Another Day, Another Year

I have turned 56. I don't make a big deal about birthdays or even special occasions like Mother's Day. Of course I appreciate the 'treats' - birthday wishes, prayers, flowers, makan, who wouldn't? It's nice to know you are loved and appreciated by many who care. Still the practical me says we don't need special days to tell someone we love them. In fact we shouldn't just tell, but show it everyday, whilst the person is still alive on earth. And I don't mean show as in buy this, that or the other present. I mean show as in honor, respect, be responsible to, and do what is right by that person you say you love. That means much more to me than all the presents in the world which can be bought by money.

Anyway the children  got me flowers and a card. I think they have given up asking me what I want anymore, since they already know my heartfelt desire every birthday is simply for them to love God as they love their mom. The flowers I will soon have to throw away when they wilt. The card I keep together with some old cards they have given me for my past birthdays. Re-reading them made me pensive. I find myself wondering where have all the years flown. Wasn't it just yesterday when I was sitting on the grass with my husband in the evening, watching them on the swings?  I still remember that morning when I had to break the news of their father's passing and I can still hear the shrill "What?" exclamation of shock from my (then) eldest teenager.

And now she's already very much her own woman. Years ago at age 21, she wrote that she needed God to learn how to be an adult, and that my most precious gift to her was the bible study sessions I used to hold with them all after dinner, as it was then she felt most close to God and to me. In another card she said I inspired her spiritually. Barely 10 years down the line, I wonder what happened to the innocence of youth, for since then, she has swung right to the other end of the pendulum, proudly proclaiming to the world she is now a very happy atheist. Likewise her other 2 siblings have literally grown out of church and all that "God" stuff, preferring to be non-committal in matters of personal faith. As I said before , children will keep breaking parents' hearts many times over, not just over spiritual issues but over all sorts of life-decisions they choose to make.  And we will of course continue to love them, as they undoubtedly love us too.

Comes a time when every parent, especially moms, know there ain't a thing that can be done anymore to make her (so grown-up) children understand there are some roads they should never wander onto, for their own sakes. As the Chinese saying goes, if they are not allowed to bang their heads on the wall, they will never know it hurts them. So mothers grit their teeth, and let them go ahead confident in their own independent ways, to bang their heads on the walls they never see coming their way. In Christian terms, I believe it's called letting go, and letting God handle it, or rather them.  Of course it's easier said than done. Which mother, or father for that matter, knowing as only parents know that their very own precious flesh-n-blood  are going to get hurt, won't do all within their power to prevent it from happening. Unfortunately humans are really not powerful at all; they can't work miracles, they can't change the seasons, they can't control their own off-spring. So all Christian moms like me can do is cry, pray and trust that Abba Father God is still faithful, even when His (my) children are faithless.

I get even more pensive with the news that on my birthday, amidst all the election hullabaloo in Sarawak, 6 lives were lost in a tragic helicopter crash in the state.  Which only reminds me how fleeting life really is. One minute we are here on earth, and the next we are not. Yes I know, I shouldn't be morbid, especially on my birthday. But surely it's not morbid to face the truth. Because that's what it really is like, exactly how the bible puts it in James 4:13-14... "Now listen, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money. Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. So aptly and bluntly put. The bible never pulls any punches or rather wool over our eyes.

Every morning I wake up still breathing means God has granted me grace to live another day. Every year I celebrate a birthday is an extension of His grace. My life could have been, may still be cut short at any moment. But today I get to see another sun rise, another sun set. Truly I stand only by God's grace, acutely aware that I could so easily be here today and gone tomorrow in the blink of an eye. But it's not with gloom, rather with thanksgiving unto my Maker that I chalk up 56 years of living. For tears may dim the eye, still I choose to believe God's hand is ever working out good in the worst of circumstances, for those who love Him, according to His purposes. Not because I am a die-hard optimist, a positive thinker or just a plain wishy-washy old dreamer, but because I know my God is good. Even when all looks bad. That's the unshakeable truth of who Jesus is; after all if He can step out alive from the tomb of death, what can He not do, for those who dare to choose to believe?

So here's to another day, another year of faith to carry on believing.

"Taste and see that the LORD is good; blessed is the one who takes refuge in him." Psalm 34:8