Catherine Claire Larson

The other day my 4 year old woke me up with a conspiratorial whisper, “Mom, come quick, I want you to see something.” Begrudgingly, I emerged from beneath the cocoon of warm covers and followed him downstairs. “Close your eyes,” he said with the flourish of a magician as he climbed up on the living room couch to get closer to our front window.

“Now, look, mommy! Do you see the colors?”  The sky was aflame with morning glory. Pink tinged the edges of the sunrise flames, like a halo. Seeing it through my winter tree limbs reminded me of Moses and his burning bush. He was right; it was a sunrise worth waking up to see.

But what struck me later on about it is that he is now stopping to notice the colors, because I regularly stop to notice them with him. Especially, as I’ve been learning to paint, I find myself paying more attention to the gradation of colors in the leaves, or the particular pattern of clouds in a herringbone sky, or how the shadows fall in the glow of the afternoon light. And now, in his own way, he is calling me to see what I have taught him to notice. 

The other night at the playground he said he wanted to stay and watch the sunset with me. A few weeks before that he pulled me out on the back porch on a nippy fall evening to “cuddle up and see the colors,” as he described the last colors of the day. And this is because I have so often been caught up in such beauty and I have pulled this little child of my heart into my delight. 

And then like an afternoon thundershower, I felt drenched in realization. This is how we teach them to love Jesus. It’s them catching my delight in belting out praise songs in the car when no one else is watching; it’s them hearing the tenderness in how I talk to God and thank him for being such a good, good Father to us; it’s them seeing how I linger over God’s word on a Saturday morning when there’s mundane things calling for my attention; and hopefully it’s a million along-the-way moments of spoken aloud wonder, instruction, insight, or thanksgiving. 

I’ve been reading this advent season from a book of poems edited by Malcom Guite called Waiting on the Word. One of the poems that struck me recently was called The Moons by Grevel Lindup. The narrator of the poem notes all the quarters, halves and slices of moon seen over the years. And wonders aloud:

“How many times did you call me from the house,

Or from my desk to the window, just to see?

Should I string them all on a necklace for you?

Impossible, though you gave them all to me.”

It’s a lovely reminder of the beauty of a shared moment. The remembered moons, like so many shiny iridescent shavings of memory, become like an adornment, a necklace– a gift. I’m certainly wearing close to my heart all the shiny shards of sunrises and sunsets my little one has collected for me. I pray that I can likewise collect so many luminous moments of my delight in God and pass them on to my children. Perhaps one day, if my prayers are answered, they will gather their own luminescent wonders of God’s goodness and give them to me like a necklace of shards of sunrise and medallions of harvest moons. 

        

Having a range of ages in my family (15 down to 4), I realized recently that I’ve been doing bedtime routines with little ones for over a decade. Over the years and with various kids it’s looked differently. My oldest would listen to stories far longer than any normal child. With two of my boys, the routine always closed with a song, “Jesus Loves Me” or “Bushel and a Peck” (which was my Grandma’s special song she sang me) or some other request. For whatever reason, the linchpin of the bedtime routine these days with my four-, eight- and ten-year-old, who share a bedroom, is “thankful-fors.” It started last year, around Thanksgiving I believe, when I’d ask them right before prayers what they were thankful for. And since then the four-year old, at least, will not let me miss a single night of “thankful-fors.” Sometimes serious, sometimes silly, often sweet, but never, never skipped, I’ve gotten a range of answers over the year: from electricity to toes to chess to drawing pencils to Jesus to hinges to oxygen to sunsets. You name it; they’ve probably been thankful for it. And oddly enough, when you actually stop to think about each of these things in turn you realize afresh, the lavish goodness of God which pulses through every atom of created matter and reverberates through the creations of his creatures as well.

Each night, we turn these “thankful-fors” into prayers, thanking God, the giver of every good and perfect gift for the particular blessing of that day. This is my memory test because if it’s my turn to pray and I miss even one thing–and sometimes the list of “thankful-fors” is quite long–I’m met with a deep bedtime pout by a certain young sir. I reassure him that Jesus remembers it all, even if I can’t and I know God is so pleased with every lisped word of gratitude and every stumbling prayer.

But like so many things in life, this little routine which began for them has ministered to me. It’s hard to close the day irritated or anxious or self-focused when a little voice tells you, “I’m thankful for you and me, Mommy.” Or “please, Mommy, I’m not done with my thankful-fors!”

A minvan that finally gave up the ghost, or the holes in the knees of their hand-me-downs, seem like small things compared to the massive list of thankful-fors. And when I hear these whispered prayers, I can’t help but think, “Boy, are we rich.”

Habits like this shape us in more ways than we realize. Studies have shown that cultivating the habit of gratitude, impacts us on a physiological level: more serotonin and dopamine, better cortisol levels, better cardiac function, more gray matter, a regulated sympathetic nervous system, and a conditioning of the brain to filter negative ruminations to name but a few (see The Neuroscience of Gratitude and Its Effects on the Brain).

But what if there seems to be nothing for which to be thankful? We certainly all pass through those dark seasons of the soul where the heaviness of our hearts makes the very act of raising them in gratitude seem nearly impossible. In those seasons, I try to remember the fleas. 

If you’ve ever read Corrie ten Boom’s The Hiding Place, you will remember what I’m talking about. As Corrie and sister Betsie faced the infamous Ravensbrük concentration camp just north of Berlin as punishment for hiding Jews in their home in Holland, Corrie struggled with the unbearable conditions. As she was lying down to sleep, crowded into overflowing beds of women on reeking straw, Corrie felt the sting of a flea bite. Realizing the place was swarming with them, she exclaimed to her sister, “how can we live in such a place?” Betsie immediately prayed and asked God how, indeed, they could. 

God brought to Betsie’s mind the verse they had read earlier that day from First Thessalonians. It read: “Comfort the frightened, help the weak, be patient with everyone. See that none of you repays evil for evil, but always seek to do good to one another and to all. Rejoice always, pray constantly, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus.” (5:14b-18). And God prompted Betsie and Corrie to pray and thank Him in all circumstances. So they thanked God for the fleas. Little did they know or understand then, but the fleas actually were their saving grace. The fleas of Barracks 28 meant the guards did not venture back to their quarters (they were afraid of picking up the unwanted tagalongs). The guards left the women of Baracks 28 largely unguarded, and consequently free to lead the other women in Bible study and prayer and all manner of exchanges of comfort. Indeed, as God would have it, there was reason to be thankful for the fleas.

So whether you feel like you have much to be thankful for or can barely lift your heavy heart up to God, as we enter into this season of thankfulness, I want to encourage you to try this as you close or open your days–not just once but habitually. Speak aloud to someone else and to God your gratitude for the things you’ve been given. Or alternatively, write down (daily) your “thankful-fors” as my little guy calls them. The act of putting words to our gratitude helps us to focus on our abundance rather than our lack. As the psalmist says, “I will sing unto the Lord for he has dealt bountifully with me” (Psalm 13:6).

What if we faced the frenzy of the Christmas season, with a sense of plenty, from a position of fresh reminders of our bounty rather than our want? Maybe, just maybe we’d be freed up to do more worship and less wishlists.

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I wrote this devotional message for a recent baby-shower for a dear friend’s daughter-in-law. If you have an expectant mom you know or a mom in the early stages of her mothering journey, share this message with her to remind her that despite the hard stories people love to share, there is a lot more to motherhood. And if you aren’t anywhere near a stage like this, think here on how we shape our days and our lives, by the things we choose to remember, by the stories we tell others and ourselves.

The other day I was by myself–(as a mom of six–let me tell you being by myself is rare), but I happened to be by myself that day driving  from my home in northern Virginia, through Maryland and into West Virginia on my weekly grocery run through 3 states in search of low prices to feed my brood of boys. 

Anyhow, the sky had looked threatening when I left, but now all of a sudden, the downpour started. It was one of those fierce and torrential rains that grinds traffic to a near halt, where you must fix your eyes on the tail-lights in front of you or veer off the road. 

But while I’ve been in some torrential downpours before, this one was quite different for one unexpected reason. Although the sky had been incredibly dark and foreboding when I left, here in the midst of the downpour, it was inexpressibly bright as if the full power of the sunset and the pouring rain were working together to blind me with light and liquid off the windshield of my car. The combination was almost paralyzing, but also astonishingly beautiful. I inched along hands clenched to the wheel, blinking, knowing I was nearing the bridge where the Potomac and the Shenandoah join at Harper’s Ferry, and feeling my heart thumping at the thought of crossing that bridge in that bright and awful deluge.

And almost as if God had heard that fear, right as I reached the bridge the rain came to a quick taper and was done. And I was left with this intensely bright, clean vista of those gorgeous rivers and mountain ranges, as if they had just been brought through the waters of baptism, all glistening and joyful. 

The experience left me feeling astonished, grateful, and kind of perplexed that at that moment I literally had no one to share it with, no one there who had seen what I’d seen and could talk about it with me. It was a moment of glory that I glimpsed and it felt like it was just between me and God.

Most moments of awe we see in the Bible, happen in crowds or at least with a few others: the parting of the Red Sea, Manna from Heaven, the walls of Jericho collapsing, but a few happen with one person alone with God–Moses and the burning bush or in hidden in the cleft of the rock, or Elijah hearing God in the whisper.  There are moments where God reveals his Glory very personally, almost, privately.

For me, motherhood has been full of such moments of personal awe. They came in the midst of labor, God meeting with me in the pain and in the praise while laboring in the tub. They came in the middle of the night, watching the rise and fall of my baby’s chest and the dream-flutters of eyelids reminding me of the wonder of breath and life itself. And they came in holding a sweaty little three-year old boy who’d outgrown falling asleep in my arms and yet somehow, just did. These moments have been shooting star moments of God’s glory. They come sandwiched between the hard stuff of life, mastitis and meltdowns, poison ivy and sibling squabbles, but even though they come in between the hard things, they are nonetheless real.

Sometimes I wonder if Mary, the mother of God, did not also have these moments. Like two bookends around the only verses we have about Jesus’ childhood, we see the refrain that Mary treasured all these things in her heart (Luke 2:19 and 2:51). She was amazed at the shepherds coming, at the words of Anna and Simeon, at finding boy Jesus teaching at the temple, and evidently, she made a point to stop and treasure that amazement. We can surmise that we likely have these stories in our Bible because she stopped and treasured them and later related them to the Gospel-writers.

 I’m not sure what it is about human nature, but in my life, at least, I’ve noticed that we all tend to share the hard parts about life. When we were students, we swapped stories about how long some paper had taken us or how hard our class schedule was this year or “Can you believe who I have for homeroom” or who “I have to endure in fifth period.” As we get older the backdrop changes from blackboard to boardroom, but the conversations are similar. And then we reach parenthood, and we swap tales of sleep deprivation and colossal blowouts, meltdowns at the grocery and the vicissitudes of potty training. 

And while there is definitely a place for commiserating and sharing the hard stuff, sometimes I wonder if all the woe-is-me doesn’t reshape our brains a bit. The stories we tell are the stories we remember. The narratives we rehearse are the narrative we believe. And there is much more going on in the early years of motherhood than tales of exhaustion and blowouts would betray.

Maybe it’s because we don’t want to sound like we are bragging or look like a goody-two shoes, or maybe because it’s simply hard to verbalize moments of goodness, but I can barely remember ever hearing anyone tell me about the daily wonders of motherhood: the near weightlessness of that delicate soul placed in your arms at birth, yet whose weight of glory you can barely fathom, the softness of that newborn head nestled underneath your chin, the wonder of how tightly those tiny fingers curl around your own in the grasping reflex, a physiological reminder of how we all come out of the womb grasping for someone to hold onto, our hearts “restless” as Augustine would say until we find our rest in God.

I’ve been awake in the wee hours of the morning and witnessed the soft rise and fall of my baby’s breathing, seen the dreaming eyelids flicker. I’ve witnessed the sunrise of a first smile at 6 weeks. I’ve heard the coos of a 3-month-old, and the rhythmic thud of little pajamaed feet kicking on the playmat floor. I’ve felt the reverberation of raw joy in the giggles and squeals of delight of my 6-month-old, whose laughter was utterly infectious. I’ve seen the fierce determination of will in a rugged army crawl and the ecstasy of delight when those awkward legs and hips master a few hesitant first steps. I’ve felt the joy of the dance in exchanged peak-a-boos, facial expressions mirrored, or airplane on the living room floor. And I’ve witnessed a rebirth of my own wonder as a little cheek pressed against a cold glass watching first snowflakes fall or raindrops swallowing other raindrops on the windowpane. And I’ve treasured all these things in my heart.

I could sit here for days and catalog the wonders of motherhood. Perhaps some would roll their eyes or say I’m over-sentimentalizing. Sure, these moments come sandwiched between the hard things we love to talk about. But the deeper truth is something every mother knows if she is honest: life is a miracle and the very fact that we get to cradle it in our bodies, and our arms is an extraordinary wonder we never quite get over.

Jesus scolded his disciples when they tried to keep the children away. Don’t you know, he admonished, the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. In some mysterious way, children show us something of God, of his kingdom, of His ways.

In the weeks before my third son was born, my then 4 year old and two year old and I had been working on memorizing a verse: “Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of heavenly lights who does not change like shifting shadows,” James 1:17. We had a catchy tune with it, and we sang it again and again for weeks.  And so, when my husband and I came home from the hospital and shared that we’d named baby brother James, the boys wanted to know if his middle name was 1:17. I’ll forever attach his birth and that verse in my mind. But the truth is so simple and yet so profound. If we can remember that every wonder of motherhood is a gift from God, we will more naturally be inclined to stop and praise Him for each shooting star moment of his glory that we get the privilege to glimpse on this journey. We will thank him and praise him and bless his name for the privilege of it.

I think we all know intuitively that motherhood and parenthood will be hard. I hope you know just as deeply that God will be with you, in abundant strength and perfect grace in every moment of the hard. There is no sleepless night where he is not awake with you. But what I want to remind you of today, is that motherhood will also be full of thousands of shooting star moments of glory. I hope you will treasure these. I hope they will lead your heart to praise and thanksgiving. I hope you will find some way or someone to share them with, as a testament to the goodness of God, but also to shape the stories we tell ourselves, the stories we believe about the bounty of God overflowing in our everyday lives, and the stories we will tell them one day, about who they are, who God is, and how they were loved.

If you enjoyed this piece and someone you love is expecting a baby or in the early stages of motherhood, consider gifting them a copy of one or all of my three devotionals for moms: Waiting in Wonder: Growing in Faith While You’re Expecting, Watching in Wonder: Growing in Faith During Your Baby’s First Year, and Walking in Wonder: A Devotional Journal for Moms of Toddlers. Also if you have a baby shower coming up, and want to share a spiritual message, I’d be happy for you to read my words to a new mom you love. Enjoy!

        

Sunday was the first day of Advent and a low-grade excitement is bubbling just under my cool exterior. It’s that time of year when we prepare our hearts for Christ’s coming, remembering the first time He came as a tiny baby and looking ahead to the time when He will come again to set all things right. 

As a busy mom, this can be an exhausting time: there are gifts to buy, meals to plan, travel dates to coordinate and celebrations to squeeze into those tiny spaces on our calendars. And sometimes all of that can feel more like chores than cheer. 

And yet, despite the chaos and the consumerism, despite the misplaced expectations and the inevitable disappointments, I love this season. I love the excuse to turn our hearts again toward this story that is the seed of the Gospel. I love the excuse to do what I love to do with my children: weave Jesus and joy into the fabric of our home.

 And so I stay up late and wrap borrowed Christmas books, so we’ll have one to open each day: my cheap little cup of Christmas cheer. I tuck clever little Christmas bucket-list plans into the pockets of our advent calendar: memories made are sweeter than chocolate. And I lovingly prepare our devotional plans to tell afresh the story from creation to cradle.

Throughout December, we’ll gather round to read our Christmas devotional. There will be snuggling and twinkle lights, fights and make-rights, verses about hope and Christmas hymns, there will be longings that gnaw at us and games that distract us, people we miss and places where we feel always on the periphery. There will be cousins and cookies, grandparents and gingerbread houses, sometimes-awful attitudes and advent candles, Christmas choirs and nativity plays. And each day, with the ups and the inevitable downs, into the warp and the woof of all these ordinary days, I will mindfully be weaving.

 I will weave for them the threads that connect the heartache and hope of Eden to the miracle of the manger and the ache of Advent. I will weave into the sorrows of our year, the hope that holds us together: that one day sin and sorrow, death and decay, will be a distant memory because the resurrected Christ will come again to judge the living and the dead, and to establish a kingdom without end.

 I won’t weave this masterpiece perfectly. But I’ll lean into this season’s work, knowing it is worthy. Weaving joy and Jesus into the ordinary fabric of our days, criss-crossing again our sorrows and our failures with the threads of Christ’s coming and His perfections. I know my kids won’t remember many individual days in these blurry years. But I hope they will remember some indescribable feeling of warmth that wrapped them in love in this Advent home, woven in faith. 

Mamas, we are weavers. Can I just encourage you in this worthy work of weaving Jesus and joy into their hearts? Mindfully weave Gospel threads and love into their lives. Advent is the perfect season to start again if you’ve lost the thread. It’s a perfect time to rehearse the stories that lead to the advent of our Messiah. It’s the perfect time to talk about the longing we still have as we ache for the day when He will make all things right. 

        

Today is the big day! My book, Walking in Wonder: A Devotional Journal for Moms of Toddlers, published by Thomas Nelson publishers hits stores today! What a joy it is to see this series for moms completed and getting into the hands of the moms it was written to bless.

This book is a devotional and journal designed especially for moms of toddlers. It has:

short reflections on Scripture to direct busy moms deeper into the heart of God

weekly invitations to journal

monthly developmental guides to help you know what to look for as your toddler grows

Each month’s theme ties into Scriptural themes that parallel both your toddler’s growth and your own spiritual growth. This was such a joy for me to explore and I can’t wait for my readers to experience these themes right alongside their toddler’s growth.

This book is part of a trilogy of books that will come alongside moms in the early days of life:

Waiting in Wonder: Growing in Faith While You’re Expecting

Watching in Wonder: Growing in Faith During Your Baby’s First Year

Walking in Wonder: A Devotional Journal for Moms of Toddlers

I hope there will be exactly the right book to bless a new mom in your life.

To celebrate the release of the book, I have written a daily affirmation for parents. I intentionally kept this daily reminder really applicable to parents of all stages. I hope you can print it and frame it, putting it somewhere so that everyday you can be reminded that you were hand-picked by God to shepherd your particular miracle. I hope this print will bless and encourage you daily to look to God for strength and hope to live out your God-given calling as a parent.

And I hope you’ll share these books and this free downloadable print with all your friends to bless other moms and parents you know. From pregnancy announcements, to baby showers, to first birthday parties, these books make great gifts to share with someone you love. And this Daily Reminder printable is a great (free) gift for any parent. Subscribe to get yours.

Celebrate with me by sharing these beautiful resources with others!