What can you do with duct tape?

If memory serves, it seems that around the time I discovered boys I also learned about duct tape. Doesn't it just seem like men and duct tape go together? Some of our dearest friends have a 14-year-old son who just loves duct tape. He uses it on just about everything. Got a tent with a hole in it? Use duct tape. Electrical cord got a short? Duct tape. Looking for a new baseball cap? Make one out of duct tape! (He seriously did this.) As a matter of fact, for his birthday, this young man asked for one thing....new rolls of duct tape.

Did you know you can buy it in a wide assortment of colors and patterns? Yes, duct tape is magical. Maybe duct tape is the 8th wonder of the world. I'm led to believe that if a nuclear bomb hit and the world as we know it ceased to exist, cockroaches and duct tape would still survive!

There are times in my life when I could really use some emotional duct tape. When I feel like I'm unraveling, somebody needs to patch me up with fluorescent pink duct tape (one of the many colors for sale at Ace Hardware).

Back-to-school season is one of those times. Our family enjoys awesome summers. We load up on sunshine and family time. Then, just when we've finally shaken off that last shred of tension from the previous school year - BAM! - it's time to start all over again. The older my kids get the more I dread school starting. It's like I can see the hands on the clock moving at super speed, threatening to make my kids grow up before I am ready.

This is when God reminds me that He's my emotional duct tape. Look at this - "He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together." (Colossians 1:17) YES! God is my duct tape! Jesus holds me together when I see my kids growing up too soon. He holds me together when they start wanting to spend more time with friends and less time with mom. He holds me together when my son no longer wants me to walk him to class on the first day of school.

Tonight, Jack asked me to scratch his back as he settled into bed. The lights were off and you could hear the comforting rumble of distant thunder. As I sat on the edge of his bed rubbing his back, he began to share about his day.

This may sound crazy, but I just sat there listening and thought about the duct tape. I thought about how, yes, someday he'll be too old to ask me to rub his back to help him sleep. He'll be too big to want to have me near when he's drifting off. He won't always want to share about his day, perhaps. And as my heart begins to break at the thought of my boy growing up too soon, Jesus is also there.

He's speaking His promises to me. He's reminding me of His faithfulness to my children as they grow up in Him. He holds all my precious memories of the past and helps me focus on all of the memories yet to be made. Will it break my heart when my boy is no longer a boy? I imagine in some ways it will.

But Jesus is already there in that moment holding my heart together...just like duct tape.

Blessings Wrapped in Seaweed

This summer we took our family vacation back to Seaside, Florida. This is my favorite place in the world. The happiest place on earth. Laid back environment. Beautiful houses surrounded by white picket fences. White sand and crystal blue water. My little family all to myself. When we’re in Seaside, all is right with my world.

This year, however, there was a slight imperfection in my perfect world. We got to the beach to find the shoreline draped in seaweed. Okay, no problem. Walk over the seaweed to the crystal blue water, right? Wrong. The seaweed was in the water too. To reach the crystal blue you had to wade through about six feet of seaweed and algae. If you’re willing to go through all the goo, only then can you enjoy clear, cool water you traveled so far to see.

It occurs to me that marriage is a lot like a beach with seaweed. When you’re in the newly engaged state it’s like driving to Seaside. You can’t wait to get to this happiest of all places – marriage. Then, at some point in the marriage whether it’s year one or year twenty, the seaweed hits. It feels yucky. It’s messy, stinky and all you want to do is shower off and be done with it!

However, the truth is, if you can manage to work through it then you get past the stink to the crystal blue. Quitting before you get to that clearest and coolest of water robs you of the full beach experience. The best part of marriage comes from wading through the gunk.

Chris and I have taken turns wading through our share of seaweed. By God’s grace, we’ve stuck with it for 16+ years. We’ve planted our feet firmly on the covenant we made before God. We’ve gotten on our face in prayer asking for strength to work through it when everything was pulling us apart. The days we thought we couldn’t take each other one more second; God reminded us marriage isn’t about individual happiness as much as it’s about bringing glory to Him. When we take our eyes off our own agenda and place them back on God's agenda we find our hearts drawn back to one another.

You’ve heard the phrase, “a whole is greater than the sum of its parts”. Marriage is more important than the two people who make it. The hard times serve a divine purpose (making us more like Christ), just as the seaweed is a necessary part of marine life. When I started in marriage I never knew how hard it could be nor did I have a clue how rich it could be.

We don’t drive all the way to Florida to just sit on the beach. We pack up the car, board the dog, and make the eleven hour journey to get in the water. I know there’s more seaweed in our future. That’s life. I pray for God’s grace everyday to wade through it. Here’s to the blessings of seaweed! Get me to deeper waters, Lord!