devotion 295 - Aroma

I handled the bouquet as if it was as fragile as glass.  These are the things that memories are made of.  I had promised Lily we would find a way to keep the bouquet.  Her bouquet, her treasure of her first time to be a flower girl.

I took it in the bathroom in the quiet hours of the morning.  The sun wasn't up yet.  I found an old mirror with hooks at the bottom. I hung it upside down, thinking that would preserve its beauty.  I knew this is exactly what my mother would have done and a warmth came over me.

I hung it carefully and took one last long breath of the aroma, still sweet, still perfect.  Strange I thought, how upside down causes straight.  There is probably a lesson for life there somewhere.

I wondered how Lily was; I silently prayed for her.

 She was away at camp; another first time. 

She had called the night before.  I had assured her I was tending to her bouquet.

She sounded so excited.  Then she said, “Let me go into the bedroom.”  And she began to cry.  She had left her blanket at home, her trusted friend and confidante and she was afraid to go to sleep.

 

“Upside down,”  I thought.  Cool is not comfortable.  I told her how I would fall asleep at 5^th grade camp.  I didn't tell her that was after an hour or two in the bathroom as my nervous stomach would dictate where I would sit.  I told her to think of a sweet memory and I listed a few.  I told her to relive each and every detail then ask Jesus to take those memories into her dreams.  I prayed silently and her tears silenced.

I see my son getting ready for school.  He hides some Lego guys in his pant pocket.  They seem his partners as we adjust to seventh grade.  I questioned him asking if others bring their Lego guys. 

“No,” he replied, “just me, I am a nerd.”  I was shocked that Lego guys are the official determinant of nerd-dom.  I questioned what made him a nerd.  This was news to me although I am sure I qualified for the same status in seventh grade.  Beau gave me a long list.  He is not sporty, not cool, etc.  I reminded him he just needed to be the best Beau and the tears came.

Desperately trying to figure out who He is and desperate to be liked, I reminded him again he can only be who God created him to be.  Why is that not enough?

In the upside down universe of God to stand alone with God is to gain, but in seventh grade, standing alone is being a nerd.  How does a mom traverse this chasm?

I kissed my son good bye and we left early on the train to see my Ava’s team of doctors.  They love her; we love them; 

all except one. We sat down with the speech doctor.  She is straight forward and brutally honest. She admitted Ava has made progress but scored her far lower in intelligibility than I thought possible.  

This little girl that can tell stories far richer than words can carry cannot be understood.  More therapy, surgery, more work; the words tumbled out of the doctor’s mouth like water over a dam and they drowned me.

I felt a failure.

We boarded the train back home.  Ava settled with her lunch and a movie and I opened my book.  It was Christian fiction, an escape for my mind and heart.  But there was no escape, the words stared and then shouted back,

“In all things give thanks.”  

I closed my book.

Had Ava’s mouth not been formed with a gaping cleft hole, she would still be in China.  I gave thanks.  In limiting her speech, God has given Ava the ability to listen, to learn to breathe in books and to sing from memory a dozen songs and to sign the Lord’s Prayer.

I gave thanks.  In the upside down world of God, pain brings perseverance, perseverance, trust and trust the understanding that the invisible is all that matters.

I want Ava to tell me things.  I want her to describe how she hurts when she cries.  I want her to retell her memories from China.  But mostly I need her to trust.  I need her to trust her dad and me and in that learn to trust her heavenly Father.  If this is the road to that trust, why then do I look for detours?

I want easy, but in the inverse of the Kingdom, hard bring us to the King.

If we find the secret of happiness, do we seek the Author?

If we buy comfort, do we seek the Comforter?

If we schedule ourselves busy, do we allow for the Creator of time?

If we sit in the reflections of screens, do we ever see the Son?

I grieve when my children grieve but is it for their and my good?

To lead we must serve, to hear, we must listen - to live, we must die, to love we must sacrifice.

He makes no mistakes.  

He creates no errors.  

He gives scents to flowers such that we can breathe in the aroma of His majesty.  I wish I was more this, or less that, that my children had no pain or angst, but do I tell the Perfect He has faults? 

Or do I embrace the ugly to turn it upside down and see the beautiful. 

He is at work in all places, at all times, in all things. 

I close my eyes and see;  and I give thanks.

But thanks be to God, who always leads us as captives in Christ’s triumphal procession and uses us to spread the aroma of the knowledge of him everywhere. 2 Cor 2:14