bare white

bare white

4.26.2018

Realizing I am not a Mom and She's not a Dancer

Performance week is here in full glittery, hair-spray fume-force at our house. Most of April is full of dancing and perfecting their dancing and costume fittings and rehearsals and lots of laughter, and joy, and amazing-ness and some tears and maybe a bloody toe or two, but always with stories to tell. And then when the lights go out on the stage, it is done. Not just partially done. Completely done, for a long and needed break. A break not just for the dancers in our house but also the chauffeurs and waiters-of-the car. A break for our gas tank, a break for the broken pointe shoes and a break for each of the toes that are hanging onto their nails by a thin thread.


The other day as we were on the 20 minute hike to the studio, my oldest dancer and I were talking about how frustrated she was that she could not nail her steps and combinations no matter how many tireless months she's has been working on them. I encouraged her through her frustrated tears, tried to make a joke and ended by reminding her,

"You know you aren't a dancer right?"

This is something I have told her the last couple of years and started telling my athletes and fashion gurus and scaredy-cats and myself.


She looked at me knowing where I was going and graciously listened to my fumbling words again.
It is the same thing I started telling myself a couple of years ago and maybe just now is starting to really make sense and flow through my veins and stoke a fire that has been wanting to come out but didn't have the words or the know-how.

You see...
I am not a wife or mom. I am not a daughter to my parents, sister or friend to anyone.
I am a daughter of a King.
Really.
Of a King who is not moved by this world because He is King of this world. A King who never changes. He is the same yesterday, today and forever and His feelings toward me never falter or grow or fade because He loves me always and ever the same..no matter what. A King who never improves because He just is. He, completely and perfectly, is.
And He says I am His.
This is the only place my identity is found. Everything else He has called me to do, but I only am who He says I am, and that is His Beloved.
Here, as His daughter, this is where I have felt and experienced true FREEDOM in Him. Freedom from performing, freedom from seeking acceptance, freedom from fear of messing up or my kids messing up or just anything messy, freedom to stand on His Word - Truth, freedom to love...truly love, and freedom to forgive because I live in His forgiveness and mercy and grace and they are new every morning.
And I am His.


Because here's the deal - I will mess up, every day. I will throw words around I don't really mean or sometimes I do but they are ugly and fiery. I will slam a door and begrudgingly wash unending loads of laundry. I will get flustered and frustrated and fuming all just because things didn't go how I thought or wanted or expected.


My kids will mess up every day. They will do the same things I do and let their guard down when it should be up, and keep it up when it should be down. They will throw fiery darts that will pierce each other to their core. They might even hit or howl or not choose to hear the words they need to.


But we can't, we won't stay here, because we have grace here and His grace covers us completely so our identity isn't found here.
Even when I try to fit Him in my perfectly crafted boxes and lines, and take back the control from the King of the world, He says...You are mine. I've got this...just stop striving and BE still.
Be still.
BE still.
I don't always know how to do that.


Just His whisper can calm the seas of life.
He can speak a storm to raise up and be still.
He brings light to the shadows of our life and break bands and chains that shackle us to anything other than Him.
He can stop the fiery darts.
He can bring a healing balm.
HE can make worlds and people collide.
He is the King of the world, and I am His.
This is who I am.




"So, my Esther-girl, you are not a dancer, you are a daughter of the King who has called you to dance. And sometimes it is about dancing, but sometimes it is about so much more. And I know you know what I mean." 

And then in that beast-of-a-van rumbling back the 20 minute drive that we know far too well by heart, my King gently reminds me of the same, "You know you aren't a wife or mom or friend or picture-taker or word-writer, Meg? You are My Daughter and I have called you to do those things for a time, but they do not define you. I define you and you are mine. And I am steady. And my grace is enough."

But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness. Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me.  (2 Corinthians 12:9, NIV)

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