Contemplating Confession

I was really thankful to think about the freedom of confession this week at the peacewise training.

Confess - meaning to say the same as.

Confession is not dredging up issues that God doesn't know about. It's to agree with God about how I have failed - failed to think or speak of him as is right about him, failed to love others as he desires... It's to agree with the one who made me and knows me and LOVES me already. Knows what I have done, what I will do... knows all the things that make my sin struggles hard, but also knows exactly, with penetrating pin point accuracy, what those sins are. And still loves me.

I think in christian life I can practically live as though confession is to say things that God doesn't already know... or that others don't know, or that others do know but don't understand or have the full picture and so this is scary. Or that somehow God is not really big enough to love me as the more I grasp my sin, the more I am repulsed by it, and therefore I gather more how much God must be repulsed also... but he is more so. And yet, at the same time, he knows it more deeply than I can see, and is disgusted more than I can know, yet loves me.

And forgives.

What a glorious gift he has given us in confession. To be freed from the need to pretend, hold onto reputation, as if pretending and clinging would make it less true. Like a child who hides behind his hands in hide and seek. Yet the child who says he doesn't know how to hide and needs help from parent would of course receive it.

I'm sure in the next year... and probably even in the next day or week, I will struggle again with confession - resist it's liberating invitation - redefine it as a means to condemn myself... because I will again forget that there is no condemnation for those in Christ... and will live again as though I am not in Christ, and wallow in fear of condemnation.

But God does not offer me this option as his child. Of this resistance to his gift of confession I hope he will also convict me, again and again, and free me again  from this voice of condemnation that I play on repeat.

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May I be a parent who breathes this grace into the lives of my children - so they may not, so far as it depends on me - fear the condemnation that comes with Christ-forgetting repentance.

Preparing to move

For 21 months we have lived in a 2 bedroom unit with an expanding family and more building issues than we planned on.

Looking at moving in 2 sleeps I am thankful. 

for a space...

of safety

comfort

hospitality

labouring

birth

rearranging

growing

changing

resting

stretching

discipline of organising

of learning about mould and how to avoid it

naturally insulated

meeting neighbours

learning about VCAT

sharing

nesting

It is sad to move, despite the challenges I have faced here. And they have been varied. I think that indicates what a privilege it has been to live in this space. I am thankful that the sad shows the thankful.

Thank-you, provider, sustainer, my creator God. Thank-you that you knew before I did what I would learn here, and you knew how long we would be here. Thank-you that you go before us to our new place.

We are moving in with another family with 2 little children. Our new house comes with a yard! And natural light. Lots and lots of it. And 6 bedrooms. And living spaces to accomodate private spaces for more hospitality that we could ever do.

I am looking forward to...

sharing spaces

deepening relationships

knowing Jesus more through seeing Him work in us

not needing a light switch

fig trees

olive trees

filling our guest room with guests

craft in a room with a door

toddler running up and down the hall

growing 

praying together

kids playing together

the challenge of more kids not playing together

water play in the yard

This is a special season of community life. I'm excited.

love it. laughed so hard I cried.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/glennon-melton/dont-carpe-diem_b_1206346.html

One of those days

Today was one of those days.

The kind where getting out the door became an ever receding hurdle to jump.

The kind where I got milk sick between my toes, down my pants, and pooled on the floor.

The kind where my toddler squeezed his pureed snack pouch all over himself when I was paying attention to feeding my baby for the critical moment.

The kind where I decided I was superhuman and could mind my feisty toddler niece whilst looking after my own two bundles of joy, but the toddler-friendly enclosed easy to manage it all play centre was closed, and the subsitute park was overfull with primary school children (read here: niece wants to go on roundabout with the older children, niece wants to push roundabout like the older children, niece wants to walk on and off roundabout like the older children, all whilst it is moving faster than she is able and all during the time I am attempting to breastfeed my baby and my toddler is covering himself with savoury puree).

The kind where getting 3 nappies changed seems to take a ridiculous amount of time, and once all is done I realise showing the toddlers where the little stream is in the park was not best done right before said changes.

The kind where one kid cries and sets the other two off.

The kind where one kid goes to sleep and is abruptly woken by screaming.

The kind where it's hard to know which parenting tool to use to deal with the 35th growl/scream/hit/bite/grab.

The kind where getting to the end of the day is bliss. To sit on the couch, uninterrupted, dishwasher whirring... bliss.

I have incredible respect for my mother, and all the mothers I know who have kept showing patience on days like this.

Days like this. When the baby has just woken again...

God give me more of what only you can give.