Well, yesterday didn’t go quite as I planned. It was a great day…even a productive day but one phone call changed my holiday plans and set in motion a series of activities that did not include completing the post I planned for day 7 of our countdown to Christmas day. That’s okay, right? I’ll pick up where I left off…God gave me a great example of His grace to share.
A little background. A couple weeks ago, my soon-to-be 79 year-old Mom took a fall and broke her knee cap. She’s been in residential rehab since then. Yesterday I spoke to her doctor and confirmed what I suspected…Mom isn’t going to be able to make her planned trip to spend Christmas with one of my sisters out of state. She is leaving rehab, however, and needs a little extra help for the next several weeks.
Mom is joining our household for awhile. She’ll arrive here right about the time our daughter and son-in-law do and, of course, our son is home from college. We don’t have that many beds.
Guess what I was concerned about?
Not taking care of Mom for a few weeks or longer. The Lord and my dear husband have afforded me the flexibility in my work to be available for “just such a time as this.” Honestly, as hard as I expect this may be, I don’t think I’d like to have it any other way.
But the idea of bringing the extra burden on my husband and kids…shuffling bedrooms, asking everyone to help out here and there and, changing up our Christmas plans as needed to accommodate Mom and her bum knee…that bothered me. And as quickly as it did, I knew the truth. I was overwhelmed with grace and just broke down.
My husband and kids will move mountains for me….bedrooms are nothing.
“Love never fails.”
Love conquers these little challenges … and much bigger ones too. We just have to let love work. We have to recognize when God has different plans for us and trust that with those plans comes provision. Jeremiah 29:11 reminds us.
“For I know the plans that I have for you,’ declares the Lord, ‘plans for welfare and not for calamity to give you a future and a hope.”
Yesterday, I received rapid reassurance of God’s provision. Just as I was pushing past my little emotional breakdown, already confident that my family would be more than willing to accommodate Granny, my 15-year-old daughter walked in and asked what was wrong. I told her and with a simple shrug she said, “It’s fine, Momma. No one minds at all.”
And with that, she proceeded to help me plan the new sleeping arrangements and how we can make sure Granny is comfortable for her long visit. Not an ounce of selfishness. Not a bit of disappointment. Just love.
Here we are at day 6 of our countdown to the day we will celebrate our Saviors birth and I suspect lots of peoples’ plans are changing…or threatening to. Sickness has a nasty way of creeping in this time of year. Perhaps an extra house guest or fewer than you had hoped will be making the trip. Maybe an employee has to take off early and you’re stuck with the helm. Or maybe you’re just out of the one spice your recipe absolutely requires.
It’s okay. God’s got this.
Every time it happens today that things appear to not be going as planned, remember God’s provision and laugh.
Yes, laugh a little (or a lot).
To quote a favorite song from Need to Breathe, “The Outsiders,”
“‘Cause if you’re not laughing, who is laughing now?”
God is our source of all the things we need in this life…at all times and in all circumstances. He is with me and He is with you, ready to take care of all the tiny details…and that’s worth more than a smile. So, go ahead. Laugh in the face of change and challenge. You have reason to be joyful.
May joy and peace be with you, always.