Flashback 7 years ago:
We were traveling down our usual route this week on 488 when my youngest child, Blaise, did something she is notorious for.
I have coined a new word in her honor. I now call her mixed up sayings a “Blaiseism.” Her previous “Blaiseisms” include her exclaiming with her hands on her hips that something annoying to her was her “Pet Pee.” She also informed us all at the dinner table recently that her grandfather was going to get “Coca-Cola” cancer if he was not careful.
She had heard us say colon cancer I guess and in her defense, “pet pee” is really close to pet peeve.
The crème de la crème of “Blaiseisms” was a remark she made about Mr. Casey’s pastureland on 488 a few days ago. There were several cattle grazing in the pasture that she noticed as we drove by. Then, when we passed the Lake Chapel cemetery that is seemingly right smack dab in the middle of his pasture, she said “Y’all, Mr. Casey sure does have a nice cemetery for his cows.”
I shot her a puzzled look in the rearview mirror. She proceeded to repeat herself and say how nice the resting place was for the cows.
Now, Blaise has been around cemeteries, attended funerals, and knows that when you have invited Jesus into your heart, the local cemetery is just a place for your physical body.
She has never been told that cows have a cemetery. Even with that knowledge, she still just let the words roll right off of her tongue proudly.
Although I am not always sure about what comes out of my youngest child’s mouth, I am sure of one thing. Blaise knows she is loved and she is comfortable with herself. (She is now nearly fifteen.)
We can all stand to take a lesson in that area from her. How often do we doubt ourselves, question who we really are, or wear labels put on us by others that are not true?
I try to remember daily on the way to school when we pass the high school marquee to start a series sentences with my crew.
We say together:
I am loved.
I am chosen.
I am a Child of God.
The Lord has plans for my life.
I adopted the concept of repeating a few simple phrases daily from the movie ‘The Help’ and made up my own. In the movie, Abileen, the caretaker, had the little girl, Mae Mobley say the following lines:
You is kind.
You is smart.
You is important.
Even though their relationship was severed in the film, I knew when I sat in the theater eating my popcorn and crying my eyes out that those words would never leave Mae Mobley. They would stick forever.
In this increasingly confusing world that we live in, we have to know who we are. We cannot doubt that we are loved by Jesus Christ, no matter who we are or what we have done.
A relationship with Him is one that will never be severed once it has been established.
I love the passage in 1 John 3:1 that proclaims a truth about who we are. It says “How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are!”
Present tense: My second kiddo is graduating this year. His announcement has only one thing in common with his big sister’s. It is our morning saying from years ago. I pray it sticks with him when he leaves home.
I am loved.
I am chosen.
I am a Child of God.
The Lord has plans for my life.