When Ungrateful Met Grace

You know how it is, two steps forward, one step back.

And all this talk of grace and change and it was sure to be tested.

The day broke in an off kilter stance.  Something just didn't feel quite right.

I think it was the fungus growing in my heart.  The one breeding ungratefulness and complaining.

And I know where it started.  One little word spoken about an old wound, and overnight, fungus appears.

And didn't Jesus tell me that? He said, "It's not what goes into your mouth that defiles you; you are defiled by the words that come out of your mouth." Matt. 15:11

Because our words will always betray what is really in our heart.

And this small word about an old hurt and ungratefulness is growing. 

I'm thinking about what I think I deserve in that situation, and this rotting pride and stinking ungratefulness, it grows roots.

I knew from the moment my feet hit the floor this was going to be a battle, a battle for my heart.

The kids sensed it too, they were feeling the fungus, creeping stealthily, contaminating us all.

And outwardly the morning was progressing along, breakfast and chores and books, but we all knew something was slinking just below the surface.

School time, workbooks opening, hurry and hustle, and in the middle of a vocabulary lesson, the battle explodes into the open.

"Mom I want you to help me now, I don't understand this question."

I had been helping this child but there five others who also needed help at this moment and well, we have to take turns. 

I explain this calmly, but there is no calm reaction.

Child says that I must help Child now, Child deserves this.

Fists clench, body stiffens, this child is now banging their head on the table.

There is a fungus explosion.

I'm breathing deep, repeating to remember, this grace where is it?

The child is sent up stairs.  Then comes the screaming, pounding on the floor. 

I know that this is a moment of ministry but it feels like a moment of misery and how to find the tools to be grace here, now.

How to be a lens to see grace?  To help others see this grace when all is falling to fungus?

I go upstairs to talk this through, to hope for heart reaching words.

We talk, it seems to be going nowhere all this sifting through heart-motives and ....help?

So I say, "Do you want to pray?"

The child says no.

So I pray anyway.  And as the words leave my mouth, I'm praying for Child to see sin and grace to fill and then The Holy Spirit speaks words in this heart.

Am I any different?

Don't I do these same things?  No, I have more self-control and I don't throw myself on the floor and cry but the roots of this fungus are the same.

And I am the one who woke up this morning feeding fungus, this ungratefulness, this ruminating on what I think I deserve. 

And what do I deserve? What is it that I deserve?  I deserve hell, the forever death.  I deserve punishment but I haven't been given that either.  I've been given grace.

I've been given Life eternal and so much more, and is anything more than that needed?

Why do I think I deserve more?

Ungratefulness.

And I see that this moment is grace.

This is grace, when we see our sin and the sin of our children, when our eyes are opened to the blackness of the fungus that seeps steadily in.

Because without seeing, there is no cleansing, no washing of Holy Water.

And how many times did I reject these Holy Moments as less that perfect, when all long they were perfect Grace from a perfect God who is always rescuing.

Always rescuing.

And this Grace it changes things. 

It changes me.

And the words come halting and broken, "Forgive me Father. For I have been so ungrateful today. Forgive me and help me to see your grace more fully and walk in it. Thank you for your grace."

And Child stops writhing on the floor and listens to my praying.  Hearing me talk of my sin, Child stills, quiets.

Can we ever remove the speck from another without first pulling out our plank?

Hearts open, grace pours in.

Holy Water washes, and cleanses eyes that they might see...

all is grace.