I have a feeling motherhood will produce an ontological change in me.

There are certain things I must believe going into this.

I have to believe in the project of life, in its goodness, its purpose, before I can be entrusted to shape one.
I have to believe that the little acts of love and care matter as much as the grandiose academic and ministerial achievements of my peers.
I have to believe that somehow being part of God’s creative and nurturing process is a worthy calling in and of itself, because God loves to create life, loves to love the ones He creates, longs to embrace them and thereby transform them into loving, creative, joyful, thankful marvelous individuals.
I have to believe that I can either invite or reject God’s kingdom, Christ’s lordship, in my own home and relationships, in the way we raise our children.
I have to believe God loves me as much when I’m changing diapers as when I’m preparing Bible studies, and that diapers are as much his agent of transformation as theological debates.
I have to believe the way we live matters, even when that way seems tedious, or monotonous, or tiring.
I have to believe God is active in the sphere of housework, cooking, playing, talking.
I have to believe he is a present at our table, as at the altar, upon my hearth and in my garden, in observing the days and seasons.
I have to believe life is a gift worth celebrating in small ways through small joys, worth living simply because it is from God, worth living well because it is being renewed in a glorious image.
I have to believe the Spirit speaks and directs me as a mother as much as any minister, that His breath blows in my own backyard.
I have to believe in life.

~lg

Every good thing given and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shifting shadow.
James 1:17

This little verse does much to instruct our way of viewing the world and life as we know it. Any misery, any death that we experience in this life does not originate in God. It originates in our willful turning, our shady attempts at self-preservation – in short, our sin – which have so permeated earthly existence. The darkness of our rebellion is lurking around every corner. Adam’s shadow falls long in our fields. Do not be mistaken; God has not brought this.

God is the originator of good, grace-full giving, of every perfection placed into our hands. Where the light shines, it is His . . . it is Him. He cannot be other than Goodness; He cannot be other than Light. There is no shadow of turning with Thee. And He continues to share His brightness with us – in the steady sunrise, in shared laughter, in the majesty of the soaring eagle, in the miracle of birth, in the rainbow that drips with liquid life. He pours His faithful Light into us, throwing open the shutters over our souls so that it may even shine out of us.

We do not live in sunlight at every moment. There is a day yet to come when darkness will be extinguished forever. But we are signs and flares in the sky that new creation has begun, that Goodness and Love are the true realities.

With this in mind, we welcome every good thing as a beam of our Father’s nature. And life is full of good and perfect things. Green grass, snowy nights, evening fires, morning glories. They are not mundane. They are not meaningless. They are opportunities to recognize the Author and Perfector of life, to stretch out our arms to a steady heaven in childlike thanksgiving. He is here in our daily rhythms, our rising and lying down, our work and play, our families and friends. Open your eyes to the Father of Lights.

~lg

At its core, life has to do with love.

The creative love of God, which fashioned us out of dust and gave us breath. The redemptive love of God, which plunged into our icy depths and brought us up from the grave. The transformative love of God, which fashions us into a new image.

Through Christ we are joined to the life of God, and God is love.

Love is our ultimate good. To love God with all that we are, this is the sunnum bonum of our existence. To love those God has placed around us, this is the natural extension of our first love.

Love is the highest virtue, the basis from which all good things flow. It is poured into our hearts from above, a supernatural infusion of the Spirit, the fertile ground for godly fruit. Without love we are nothing.

Love is concrete, embodied. It must take form at our kitchen tables, in our families. We cannot choose those whom we love, nor do we love “everybody” in some vague general feeling of goodwill. We must love the child in our arms, the neighbour next door, the person in the pew in front of us, the coworker who talks behind our backs.

As we love, we are transformed and we become agents of transformation. As we live in love, we live God’s way. God’s way lives among us.

~lg

As a baby bumbles around my belly, I am left to wonder . . .

Why has God given us life? Why has he asked us to be fruitful and multiply? What is the point of our life on earth?

His original intent, now shrouded by a veil of sin, lies in the early chapters of our human history. Created in his image, created to be blessed. Created to bring more life into the world, to fill the world, to subdue and have dominion over it. Created to till and tend the earth, to continue the cultivation of God’s own garden. Created to recognize breath and food and water as his gifts, to receive the earth’s nourishment with thanksgiving. Created to explore and name the world around us. Created as male and female, to be together, to help each other. Created to converse with the Creator, to choose to trust and obey. Created without shame.

God created a good and beautiful world, breathing into us good and beautiful life. And then he endowed us with the ability to create, to share in his image and work. We tend and tame the natural life placed around us. We create more human life. God must love life, the abundant diversity of living and growing things. He passes this love to us, this capacity, this gift. In a sense, our purpose is simply to live, to breathe. And we are to do it together.

But, of course, things have become far more complicated. We may never know the sort of life our primal parents may have lived had the serpent’s temptation been disregarded. What would God’s ideal family and society have looked like in the peace of the eternal garden? We are left to pick up the pieces of a shattered world, a tattered image.

But we have not been left alone. The ultimate question – why life at all? – is and must now be answered in Christ. He came to show us the way. Just as we look at Adam to define our origins and original purpose, as well as the consequences of turning away from our Creator, we look at Christ as the Second Adam to define what our new life and renewed image looks like. In Christ we are not simply going back to Eden. He is not only a remedy; in Him life takes on a new dynamic. The incarnation really has changed everything. Our Edenic mandate is still valid, but it is also elevated. We are moving forward as members of a new creation, a new covenant, a new purpose, all in Christ.

So as I think of becoming a mother, of sharing somehow in God’s creative and nurturing work, I wonder how my life will change. I wonder how my purpose as a human in Christ will be fulfilled in this new role. I wonder what God’s intent for my child, my family, my home is. When life is “reduced” to caring for another tiny image bearer, what will matter most? When I look into the eyes of my new son or daughter, what will I see? How will I see God?

~lg