The parable of the cranky children.

Love me.  Now!

I've been thinking a bit about the parable of the hidden treasure lately.  You know the one.  Where the man finds a hidden treasure and in his joy, sells all he has to buy the land where he found the treasure.  Even though everything in my life is in fast motion right now, I managed to slow down long enough to think about this parable that I've read probably hundreds of times in my life.  Obviously this parable is not like some of the others where the meaning was hidden to the people Jesus was speaking with.  This one is blatantly talking about God's kingdom.  So, what does this look like for me?  Do I have to sell everything I have to find the kingdom of heaven?  I don't think so.  To sell everything- that is a big sacrifice!  But, what about to give up sleep?  To give up "me time"?  To be busier than I like to be, more needed, stretched in more directions than I'm used to?  What if that is the sacrifice the Lord is asking me to make to find his kingdom?  It seems like God's kingdom in Bible times came to those who were being healed and freed and given sight.  We're told even though the fullness is yet to come, we live in His kingdom when He is at work around us, in us and through us.  When I am rocking Moses in the night for the 10th time because he is crying again, God's kingdom has come.  When I'm sorting out tears and tantrums from my 3 year old and showing her that someone cares, God's kingdom has come.  When I sympathetically listen to my eldest complain that everyone else gets treated better than her, God's kingdom has come.  I've been known to complain about a lot of these things lately.  It's exhausting to mother 3 needy children.  (Can I get an AMEN?!)  But, I think the Lord is wanting me to see that the painful sacrifice of it all brings me an even greater reward: Himself.

Life will be better when...

...Moses starts sleeping more at night.
...we're in the new house.
...Scotty gets on top of his work.
...Jubilee gets past the jealous phase.
...I have more time for myself again.

We've all done it.  (Or am I the only one?)  We look ahead to some future goal, a hope, the return of something we had before, and think life will be better/easier/less stressful.  I think I'll somehow become more content, more godly, more disciplined when these things happen.  The Lord has been challenging us about this erroneous way of thinking.  It's the lie that we too easily believe that keeps us from being content, keeps us from finding joy in the now, robs us of learning what this season (how ever hard it may be) is meant to teach us.  Scotty and I are trying so hard to take this phrase out of our vocabulary, but I know we both still struggle with it.  We're at the beginning of a transition phase and sometimes we just want to push through and get to the end of it, as though the process was not more important.  It's in the midst of the stress of a new job, the exhaustion of a baby who needs us all hours of the night, the confusion and frustration of trying to build a house in a developing country that we learn to cry out to our Lord who is in control of it all.  We see how quickly we fall short of being merciful, kind, patient people and instead see a big mess of ugly sin that is need of endless forgiveness.  We learn to be grateful for little things.  How desperately I want this season not to be one we'll look back on and say, "Whew!  Glad that's over".  But, "Remember how sweet that time was?  How much fun we had as a family in the chaos?  How much we grew?"  Only by God's grace.