Messy Monday: Found

Yesterday was a moment to let dishes sit and lunch turn to crusty cement on our kitchen table, because my kids were ready to play outside. I was ready to play too.

 

We headed into the sunshine to run, bike, and roller skate while the men-folk played football in the yard. My three-year-old emerged from the cluttered garage with a packet of cilantro seeds that had apparently been shuffled into the unknown for the duration of the summer, as well as a package of Easter stickers from goodness knows where. She toted both in the woven white and magenta basket on her bike until a moment of enlightenment.

 

An impromptu game of hide-and-seek sprouted organically from our play. I climbed atop the tube slide, pressed against the wooden wall of our church's ark. I heard her giggles as she found her sister and they set off in search of me. One minute later a laughing face shouted, "I found you!" I was caught, but there was a consolation prize. "You want a sticker?" For each time she found me I was given a shiny Easter sticker, and of course so was she.

 

I drove to pick up our pizza, stickers emblazing the fact that I was a proud parent of a preschooler. I owned every bit of it.

 

To bear the marks of my daughter is a gift.

 

To bear the marks of my Savior, immeasurably greater.

 

For the run-down, bone-weary moments, we have a Savior who points to our lives and says,

 

Remember when I found you?

 

When we are tempted to feel failure as our very definition, He points to our lives and says,

 

Remember when I found you?

 

As though we could be emblazoned with days and moments that sing for joy, I belong to Christ!

 

 My soul will be satisfied as with fat and rich food, and my mouth will praise you with joyful lips,

 

As though we could roll out of bed to the sight of our Savior smiling in the morning sun,  Found you.

 

when I remember you upon my bed, and meditate on you in the watches of the night;
 

Remember when you hid behind your pride,

And I found you?

 

Remember when you couldn't see a way out of the darkness,

And I found you?

 

Remember when people were cruel and you cowered inside yourself,

And I found you?

 

Remember when the pain covered you with a patchwork of injury,

And I found you?

 

Remember when your anger was so great you feared it would consume you,

And I found you?

 

 for you have been my help, and in the shadow of your wings I will sing for joy.

Psalm 63:5-7 

 

Over and over until our whole lives are just enormous testimonies to the Founder and Foundation.