A Spiritual Push - the story of three little things

I wrote this about a month ago.  Not sure why I didn't publish it straight away.  But now it feels right.

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ok.  It's been a crappy two weeks.  To be honest, it's been a crappy month.  At least two out of the three members in this family have been sick at the same time for the better part of the month.  My patience has run thin with LQ on many occasions.  And you always know that when life gets crappy, you are bound to get PMS to help you look at every situation in a rational, non-emotional way.

I got to Saturday just gone and and after screaming at LQ for the sixth time over two days, I broke down.  LQ sat in my bed sobbing and I sat in my sewing room with tears streaming down my face.  I was emotionally spent, and as a result was physically and spiritually exhausted as well.  I stared into the dark window that sat in front of me and whispered "I lose".

"If we are to endure to the end, then I've lost the game.   I don't have it in me to keep choosing the right".

I love my religion.  I personally know that it is the correct church for me.  But boy howdy, it's not an easy religion to have!

I listlessly went through the motions the following day.  I got ready for church.  I finished up the flyers and posters for the upcoming Relief Society meeting, I put the finishing touches on my lesson for the Sunbeams (a group of energetic 3 year olds) and tried to stretch out my favourite dress that I accidentally shrank.

I walked into the chapel with Dal and LQ just hoping to get through the 3 hours that lay ahead of me.  And then the first little thing happened.  A talk - seemingly just for me.  And not one of those "God loves you" talks.  A talk about obedience that struck a chord with my heart.  But as many young mother knows, talks only come in bits and pieces in between the dinosaur stickers and the fish crackers and the card playing.   So the first little push didn't take me very far at all.

After sitting for 30 minutes with my little group of Sunbeams (including LQ) and getting quite frustrated with the one who wouldn't keep his hands to himself, the second little thing took me by surprise.  Singing Time in Primary is a fun time for me.  I can't tell you how much pleasure is derived from watching LQ belt out songs she doesn't know at all.  She is one of the loudest singers when loud singing is called for... but it's all without a syllable in there.  It makes me giggle.  So having my heart softened with her usual display, we all finished our singing time with "I am a Child of God" and I cried.  Something I had forgotten the previous night when I had given up.

The third little thing came as I tried to teach those poor rambunctious Sunbeams.  Teaching 3 year olds in the third hour of a three hour church block is on a par with any kind of medieval torture.  They've just been sitting for two whole hours and they "want to go home".  Yes it's said to me often and I feel like one of the many wicked characters in any fairy tale by keeping them there.  This Sunday was particularly rough because I had two boys that had not attended my class up until that Sunday.  They climbed on the chairs, they tried to shimmy the curtains, they dug through my bag of goodies.  They pretty much did everything but sit and listen to my lesson.  And as I observed, wrestled and bargained the third push came.  A clear thought came to my mind.  "Look at your daughter.  You worry so much about how delayed she is that you never see the progress she makes."  The LQ worry drained from me as I realised that my darling daughter was indeed like any other normal 3 year old that struggles with a few words.

Years ago when I was an adolescent, my dad took us on an overnight hike (craziness,  I know).  There were times that it felt like I couldn't go any further up the steep incline.  My backpack, filled with a girl's necessities (toilet paper, yummy food, plenty of changes of clothing, etc), weighed me down and I knew that I couldn't take another step.  I would stand on that incline frozen, knowing that it wasn't possible to go back but it also wasn't possible to go forward.  My dad would come up behind me and lift my backpack with his hand and push.  With that little lift and push my dad was able to get my momentum going again.

That is what happened on this particular Sunday.  The heaviness of my problems and the seemingly too steep incline to a better me were alleviated by those three little pushes.  I got my momentum back.