Grandchildren, the Apple of Our Eyes


I've decided grandchildren are the best thing in the world to teach us about the grace of God.

Or maybe they are just what I needed to learn the grace of God.

Everyone tells you, "Oh you just can't know until you have one of your own."

Well.....they are right.

When I became a mother, I mean I became a mother.

I was all in, and I love my kids like a don't even know how to tell you.

I said, I never even knew what love was until I had them.

That all consuming, die in an instant without question for them kind of love.

Along with that love came a responsibility.

I can remember lying there in the hospital bed after Heidi was born and they placed her in my arms and I had two thoughts.

First, I thought, oh no she is a girl and that means she is going to have to do this one day.

I guess I thought that because the experience was still so fresh.

Next I looked down at her and thought, "I've got to be everything to her my mom was to me."
How was I gonna do that?

Then  in about two years Lucas came then two more and Jess came and then two more and Liv came and so we were off on the parenting journey.

Mark worked all the time and I was busy with the kids.

I felt like I had to tell them and teach them so much.

I loved being their momma.

Time went on and they grew up and then I looked back at pictures and it's like I never remembered them being so little.

I always thought they were older than they were.

I expected a lot.

Now here we are grandparents and I see how little Ezra is in a way I didn't see in my own children.

Every single thing he does is precious to Mark and I.

We sit and just watch what he does and then we smile at each other.

We imagine what he will say when he is with us, of course he can't talk but Mark has the cutest voice for him and says what he thinks Ezra would say if he could and I love that.

We love all of his attempts at everything and we don't care how feeble they are we clap and cheer and urge him on.

I think about the verse In Psalm 17:8 that says we're the apple of God's eye and that he guards us.
I also like Zechariah 2:8 where more of less God says, if anyone messes with you, they have messed with the apple of my eye.

Don't you just love that?

The Bible tells us more than once that God delights in us.

We don't use that word much, delight but it's a wonderful word.

It's a light, happy, exuberant word.

It's the perfect word to describe how we feel about our grandchildren.

We delight in them and they are the apple of our eye.

We love our children and we delight in them too but with the grandchildren the delight is so much clearer to us.

It's clearer because our job is different, it's clearer because we're wiser and we can slow down.

It's clearer because even though by this time in life, we may need bifocals ..we see more clearly than we ever have.

I know the Bible tells me that God is my Heavenly Father and I know that because he is, he sometimes has to discipline me.

I also know God has no grandchildren, he only has children yet I love that his love is big enough to love me with the fathering love that includes discipline and yet I'm the apple of his eye and he delights in me and has grace for me in a way that is like the love of a grandfather.

Grandparents are understanding, they are slow to anger, they are quick to give another chance, they have a connection with the child that a parent can't have.

The parent kind of love is needed, what would become of the child if they didn't have it?

But the grace, and understanding of the grandparent is needed just as much.

I'm so glad God is teaching me about himself, through Ezra.

I guess I shouldn't be surprised....after all, his book does  say, "A little child shall lead them."




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