Sparrows, Rams on the Mountain, and Me

When my daughter was born she screamed for the first forty-five minutes of her life. She wasn't crying. She was screaming. She was irate. Inconsolably angry at being brought into this cold, strange world. And she was hungry. I mean, she was eleven pounds, eight ounces at birth. The girl probably really wanted some chocolate chip cookies and a glass of cold milk. It was her favorite in utero and it's her favorite now at three years old. But it's not exactly protocol to give newborns cookies and milk, however much they scream. Instead, we tried to get my baby to nurse. By "we" I mean I had a whole team working with me and trouble-shooting and trotting out every trick they had up their sleeves. When the lactation consultant--who was so kind and cheerful and positive and wonderful--declared that my daughter was a "tough case" I knew I was in for trouble.

You see, I have two children (most of you already know this, but I will write for those of you who perhaps don't know me in real life). My daughter is my youngest. I have a son three and a half years older. And he never did get the hang of nursing. Oh, we tried. And the guilt I had when I stopped trying and started using formula instead was intense. Deeply intense. And very much exacerbated by my undiagnosed post-partum depression and the mommy wars. You know, those passive aggressive comments made on social media that cut to the quick and everyone bloody well knows it. Those mommy wars.

So when my sweet screaming girl came along, I had been determined that I would breastfeed her longer than my son. If memory serves (which it doesn't because I've been sleep-deprived for almost seven years), I made it about ten weeks with my son and my goal with my daughter was eleven. I wanted just one more week. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

Back to the hospital....Collectively, the experts and my husband and me agreed that we would try to get my daughter to latch for ten minutes and if she was still hopping angry, we'd stop and give her a bottle. We didn't want her to start associating feeding, or worse yet, me, with anger and frustration. The plan was to pump as much as possible but if girlfriend needed a little formula, that was okay too. Really hard for my pride in the mommy wars, but okay.

I so clearly remember sitting alone with her in my quiet little hospital room and feeling deeply worried. I had all this emotional baggage from "failing" with my son. I had hoped she would be easy. Nothing about this was going right and we hadn't even left the hospital. Then--all of a sudden, as they say--I felt in my spirit a message from the Lord. He assured me that he looks after birds and makes sure they get enough to eat each day, and that my dear sweet girl was worth more to him than any bird. He would make sure she'd thrive too. One way or another, I wasn't in this alone. I wasn't responsible for making sure she was okay. I mean, I wasn't free to neglect her, but the parts that were out of my control were in His control. He saw me. He saw my daughter. And we were going to be okay.

Naturally, I looked up the scripture passages about sparrows and the lyrics to the song "His Eye is on the Sparrow". I started singing it to her to soothe her. I found a rendition by The Newsboys that I think freaks my mother (Hi, Mom!) out a little bit, but it worked like magic to settle my fussy newborn. I learned all the words to that song. I memorized them in the first week or so of her little life. It became my anthem, even when it didn't work to calm her down.

There were some nights when she just wouldn't stop crying. It didn't matter how hard I tried, how much milk I offered, if I swaddled her or not, if I rocked her or not, if I sang or not. It didn't matter to her if I sang, but I kept singing because it mattered to me. I distinctly remember standing in her nursery, so bleary-eyed from no sleep, and teary-eyed because I was just so wrecked by the crying infant and singing over and over again...

"And I sing because I'm happy, I sing because I'm free for His eye is on the sparrow and I know He watches me."

Singing about happiness with tears streaming down your face makes an indelible impression on your spirit. I was clinging to that promise. I grabbed hold of it hard and I didn't let go.

Eventually, my daughter got a grip on her emotions and settled into a pretty wonderful baby. I also eventually gave up nursing her (I believe I made it eleven weeks and one day.) About the same time she became rather pleasant, PPD hit me hard. Anxiety. Never had it before. Not like that anyway. Which I talked about in the post 'Kindness Carries the Light'. Fluctuating hormones, and weeks of high-stress and very little sleep did me in. Still, I had the promise that God was watching.

And not just watching, lest you think this God of mine is a passive one who merely observes from on high and occasionally remarks to other celestial beings about the tiny humans on that blue and green ball. That is not my God. My God is deeply personal and intentional and deliberate and kind. God moves. His plans are, in fact, set in motion before my need even arises. He knows what I need now and what I will need next week and what I'll need in three years or thirty or whatever. Being omniscient gives you that kind of high-level clearance. And being omnipotent gives Him the clearance to also do something.

You don't always see it. Or, I don't anyway. I probably shouldn't speak for you. Maybe you're more observant than I am. But I don't usually see the provision before it's smacked me in the face and announced it's arrived. I don't see the ram climbing up the hill as I trudge up with my sacrifice. When Abraham and Isaac went up the mountain so Abraham could sacrifice his beloved son, he didn't notice or know about the ram coming up that would take Isaac's place. But God did. God made sure that ram was coming. Lately, I like to trace the steps backwards in this biblical narratives that we know so well that we take the details for granted. God knew that ram was needed the day it was born. That ram had a purpose and God got it up the hill for Abraham on just the right day. The ram wasn't a week early and missed it, it wasn't a day late and a dollar short. The timing was perfect. The provision came in the moment of crisis.

Friends. I'm going to be honest with you. 2019 has been a moment of crisis for my family. All three months of it. My husband has a heart condition; it's genetic and he's known about it for over twenty years. It's been well-managed and monitored for those two decades. This January he had an episode that landed him in the hospital for five days while they poked and prodded and scanned him, then hemmed and hawed and read results. The good news is after a minor surgery where he got a new internal defibrillator with some additional features and some new medicines, he's stable and good to go. He can live his normal life and he's fine! Except his employer won't let him come back to work for a year. We don't understand it. The doctors don't understand it. No one I have talked to understands it. And mountains of paperwork has been printed and faxed and copied and mailed and messed up by people not us....and hours and hours of phone calls have been made to fix what's messed up and find out what's needed and to determine what our immediate future holds. It's been stressful.

Yet. My God is watching. El-Roi. The God who sees me. This name was given to Yahweh by the Egyptian slave Hagar, a woman mistreated and hurt and desperate. She was sure she was alone in the wilderness and unable to provide for her son when God spoke to her. He gave her a promise and he provided for her and her son.

I've loved the story of Hagar ever since college when I first intimately understood that my God is one who sees me. Then today, oh, today was a hard day of listening to my husband's half of phone calls and feeling like I can't fix anything and trying to keep the kids and the dog quiet and no one was having it. I was so done. I was just so exhausted deep inside. I used up all my soul energy frowning and fretting and freaking out but swallowing it up whole so the kids wouldn't start to worry. Anyone else ever been there? Anyway. I finally got shoes and socks on the wild ones and we headed out the door to pick up some things we needed. As I stepped into the garage, it hit me--all of a sudden:

"His eye is on the sparrow and I know He watches me."

It was almost audible. I'm surprised my kids didn't' say, "who said that?" I dialed up the playlist I made for my daughter when she was a newborn, I haven't listened to it in two years at least. The first song on it is "His Eye is on the Sparrow" by The Newsboys. Ordinarily, my children have very strong opinions about what we listen to in the car. If it's not The Greatest Showman, Mary Poppins Returns, or Charlie Brown Christmas they're not having it. Today we listened to "His Eye is on the Sparrow", "A Dream is a Wish Your Heart Makes" (the Lily James version, so lovely), "Blackbird" (yes, by the Beatles. My son asked to turn it up), "Forever Young" (sung by Alfie Boe. Look. It. Up. Get tissues first), and "Your Grace Finds Me." They fussed a little with the last one but I had it cranked pretty loud at that point. *Shrug* I was worshiping the Lord.

I wish I could tell you that we got home from the store and my husband ran out to greet us shouting that all our problems are over and we struck oil in the backyard...or found gold under the shed....or someone just gave us a check that would cover the whole year....or some other bananas thing. He didn't. But he was smiling. And we had a nice dinner and then he played with my son while my daughter and I did the dishes. Okay, I did the dishes. She played in the sink but it makes her so ridiculously happy to do it that I no longer mind the water slopped on the floor or the fact that she's technically in my way. We were together. We've been together more in 2019 than we've ever been since the kids came along. And happier. We have our moments--all families and couples do. It can't always been sunshine.  But we're contented together. We play games and build with Legos and do puzzles and draw pictures and tell stories and read books and watch movies and play with the dog. There's so much to do just here in our home. The little home we complain about because the kitchen needs remodeled and we wish it sat on five acres. Yet this home is full of good things, and "every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like the shifting shadows." (James 1:17 NIV)

James wrote that in his contribution to the New Testament. James was a brother of Jesus. I wonder if he was among the brothers that first thought Jesus was mad and tried to bring him home to just be quiet and stop embarrassing the family. In their defense, maybe it was bad for business. Reputation is everything for a family business. But James came around. We don't know how exactly, but clearly he came to believe in his big brother. And I'm glad he did. James also wrote "consider if pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance....Blessed is the one who perseveres under trial because, having stood the test, that person will receive the crown of life that the Lord has promised to those who love him."

In my life, I have faced trials of many kind. The other evening I started thinking through the last several years of my life and the list of trials was staggering (I had a legitimate reason for pondering this, it wasn't self-pity, I promise! It may perhaps be another post sometime this year). I don't know that I've always persevered well. I'm not much for perseverance typically. I'm more of a sit in the dirt and whine type. And yet. I'm here. And I've learned so much about the Lord it is also staggering. I know I haven't considered it pure joy. At no point today did I start naming and claiming 'pure joy' about our circumstances. Yet, in the moment when I heard the Good Shepherd speak to me, I experienced peace and joy. I was able to worship Him with a lump in my throat and kids in the backseat because I know that His eye is on the sparrow and He also watches me. I don't know that have that 'crown of life' yet, but I know that if I get handed any crowns or treasures when I arrive in Paradise that I'm headed straight to throne room to set it at the feet of Jesus. I have much thanks to give for all the rams on the mountain, all the provision in the wilderness, and all the reassurances that my family and I are worth more than many sparrows. Really, I owe Him everything.