It's Easy to Feel Helpless

Have you ever felt helpless? 

As I lay here, my mind reels through some of the things I love to do that always made life move from day to day.

It's easy to feel helpless. 

I'm the wife. To that handsome man who dances with me in the kitchen and wraps his arms around me while I daydream with my hands in a soapy dish-filled sink. I love folding his laundry just the right way. I love pouring his coffee and baking him the biscotti that he loves to have with it. I love hearing him pull in the driveway after work and running to push the button to open the garage door for him and timing dinner with the moment I know he'll be walking through the door. I love seeing his face later on, when I walk in the door after a long night of teaching dance, when he is so excited to tell me about the great story he told the kids when he put them to bed. I love getting out for dates and walking on the pier with him and holding his hand. And I love serving him--it brings such joy to my heart.

I'm the mom. To these three beautiful little children. I love to carry them and snuggle them and lay on the floor with them and dance around the living room with them. I love making them sandwiches shaped like the boats that take us off on crazy adventures in the fantasies we create when we dress like princesses and pirates. I love taking them outside and burying them in leaves and helping them cover the driveway with beautiful chalk murals about the Bible verses we're memorizing together.

I'm the friend.  The daughter.  The sister.  The aunt.  I love hugging.  I love putting my feet on the coffee table and sharing time together to talk and listen and study and plan. I love making meals for people and surprising them with little things that might make them smile. I love hiking with a baby on my back and making sandcastles and snowmen and teaching people how to perfect a grande jete. I love standing and singing songs to praise my Savior. I love serving and giving and playing. 

And here I am.  Faced with finding a new normal.  It's easy to feel helpless.  

I catch myself saying to almost everyone who comes through the door, "Can I get you a cup of coffee? I mean...can I...direct you to where you'll find a cup of coffee?" So I laugh. Because I really can't get them a cup of coffee. And because the whole reason these beautiful, big-hearted people are here right now is to serve me and my family.  They're here to love on us and to help us navigate this new normal.

It's easy to feel helpless.  Two weeks ago, I could do all of those things with ease. Two weeks ago, something in me thought people depended on me to make life move from day to day.  Something in me thought I could make life move from day to day.

I want to give back.  I want to pour that cup of coffee. I want to cuddle that baby and run around with those little girls. I want to make that dinner and fold that laundry and teach that dance class. I want to serve at the church and drive to the playdate and dance with the handsome man who now has to carry me into the chair that helps carry me.

So, how do I keep the smile? How do I choose joy when, all of a sudden, I can't love people in the ways I know how to love them well? How do I choose joy when I can't serve in the ways I love to serve?

I'm filled with joy because I know that I was helpless, but I am not anymore.  I was helpless before Jesus rescued me.  He is my help, my heart, my hope, my stability, the very ground beneath me, whether these legs can walk on it or not. "Because you are my help, I sing in the shadow of your wings," (Psalm 63:7 NIV).

I hear His voice--the voice of the One I love--the voice of the One who loves me with the highest, deepest, longest, widest love. He reminds me that I am not the one who makes life move. He is. I am just an instrument.  "For in Him we live and move and have our being," (Acts 17:28, NIV).

Any love with which I can love--it is His love. Any gift with which I can serve--it is His gift.  "I became a servant of this gospel by the gift of God’s grace given me through the working of his power," (Ephesians 3:7 NIV).

Jesus is love, and nothing can separate me from His love (Romans 8:39). So, there is NO way that any disease or trial or lack can keep me from loving. He will love through me if I let Him teach me new ways to love. He is the servant of all. He will serve through me if I let Him teach me new ways to serve.  And at the same time, I get the beautiful privilege of being a part of something so much bigger than me--something in which so many other people get to use their gifts to love and to serve!!

It will look different, but it will be glorious.  Because no matter how my circumstances change, my God does not change.  If I fix my eyes on Jesus, I can find joy through the pain.  He helps me to choose joy when this breath-of-a-life is heavy and hard. He truly is my joy, and He always will be. If I set my heart on what lasts forever, I never forget that today is just a moment--just a tiny piece of something so much greater.  And I have the greatest Helper.

"Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal," (2 Corinthians 4:16-18 NIV).