lives of our children, but ultimately their lives (and ours) belong to God.  He has made them for His purposes, whatever that may be.  And we cannot hold them back selfishly from moving on to becoming all He designed them to be.  That “moving on” requires our “letting go”:  of our own fears, of our own desires, of our own plans and visions of how their lives “should” go.

Perhaps that kind of letting go is even more difficult.  But with proper boundaries in place, we free our children to fly away from the nest and return in liberty.

This learning to let go is really learning to love.