The Ancient Struggle, or The Reality of Toddler Acsesis
Aaron was at a Men's group meeting last night, listening to the tales of a WWII vet who helped raid Hitler's bunker (pretty cool...whole other post), so the kids and I met my mom for dinner. On our drive home, the melodic mellowness of Iron and Wine (a MD gift from my Munkee) was lulling J to sleep. I heard a sudden THUD on the window next to the sleeping girl.
"Basil, did you throw your bear at her?"
"Yep, I want her to wake up."
"You can't throw things at her, Basil...let her sleep. You need to be nice to her!"
"I'm trying to be nice." pause, me thinking, yeah right. "It's pretty hard, Mommy."
"I know it is, buddy."
There it is. It is hard. We are struggling against the flesh. Restraining our impulses for destruction, self-gratification, self-exaltation, anger and TRYING to replace them with love, grace, patience, self sacrifice. Why? To be "good people"? To avoid punishmet? Hopefully, my struggles are aimed at wholeness...communion with my Creator, becoming truly human, with God's Grace, as He intended me to be.
While a two-year-old may not understand concepts like synergeia or theosis, intuitively he knows...it IS pretty hard. But, alas we are God's fellow workers (1 corinthians 3:9) and He gives us what it takes to fight the good fight.
"If we are to achieve full fellowship with God, we cannot do so without God's help, yet we must also play our part: we humans as well as God must make our contribution to the common work, although what God does is of immeasurably greater importance than what we do." Bishop Kallistos Ware, The Orthodox Church
What a truly amazing mystery. Lord have Mercy.
Aaron was at a Men's group meeting last night, listening to the tales of a WWII vet who helped raid Hitler's bunker (pretty cool...whole other post), so the kids and I met my mom for dinner. On our drive home, the melodic mellowness of Iron and Wine (a MD gift from my Munkee) was lulling J to sleep. I heard a sudden THUD on the window next to the sleeping girl."Basil, did you throw your bear at her?"
"Yep, I want her to wake up."
"You can't throw things at her, Basil...let her sleep. You need to be nice to her!"
"I'm trying to be nice." pause, me thinking, yeah right. "It's pretty hard, Mommy."
"I know it is, buddy."
There it is. It is hard. We are struggling against the flesh. Restraining our impulses for destruction, self-gratification, self-exaltation, anger and TRYING to replace them with love, grace, patience, self sacrifice. Why? To be "good people"? To avoid punishmet? Hopefully, my struggles are aimed at wholeness...communion with my Creator, becoming truly human, with God's Grace, as He intended me to be.
While a two-year-old may not understand concepts like synergeia or theosis, intuitively he knows...it IS pretty hard. But, alas we are God's fellow workers (1 corinthians 3:9) and He gives us what it takes to fight the good fight.
"If we are to achieve full fellowship with God, we cannot do so without God's help, yet we must also play our part: we humans as well as God must make our contribution to the common work, although what God does is of immeasurably greater importance than what we do." Bishop Kallistos Ware, The Orthodox Church
What a truly amazing mystery. Lord have Mercy.
4 Comments:
My Dear Sara,
Wow...this is my favorite post so far! Very, very well said.
I agree, it doesn't get easier, our struggles just change.
I, for the most part, have gotten over throwing things at my younger sister. I however, still have besetting sins that I struggle with every day.
Mimi, I will always throw things at my little sisters. I'll probably start throwing things at Chris soon enough :)
I agree with Aaron, Sara, this was a wonderful post.
ah, such a sweet boy you have.
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