I come from a music-loving family. We regularly sang around the piano together and quite often met up with church members to sing hymns at retirement homes. On one occasion I remember singing a solo while my mom accompanied me on the piano:
“there’s something quite peculiar about this world of ours,
sometimes we live in sunshine bright,
sometimes we live in showers,
but if you would keep happy when things are looking bad,
just lift the corners of your mouth and make believe you’re glad!
and smile! smile! smile! and keep right on a smiling…”
I remember exaggerating my smile while I sang.
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The lyrics to this song spoke to me this weekend. I know this never happens to you, but I was aching for praise. Just wishing for a few words of affirmation. And I began to think that if nobody cares enough to say something, I might just quit. Even though I love what I do.
Enter this song and these words and a rush of God-speak to my heart.
Riches I heed not nor man’s empty praise
Thou mine inheritance now and always
God’s praise is not empty. It goes beyond a mere complement to the even greater realm of forever rewards.
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The lights burn my tired eyes. The dishwasher hums. Kitchen chairs sit askew. Bicycle helmet and badminton rackets lay on the couch next to the book I was reading this afternoon. The fridge is littered with schedules and lists and reminders — all my attempts to organize this life. A glass bowl full of ripe pears on the counter along with three huge donated butternut squashes.
The kids asleep. The husband away. And me.
Me feeling like somehow life has gotten away, taken its joy and its wonder and sneaked away like a bandit.
Me feeling faithless, dried up and empty from so little time spent thinking and so much time spent doing.
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She spends fifteen minutes on her makeup, adding a bit of eyeshadow here, curling those eyelashes one more time. Her hair just isn’t laying right, as she checks the back for the fifth time with her handheld mirror. Maybe a turtleneck would work better with her hair down, or maybe she should just wear it up and out of the way today. She frets. She frowns. She feels paralyzed in this place of not-pretty-enough.
Across town, another woman is cleaning. Baseboards, windowsills, walls, doorknobs. She sees some spots on the window that she must have missed the day before. She sighs and reaches for the Windex and paper towels.
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I beg him for specific feedback. “Do you like my hair this way?” “Is this a good color on me?”
“I actually spent time trying to look nice today…did you notice?” I’m his wife, his beauty, his companion, his best friend.
My heart beats a little faster when he tells me, with great fervor, “you’re the BEST mommy ever!” I’m his parent, his guidance, his role model, his cheerleader.
To others I am daughter, teacher, friend, listening ear.
But when I try to imagine who I am to God? I pause, speechless. My first thoughts land on words like unworthy, disappointing, insignificant.
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Summer. It’s popsicles, pool parties, sunscreen, watermelon, late nights, and sleepovers. It’s air conditioning, family reunions, camping trips, and water balloon fights. It’s Vacation Bible School. It’s swimming lessons. It’s fireworks. It’s ice cream.
It seems like it comes and goes in a blink, as we’re carried from packing to unpacking to laundry to the pool to a friend’s house and back again. Summer is a hummingbird, darting from flower to flower, wings a-buzzing, never stopping.
It’s the fast season — where plants grow and flowers bloom, water rushes off melting glaciers and insects fill the skies. All nature moves quicker with this season of warmth and prosperity.
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This month I was able to visit a family who lives in Guyana, South America. We stayed in their home, ate meals together, walked home in the rain after visiting other friends, and spent many hours in their boat on the river. I watched them give hearty handshakes, exchange smiles, hold little scared hands. I watched them give rides, give encouragement, and give hope.
I watched them love.
You see — they’ve been living in a remote part of Guyana for almost five years now, ministering to the needs of the people in areas only reachable by small plane or boat.
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My early morning walk the other day began with a prayer for understanding.
It went something like this…”God, why am I always searching for something more, something better? It seems like I’m never satisfied, always wishing for more.”
I couldn’t even really put my finger on the source of the dissatisfaction. No good reasons to feel discontent. And yet that lingering desire, that hunger…what is it that I feel like I need?
What a pain to feel discontented because I’m discontented.
But the freshness of the early air and the chirping of the birds always speak to my soul. The planets of my brain start to align and get back in their orbits.
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