I was frustrated at Jesus today.
I was frustrated because as I was reading Luke, it dawned on
me that He and I are so very different. Not just because He unconditionally
loves His neighbor and by contrast I dream of ways to take out their yapping
bird under the cloak of night.
But I realized that I am married, a mother, and a female.
He is single, no kids, a male…and well…the Son of God.
I even had the thought creep in that God couldn’t allow Him
to parent because He needed Jesus to remain sinless. Seriously, I had this
thought.
It’s been a rough parenting month.
As I continued to reflect on His life there were several
passages that jumped out to my desperate position of tired mother of 5 and
cruddy wife to 1.
Jesus had times where He needed to find a desolate place to
huddle up with the Father.
This was Jesus’ “Hide in the bathroom, lock the
doors, and feign a menstral moment." I need to redeem those 5 minutes locked in the bathroom. The problem is that I often
spend those 5 minutes checking email or reading the back of the shampoo bottle
because my brain is working on ½ a cylinder. Jesus knew that the most
refreshing thing He could do was to escape to His Dad.
Jesus often had hords of people shouting demands at Him.
“Heal
me, feed me, show me where to go!” This is Jesus’ “When’s dinner? Mom, Charis
stuck Jell-O down my underwear! Makaria is throwing up in the bathtub!” Jesus
understood my brain being split into hundreds of pieces and trying to attend to
the needs of the desperate. Instead of balling up into the fetal position and
sucking on a ring pop, He patiently healed and feed and wept with His people.
He did not in fact weep because He was spent. He wept because He was
compassionate.
Jesus walked around with 12 passionate, clueless, and
utterly dependent men who often brought friends along with them who wanted to
eat.
This is Jesus’ “Walk through the market with 5 children clawing at my
purse, crying for water and screaming when they don’t get what they want.” He understood what it meant to look after a ragtag group of children when crossing the street. He understood that when He was talking to the Jairus, he was also teaching the disciples. His words were held and remembered by twelve.
As a wife and mother, it's easy to feel like I just want to escape. The thing is, Jesus did too. He knew that there were times to be encircled by needy people. But there were also times He needed to receive His refreshment and work orders from His Father. He didn't escape to Facebook or the blogging world. He escaped to the Father. There are so many times that my prayer life feels like just another task in my day. Jesus' life has reminded me today I it's not a task, it's a lifeline. That if I want to parent out of holiness and not just "suck it up-ness," then I needed to be sitting with Him at some point in my day.
I'm working on putting Bibles near the sink or in the kitchen so that I can grab one for 1 minute. Or putting on music that will fixate my mind on Jesus, even for 30 seconds. Jesus knows my struggles because realistically, they are human problems, not just wife, mother, female ones.
