We’ve reached the crawling phase. Well, at least Kirsten has. And it’s more of a backwards scoot. She inches herself up off the ground and propels herself backwards. It’s darling to watch, but more often then not, she grunts and hollers in frustration as she scoots. Everything in my momma heart wants to pick her up, set her upright and help her get to where she wants to go. But I know she has to learn somehow, so I let her grunt and scoot and wail with irritation. The toy she wants is just out of reach. Oh how I want to reach over and hand it to her, it would be so easy for me! But she gets a determined look on her face and she pushes, moving her little legs and whining in the process. I cheer her on, “Good job Honey Bear! You almost have it!” She hollers back at me, mad that I am making her do this herself. She has to learn this herself, this is good for her. Even if it’s hard to watch.

It makes me wonder if this is what it’s like for God. He sees us trying to do something new, learn something, grow. And goodness, it’s so frustrating right? We keep trying over and over again and we just feel stuck. It hurts! Our dreams feel so close, yet so far away. We see a relationship we want so badly, yet it’s just not happening. We want a baby in our arms, yet a positive pregnancy test seems so far away. We want our business to grow overnight, yet it’s taking way longer than we hoped. GOD! YOU COULD DO THIS FOR US! Just hand me what I want and need, please!

And for some reason, He doesn’t always do that. And as I fall into my parenting role more and more each day, I am starting to understand why. There’s a reason growing is hard. It stretches us past what we are comfortable with. What we understand, what we know. We have to learn somehow and pushing ourselves past our comfort zone seems to be one of the only ways we grow.

I don’t know why sometimes the learning and growing stage takes forever. I don’t know why sometimes we think we reached our toy, only to find we actually ran into a wall and have to start over. I wish I understand why God allows things to happen, or pushes us to grow as hard as He does sometimes. But I am sensing more than ever, that if we quiet our hearts, we will hear Him cheering for us as we push forward.

You’ve got this! Keep up the good work! You’re almost there! Strengthen those muscles! Try again! I am right here with you!

And before we know it, we will grow. And then we will be faced with another opportunity to learn something new, stretch ourselves in new ways. Take some new first steps. It’s a constant pattern. But our parent, our Father, is always with us. Even when we grunt and scream in frustration. Which is more often than not, am I right?

“When you’re in over your head, I’ll be there with you. When you’re in rough waters, you will not go down. When you’re between a rock and a hard place, it won’t be a dead end—Because I am God, your personal God,  The Holy of Israel, your Savior.” (Isaiah 43:2 MSG)