OK...so, this will be probably one of the most random posts I've ever...posted. I am going through a Bible Study at church by Beth Moore called "Esther". Obviously, it is a study of the book of the Bible called Esther. The following are direct quotes out of the lesson for today...and a few of my own thoughts sprinkled in. I just really was struck by parts of this lesson today. I felt it directly related to me in some mothering ways...how do you speak to your children to encourage and "push" without pushing too much OR without coddling so much that your children are helpless. Parts were also a good reminder to me that my everyday-ness IS beautiful and extraordinary and an offering to God WHEN I choose to make it that way. All the "wiping" that is my life right now - wiping noses, wiping bottoms, wiping counters, wiping windows, wiping up spills, etc. are all "breathtaking works of art" when I do them for His glory.
And so....
(The writer of this study entitled "Esther" is Beth Moore. In this particular day of study she is quoting from another author named Laura Fraser and her book called "My So-Called Genius" in which she recounts her remarkable journey from being a whiz-kid to a fairly-ordinary adulthood of unmet expectations. Her story relates her issues of assuming that since she had been told she was "great" that she must always accomplish "great things" or else be a failure. A psychologist pointed out to her, while she was in her mid-forties, "Do you have to do something great? Can you be happy to do something really good?")
-"Perfectionists always lose."
-Couldn't the craving to do something great keep us from doing something good?
-Perfectionism would have paralyzed Esther if she'd given way to it, but, today's lesson offers us a chance to broaden the spectrum. Let's spread around the responsibility for destructive expectations of greatness to the generations. As parents, teachers, relatives, leaders, or observers, we are wise to be careful about telling gifted children how great they aredestined to be. It is a trap and a forecast Fraser claims rarely pans out. She points out the monumental difference between talent and having a clue what to do with it and how genius rarely exempts people from having to work hard just like everybody else who wants to make it.
-...every gift is a trust placed in human hands by a holy God. The blessed recipient is responsible for developing the integrity, humility, and work-ethic to know what to do with it. (1 Tim. 4:12-15, 2 Tim. 1:6) Gift without grit is a pitiful waste.
-Every one of us who embraces the glory of God as our purpose will end up doing great things precisely because we do God-things. His holy hand resting on the least act renders the ordinary extrarordinary. Spooning soup into the mouth of the weak or manning the nursery so a tired mom can go to church are acts of high worship when offered in the name of Christ. He beholds the sight like a breathtaking work of art, tilting His head to study each subtle detail. "She has done a beautiful thing to me" (Mark 14:6).
-Those with presence of mind and semblence of health are called to pour out the drink offering of their lives until the cup is overturned and every drop of energy slips - perhaps unnoticed, uncelebrated - into the vast ocean of earthly need. The last imperceptible drop of your well-lived life will sound to the hosts of heaven like a tidal wave hitting the floor of the Grand Canyon.
-In effect Christ says, "I'm already great enough for both of us," relieving the willing of their woeful burden, "Just follow Me."
OK...so, none of these are my thoughts...just thoughts I found fascinating and didn't want to forget about in the midst of everything else that is my life.
And...I didn't really wrap that up well at all...but, life is calling. Lydia is screaming from her bedroom and Susanna has just woken up and is also SCREAMING!!! Thus I go...
