I'm Not Cool

It started with this:

"There is no way I could EVER drive a mini-van! I am not THAT mom! I'm WAY too cool for that!"

I heard the pretty thirty-something say those words this week, with a dramatic roll of her eyes, and I remembered being right there. I have been her. Often.

I remember the pressure to measure up and be cool. I remember the constant struggle to have it all, do it all, and be all.
I remember when it was more important my children matched perfectly on a stressful Sunday morning, than it was that we all walked out the door with hearts prepared to worship our King. I remember envying those who drove the cool cars, had the cool phones, and the cool clothes.
I remember trying to be the perfect Mom. I wore myself out trying to potty train a six-month-old, because my friend did. I played symphonies to my babies in-utero, so they would someday themselves compose a symphony. I prayed that the pediatric police wouldn't stop by my house to find that I had indeed laid my sleeping baby ON HER TUMMY! I laboriously wrote notes for lunch boxes, so my children would have emotionally healthy childhoods. I scrubbed. I cleaned. I organized, and scrubbed some more. I tried to do it all right, and cool, and perfect, because if I did, others might applaud.

Oh, how well I remember trying...the never ending trying.
I lived as one who was convinced that my value was wrapped around who I was, what I could do, or how well I could do it. I drug around the ball and chain of perfectionism, believing it would make everything perfect.

It did not.

It only made me miserable, and miserable to be around.

(One day, I might write a book about that.)

But in the meantime...
Sometimes out of left corner, those pressures and insecurities will still come knocking. So upon hearing that driving a mini-van does not make one cool, I began a dialogue with myself that went like this:

"Sheila, you drive a mini-van (Yes, I do. An old one.). You are that Mom! (Yes, I am, but I can still be cool, right?) You are not cool! (I'm not cool!)

Then I waited. I waited for an all too familiar feeling of inadequacy to creep in.

It didn't.

Did you catch that? I absolutely did not care that I drive a mini-van, and that someone thinks that I am un-cool. (But, my mini-van is paid for!)

So then I said this to myself. Actually, I believe God whispered it to me.

"Sheila, rejoice! Your value is not tied up in what you drive."

Many years ago, I gathered my children around me for a bedtime story, and read them a new book we had been given for Christmas. It was titled "You Are Special" (Max Lucado).

I read aloud, and as I turned the pages, the tears flowed and dripped off my chin.

In Wemmickville the wooden residents walk around with two boxes. One box is full of gray dots, and one box is full of gold stars. All day they go about sticking dots or stars on each other. If one can throw a stick really far, he gets gold stars. If another has a big nose, he gets a gray dot. If one has short arms and frizzy hair, she gets covered in gray dots, but if one can sing beautifully, she will get showered in gold stars!
One little guy "Punchinello, never gets any gold stars, only gray dots because he isn't talented or handsome. He watches the wooden people scurry around to give out stars and dots, and says, "It's not right." He climbs the hill to talk to His maker, Eli the Woodcarver.

Eli scoops down and picks Punchinello up, to set him on the bench. He lovingly looks at all the gray dots covering his wooden creation. Punchinello pours his heart out to Eli, and Eli starts telling him that it doesn't matter what others think about him, but that he is special just they way he is. He tells Punchinello that if he will stop caring what the others think the stickers won't stick. "The stickers only stick if they matter to you. The more you trust my love, the less you care about their stickers."

Oh, I've been so guilty of sticking dots and stars on others. Interestingly, as I've labeled others, I've looked to find myself covered in stickers, some are my own doing.

There was a day, that when being told I was a completely un-cool mini-van driver, I would have plastered myself in gray dots!

This business of sticker-sticking drains the life from all of humanity. As we stick, we wound. As we compare, we cut deep. As we impale, we lose the ability to empower. We can be so unkind.

With all the labels I've given and received, God in His merciful compassion, has reminded me that only when I look at His creatures through His eyes, will I be able to offer hope, and speak words of life. When I see myself as Jesus does, I won't need to measure up, because He is enough.

I'm thinking that I need to get behind the wheel of my mini-van, and go look for someone covered in gray dots or gold stars. She may be the coolest cat on the block, who simply needs to hear words that breathe life into her soul.

"My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever." -Psalm 73:26

*You Are Special by Max Lucado, Copyright 1997, Crossway Books

Slight Inperfection

I meander through the aisles of a favorite thrift shop, just looking at all the once loved or used items that crowd each shelf. I'm watching for a pretty tea cup, or Collector's Edition of a Holly Hobbie plate. I have a rule that the item has to be under $3.00, or I walk away. Not often easy.

I stop at the end of an aisle, when I spot two china cups. One is a sunshiny yellow, and the other, is a heart-fluttering robin egg blue. I turn them over and notice they are in my price-range, and I sigh, happily.

 

I'll never know if the original owner of these cups, chose the china patterns before her marriage, or maybe they were a wedding gift, from her Mother and Father. Perhaps she saved for years, and bought them to add to her collection of dishes to use when special people came to dine, or when it was a fancy occasion....I'll never know.

Did she wrap and pack them gently, so she could move across the nation from Kansas or Oklahoma, as my Great Grandmother's did?

What I do know is that they have been well used. I can see the wear and tear on these wares, and that is what I am most attracted to-their story. It took me a few years to realize that while I am captivated by the colors; the flowers; the dainty feel and look of a tea cup, I'm most drawn to the awareness that someone once used and enjoyed these gorgeous dishes, and there is a hidden story in each one.

I'm not often very attracted to a brand-new cup. Silly, I know.

I carefully placed these cups in my cart, next to the canning jars I found for a bargain, and make my way to the check-out.

The cashier lifts the saucer to the blue cup and says, "Ma'am, are you aware this one is chipped? Do you really want it?"

I reply with "Yes" to both questions, and he continues to scan items.

He then lifts the yellow cup and saucer and says, "This set is perfect, and beautiful!"

I feel my heart grab, and I hear the lesson....immediately!
 

We all come in different shapes and sizes. We all come in different colors. We all come from different places, such as these cups; one being from England, the other from Ohio.

We may be asked to come to the big table for fancy occasions, or maybe a small table for a intimate tea party.

Most of us have chips in our pottery, scrapes in our paint, or cracks in our handles.

Some of us are still very useful, and some having been useful for years, are too fragile now to be called upon to serve, and are asked to sit with their loveliness, in a china cupboard.

We are all beautiful.
We are all imperfect.

Perfection isn't an indicator of Beauty. Imperfection does not deem us useless.
It means we have lived and loved well.

We will find beauty, in each other's scrapes, cracks, and chips...our histories of imperfection, if we are willing to show grace, there.

I can look past the worn-out areas in you, and see you for who you really are.

Maybe you are sturdy, dependable, or maybe you shine in your elegance. You may be flowery and colorful, or plain and simple. You might even come with curves around your broken edges.

It's your wear and tear that indicates how loved you are, and how often you have served as you were created to do... that's true beauty.

Where some may look and only see cracks and slight imperfections, God looks through eyes of redemption and says, "I have a purpose for this beautiful one!"

 

"He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human heart; yet no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end."

Ecclesiastes 3:11