Most weeks are like that anymore, mostly because of Jadon and the joy and challenge he brings to my life. So I’ll start with that.
I am convinced that we have the easiest, best, sweetest baby in the world (I know you other mothers will disagree!). Our band had a last-minute gig Saturday, at this charming little restaurant in Helotes (Northwest San Antonio). Since the show was so last-minute, we hadn’t been able to arrange for anyone to watch Jadon. But the stage area had room enough for a playpen, so we set it up, put in a few toys and hoped he would do well during our first set. He never complained once! He stood holding the side of the playpen watching us play, sometimes even singing along. He never cried once. The second hour-long set was the same. After our show was over, people kept coming up to us commenting on what a great baby we had on our hands. God has blessed us with the most amazing child ever.
He even started dancing during the song, “Jadon’s Lullaby,” much to the entertainment of our crowd. He knows that one by heart. Mama sings it to him often.
So, with part of the tip money we made, we bought him a new toy that he played with for about five minutes.
Don’t get me wrong. We are still working on discipline and teaching Jadon what he can and cannot touch (computer cords) or eat (floor fuzz) or drop on the floor (papers on top of the filing cabinet). He still gets smacked—often. But he is one of the most laid back, flexible, people-loving babies I’ve ever seen. He’s visited many church nurseries in the last few months, and he will play with or be held by anyone.
My son has turned 10 months old. With each passing month, it gets harder and harder to believe that he is really that old. He is a little man, all rambunctious and rowdy and wild. Yesterday he kept climbing into this saucer chair and then spinning around to face me with this big, triumphant smile on his face, as if to say, “Look what a big boy I am.” I wanted to laugh and cry all at the same time because he’s so smart, but he’s growing so fast. I want to hold on to the baby as long as I can, but he is quickly being replaced by a little boy.
Jadon took his first few steps about two weeks ago—without holding on to anything. He still prefers holding on to something, but sometimes he’ll forget to hold on, and he’ll walk a few steps, then remember. He likes to stand by himself, and then squat to pick things up and then stand again. I tell him that’s got to be harder than walking! All those squats!
He’s finally sitting again in the bathtub. A couple of months ago, he was trying to crawl in the tub. Ben turned his back to grab something, and Jadon did a face plant in the water. I think it was a traumatic experience for him, and, since then, he hasn’t wanted to sit in the water but will stand and make us wash him as he stands. But my wild boy has finally forgotten that trauma, and he sat again for the first time this week.
We’ve been working on teaching him to feed himself. Right now he just does it with his fingers, but he’s interested in the spoon and takes it away occasionally. He’ll stick it in his mouth and then make a funny face when he realizes there’s no food on it.
He’s had a few new experiences this month. We’ve taken him bike riding. He loves it. He hates wearing the helmet, but I think it’s the cutest thing ever!
I also let him sit in the grass (previously avoided because we have a bit of a problem with scorpions out here in the Hill Country). He didn’t like the prickly feel, so he tried not to touch it with his arms or his legs. Since he was in shorts, he sat there doing a jackknife (isn’t that the ab exercise we all used to hate in athletics?) until he fell back into it. Then he just lay there looking at me, his face saying, “Please, Mama, come get me out of this weird thing.” Seriously, though, he loves being outdoors. Sometimes I just open the doors and windows and let him stare outside, and he’ll cry when I close them. So silly.
And then, he went to Corpus for the first time. It was a business assignment, so we didn't have enough time to visit the beach, but we did get some cool pictures.
I so miss the baby who used to lie in my arms, content to be with Mama, but I’m enjoying watching this remarkable boy and his daily discoveries.
Ben and I have been talking a lot lately about love. Like what did Paul mean when he said, “Love always perseveres” (1 Corinthians 13:6) and that faith, hope and love remain, “but the greatest of these is love” (1 Corinthians 13:13)? What does it really mean to have no fear in love, to be made perfect in love (1 John 4:18)?
I’ve been watching my extended family fall apart. Just crumble like piles of stone stacked too high. My heart has been so heavy. I was up half the night praying for my two sets of aunts and uncles who are toeing the line of divorce.
I am far from a Christian scholar. But I have to believe that God intended love to be enough, that John Lennon (The Beatles) really did have it right. Love should be all we need.
Why else would He tell His disciples that the greatest of all the commandments was to “love the Lord your God will all your heart, soul and might, and love your neighbor as yourself.”
And what does that mean, really?
Somewhere along the way, I think we have stopped giving the kind of love God always wanted us to give—the kind of love that always perseveres, the kind of love that fosters no fear, the kind of love that’s wrapped up in faith and hope and sacrifice. We give a self-serving love, a more convenient, fair-weather love that stands in the good times but crumbles in the storms. I am guilty of this, too.
This kind of love is destroying our tradition of marriage. We are passing a new definition of love to children who will “take the easy way out,” just like we did.
It really is a slow fade down the slippery slope of destruction. That’s the way our enemy intends it, because then we don’t notice when things begin falling apart. But marriages don’t dissolve in a day. Children don’t become their parents in a day. Generations don’t make the same mistakes in a day.
But we can turn the enemy’s game around. Spin it right around on his horned-red head (that’s bad theology, but isn’t that how every kid who grew up in the Southern Baptist Church sees the devil?). If we would only choose to love more deeply.
Our pastor, Scott Heare, sort of solidified the whole heart, soul and might thing for me during a Sunday sermon weeks ago. He said God wants all our love—the emotional (heart), the spiritual (soul) and the physical (might or strength). We talked this week about strength and how our world sees strength as how much we can bench press or how many burdens we can handle without our eyes leaking. But Jesus showed us real strength in the way he submitted his life to His Father. Real strength is found on our knees.
What if we chose the kind of love that holds a husband tightly when he’s been out too late drinking too much, instead of voicing our disgust on an already-dark night while our children are listening just outside the door? What if we chose the kind of love that offers a safe place to land for a husband who’s gone astray? What if we chose the kind of love that said, “Your healing is more important than mine,” if only for a little while.
What if we chose to love with mercy?
I believe marriages would be stronger for it. God, let it be so in my marriage. For the sake of my children and the generations that follow.
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