On Parenting with Wisdom
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While washing grapes,
while watching them swim,
stories I never meant to collect,
stories too heavy for me to hold,
flood my mind:
A library of scary,
dewey decimal-ed,
organized without my permission.
The anxiety creeps in.
It fills my belly.
It clamps around my jaw.
I used to give it the wheel,
let it decide where to turn
let it lure me with its promises:
“I will keep you safe”;
“I will keep you in control.”
But now I’m three kids
and ten years in,
and I’ve started to see what this is:
anxiety, not wisdom.
And I’ve learned that anxiety isn’t good at driving.
(It will pretend its keeping us safe
and then drive us off a cliff.)
Wisdom needs the wheel.
And you know,
with all these stories we collect,
it’s as if we think fear of stuff
is the beginning of wisdom,
but it’s not.
“The fear of the Lord
is the beginning of wisdom.”
So I have to hit the brakes.
I have to see where I am:
I’m in the library of scary,
soaking up stories that are not my business,
acting on themes are are not mine.
I have to return the stories I’ve checked out,
and read another instead,
I have to start by fearing God,
who has all power,
who is in charge,
and can be trusted
(even when I don’t understand what He’s doing
or agree with what He allows).
And so when the anxiety rises up,
when I’m washing the grapes,
while I’m watching them swim,
I’ve started to do a new thing:
Get small before my big God,
and pray stuff I know about Him
about stuff I don’t know about my life:
“Dear God you are God.
You made me, and you love me.
You made my kids, and you love my kids.
You have every day of our lives
written in your book.
I know I can ask you for things.
Because you’re my Father who loves me.
And I know I can trust you
to give and withhold
based on what is ultimately good
(and you decide what is good
and I’ve decided that’s good).
And so, I ask you: protect my kids—
I know you know this lump in my throat—
and protect me because
I am prone to collect anxieties
you’ve told me to hand to you.
And the anxieties hurt me,
and tempt me to parent unwisely,
and tempt me to think I’m in control,
and tempt me to think
I can keep us safe from everything,
and to think I hold the whole world in my hands.
But my hands are too small,
and I have more limits than I can count.
I cannot keep watch
over every grape.
I cannot keep watch
over every splash of water.
But fueled by your grace,
I can be a wise and watchful parent,
knowing I am parented
by the wisest and most watchful parent.
Help me not to collect anxieties
(they do not come from you),
but to collect wisdom instead
(this comes from you).
