Oct 29, 2013 By Lori Rodeheaver 3 min read

“Mommy! Mom! Mommy! Mommy!”

Maylee runs toward me with great anticipation.

“What?”

“Mommy!”

“What?”

“Mom!”

“What?!”

 

Yes, she’s getting a little redundant here. Every mom knows what’s going on here. Every child does this. My temptation, if I’m not looking closely enough or paying careful attention to her, is to furrow my brow and answer sternly. Guilty. I’ve done it plenty of times. It goes something like this:

“What already?! Quit saying my name if I answer you!”

But I’m learning. When I do that and impatience gets the best of me, I miss her. I crush her little spirit and squelch her joy before she even gets to the part where she can’t wait to show me what she made or tell me what she learned. Her countenance drops, her smile vanishes, and her great expectations of her favorite friend wanting to know her are dashed in an instant.

Instead, I raise my brow, I smile, I open my eyes as wide as they go and look her in the face. I run toward her and I repeatedly answer, “What!”

Because, if I’m not too busy being self-absorbed and stingy, I simply cannot wait to see what she’s up to. My response is full of the same excited expectation as her requests. She cannot wait to show me her world and I cannot wait to see it. I am not annoyed; I am blessed beyond belief when I see her new block tower with me and her on top or her special picture of she and I standing in the middle of a dozen hearts.

My other two girls will do as much when they bring me cards or makeshift, self-inspired crafts. There are Q-tips, cotton balls, misspelled words, stick figures, scribbles and repetitive themes galore. But despite my love for order, grammar, and the nagging teacher in me, I never see those flaws when I’m graced with those kind of gifts. No. These are that in which I delight.

“…But this is the one to whom I will look:

he who is humble and contrite in spirit

and trembles at my word. ~Isaiah 66:2b

God delights in his children. He looks only at our hearts. He never criticizes our redundancy or gets annoyed with our misplaced, miscommunicated excitement. He is not selfish with his time or impatient with our makeshift gifts. He is not annoyed with our misspelled, ill-fitting words when we rush in to talk to him. His children already know their attempts at perfection are not good enough. He never feels inclined to remind them. No. He is not like us. God looks at our hearts like a mother looks at her youngest child – raised brow, eyes wide, arms open, expectant smile. I can almost see him extending his hand to receive what he does not need from me and hurrying to tell me how beautiful it is, how much he loves it, and how thankful he is that I chose to give it to him and no one else.

Bank on it. If you’re running to him, no matter how awkwardly, he is waiting to delight in you.

Lori Rodeheaver is a resident of McClellandtown.