A Mother Who Knows Nothing

Most days, I am certain I am doing it wrong.  I picture my children, years from now, telling some therapist all of the ways that I messed up.  They will tell stories of peanut butter sandwiches for days without end because I didn’t have the energy for making anything more.  They will bemoan the fact that I repeatedly refused to allow flip flops to be worn to church for no other reason than it just felt wrong. I would surely be mortified if anyone counted how many times a day I hear myself saying, “Go play.” I know that I should, instead, really be telling them to “Come and sit.”  I do my best to pour into them, but am unsure how to do that when I myself feel so empty most days. And I should know more.  How many times do I answer their “why” with “I don’t know” and I feel so inadequate in this role of mother.  How do I explain the whys of cancer and divorce and friendships broken and a world that takes and never gives? This job of mothering is overwhelming and lonely. It’s 2:00 a.m. and I rock a babe who fights sleep and I pray for her and for the other tinies who sleep down the hall.  I pray and admit that I know nothing when it comes to this thing called motherhood and I hear Paul’s words.

For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. – 1 Corinthians 2:2

Could it be that, to know nothing, is the best way to go about it?  When I sit down across from those questioning eyes and their innocent “whys,” could it be that “I don’t know” is the best answer I could give. I know nothing about what makes people do the things they do, but I know Christ and Him crucified. I have no way of knowing what tomorrow will hold, but I know Christ and Him crucified. There will come a day, very soon, when my babes will have boo-boos that Barbie band-aids cannot fix. They will discover that the mother they think can do anything cannot do much at all in the way of healing broken hearts or making good-byes easy or making dreams come true. And, yet, I am oddly at peace with that.  I don’t want to have all of the answers.  I, like Paul, make a conscious decision to know nothing. And, maybe, Paul had the key to successful parenting.  I must be a mother who decides to know nothing except Christ and Him crucified.