Theology from Veggie Tales

The other night our two youngest girls asked if they could watch a "show" instead of read a story for bedtime.  It was sort of a hectic night (our oldest, my husband, and I were just sitting down to eat supper at 7:00 p.m.), so I said yes.  I fired up the Wii, searched Netflix and Amazon Prime for the requested "Charlie Brown."  Nothing for less than $1.99.

I draw the line at paying for bedtime stories, when I'm already paying for the subscriptions to online movie channels, so I searched for something else.  Aah, Veggie Tales.  Most of the episodes were over an hour long or had been watched ad nauseam, so I settled on something about Snoodles.  Whatever.  Like a good mom I wasn't going to watch it with them.

Now, in my defense, it should be noted that I know how long it takes to read a novel when working nearly full time outside the home; being an at-home mom to a preschooler; staying involved as a volunteer in my Kindergartener's and 3rd grader's classes; trying to write a novel; and keeping up with my responsibilities as a wife, daughter, sister, friend, and church member.  (I was told recently via a blog post I didn't have the time to read that we should stop highlighting how busy we are, because it's neither healthy nor helpful.  So pretend none of that just happened.)  Anyway, here's how long it takes: more than nine weeks.  I know that because I'm one week from my library book being due--after my allotted two renewals--and I'm still only half way through the sucker.  You don't get to read through it very quickly when you only read a chapter at a time . . . on a good day.

So, like any good mom  normal mom sane person I took the Snoodles time to eat my dinner and read my book.  One sandwich and five pages in I felt that all-too-familiar feeling.  Cue the guilt.  Cue the "here's your chance to be an involved parent while expending almost no energy, and you're sitting here reading."  Cue the self-imposed judgement.

I put in my bookmark and crawled onto the sofa with three of my family members (four, since the youngest always insists on including the cat), took a deep breath, and started watching the Snoodles.

I'll be honest, my mind was on my book, so I wasn't paying the closest attention through most of it.  All I noted was that the story sounded a lot like a Dr. Seuss book (so did Larry, apparently, because at the end he told Bob he was thinking he wanted to eat some green eggs).  And then the littlest Snoodle who'd been carrying around all these drawings people had given him of what they saw when they looked at him showed up at a little shack.  Inside, he found a stranger.  The little Snoodle told him how upset he was and how weighed down he was by the artwork he carried.  So the stranger said, "Let me paint what I see."

"Oh, great," thought Little Snoodle.  One more person to point out how I don't measure up.  How my dreams are silly.  How my clothes don't fit and they don't match and no one likes me anyway.  How nothing about me is right or will ever be right.

The stranger painted.  And he painted.  And then he unveiled his painting with a flourishing withdrawal of the cloth and an, "It's time that you learned what you really look like!"

Little Snoodle saw a boy who was older and strong.  He had wings that would help him fly.  His eyes showed courage and freedom.

And Little Snoodle said, "I'd like to believe it, but I'm afraid to."

What was the stranger's response?  "I know who you are, for I made you."

I.  Made.  You.

Friend, there is Someone who made you too.  So He knows who you are.  Those people handing you pictures of who you are, what you're good at, what they see when they look at you . . . they don't know.  They.  Don't.  Know.

He knows.  He made you.

As the stranger, no, the Creator, says to Little Snoodle, "I gave you those wings so you can soar."  Little Snoodle replied that the picture from the Creator was too big, and it would weigh him down like the others had done.  Instead he was told that if he carried that picture, if he remembered what it showed about who he really was, he would find it actually made him lighter.

And, lo and behold, he looked down and saw that he was flying.

God gave each of us wings, too.  And He wants us to soar.

It takes more than nine weeks for me to read a book.  I often park my kids in front of the television because I'm exhausted.  We have eaten out more times this week than anyone should.  We haven't had guests in our home in too long, and I haven't spoken to my best friends--more than a quick wave and a stolen chat from a car idling in the middle of the road--in weeks.  I so often feel like I am failing at everything I'm trying to do.  But none of those things are the picture of what the Creator made me to be.  He made me brave.  And free.  And He wants me to soar.

A Lesson from my Dad

Because The Eighteenth Sabbath reminded me of my dad and one of the most important lessons a girl could ever learn, here is that lesson for all of you, too. 

In July 1989, my dad took a call at 36th Street CRC in Wyoming, MI.  It meant a family move to Grand Rapids from South Dakota.  It also meant I would start 7th grade in a new town, at a new school, with no one that I had ever met before.  My sister was in high school, so she had to go to school to register on a Monday.  I wouldn't start until Tuesday, so my dad took me to Meijer on Clyde Park to pick up a few things for school. 

Riding in the car with my dad has always meant listening to music, and it's usually meant listening to it loudly.  That's what we were doing that day.  It must have been 99.3 (WJQK), because WCSG (91.3) usually played sleepy music in the late '80s and early '90s, and WAYFM didn't exist yet.  We had just pulled into the parking lot, when a song by DeGarmo & Key came on.  My dad had me sit and listen to it, and then he said, "This will get you through tomorrow and every other day, kiddo.  If God is for you, then no one else matters."

It's a hard lesson to learn and an even harder lesson to remember.  When the pressures of the world stack up, and I feel like I don't measure up, the last thing I'm thinking about is that it doesn't matter what others think, because God is for me.  It's easier to think that if I was just something more, something different, then the world would be nicer to me.  But, the truth remains: if God is for us, who could be against us?  No power on earth can take His love away.

When you rest in that, you can truly rest.  Thanks, Daddy.  It really does get me through every day.