On A Serious Note...

To the choirmaster. A Psalm of David.

O Lord, you have searched me and known me!
² You know when I sit down and when I rise up;
    you discern my thoughts from afar.
³ You search out my path and my lying down
    and are acquainted with all my ways.
⁴ Even before a word is on my tongue,
    behold, O Lord, you know it altogether.
⁵ You hem me in, behind and before,
    and lay your hand upon me.
⁶ Such knowledge is too wonderful for me;
    it is high; I cannot attain it.

⁷ Where shall I go from your Spirit?
    Or where shall I flee from your presence?
⁸ If I ascend to heaven, you are there!
     If I make my bed in Sheol, you are there!
⁹ If I take the wings of the morning
    and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea,
¹⁰ even there your hand shall lead me,
    and your right hand shall hold me.
¹¹ If I say, “Surely the darkness shall cover me,
    and the light about me be night,”
¹² even the darkness is not dark to you;
    the night is bright as the day,
    for darkness is as light with you.

¹³ For you formed my inward parts;
    you knitted me together in my mother's womb.
¹⁴ I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.
Wonderful are your works;
    my soul knows it very well.
¹⁵ My frame was not hidden from you,
when I was being made in secret,
    intricately woven in the depths of the earth.
¹⁶ Your eyes saw my unformed substance;
in your book were written, every one of them,
    the days that were formed for me,
    when as yet there was none of them.

¹⁷ How precious to me are your thoughts, O God!
    How vast is the sum of them!
¹⁸ If I would count them, they are more than the sand.
    I awake, and I am still with you.

¹⁹ Oh that you would slay the wicked, O God!
    O men of blood, depart from me!
²⁰ They speak against you with malicious intent;
    your enemies take your name in vain.
²¹ Do I not hate those who hate you, O Lord?
    And do I not loathe those who rise up against you?
²² I hate them with complete hatred;
    I count them my enemies.

²³ Search me, O God, and know my heart!
     Try me and know my thoughts!
²⁴ And see if there be any grievous way in me,

and lead me in the way everlasting!

It's been 6 months since I started this job and I thought it about time I reflected on the task so far. As I watch Mu, now 6 months old, I can't help but marvel at what she's achieved. In the time I've known her she has learnt the following...

1. To see things
2. To sit up
3. To grasp objects
4. To eat food
5. To laugh
6. To smile
7. To chat
8. To sleep through the night
9. To kick her legs
10. To roll over
11. To turn her head
12. To hold her head up
13. To twist her body
14. To choose her preference
15. To communicate when she has had enough of something
16. To recognise people
17. To be tactile
18. To blow raspberries
19. To know when she has made someone laugh
20. To understand facial expressions

This list comprises a small part of the differences in her between when she first arrived home and now, some of these aren't learnt by fully grown adults and she has mastered them in just 26 weeks...while I could go on to extoll the genius of her as an individual (Mam is convinced that she is an actual genius), it has brought me back to the Psalm above countless times over the last few months.

This was the first glimpse of her (left). Then we didn't know her name, what she looked like, even if she was a boy or a girl, and yet Mam talked endlessly about this person whom she had never met and whom she was instantly in love with. I watched as she studied the picture like she would be tested on it marvelling at how clear it was even though to the outside world it wasn't even obvious she was pregnant.

And yet, as I think of all we didn't know about her, it astounds me that God did know her. More than that was "...knitt[ing her] together"He knew her eye colour, her hair colour, her smile, her name.

And now I look at her just 6 months on, thinking how much she has changed from that small, wrinkled ball of hunger to this huge(!) giggly young lady with excellent deportment and wonder what the next few months and years hold for her. Who will she become, what will her voice sound like, what will make her laugh, what job will she do, who will she marry, and as I ponder these things, I am reminded again of this Psalm...

"Your eyes saw my unformed substance;
in your book were written, every one of them,
    the days that were formed for me,
    when as yet there was none of them."

As her mother becomes more neurotic, and her father becomes more of an emotional wreak, wondering and fearing for her over the coming years, it is comforting to know that it is not all in their hands, and it never has been. Mu is on loan, gifted to them, inadequate as they are and ever increasingly will be. But perhaps given to them to help them understand something of how God feels about them as a Father, and something of his sovereign grace and power over all.

Which leaves me thinking of the words spoken of another mother...

"But Mary treasured up all these things, pondering them in her heart." Luke 2:19.