Gentle Passages and Tears

Today is my daughter's birthday.  I try to find a verse each year for each child on their birthdays that could apply to them in some way.  I usually just take one from where I'm currently reading.  This year, it was just perfect, almost written as if David knew hundreds of years ago that it was her birthday today,

"You crown the year with your bounty, your wagon tracks overflow with abundance." (Psalm 65:11)  That is my prayer for her, that God would crown her year with bounty and that she'd get a wagon!  Just kiddin'....though she really does need a car!

When she and my other daughter turned 12 and 13, we held a celebration, similar to the ones we did for my boys.  Both my older daughters have winter birthdays, so we don't do the huge bbq, instead we hold it indoors with just mothers, daughters, aunts, grandmas, sisters, and friends her age.  We just want to make it a more formal passage into womanhood, so, as I said at the party, that she'll never question whether or not she is a young woman and when that stage of life begins....no, we said, today marks that day.  That was just after Christmas, a few days after her birthday.

I never do well at these things because of the emotional side of me, but oh well, I wasn't going to let that stop me.  I plowed through what I wanted to say.  I began by telling her a story that I had read in a beautiful book called Gentle Passages, given to me by a friend who believes the same way we do about these things.  In the story, a young girl is visiting an older mom and they are having a snack together.  But the girl is mad, mad at her mom and is telling this older woman who happens to be a friend of the young girl's mom, all about the situation.  This mom would not let her daughter go to a movie while all her other friends were allowed to go.  She thinks she's way too protective.

As the young girl and this older mom are talking, food is being fixed.  The older woman takes a dirty paper plate from the garbage and is about to put the chocolate-covered cherries on it when the young girls stops her.  At that point I grabbed one of our oldest plastic plates from our drawer and showed the ladies how I was about to put the beautiful scone my daughter had made on the ugly worn out plastic plate.  In the story, the young girl is horrified!  Why would she do that?  Why would she use an old yucky plate for such a beautiful dessert?!  She quickly asks her what she is doing and suggests perhaps a nicer cleaner plate?  "Oh sure," she says.  "I guess I could use my fine china.  I tend to keep it on this shelf, protected.  I'm probably too protective."  Of course, by this point I've already lost it, as I'm desperately trying to get through the story, but again, oh well, powered through it.  I grabbed my fine china, from my wedding, also behind glass doors, rarely used, protected, and put the scone on that plate.  Suddenly it was much more appetizing.  Long pause to get myself together.

The girl in the story immediately understood.  "Aren't you like this fine china?  You have a purpose, just like this plate, to serve others, to stay pure....and your mom?   She wants to protect you for the purpose you have in life....whatever that may be...."

I spoke these words to my daughter who, no doubt, sometimes feels like she is a fine china plate on a shelf, not allowed to do all the things she wants to do.  I wanted her to see that has a purpose and that we, too, are trying to protect her.....but not forever.  We realize she will be like that plate, being used by God in some way, in the future, perhaps even married one day, and that her spouse will appreciate that she was protected so that she could live her life's purpose uninhibited.  She can't stand on the shelf behind glass for the rest of her life.

As a symbol to the other young women there, we gave each one of them a fine china tea cup with the words written on it, "You are God's fine china."  Taken from 2 Timothy 2:21, "If you stay away from sin you will be like one of these dishes made of purest gold - the very best in the house - so that Christ Himself can use you for His highest purposes. (TLB)

Somehow, I pulled myself together and then a few of the older women spoke words of life to her or verses that meant something to them for her.  Gifts were opened.  More tea was poured.  It was beautiful.  The rest of the day I was still shaky as the realization hit me over and over how I have two "women" in my home now.  This second daughter is just that much older looking for her age, wears makeup, does her hair, is very mature....she grew up fast!  What a responsiblity!

The neat thing about the whole tea party, as we held a high tea for the occasion was that I was kind of worried about the cost of putting this whole event on.  But, as one of our Christmas gifts, we were given a huge gift basket, full of cookies, chocolates, treats, as if it were for a high tea.  I knew we could never have consumed all that on our own without major cavities as a result, so I decided to share and use the goodies for the party.  The only expense was making scones and coffee and tea!  I could handle that!  It was a beautiful spread and I think a special memory for my daughter.

As for my tears, I've always hated that side of me (all of my sisters and I have this "condition".....we blame Mom! :), but then yesterday I read from Psalm 56 and David talks about tears.  I've always assumed they were tears of sadness.  My tears that day weren't tears of sadness, but of love towards my daughter as I thought of her as that fine china plate.  I was so overwhelmed with the idea that I so longed for her to understand why we do the things we do, for her and for our family.  That's not sadness, yet, somehow God still allows me to have these tears.  David says, "You have kept count of my tossings, put my tears in your bottle.  Are they not in your book?" (vs. 8)  In David's case, he was being chased by his enemies and he had cried, perhaps in fear or dread.  Either way, to me, God has known my emotional "tossings" and He has kept count of them.  He has all my tears, even the ones I wish I had never cried, in His "bottle", in His "book".  Isn't that an amazing idea to think about?  It helps me to cope with sometimes the frustration I feel when I cry.

On a lighter note....we have a Buzz Lightyear alarm clock in our house, I just heard Buzz start trying to wake people up upstairs....so funny!