He Stoops to Meet Us There

Even six years ago, my days were not much different…

I am folding the wash, a heap of humanity in undies, bottoms, tee shirts, onesies, and socks endlessly reproducing its own kind but never its twin. I am still wearing the backpack dangling from my waist, partly because I am indifferent but also the snug belt around my hips is somewhat reassuring that a waist still exists below my perpetually postpartum belly.

Baby, toying with a flick of a fever–here it is, there it goes–vacillates between staying on the floor, staggering unsteadily around the coffee table with a whimsical and wet wooden toy clutched in hand, or riding upon and melting into my back, his thumb in his mouth and head upon my scapula. Right now, he is holding himself up at the sofa, bouncing at his knees, carrying a large knobby puzzle piece with his mouth and, with the other hand, swiping clean pajamas, leggings, and sweaters off the table. He giggles when I say, “Hey there, Mister…I’m folding those!”

It’s another Sunday home away from the church meeting and sermon. Instead of singing hymns with the body of Christ, I am humming hymns as I tuck another tiny tee into the laundry basket. The washer is humming too, spraying water onto a mess of whites as its cycle nears the end. It’s peculiarly quiet in the house without nine other people in it, and in the near silence you can’t miss the chirrups of chickadees right outside the window. Or the filtered light flickering on the opposite wall. Or the scent of baked oatmeal, cooling and crusting on the countertop, left in the rush to leave.

I consider my mission in life: to be a good wife, homemaker and mother. And, as I wad up small footed pajamas into a rectangle (how do you fold those, anyhow?), I ponder how I will ever know if I’m doing a “good” job? Is this a good work? Sort, fold, sort, fold, sort, fold. It seems lowly. And lonely.

Baby is at my knees, his little wet hands patting my shin. He looks up at me with his large brown eyes and I wonder how I look to him, this woman and the comfort of her neck a mile away and helplessly out of reach without her attention and stooping down to gather him up. Sometimes I am tired of stooping, and want to distract him with a shiny toy so I can get my work done. But I know that where his attention goes, there will his appetite grow, so I allow him his babyhood and slip him onto my back once again, where he rests his heavy head.

The basket of laundry fills in tidy order, and it seems to me a satisfying end even as I know the tide will come in again for another dump of clothes with washcloths, dish towels and yes, more stray socks onto the sofa. Perhaps a “good” job, a success if you will, lies in that satisfaction, the happy contribution to a tidy home, the gratitude that baby is, blessedly, consoled by the sound and scent and snuggle of a mother willing–no, eager–to do the stooping down.

As I climb the stairs to put baby to bed, I consider the sermon the Lord preached to me in the quiet of my own thoughts and home: to persevere. Because the kingdom of God attends us even in the daily hard work of making the mundane our altar of holiness and gratitude, and He, even He, stoops to meet us there.

1 Corinthians 15:58   Therefore, my beloved brethren, be ye stedfast, unmoveable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord.

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