05 December 2012

hope

The kids don't love each other today. Understatement. They're saying in cold, deliberate voices "I'm going to kill you." (which is worse than screaming it)

It makes my heart fall to pieces. What do you do when they hate each other, when what God has done for them means nothing to them, when they're stubborn and irrational, when they're deliberately and spitefully cruel? What do you do when they can't see past the smog of their anger? When their sinful hearts crawl like nasty little monsters out of their mouths?



What does God do with us? Does he squeeze our jaws until apologies wheeze out as if from a dying organ? Does he turn up the radio and focus on waiting for the light to change?

I know it's not either of those options. He is neither aggressive nor passive. But I'm not sure how to mimic him. I know he is patient. I know he repeats truth to us, even when we refuse to listen. I know that even in our ugliest moments his love for us is steady. I know his heart breaks too.

So after a long conversation that got nowhere, I sit in the car, enveloped by dark rain, and pray. God, help me show you to them. We need you.



I come inside and start writing these words, and in the middle of the third paragraph, E walks in. He runs up to me and hugs me tight around my waist and says simply "Megan, I'm sorry I was mean to you, and I already apologized to her, too." And I'm weak in the knees at God's kindness, and at his reassurance that he is pursuing their hearts. I have great reason to hope.