"Father who breathed into this daughter…
I pray for this girl being formed into eternity….
May the wind always be in her hair
May the sky always be wide with hope above her
And may all the hills be an exhilaration
the trials but a trail,
all the stones but stairs to God...
Oh, and raise me, Lord, from the deadness of my own sins to love this beautiful girl like You do…"
when i was pregnant with each child, i choose a hymn to be "their hymn". a hymn that i sang over them as i rocked them to sleep. a hymn that i sang to them at night into their childhood. until they asked for me not to sing it out loud anymore (i don't have the best voice.) a hymn that i still sing to them, quietly and outside their doors while they are sleeping. i am a ninja hymn singer like that.
however, i think the words "i chose" in that previous paragraph need to be replaced with "God choose and make me think it was my choice".
millie's hymn is "tis so sweet."
it was only recently that i realized how much those words actually spoke more about ME at this stage of parenting (see it really is all about me. ha.) these last few years of raising her have actually been more of her helping grow ME up in faith. because no matter how much we have tried to raise her, it has been us that have been molded and shaped and matured by this journey of parenthood. in trying to instill faith into her, i have come to a place where i realize that it is ME who needs the faith to trust that God is who He says He is. that He is in control. that He is good and what He does is good and right.
i do not miss the irony of the fact that the song that i choose has this story behind it...
"It is said that Louisa M. R. Stead wrote the lyrics after she watched her husband drown and die.
According to the story: It was a beautiful sunny day. Louisa M. Stead, her husband, and her daughter Lily, decided to go for a picnic. They went picnicing on Long Island Sound. While having their picnic, the Steads heard a scream. It was from a young boy. Mr. Stead ran to the rescue. Louisa Stead and young Lily watched helplessly as Mr. Stead and the boy drowned. Their troubles were not over yet, however, and without her husband, Mrs. Stead became very poor and destitute.Yet God never left her. He provided for her always and she and her daughter made it through. Louisa learned to trust God, and thus the words to the song 'Tis So Sweet to Trust in Jesus.' " (source wikipedia)
i have clung to the words of that hymn that i used to sing to put her to sleep many a night as i sing it to my own soul...
'Tis so sweet to trust in Jesus,
And to take him at his word;
Just to rest upon his promise,
And to know, "Thus saith the Lord."
Jesus, Jesus, how I trust him!
How I've proved him o'er and o'er!
Jesus, Jesus, precious Jesus!
O for grace to trust him more!
I'm so glad I learned to trust thee,
Precious Jesus, Savior, friend;
And I know that thou art with me,
Wilt be with me to the end.
as we begin a year of LASTS with millie, i know that He is with me through every LAST. until the Day that LAST is defeated and there are no more LASTS...
But Sam lay back, and started with open mouth, and for a moment, between bewilderment and great joy, he could not answer. At last has gasped: “Gandalf! I thought you were dead! But then I thought I was dead myself. Is everything sad going to come untrue? What’s happened to the world?”
“A great shadow has departed,” said Gandalf, and then he laughed and the sound was like music, or water in a parched land; and as he listened the thought came to Sam that he had not heard laughter, the pure sound of merriment, for days upon days without count. It fell upon his ears like the echo of all the joys he had ever known. But he himself burst into tears. Then as sweet rain will pass down a wind of spring and the sun will shine out the clearer, his tears ceased, and his laughter welled up, and laughing he sprang from his bed.
“How do I feel?” he cried. “Well I don’t know how to say it. I feel, I feel” – he waved his arms in the air – “I feel like spring after winter, and sun on the leaves; and like trumpets and harps and all the songs I have ever heard!” (j.r.r. tolkien, return of the king)
“[Some mortals] say of some temporal suffering, “No future bliss can make up for it,” not knowing that Heaven, once attained, will work backwards and turn even that agony into a glory.” (c.s. lewis, the great divorce)
“He who testifies to these things says, ‘Surely I am coming soon.’ Amen. Come, Lord Jesus!” —Revelation 22:20
everything sad is going to come untrue. agony turns into glory. bring it. amen.