Monday, March 17, 2008

Life lessons from Sun-Maid


Another lesson from mommying:
Today I was driving in the car with Lincoln who has recently developed a passion for raisins (I don't think he's my son). I handed him the bag of raisins and he's plugging away eating every last one when I think he's had enough. I take the bag of raisins away and hand him a few more to tide him over when he starts screaming.
He knew he could have had the entire bag and all he has is a few in his hand. So here he is, shoving the raisins he has been given in his mouth all the while screaming fervently for the raisins he doesn't have. I try to comfort him by telling him "It's okay buddy, eat the raisins you have" and then I catch myself saying something with such profound meaning for my life that I can hardly believe the words are coming out of my own mouth. I tell him "Be thankful for the raisins you do have."
Wha????
This is such a foreign concept in my heart that I couldn't believe I was touting the principle to my 2-year-old. It was at that moment that I felt God lovingly smack me upside the head with a new truth I need to grasp. Contentment.
Ah-ha.
Be happy with the raisins I have. So often in life I catch myself asking God for something (namely at this stage it's me asking for our townhome to sell and for us to be blessed with a bigger house before this baby comes), and I'm crying and screaming so much for the raisins I don't have that I fail to be thankful for, end enjoy the raisins that I'm currently being given.
I wish I could convey what an impact this had on me. It's one of those lessons that you "know" but you haven't really come to learn. Surely I've been blessed beyond measure, and my thankfulness for our current circumstances should be much deeper than a mere formality I profess to believe because I know how pretentious it sounds to be asking for a bigger house with a yard. Surely there are people not only with much less, but with nothing at all, and the thing that I have been given (whether townhome, clothes, etc) is perfectly suitable and even beyond that an abundance more than I've ever asked. Not only that, but remind myself of the truth that I have been forgiven an astonishingly large debt, for which Christ bought my forgiveness and I am a free woman, no longer even living for the things this world can offer me. Yet somehow I've managed thus far to coast through life with little appreciation for my raisins.
I wonder which raisins I can learn to appreciate better today.
(the picture above is our amazing garden, something which God greatly blessed us with and for which I am overwhlemingly thankful every spring and summer).

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