There is little I love more than having days off during the week. There is a quiet thrill in waking up on Monday morning to moments of anticipation and freedom, versus the usual hustle and bustle. Mornings are hard around here; busy, to say the least. My six year old wakes up ready to go! He is chipper, chatty, and pops out of bed like toast from a toaster. My 3 year old, God bless him, is so much more like his Momma. Of course, his Momma is not anyone's idea of a morning person. I am not peppy. I am not perky. I WANT TO SLEEP. Please don't speak to me. It takes me a solid two hours to wake up and be functional. I am not alert and oriented for at least three hours and two cups of coffee.
So, mornings like this one are absolutely blissful. Sure, there is the initial scramble to get the boys up, dressed, and out the door on time. However, once I give my last X's and O's and send them in to daycare with a wave, I am a free woman. I make the 0.8 mile drive back home, slip back into my pajamas and brew my first cup of coffee. I squeeze out every acceptable second of time lounging in my bed, so while the coffee is brewing, that's where you'll find me. I roll back out of bed, grab my coffee and my Bible, and roll back in to bed. Occasionally, I will pre-determine that I spend too much time in bed and begrudgingly take up residence on the couch. Today, however, the bed won out.
I sit in my bed, sipping on liquid grace from my brilliantly bizarre fox cup, and open my laptop. I delight in the sunshine trickling through the curtains, illuminating the bold-patterned quilt draped across my resting place. I pull up my email and dive in to my daily helping of devotionals. My thoughts wander around the room, dancing with one another... some more gracefully than others. I brew my second cup of coffee.As my heart begins to pitter-patter under the caffeine craze and my thoughts tire of their pranceful pirouetting, I open my Bible to indulge in the Truth. Psalms 118:24 (NKJV) says this: "This is the day the Lord has made; We will rejoice and be glad in it." There is a higher significance to this verse than meets the eye. However, it appeals to me on a most basic level this morning. "This is the day the Lord has made..." Aren't you grateful for today? Aren't you just so grateful? Coffee, sunshine, and His word ... that's about all I need in life. I will rejoice and be glad in it.
There is a reason I love days off during the week. It is because I start my day off well. I don't end my day with Jesus, I start my day with Him. I welcome Perfect Peace in to my heart, bright and early, and my whole attitude is different. On work days, mornings are hectic. I don't make time to invite Him in and my demeanor reflects it. I let the chaos take reign and we begin our day frazzled and frustrated.
Over the last week, I chose to change my morning attitude for my kids. I realized that just as my days are affected when I don't make time for Jesus, their days are affected by my early-morning dysfunctionality. "Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it." Proverbs 22:6 (NKJV) We must train ourselves AND our children to invite the Lord in to our hearts every morning. Like all other things, we have to teach them what this means, what it looks like, and how it feels. So, when I sneak in to wake them up each morning, I do so with a song. I sit down gently, I rub their heads, I admire my sleeping babies. My heart skips a beat as they wipe away the sleep from their eyes...
THEN, I start to sing (rather loudly and off-key), "Rise and shine and give God the glory glory!!" My six yr old, true to his nature, jumps up and starts wiggly dancing. We laugh and hug and I go to wake up his brother. Mason, who you'll remember is much like me, offers little more than a half-grin at my silliness before reaching his arms up to me. I snuggle him and offer him the love of the Lord and we start our morning. After just two days of this, I noticed how much more smoothly our mornings were running. It is practically palpable.
My next goal is to make Him a part of my morning, every morning. ...Even if that means waking up earlier than the "hustle and bustle" for the sole purpose of coffee, sunshine, and His word. Some of you are like me and your time with Jesus is simply irregular, while some of you don't spend much time with Him at all. So this week, I challenge you to make a change. Before life gets loud, before you check your Facebook, or make your to-do lists... fill your heart with Jesus. Start with today and push on again tomorrow. My hope is that before we know it, those minutes of sleep we sacrificed will pale in comparison to the benefits of beginning our days with God. I believe that welcoming His presence in to our first moments each day will fuel a difference for us all. He longs to be part of everything we do, it's as simple as opening the door and inviting Him in for coffee...
