Wake up, finally

In the past month my life has been flipped upside down in the most wonderful way possible. No matter how many classes we went to, books we read, or advice we got from anyone and everyone...nothing fully prepared me for the moment standing in the delivery room, when one second there were five of us in the room, and the next there were six. I still can't get over it. The best part is, I thought I had a plan. What a fool I am.

For the better part of the last 13 years I have worked with kids...large groups, small groups, one on one, kindergartners to college aged, affluent to needy. In all of that experience I had developed at least a few ideas of what I wanted to be as a parent. Some of ideas came from watching great parents do great things, some from watching kids who couldn't get an adult to give them the time of day, some from child development courses in graduate school, some from sitting next to kids at Wendy's. But in a single moment, all of that experience and time with kids seemed to fade into a mass of nothingness. When everything in me seemed to scream "JASON, YOU HAVE NO IDEA WHAT YOU ARE DOING!!!"

The truth is there are a whole lot of things out of my control. Ellery will grow up to be who she will, and she will experience so many things I can't even begin to imagine for her, both good and bad. But laying heavy on my heart is how to expose her to things that I hope will build compassion, love, honor and responsibility in her. How to let her taste God's love for other people in a way that breaks her heart and molds her spirit. One overwhelming thought has struck me as I have tried to think about how to be intentional about exposing her to a life of compassion...the thing that will make the biggest difference, where she will most see God's heart for his world, is not in special trips or rare events, but in how we choose to live every day, what we talk about when we are together, what becomes common place, not what is extraordinary. Suddenly the Shema means so much more to me.

Even more challenging to me is this deep sense that I want to figure out how to display compassion and love more in the everyday fabric of my life. I am excited for what it can mean for my family, for me, and for my daughter. But to be honest, I am a little saddened. Because I know that my daughter is not the only one that my life should be communicating God's love to. Why is it that it has taken me being father before I decided it was time to get intentional about things God has entrusted to me my whole life? So in the joy there is a sense of regret. I am thankful to wake up, but know God has been calling me to wake up for some time, and it took the lifeshattering joy of my daughter's birth for me to finally respond.