Are You Ready for Some Joy?
Birthday Party!
Joy. What a sweet word. So short, and yet, full of impact. I got to experience pure and unadulterated joy this weekend. It was our Mia’s Eighth birthday. She wanted to have some friends go ice skating with her. She had never been, but ever since the Olympics, that is what she plays constantly at our house. She wears slick socks and fancy costumes and choreographs elaborate routines to “skate” around our kitchen and family room. So, to get to go ice skating for real was her hearts desire for her birthday. Now you know me. You know that things that are foreign to me make me anxious. You know that when I am in a situation that is beyond the parameters of my control my palms sweat, my heart pounds and I really just want to throw up. Yep, it’s that bad. So you can imagine how things were going as we arrived with 4 girls ranging from 7 – 10 years old and then two 3 year olds to go skating. It was not pretty to say the least. I had not planned on skating. My plan was to sit back and supervise. But then I quickly realized that my husband just cannot ice skate. Watching him weeble and wobble a couple of feet and hearing him tell Selah(our 3 year old) that Daddy really just couldn’t help her, gave me hives. I could just see split skulls, broken arms and bloody lips. So of course I had to march myself back down to the ticket window and rent myself some bee-you-tee-full hockey skates. I got back up to the rink and proceeded to step out on the ice to try and keep chaos at bay. Luckily, my sister was there to help the kids too. We quickly realized that there were too few of us, who could actually stand up to be able to help our, shall we say, less graceful family members. Luckily those smart people running the place provide these little red ice skating walkers that can be rented for an extra $5 and my Mom and Dad procured some of these broken-bone saving devices. Those who needed the extra help got the extra help. Those who wanted to try it on their own did. And in the process of being on that rink in the gorgeous weather, (so hot we stripped off our coats and just wore our shirts) watching those girls skate and fall, get up and go again, making friends with those around them and the whole time laughing their fool heads off, I let go. I let my big girl skate as fast as she could go and wipe out with a thud that made my Mama’s heart shudder. I let my husband just be himself having fun with those kids. I let my baby girl talk me into holding onto her and the walker and push her around that rink so fast our hair was blowing in the wind and she was yelling “Go faster, Mama, go faster” in between bursts of gut-wrenching giggles! At the end of the session I even let that little bundle of joy take off on her own while I stood back and held her Daddy’s hand and we made fools of ourselves skating together. And along the way I felt joy rising inside of me and spilling out of my mouth. It caught me off guard. Finding that joy there on the ice was exhilarating and liberating and scary.
Joy is a word, that for me, usually conjures up a sense of sadness and loss. I know that is the antithesis of the meaning of joy and yet, for me the connotations of the word are not so joyful most of the time. I, like so many of you, am weathering some stormy times right now. I’ve been taking some time to dig deep; ask myself difficult questions and pray for God’s answers to come. God’s been after me for a while to just give it all up to Him. I saw this weekend that He can give me a joy that is totally foreign to me if I will just let Him. My bible says this: “He will fill your mouth with laughter and your lips with shouts of joy.” I found this verse in Job of all places. Job, who had every right to be angry, sad, defeated, you name it and he had the source for all those negative emotions and yet in Job 8:21 the Word tells us in no uncertain terms that God will give us joy. We all go through times of trial and struggle but I am clinging to the above verse and holding onto Psalm 30:5 “. . . weeping may remain for a night, but rejoicing comes in the morning.” It’s time for me to let God give me some joy in my life. I have robbed Him of that by “controlling” my life. I’m ready for some joy. Are you?
Going all by herself!!
Letting Her Go!
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