There's a Safety Pin Holding My Pants Shut

I've had the privilege of sharing my testimony a handful of times over the past few years. One of those times, I opened with this line: "There's a safety pin holding my pants shut."

I couldn't help it. For starters, it was true. I really had busted the closure on my favorite pair of trouser jeans, and as nervous as I was, wasn't about to wear anything but the clothes I loved most -- broken or not. On my way up to the podium, I had an overwhelming sense that I might give the women in the audience the impression that my life is easy, breezy perfect. A succinctly edited 30 minute narrative could certainly give that impression, particularly when there's a happy ending like Josiah and Isaiah, my boys, on display.

So, I told them about the safety pin holding my pants shut.

The point behind that safety pin comes up often. It's in my conversations with a dear friend who's struggling to be a godly mother and wife alongside a husband who doesn't share her faith. "You just don't know the blessings you have," she'll always say. It's prevalent in the underlying views of another dear friend, who's leveled me more than once during discussions about marriage when she says, "You and Andy just don't have the problems the rest of us do." It rises up again when still another dear friend, who wishes she could quit her job and be home with her kids full-time says, "You have no idea have good you've got it."

Actually, I do. I'm desperately grateful to my Father for blessing so abundantly someone as truly undeserving as me. Everywhere I turn, I'm confronted with yet another way my Father has chosen to demonstrate His love for me. It makes me shake my head in wonder more than a few times a day.

This summer our pastor has been teaching out of Genesis during Sunday school. He's focusing solely on chapters 12 through 24, the life of Abraham. Last week we lighted on chapter 16, which opens with this revealing information: "Now Sarai, Abram's wife, had borne him no children. But she had an Egyptian maidservant named Hagar; so she said to Abram, 'The Lord has kept me from having children. Go, sleep with my maidservant, perhaps I can build a family through her.'"

No pastor can bring up Genesis 16 without mentioning the all-consuming nature of the I-word -- infertility. Pastor Randy was no different, and while he thoroughly outlined the cultural significance of bearing children and the unending cycle of anticipation and disappointment, I did the same thing I usually do -- I forced my face blank, which isn't all that easy since Sarai-turned-Sarah and I are kindred spirits, laughing and all.

My face didn't remain blank long. As Pastor Randy's message unfolded, his overall point nearly made my jaw drop because of its piercingly accurate truth: focusing on the one thing God has withheld from us becomes an obsession, the likes of which we cannot see anything else through. It distorts our vision to the point we overlook the safety pin holding the pants together.

We see perfection instead of real people living real lives fraught with real consequences. Sarah saw Hagar that way, a genius solution to a lifelong problem. The maidservant was swiftly thrust into the drama as Abram's second wife and things went sour when Hagar became pregnant. She lorded the forthcoming child over Sarah. Sarah, in turn, lashed out at Abram and mistreated Hagar.

I've wondered since Pastor Randy's message if things might have been different for Sarah if she had been able to focus on the blessings God had already given her. God's plan wasn't thwarted in the least by her grumbling -- she still received the long-awaited child --, but perhaps her life before Isaac could have been less painful. I'll never know, but I do know that my friends are right -- I am extremely blessed. More than they or anyone else could know. Like Sarah, my greatest blessings have been born from my greatest heartaches. I suspect Sarah and I aren't the only ones.

I'll most likely keep spilling the beans about things like the safety pin holding my pants shut. It's my way of preventing others -- and myself -- from thinking that I've got it all together. It's a challenge not to focus on the thing God has withheld in your life -- like a working zipper --, but giving thanks for the things He has provided -- like a spiffy pair of jeans -- goes a long way to keeping our vision fixed where it singularly belongs -- on Jesus.

On being thankful

My oldest son got mixed up at snack time today. In other families, this would not be a big deal. In our family, it's a huge deal.
My oldest son took a bite of his brother's cookie. And immediately, he had second thoughts about going on and eating something without asking us first because he called to myself and my husband Nate "What does my cookie look like?" Nate and I looked at each other (we were in the other room).
"Phin's cookie is a wafer cookie and yours is the oatmeal one." We heard Isaiah start to panic.
We ran downstairs and saw a bite missing from Phin's.
Isaiah is allergic to wheat. He's allergic to peanuts, eggs and peas too. We weren't sure if those things were in those cookies, but we knew there would be wheat in them. My husband grabbed the Benadryl and gave it to a crying Isaiah and he gulped it down.
Then we watched him.
I'm not sure what Nate was thinking during this time, but I know what I was thinking: "Just let him be okay, just let him be okay......"
You know when you get a bag of flour from the grocery store and you bring it home and pour it into its canister? Isaiah can't even be one room away from that process or his eyes will swell up and he'll have an allergic reaction. We have to give him Benadryl just from being around flour at times. Who knew what would happen once he had digested it?
So, we waited. We waited for Isaiah to stop crying. We waited for the Benadryl to do its job. And were grateful.
He did fine. He recovered beautifully. Tonight you wouldn't even guess there had been anything wrong today.
As parents, we pray for protection for our children. I believe there are many things that happen all around us, all day long, where the Lord is protecting our kids. We just don't see it.
Today I got to see it.
I got to see how the Lord protected Isaiah.
He gave him the instinct to ask us about his snack.
What would have happened if he had taken more than that first bite? We don't have to know that answer.
I'm so thankful tonight. Thankful that I love my kids. I love my kids so much. I do whatever I can to protect them.
But the Lord loves them more.