Falling down

As soon as we walked in the door from school, she thrust her papers at me.
“Here” were the only words that came out, but I could see in her eyes there was more.

This child, my middle Miss, bears the resemblance of her mother in more ways than I can count.

It was a quiz, and she didn’t pass. Her eyes welled up in tears.
She’s never seen a grade like that before.

I pulled her over, consoled her and told her this was just the first of many, but that didn’t help.  She was broken. Undone.

That’s when I told her this: “Baby, sometimes you learn best by falling down.”

My Turn to Apply

This weekend I woke up grumpy. It was the “everyone-steer-clear-of-your-mom” kind of mood. Although I got up on the same side of the bed as I do everyday, on that day – it was definitely the wrong side of the bed.

My flesh woke up screaming. 

My breaking point happened shortly after lunch at my daughter’s soccer game when I yelled at the referee. Out loud.
It was not pretty. {Oh, go ahead and imagine it. I was officially that mom.}

I put myself to bed early that night, stuck my nose in a book and tried to ignore my day. About one page in, I read these words, “I pray for the Lord to redeem the time.”

What I was reading had nothing to do with my circumstance, but those words struck a chord deep inside. With tears in my eyes, I turned my words upwards. “Oh Lord, how do you redeem this day?” Now I was the one broken.

Quietly the words I had spoken to my daughter came back to me. 
But this time, they were for me. “Baby, sometimes you learn best by falling down.”

I heard this song for the first time last Thursday. 
Over and over, I played it until the words began to sink in.
This song became my prayer, set on repeat.

This isn’t a prayer we want to pray.
Make me broken. 
Make me empty.
Make me lonely.

But what if we did, and He finally became our everything?

This weekend, I fell down.  I was broken.
But God’s still making me.