In pain you will bring forth children

Peter, AJ, and Grace are watching a Yankees game on Grandpa's tv which has been set up on the organ bench for the occasion. Susan, Kilby, and Becky are up at the seminary with Cal and will be fetching Nonnie from the airport on their way home. David is still at Cintas working. I am desperately tired, sleepy, eyes stinging, unable to focus tired. But I keep putting one foot in front of the other, a load of laundry here, helping Grace stain her new stool there, and now a few minutes of blog before I straighten Nonnie's bed where Becky slept a week ago when the house was all torn up for carpeting. All the while, all day I've thought: just take a day off. Just get in to bed and read till you sleep and then sleep again. When was the last time I did that? I don't think it would be physically possible, not to mention logistics. I wonder if God will grant me rest by putting me up for awhile. Last time I had thoughts like that I had the perimenopausal bleed that put my anemic body in bed to be waited upon for two weeks. I'd like the rest. I just don't want something that drastic to give it me. I think part of what I need rest from is all the unfinished stuff. The niche in Susan's room that I don't know how to tile, the bookshelves in my room that need to get out, the going to the upholsterer with Penny to pick out fabric for a chair, the stuff, the stuff, the stuff that needs to be reshuffled and reorganized. All of that in addition to the normal everyday life. And then there is the garage. I wonder why no one else can do this stuff. Well, plenty COULD. No one DOES. That's MY job. Not to DO it but to GET IT DONE. Driving home from Sam's Club this a.m. listening to another wonderful, excellent sermon by Pastor Skogen on Christ's service to the disciples I thought on why I need to tell my kids to serve at all. Why don't I just DO it and they'll wonderfully follow my humble example? Does it work that way? Well, I was taught to serve by precept as well as example. So I think I need to teach by precept and command as well as by example. And driving home ruminating about all this I believe I had an insight which I hope is holy: It is my God-given and holy JOB to train these kids. It is not EASY. It makes me feel like a nag. It leaves me tired. But it is my JOB. May I do it faithfully, even when I don't think I'm doing it well. God did help me just moments later. I came in to find the work I'd hoped finished not quite done, and the worker moving too slowly. Employing several others we got lunch on only 25 minutes late. Bell rang while I was whirling around the kitchen to clean it up. And while I was sweeping the floor, the kids were taking their places at the table, waiting for Cal. God gave me grace not to whine at them; but to call one child to come and clear the dish rack, then another child to wipe off a counter, yet another child to clean the spots off the floor. Soon there were four of them at work alongside me, and we had the kitchen clean before Cal came in. God help me not to whine and complain, but to act. SDG.