After going through 2020 with various levels of social distancing, lock down and caution, COVID-19 made its arrival directly into our home. Eric was diagnosed and we went back into strict isolation. Our youngest son had mild symptoms and based on protocol, I drove him to a drive-in COVID clinic for testing. He's the type that says thoughtful things when he has one on one time with me and is not being overwhelmed or out talked by his older brothers.
"Mama, when you were a kid like me, were you afraid of being homeless? Like you didn't know how you would find a place to live?"
Did I hear him correctly? Where was this coming from? I asked the requisite follow up questions to make sure I was tracking with him. Yes, my sweet, kind-hearted boy was expressing a fear of being homeless someday. I jumped into an explanation of how I didn't remember having that fear as a kid but that he wasn't alone to figure this whole life and adulting thing out by himself. I mentioned education, possibly college, and various jobs he was interested in. I told him we would teach him how to budget and save for a deposit on an apartment or a down payment for a house. Kids don't always understand nuance though. While I was thinking about our responsibilities towards him as parents, to teach him and train him, he simply wanted a sense of security, a safety net. He wanted reassurance that he would always be our child and would have a place with us if he needed it. I told him unequivocally that he would always have a place with us. I could tell that lifted a burden for him. Are we not also like little children looking to our Heavenly Father for the answers? Aren't we also looking for security?
It made me think about all the things I want to share with our sons in the coming years before they become men. I thought about how time is fleeting and we're more than half way to adulthood with the twins already. There is so much to teach and it feels like so little time for this life altering task. The weightiness of raising future men is heavy. I think of the kind of men that I desire and pray for them to become and the One I need to constantly point them to.
If you know me well, then you know I largely live in my own head. Simply put, the prompting to begin writing again has been on my heart. Having an outlet is good and if it encourages some like minded people or causes some others to think things through a different perspective, then it's time well spent. The battle against the 'why not' has been that no one cares about my thoughts or opinions, that I have nothing new to say and that no one will read this. Ultimately being faithful in my testimony is what wins out. I may not have anything new to say. That's actually well and good because I have no desire to be a heretic but rather I want to faithfully address Christian worldview, parenting and marriage. These truths can be said again and again through various generations and they never get old. And if you got this far, then I have had at least one reader. Welcome, friend, to Guddats & Grace.
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