Here Comes The Sun - Day by Day Parenting

Parenting encouragement for those in the season of raising kids especially those welcoming their first child…

Parenting. Parenting is a lifelong journey of humility, growth, and learning who you really are when “the spit hits the floor”.

Some babies spit and some don’t. I didn’t realize this was even “a thing” until I had a baby that was a spitter. I called it the “burp and urp”. I would be holding the baby, patting his back, and receiving the successful burp…but then the “urp” would follow. 

I used to try to avoid it…the inevitable burp and urp.

Anticipate it, do the dance, skirt out of the way, desperately fumble with the spit up cloth to move it into the right spot…but for whatever reason, it would always miss the cloth and hit me and then SPLAT! (we had hardwood floors so it really splat).

The spit hit the floor. 

My floor (and my clothes) were ALWAYS filled with these spit-up splats. At first, I cleaned them up but as the days, weeks, and months passed - the overwhelming responsibilities of being a parent coupled with both David & I working full-time jobs and trying to juggle just the most basic of household chores led me to simply leave those splats alone.

I simply couldn’t keep up.

It finally got to the point when the baby started crawling and he would wipe them up himself as he army-crawled across the floor. This was not exactly the way I pictured the “joys of being a parent” looking…I was exhausted, struggling to hold everything together, and when the spit hit the floor, I just didn’t care anymore. It wasn’t at the top of my list to have clean floors (or clean clothes for that matter).

But do you know what I do remember from that season?

Every night at the end of an exhausting day at work, I held and rocked our baby to sleep and sang “You are my Sunshine”.

Every night I laid him down to sleep and prayed over him. Every night I took 10-15 minutes to simply be with him.

It wasn’t what we had originally planned or pictured…both of us working full-time to help make ends meet for our little family but being present with our child & spending time with him at the end of the day became our biggest priority.

PRESENT, NOT PERFECT

When I was first pregnant, we had a vision of who we would be as parents and what our life would look like. As David and I planned and prepared for our son’s upcoming birth, we wrote down our birth plan, we attended all the classes at the hospital, read books, decorated the nursery, and listened to eager friends as they shared wisdom and advice for this new season.

It was a season filled with hope, anticipation, and lots and lots of plans.

When the day came for Mason’s arrival, what seemed to be progressing normally quickly took an unexpected turn as one day of labor passed into two and he still would not make an appearance. After forty hours of labor, I remember the moment when the doctor rushed in to announce we needed to do an emergency C-section…we pointed to our birth plan in desperation but our “perfect plan” no longer mattered - my health and the health of our baby was at stake. 

I was scared, exhausted, and disappointed in myself because my body had failed - I had failed.

This was not the way it was supposed to be.

This was the first of many moments as a parent where I have felt scared, exhausted, and disappointed in my weakness.

My failure.

And frustrated at plans that have changed.

Yet this is life. And this is parenting.

Parenting is not about perfection - trying to make all the “right” choices and follow the perfect plan or vision for how you want your life to look. Parenting is about pointing our kids to the perfection of our Savior. 

This means that in the midst of our imperfection (because we will inevitably fail) or when our perfect plans are interrupted, we remind and point our children to God’s perfect, faithful love which will never fail them. 

Here comes the sun. 

Day by day, morning by morning, here comes the sun.

Faithful, unfailing, steadfast - even when it’s hidden and we can’t see it or feel its direct warmth, the sun remains right where it has always been. In the night, in the storm, in the winter, the sun remains still, silent, and shines brilliantly.

Parenting has opened my eyes in a new way to the brilliant love of our Father God and the ways in which He infinitely, faithfully loves us day by day, moment by moment. You see, parenting will build and refine strengths within us but it will also uncover and expose our shortcomings, our weaknesses - our fears, failures & flaws. 

The very self that we thought we had outgrown, matured from, or even escaped from rears its head again. And this should daily keep us humble - we remember that we are in need of a Savior, just as our kids are in desperate need of a Savior. We all need Jesus. 

Paul David Tripp writes, “Like everything else God calls people to, God doesn’t call people to be parents because they are able….God calls unable people to do important things because ultimately what He’s working on is not your immediate success, but that you would come to know Him, to love Him, to rest in His grace, and to live for His glory.”

He goes on, “God’s grace grows and changes you as a parent…Because you and I always do our parenting between the ‘already’ of our conversion and the ‘not yet’ of our final destination, we parent in the middle of our own sanctification. Remember the gospel; although the power of sin has been broken in the beautiful justifying mercies of Jesus Christ, the presence of sin still remains with us. So God’s present zeal is to progressively deliver us from the remaining hold that sin has on us. This means that He will use the pressures, opportunities, hassles, burdens, griefs, temptations, and joys to grow and change us…as you are parenting your children, the Heavenly Father is parenting you.”

Parenting is more about the transformation that God wants to do within your life than it is about your vision for parenting and your plans for your kids. It is about dying to self and daily surrendering to God. Allowing the Holy Spirit to fill you with His light and love. We remember that the Son is coming and we have kingdom work to do. Work that begins within our home.

We don’t need a life plan with goals mapped out like signposts on a road map. We need the Son. We need Jesus. He is our Way day by day.

When we face long, sleepless nights and messy, mundane days, 

when our spouse fails us, 

when our kids irritate us, 

when our friends disappoint us, 

when our thoughts betray us during the day, 

when our perfect plans are upset 

and the vision of who we thought we would be is not the person we end up to be….

when “the spit hits the floor” and we simply don’t care anymore…

we remember that we all need the Son, our perfect Way, day by day,

and that above all, as parents, we are called to be present, not perfect. 

THE GIFT OF PRESENCE

We wisely steward our time with our children - for we only have eighteen years before we need to send them off into the world to begin their own lives - and we do this by simply showing up day to day - weak, exhausted, and most definitely imperfect - and we choose to fully engage in their lives. The greatest gift we have to offer our kids is the gift of our presence.

We choose to be present, not perfect. 

None of us is perfect and you will never meet the perfect parent.  We all make mistakes. We all mess up. But the more we spend time with God and remember His Son’s perfect sacrifice, His Holy Spirit will transform our character. Change us. Grow us.

We parent in the middle of our sanctification. And when we choose to prioritize and spend time with our children, to be fully present and engaged in their lives - they will witness this transformation for themselves. 

Our floors and clothes may be covered with spit-up stains and reminders of the messy, mundane kingdom work of parenting but at the end of the day, we can choose to hold our children, read them a story, sing them a song…spend time and be present with them. 

Parenting is like a wall of twinkling lights - each light represents a moment with your child - some will be off and some will be on. Some moments will be good - joyful, exciting, happy. Some moments will not be so good - the good, the bad, and the ugly - it will all come to pass…

But when you step back and look at the wall of lights as a whole (your eighteen years of stewarding this gift God has given you), there is beauty when you realize that the lights are meant to twinkle. They look beautiful because all of these moments together create a beautiful wall of sparkling light. Off, on. Off, on. Off, on.

FLOODED WITH LIGHT

Parenting is not meant to be a solid wall of light - it will never compare to the perfection of steadfast, pure, unending, day by day sunlight. Our little wall of twinkle lights is artificial light but it will look beautiful in its own way because we have the light and love of Christ in us - the Holy Spirit working in and through us each and every day despite our weaknesses.

Paul writes in Ephesians 1:18, “I pray that your hearts be flooded with light so that you can understand the confident hope He has given to those He called - His holy people who are His rich and glorious inheritance.”

As parents and ambassadors of Christ, we are called to share the confident Hope we have with our children first and foremost. Your greatest calling and kingdom work will be first as a parent. I remember our pastor sharing a quote from Andy Stanley at our daughter’s baby dedication that has stuck with me all these years - “Your greatest contribution to the kingdom may not be something you do but someone you raise.”

Ministry should always begin within the walls of our home and go out from there. We spend time with God, value intimacy with our spouse, prioritize quality time with our kids, and then engage in whole-hearted community with others. We are present, not perfect.

Over a decade after becoming parents, David & I still try to end each day just being with our kids. He reads with our boys before praying with them and hugging them good night. I still sing “You are my Sunshine” to Addi and read and pray with her every night - just as I did with Mason & Seth when they were younger.

Every day, our kids will see the good, the bad, and the ugly - all the twinkle light moments - but in our weakness, He is made strong. He will make everything beautiful in its time. We choose to show up, be present (not perfect), we die to self and daily surrender and point to the One who IS perfect and offers faithful, unfailing love day by day, moment by moment.

Here comes the sun. Morning by morning, His mercies are new. Great is Thy faithfulness.

Great is Thy faithfulness, O God my Father

There is no shadow of turning with Thee

Thou changest not, Thy compassions they fail not

As thou hast been, Thou forever will be.

Great is Thy faithfulness, Great is Thy faithfulness

Morning by morning, new mercies I see

All I have needed Thy hand hath provided

Great is Thy faithfulness, Lord, unto me