It was Christmas Eve morning, and I was preparing for a day full of cooking and family fun. The day before, I had pulled off my plan for an “Aaron day” without a hitch. I wanted him to have time doing what he loves before all the commotion of Christmas wreaked havoc with his routine and therefore with his behaviors. Our son and his girlfriend, just in for the holiday, joined us at All Star Sports for some Aaron-style fun. Afterwards, we ate at Old Chicago, a favorite of Aaron’s. It was a great time!
But early the next morning I heard Aaron having a big seizure. This was a bed wetting one. So mixed in with my cooking and all the other Christmas prep, I found myself hauling loads of bedding to the laundry room. My main emotion was sadness for Aaron that day as he had two more big seizures over the next several hours.
Yet these moments also drive home to me the fact that caregiving is my life. It’s a life I never envisioned for myself when I contemplated marriage and motherhood as a young starry-eyed woman.
Every mother lives a life of self-sacrifice in many ways but having a child with special needs of whatever kind increases that role in ways she never knew. Any caregiving role is the same.
That is why I was so impacted by some verses I read one morning. Paul was talking to Titus about practical ways that we as believers are to live out the gospel. In chapter two of Titus, Paul gave instructions to older men and women as well as to the younger men.
He ended that section by urging slaves to conduct their lives in a way that they would “…adorn the doctrine of God.”
In that culture, slaves were nothing. They were the lowest of the low. Yet Paul told Titus to encourage them to adorn the doctrine of God, the gospel.
This is a high calling for such a lowly people!
The word “adorn” carries the meaning of arranging jewels in a setting that displays their beauty.
I love what John Stott said about these verses: “…the gospel is a jewel, while a consistent Christian life is like the setting in which the gospel-jewel is displayed; it can add lustre to it.”
Our human tendency is to equate importance with the “big things.” Red carpets, book signings, conference speakers, a record contract.
Not with wet bedding, doctor visits, behavior issues.
Not with dementia, hospice, hospitals, infusions, cancer…
But the gospel shines brightest in the darkest places. This is where God is especially honored and given great glory.
How? By our faith being seen in our service to the ones we are caring for. By yielding to God’s plan for our lives with trust and peace, even through tears or anger or resentment that inevitably comes at those vulnerable moments.
It’s a matter of my heart, not my surroundings.
“Slaves, in all things obey those who are your masters on earth, not with external service, as those who merely please men, but with sincerity of heart, fearing the Lord. WHATEVER YOU DO, DO YOUR WORK HEARTILY, AS FOR THE LORD RATHER THAN MEN.” (Colossians 3:22-23)
Where do you find yourself today?
Remember that the seemingly lowest place is the place of high calling in your life as a believer.
Even if we feel like no one notices our service, God still urges us to shine with the beauty of the gospel. God notices and that is all that really matters.
He Said What?! 