*A few days ago, I was blessed with the chance of holding a newborn infant, only a few hours born, in my arms. Looking down at her precious, tiny nose and perfect, tiny toes made me very curious about what it must have been like on the day that God constructed her perfect little self. As I sat counting her fingers and stroking her soft cheeks, I wondered, What was going through His mind as He was placing the cells where they needed to go in order for Hailey to have eyes the color He wanted them? What was He thinking as He planned out where she will one day get freckles when she's been out in the sun for too long? Did He say to Himself, "One day she will fall down on this knee, so I need to make the skin a little extra tough right here"? Or, "I know that little boy is going to pull her pony tail in class, so let me make sure that her scalp is really strong"?
*I began to wonder about the inner dialogue that goes on inside of Him every time he creates a new person. Able to know every single thing we will ever have to go through in our lives, and being responsible for creating a heart, mind, body, and soul that are able to withstand the rigors of this world, what crossed His mind with each new addition to us? Not humanity as a whole, but specifically when He created you or me, what was He thinking?
*When He was assembling this person they call Casey, did he stop to think about the emotional bruises He knew I would have to endure... and so chose to make my spirit a little more resilient than He would have otherwise? It had to hurt Him to think about me crying into my pillow as a teenager when this boy or that girl had hurt my spirit and wounded my heart. I bet He wanted so badly to keep me from that pain, but instead gave me the strength to endure it; because without that hurt, without that experience, I wouldn't have gained the wisdom He needed for me to have in order to protect myself and my children in the future.
*I wonder if, while he was putting me together, He shed a little tear when He thought about how my heart would be shattered into a million pieces the day my grandfather, Buddy, passed away. As a parent, I can't help but think that He had to overcome some temptation to keep me from the pain, to help me avoid it altogether. But He knew that it wouldn't be long after this loss that I would lose my daddy, an absence which would hold even more agony for me; and so He decided instead to give me a man who was strong enough to hold my hand as tears streamed down my face to help share the burden of my grief with me. He knew I would need these experiences in order to help others get through the pain of losing their loved ones. He needed me to become strong enough to share the burdens of His other children as well.
*Did He have to talk Himself out of keeping me away from those people in my life who would introduce me to the enticing lures of mind-altering substances? When He envisioned the day that His little girl would no longer "just say no", did He cry out a little, wishing He could yell loud enough to make me listen and warn me about the road down which He knew my choices would inevitably lead me?
*Knowing that I will never be as hard-hearted as I am hard-headed, did it make Him take a deep breath, and maybe even have to hold back His anger when He foresaw me getting taken advantage of by horrible people in my life who would intentionally hurt and traumatize me? But instead of preventing it, He had to instead equip me with the survival instincts to be able to make it through these things, so that I could one day yell loud enough, convincingly enough, to warn the other unsuspecting people that this is NOT the road down which they should travel.
*As He held my tiny little being in His enormous hands, did he look into my eyes, and into my future, and think about the day that His innocent little Casey would finally be overcome by temptation and give in to the seduction of wandering away from Him? The day that I would stray so far from Him that even He would have to squint His eyes in order to see me... The day He would have to let me go so that I wouldn't have any other choice but to fall. I bet He almost couldn't stand the thought of me hitting rock bottom, but knew it was the only way I would realize how desperately I needed to be clinging to Him.
*And I wonder what joy it must have brought Him when He looked down at my infintesimely small feet and realized that these were the same feet that would one day, dirty and dusty and scarred, bring me back to Him like a prodigal daughter returning Home. I wonder if He even bent down to plant a little kiss on my itty-bitty feet, blessing them so that they would be able to withstand the tumultuous journey He knew they would carry me through.
*I can't help but imagine that He placed His hand, ever so gently, on my heart for a moment... Pouring His love into me intensely, perhaps even ferociously, so that I would never have to endure one Love-less moment, even after this life and this world have managed to sap all the energy and motivation out of my soul.
*He surely must have felt a little twinge of bittersweet reverie when He finally placed my soul into my body and breathed that first breath of life into my lungs... Oh, how He loved me in that moment, in all my innocence and tenderness and inexperience....and, oh, how He must have hated to have to let me go, even though it would just be for a brief period in His infinite span of time.
*And now.... Oh, how He loves me even more now! Now that I'm hardened and damaged and broken and fractured, He holds even more passion for me. He's seen all that I've done, the good, the bad, and the undeniably ugly, and He feels even more violently in love with me! When He looks at me now, He looks *at*, not *past*, all the battle scars on my body and war wounds in my soul, and feels a rush of affectionate admiration for me and all that I've become. He somehow sees me through eyes filled with pride and satisfaction.
*Where the world sees a tired, overburdened, underappreciated, and sometimes resentful and bitter woman, He sees His hard-headed, soft-hearted, bright-eyed and unapologetically optimistic little girl with a not-so-tiny-anymore nose and toes that are no longer tiny, but are laughably and perfectly crooked... And He smiles down at me with a knowing grin on His face, because no matter how old I become or how dirty I may get, He will always see me as His sweet little Casey with big brown eyes, freckled skin, and scarred and knobby knees... All of which He placed right where they should be. For I was perfectly and wonderfully made by an Abba who dotes on me every second I'm alive, and with every breath I take He somehow loves me more than He did the breath before.
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