Ragamuffins Wanted

This email came to me from the Mother's of Preschoolers group I attend, and it couldn't have hit home any closer.

Ragamuffins Wanted

By Tally Flint, Mom-E-Mail Coordinator

Do you ever look around at your life, and wonder what God was thinking when he gave it to you? I do. I love my large, boisterous family. But I so often feel inadequate to the task of mothering my brood. Just the other day, I lost my cool trying to contain my three-year-old twins at my seven-year-old’s school performance. I yanked their arms, hissed shushes into their ears and let out little sighs of disgust. On the way home, I not only felt exhausted from trying to keep them under control but also ashamed at how easily I slipped into the mean mama I so don’t want to be.

With all my faults and foibles, how did I possibly deserve the gift of raising four beautiful children? The answer: I didn’t. I don’t. My life is not a reward for my performance, but instead a grace-filled outpouring of God’s love for me.

"No life is too far gone
for God’s restoration."

One of my favorite books provides a passionate description of how God's message of grace and love was designed especially for the ragamuffins – the dusty, broken, screw-ups who shuffle along on the road to grace. At Easter, we celebrate God’s ultimate gift of grace: sending his son to redeem a hurt and fractured world. No life is too far gone for God’s restoration. In fact, it’s in the messiest of situations when God often does his best work.

I’m beginning to think God gave me the challenge of raising my children, in part, so that each stumble would land me in his loving embrace. Ragged little me, beautifully redeemed.

Dear God, thank you for loving me so much that you went as far as sending your son to save and restore me. Help me to never lose sight of your grace and how it redeems my life.