If you had been out for an evening walk around the neighborhoods of Fort Bragg in the fall of 2007, you might have bumped into me. I was a thirty-one year old mother of three young children. But, I wasn’t really “out for a walk” myself. I sprinted and stopped, sprinted and stopped. I spoke loudly up to the sky, sometimes through tears, sometimes with expressive hand gestures. To be quite honest, I might have appeared to you to be a bit, well, odd.
My third child, then about eight months old, was born with a (then undiagnosed) rare syndrome. He had failed his two, four, and six month developmental markers. Constantly sick, he was born at a solid nine pounds but steadily fell off the growth charts. This earned him the depressing label “failure to thrive.” He developed anaphylactic allergies, needed feeding therapy, couldn’t see and got glasses at eight months. He often stared off into space, mouth hanging open, tongue protruding.
Through it all, this little guy was the sweetest baby, weathering misery with unexplainable grace. He loved music, his siblings, and his dogs. He babbled and cooed appropriately. When around people he knew, he lit up with a beautiful radiance and contagious laugh. The pain and confusion I felt watching this child suffer overwhelmed me. My levels of concern mounted along with the appointments, compounding with frustration at the medical community, my own ignorance, and the Lord.
Running down Arnhem Street, oblivious to what the neighbors might think, I poured out my frustration, talking loudly toward the sky. I was completely lost in the parenting complexities unfolding before me. But, during that erratic evening run, the Lord helped me remember three truths found succinctly in the beginning of The Lord’s Prayer: “Our Father, Who Art In Heaven.” Though those words initially seem to be a simple greeting, they hold tremendous weight. When parenting seems insurmountable, those words tell me where I am, where God is, and that God is El Roi, the God who sees.
Where Am I?
I have a terrible sense of direction. Once, I lost my van in a six-story hospital parking garage. I was nine months pregnant with my fourth child and pushing a stroller with #3. That experience should have driven home the importance of remembering where I parked, but the lesson sadly still eludes me. In fact, I lost my car in a parking lot just last week and pulled the “I am just going to act like I know where my car is” move as I walked up and down the rows pushing my groceries. Maybe it’s a new Crossfit move to push heavy-laden carts down parking lot rows?
In my son’s medically chaotic infancy, I forgot that I lived in a fallen world. My “van” was parked in an imperfect space, full of struggle and pain. I didn’t remember the loving words of Peter, written for me so long ago: “Beloved, do not be surprised at the fiery trial when it comes upon you, as though something strange were happening to you. But rejoice insofar as you share Christ’s sufferings, that you may also rejoice and be glad when his glory is revealed” (1 Pet. 4:12-13). I was undone because I had forgotten where I was as a parent. I lived in an imperfect world, and my baby lived in an imperfect world too.
Where Is God?
As David writes in Psalm 103:19: “The Lord has established his throne in the heavens, and his kingdom rules over all.” What a relief! God is enthroned in majesty, ruling and reigning over all his creation from Heaven. Someone is up there. And that Someone is clearly in charge, working all things for my good and his glory (Romans 8:28). All parenting challenges are under the total rule and reign of God from his throne in heaven. Behavioral struggles, rebellion, medical issues, sibling rivalry, relationship messes, school disappointments, college decisions…God is sovereign over it all.
Jesus reigns in heaven at the right hand of God the Father. The Holy Spirit was sent to guide and comfort us as we await Christ’s return (John 14:15-31). In this tension between the already and the not yet, God is still on the throne. I might be stuck in this fallen world, but nothing happens to me or my children in this pot-holed parking lot without the explicit permission and design of my Father.
The God Who Sees
The mighty God enthroned in heaven rules over all, and he sees and knows me, the goofy mom who can’t find her car in the parking lot. Psalm 33:13-15 reads, “The Lord looks down from heaven; he sees all the children of man; from where he sits enthroned he looks out on all the inhabitants of the earth, he who fashions the hearts of them all and observes all their deeds.” I lived in a fallen world where my child was suffering and parenting was hard. Because of the finished work of Christ, I had a mediator seated next to my Father in heaven with the veil torn in two. I could talk to my Father directly, honestly, earnestly – even while crying, sweating and running down a sidewalk (Matt. 27: 51-52).
As a parent, I must repeatedly reorient my thinking to this line of The Lord’s Prayer. Each parenting challenge reminds me that though I live in a fallen world, God reigns from Heaven. Whatever the situation, God sees and cares for me and my child. As Hagar said of the Lord after she fled from Sarai, “So she called the name of the Lord who spoke to her, ‘You are the God of seeing.’ For she said ‘Truly here I have seen him who looks after me’” (Gen. 16:13).
Our Father, who art in heaven…
Interested in learning more about The Lord’s Prayer? Check out our friend Youth Pastor Theologian’s curriculum on it!
