To My Mother

a poem by Wendell Berry

I was your rebellious son,

do you remember?  Sometimes 

I wonder if you do remember,

so complete has your forgiveness been.

So complete has your forgiveness been

I wonder sometimes if it did not 

precede my wrong, and I erred,

safe found, within your love,

prepared ahead of me, the way home,

or my bed at night, so that almost

I should forgive you, who perhaps

foresaw the worst that I might do,

and forgave before I could act,

causing me to smile now, looking back,

to see how paltry was my worst,

compared to your forgiveness of it

already given.  And this, then, 

is the vision of that Heaven of which 

we have heard, where those who love

each other have forgiven each other,

where, for that, the leaves are green,

the light a music in the air,

and all is unentangled,

and all is undismayed

Has there ever been a more splendid ode to a Mother's forgiveness than the poetic lines above?  I don't think so.  And yet, I would love for my mothering-life to reflect such grace, spilled out new every morning.  Yes, a true picture of Heaven.  And why shouldn't it be a picture of Heaven?  The forgiveness we earthly parents extend to our children is but a blurry reflection of the forgiveness we have first received from our Heavenly Father.

So, why do we often times find ourselves shackled again and again by feelings of anger that smack of unforgiveness as Moms?  

I've had some of you ask me recently, "are you able to laugh at the rough and tumble, often times violent or just plain bizarre, antics of your boys?"   In cases like Brody's very public fit last week when I wouldn't take him home early from his first day of Kindergarten, you bet I can laugh.  But there are many times I can't and I don't.

I know other moms who can and do, and I envy their quick chuckles and twinkling eyes.  They see their children as children just being children, and don't  take their fits or quirks personally.  When I watch them I cry, "that's the mother I long to be!" from inside my grim-faced shell.  So what's the difference between the laughing and the scowling mothers?  

There's a fountain that seems to well up from the ladies who open their mouths wide in laughter; a natural source that their "multitude" just can't seem to stop up with their childishness.  It comes from somewhere deep and true and unchanging.  And it's called JOY.

A joyful heart is good medicine, but a crushed spirit dries up the bones.

(Proverbs 17:22)

The times I am most slow to laugh and quick to feel anger are when I am tired.  Bone weary.  When the longest of days have been made longer by constant complaints and whines for more; when everything I set upon the table illicit a "yucky" response; When I am all spent from a day's worth of giving only to tuck the boys into bed with cries of injustice ringing from all three rooms, I do not find myself in a laughing mood.  But the true heartbreak for me is not my grumpy, weary heart... but how slow I am to forgive when the laughter ceases.

Weary days are crushing days, and I long for a good dose of joyful heart!  But again I ask, where can it be found when I am all wrung out?  God's Word promises us this:

In His Presence is fulness of Joy!

(Psalm 16:11)

Joy can be found in God's Presence.  I know this to be true:  When I abide in His Presence and He literally abides in me, there is fruit that springs forth from my life.  The fruit includes Joy!  JOY!  Joy is born and expressed in my life when I draw near to the God who loves and forgives me fresh each day. And the more I live joyfully, the easier I find it to forgive the childishness of my children.  Because a joyful heart has been my medicine.  

Crushed bones have a hard time walking in forgiveness, but healthy bones, that rest in their own forgiveness, are able to forgive.

I want to be a laughing Mother to my sons; a forgiving Mother to my boys; a Mother whose forgiveness is so great, it seems more like a safety net, in which my children can fall, "safe found" within my love.  And when the day coms for them to write a note to me, their mother, as the poet did to his mother above, it would be my delight if they added a line about the sound of my laughter, the twinkle in my eye, and the joy in our home.

If you keep my commandments, you will abide in My love,

just as I have kept My Father's commandments and abide in His love.

These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may remain in you,

and that your joy may be full.  (John 15:10-11)