My daughter just turned seven and I am already seeing the emergence of an older child within her. The independent girl is slowly coming to the surface. I have to admit, even though I miss my little baby, it is a little bit of a breath of fresh air to have her roll up her sleeves. We straighten her hair for her birthday party and of course, rain! I mean like all day, not going to stop rain. It did this for about three days straight after her party. Ladies, you know what that means. Bye-bye straight hair. In order to be back to cute, I now had to redo the masterpiece created by the stylist. After sitting down and studying the hairstyle, I decided not to. Back to cute, little girl twist.
After about 10 minutes into doing her hair, Niomi asked if she could help me twist her strands. I wasn’t going to stop her. She grabbed a mirror to place in front of her and began twisting away. I am little OCD when it comes to hair. Niomi’s twists were fuzzy, bumpy, and could use a little help. Internally, I became a little frustrated as I stared at her twists because I was just going to have to do them all over again. I then heard a little voice on the inside whisper, “They are perfect.”
“What? They are horrible,” I thought. Then it came to me. Her twists were perfect because her heart was in the right place. She wanted to help me do her hair. She wanted to take the load off of me and help me take care of her. I would be the cruel mother who indirectly told her child her efforts wasn’t good enough if I fixed her twists.
My Daddy reminded me in that moment that is all He is asking for from us. He is not looking for perfect, flawless lives. For that is impossible. Only He is perfect. He is looking for willing hearts. Hearts that want His will more than anything else in this world. Hearts that toss their own plans away for His plans instead. Hearts that say “yes” even though what He has tasked us with is outside of our own capacity, abilities, and strength.
I challenge you and myself, to forget about being perfect, but to instead be willing vessels that the Lord can use for His glory and His heavenly purpose. We just need to provide Him our lives, and He will do the rest!
2 Corinthians 8:12 – For if the willingness is there, the gift is acceptable according to what one has, not according to what one does not have.
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