Whenever my 3 year-old Emmy has even the slightest of stuffy noses, she’ll stir several times in the night thrashing and crying out in her sleep. No matter what we do to clear her nose (nasal aspirator, essential oils, blowing her nose), it doesn’t stay that way for long and she cannot seem to get a handle on breathing through her mouth while her nose is out of commission.
We always know we’re in for it for a couple nights in a row when this happens. She’ll cry out repeatedly trying to breathe through her nose, and gets mad as a hornet because she can’t. She becomes completely irrational and can’t be settled — as 3 year-olds often do.
One night right before Easter, I sat with her on the couch late into the night comforting and rocking her, praying her nasal passages would clear up so she could rest. She drifted off to sleep again as this thought came to mind,
“I wish I could trade places with her for the night.”
I was willing to suffer a little while, so she could sleep comfortably. If only that were possible.
In that moment, hopelessly worn-out from the extended mom hours that night, the Holy Spirit immediately brought Jesus to mind. Jesus willingly suffered much more than a stuffy nose for His children to be able to enter into His rest. (Hebrews 4) In that moment, I knew His heart for us.
I experienced a teensy bit of His love for His children in my love for my spirited little Miss and desire to see her whole and at peace.
That mama-love you display so faithfully, desiring that your child be well, be whole, and able to rest mirrors that of our Savior. So if you ever get the notion that you’re not enough, or are failing in a million different ways — remember this: you love and desire good things for your child like Jesus does for his. That doesn’t sound like failing — it sounds like a human mother doing what God created her to do.
Amanda Bacon
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