The Big Picture

In my house, I don't do the dishes often (My sweet, amazing, selfless, husband who loves me and spoils me does it almost every day), I haven't been keeping up with the laundry well, I don't shower every day, and I am lucky if I eat a decent breakfast in the morning. I am often exhausted when Derek gets home at night. Sure, we do our memory verses at lunch, science/history reading at snack time, and devotional at dinner...we have Family Bible time when it works out and Daddy is home in enough time to do so...but sometimes, sitting down with to work on a puzzle together or to play a game that involves any sort of thinking is too far beyond my energy level!! I have guilt over that...guilt that maybe we shouldn't have had so many kids in such a short amount of time. Guilt that I'm not giving them as much one-on-one discipling/education time as some of my friends with fewer and farther-between kids. Once we finish our school stuff for the day, I am often spent.

But here's the thing with this Big Picture Project. My point, obviously, was to take photographs of every-day things and look for the "big picture" in it. (Doing a gigantic load of laundry seems like an awfully boring and mundane task unless you think of how you are serving your family and worshiping the Lord as you do it with the right heart and fulfill the calling He has on your life right now.)

Anyway, I realized that sometimes, seeing the "big picture" means looking a few years down the road. Past the diapers, past the spilled drinks, muddy tracks on the carpet, and temper tantrums. What I am doing now and how I am reacting to all of those things is laying a foundation for my relationship with them...a relationship that will be extremely important as they get involved in things that really count (a life in the real world!)

So as I took this picture and looked at the faces of my boys, I focused on the big picture:


Loving them...

and striving to live a life that reflects everything I know to be Truth

in the hope that my children will one day walk in that Truth

with love in their own hearts, and with the "big picture" at the forefront of their minds!


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