October 21, 2011
Fresh, homemade apple crisp made from apples we hand-picked at the orchard, along with a soy latte? Yes please 🙂
This transition into motherhood is resulting in a vast change in perspective. Not just my perspective on how much time an adequate shower requires, or my perspective on a “good night’s sleep”, but my perspective on Christ’s incarnation. A couple of weeks ago, Z and I were walking in the park with my friend Alissa and her baby girl. Alissa and I began to discuss what life must have been like for Mary, raising baby Jesus. Did Jesus ever cry for hours on end and leave her frustrated and exhausted? Jesus really had messy diapers and snotty noses? The one that boggled us the most was, when did baby Jesus realize He was God? Obviously He knew He was God, but a child may not even develop a self awareness until a couple years of age. As He developed that awareness of self, is that when He recognized His identity as God’s Son?
The other day I was laying on our sofa, cradling Ezekiel in my arms as he was fast asleep. He had been crying for a good 20 minutes. His face was still red and tear-stricken. As a mother, I cannot bear to see my child suffer. I began to think about Jesus in the Garden of Gethsamane, before He was led off to be crucified. I cannot imagine the heartbreak of God as He looked down upon His own Son, seeing the beads of sweat and blood pouring from His face, fully aware of the impending suffering that would befall on Him. Not only the physical anguish, but the unbearable separation that would form a chasm between them as Christ would take upon Himself the sin of the world.
I have never known a love before like the love I have for my child. Yes, my love for God and my love for Grayson actually surpasses this, but this love I have for my son is all-together a new and different devotion of love and responsibility. From the perspective of a parent, I cannot begin to fathom the agony that God the Father felt as He watched His own Son suffer. It is a beautiful, glorious picture of His own love for us.
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Raising kids stirs something deep in our souls — an innate knowing that our time is finite. Taking my kids outside in creation, I’m discovering how to stretch our time and pack it to the brim with meaning. God’s creativity provides the riches of resources for teaching the next generation who He is and how He loves us. Join our adventure and discover inspiration and resources for refusing rush, creating habits of rest, living intentionally, and making the most of this beautiful life!
I'm Eryn, Master Naturalist, Author, & Bible Teacher
Hey there!
"but the unbearable separation that would form a chasm between them as Christ would take upon Himself the sin of the world."You have struck here upon what I feel is one of the most passionate parts of Christ's story. I have always felt that the most painful part of the crucifixion, the part that drove Christ to pray "let this cup pass from me, but not My will, but Yours be done" was the approaching separation you speak of.At that hour on the cross, hung suspended between mankind that rejected Him, and when darkness covered the land when the Father, God, whom Christ had been in constant communion from eternity past, turned His back on His Son because Christ had taken on our sins and had to therefore be separated from the Father…Utterly isolated, rejected by man and God, how did He ever bear that pain of all our sins, as He paid that price?