Overflowing

How I love to be seated firmly in the driver's seat of my life.

So when the pressure of finishing All The School before midsummer intersects with Little League-times-three kids; and people need haircuts, dentist appointments, orthodontic work, and eye exams; and my family will die without dozens of pints of homemade strawberry jam from fields that are ripe Now and Only Now; and online pre-algebra classes for next year are filling up unless I research, make a decision and register also Now; and humans somehow continually need clean laundry and especially frequent meals whether I have time for it or not.... I feel more like I'm in the driver's seat of a runaway wagon down a jouncy mountainside.

How natural my bent to go completely the wrong way with this!  Pride likes to feel in control and successful.


And it doesn't feel successful when you walk in after the kids had to feed themselves and you step in a plate of beans.

So pride gets really cranky.

Pride freaks out because what would other people think?  They might even think I'm not perfect...

My Mother's Day present:  a picture painted by each kid of what they like to do with me.  ♡

Then pride tallies up all the meritorious work I've done, bloats the numbers a bit, and sanctimoniously sniffs that I'm so underappreciated.


It's ugly, what comes out of my heart when I'm squeezed.














What if, when my cup runneth over with responsibilities, my heart instead overflowed with thankfulness?

Rejoice in the Lord always; again, I say, rejoice!

Real life is not nearly as pretty as these highlight pictures, believe you me.  But my good Father is pouring out His blessing on me through sunny May ballgames and giggling kids...and through overwhelming piles of dishes and dirty uniforms and coming to the end of myself.  

There is, truly, no other life I'd rather have.  I have a home.  I have food.  I have a loving family.  I get to stay home with my kids and homeschool.  They have healthy bodies that can run and play.  I get to take care of them.  I get to play house every day.  

My Father loves me.  He is forming me from glory to glory, forgiving my ongoing sin and slowly, gently, melting more of it off.  

Pride isn't the boss of me.  

The Boss of me isn't demanding I make it look pretty.  He's calling me to forget keeping track of my merits and rejoice in Jesus, who was perfect so my life doesn't have to be.

His yoke is easy; His burden light--whether I'm trudging uphill or careening down in a windy blur.