Thisafternoon I was telling God in tears how tired I was of some of Lydia's behaviour. Sometimes it seems everything turns into a fight and a training session. If I take her for a walk, it's a battle to get her to hold my hand. If she rides her trike, she has started to drag her feet along the ground instead of pedaling. If she goes outside, she takes her jersey off. The most wearying one is the way she constantly calls me! I can spend a lot of time on these things and it seems to make no difference.
But this verse came to my mind which encouraged me.
"Let us not be weary in well doing: for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not." Gal 6:9
What a helpful reminder that was! I straight away wrote it down on my list for the day. Perseverance, patience and consistency does pay off but only if we don't give up!
Then when I was cooking dinner, I was trying a new recipe--a Chicken Pie. On the bottom of the recipe was this quote...
The highest reward for a person's toil is not what they get for it, but what they become by it.
Another encouraging thought! Motherhood and any honest work brings it's own reward, but there are many times it seems that there is more work than reward. In those moments of having to do that same thing yet again and our patience wears thin, it doesn't seem like there is much reward. There is if we keep at it, but this quote encouraged me by giving me a different perspective. One of my rewards for all my time and patience spent on Lydia is what I am learning and becoming through it!
Later on when Joseph came into the kitchen to set the table, he noticed my verse written out on my list. "Hey mum," and he quickly grabbed a little devotional out of his room. "Look! I read this verse in here this morning." I had a look and it was a story about two missionaries in Papua New Guinea. It described the five days journey through soggy marshes, over rocky cliffs and through freezing rain just to get to the tribe. Then they had a lot of hard work to make an airstrip and a hut etc. It went on to say...
"Does all that sound exhausting? Sometimes the work of God can be very hard. But they wanted to give these people the good news of the God who loved them and sent His Son to die for them. The hard work was worth it."
Whatever your situation and whatever the good work is that you are doing, I'm sure you can relate. Everyone has a job to do, a patience that gets sorely tested and a body that gets weary! I hope these thoughts are as encouraging to you as they were to me today.
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