Today I'm joining hundreds of other writers to write for five minutes flat about one word. No hyper-editting. No backtracking. Loving and encouraging your fellow writers. Won't you join us over here?
Today's word: mighty
Nothing makes this mama of two boys feel more inadequate than when five o' clock rolls around, I'm trying to make dinner while the kids are fighting in the next room, and I'm wondering why on earth I didn't order a pizza for dinner. I think how calm and peaceful of a person I was less than an hour ago, and somehow all of that collectedness flew out the window as soon as my five-year-old jumped into the car at the bus stop and immediately began antagonizing his younger brother.
Why did I think I was qualified to raise these children who send me over the edge of my sanity faster than the blink of an eye? Where was this temper than rages within me when I was in my twenties? As I stand here and try to dodge grease splattering from the skillet while at the same time trying not to trip over my toddler who refuses to stay out of the kitchen for more than thirty seconds.
In those nano-moments between the yelling and the tattling and the tripping over small feet, I say the only name that can make me mighty when I am weak. When I am failing.
Jesus.
It's all I have time to say but it's all I need. He gives me the grace that I so desperately lack. He fills in the spaces when I wonder if I'll make it until bedtime. He is my mighty warrior in the battlefield of my life filled with calls of "mama" when all I want to do is lay my head down on the pillow.
And even though order is not restored I somehow manage to get food on the plates while the kids are still alive.
He's my power in the midst of the chaos.