Heather vs. Holiness

At this stage of my life -- 4 rambunctious children under the age of 9, our small "bungalow," the joys of making a life on one income (by choice so don't feel too bad for me) -- it's hard to get some quality alone time.

Actually, I should qualify that....quality alone time in my house. Women's retreats....great alone time. Flight to Branson without the family...alone time galore.

But there's something about being the momma of the house that makes it virtually impossible to disappear to do something (read, blog, go to the bathroom) without somebody coming to look for me. I know I'm not the only one who literally has to lock the door to keep little people from constantly coming in and interrupting.

So, instead, I get to hear constant manuevering of the door handle and pounding against the hollow door and repeated, "Mom! Mom? Moooommmmm....are you in there?" As if I popped out my bedroom window screen and snuck out to the backyard to hide out (okay...so I've thought about it).

So now you get the picture of what I am dealing with...and if you are a mom too, then you have your own picture and certainly don't need to look at mine.

Flashback to yesterday....

As with most days, a good portion of the afternoon was eaten up by homework time (which everyone loathes, with me at the front of the line) and repeated distractions of food, bathroom needs (or not...I question some of those "urges"), and what the younger brothers are up to....again, you get the picture.

On top of it all, I knew that rehearsal for my church's worship team was that night at 6 p.m. and I needed to get dinner started and finished a bit earlier than usual. Added to that was my husband's fervent desire that he go to the "Guys' Movie Night" that had been on the schedule for weeks but for which he had neglected to secure a sitter -- full-well knowing that I had rehearsal that night of the week...just like I always do...ahem.

I digress....

Family members were unable to babysit, and so at the last minute, I called in our "nanny" to save the day (I just like to call her that....she's really our preferred sitter, but that sounds more glamorous).

After figuring out that I would need to leave the house at 5:40 with all four kids fed and dressed in their pajamas to pick her up and take her with me to the church to watch the children there, and being informed that my husband would be leaving at 5:30 p.m., I started getting a little crazy.

Dinner became "Leftover Night" -- a.ka. "wow...look guys you can have ANYTHING you want...as long as it's strogonoff, spaghetti, lemon chicken or bacon!" As the clock ticked closer to 5:30, I realized I hadn't learned the song that I was supposed to lead that evening in preparation for this coming Sunday. Granted, I only received it 24 hours before, but that didn't mean I wanted to fumble around on the mic in front of the entire band.

So, I told my husband I needed a few moments alone, grabbed my iPhone and earbuds and ran back to our bedroom to learn/practice in peace.

Yeah, right!

As I tried desperately to listen to Kari Jobe bust out a beautiful performance to Gateway Worship's, O The Blood, and learn the words and phrasing, I had just started to sing along as child after child busted in to ask me a question, or ask me to help them to do something...you get the idea.

Which led to a sad comedic episode that went something like this:

Me: (Singing the chorus) "O the Blood of Jesus washes me...."

Child #1: "Moooommm! Hadley is kicking me...make her stop!"

Me: (Gesturing to her and making a shoo-ing motion out the door) "O the Blood of Jesus shed for me..."

Child #1: "Well, are you going to doooo something?"

Me: (Making "mean mom eyes" at her, while drawing my finger across my neck) "What a sacrifice, that saved. my....

Child #2: "Mom...she's lying! My leg just kicked out on accident!

Me: "It's the blood....

(Child #2 kicks Child #1 for good measure when she thought I wasn't watching)

Me: (Screeching) "Get Out! Get out, GET OUT! I need five minutes here.... (and then coming in on)...."my victorrrryyy."

Me: (Attempting the last verse with the soaring vocals at the end) "O what love, no greater love..."

Child #3: (Walks in with a Gogurt in hand and shoves it in my face) " Want Some!" (he's 2 years old)

Me: "...grace, how can it be" (to child #3)....."go take it to Daddy!"

Me: "Yet in my sin....yes, even then...."

Child #3 (Shoving the Gogurt in face again) "SOME!"

Me: (Primal scream out to my husband for help!)

Child #4: "Mom...where's Daddy?"

Me: (Realizing he's gone, gone gone without letting me know) "Arrrrghhh! Forget it!"

O the blood is right. Don't think I didn't catch the irony of singing about being "in my sin" as I was threatening, shoving, passing off my children.

It's crazy; it's hilarious; it's my life.

But my underlying point is that sometimes holiness is hard. I really did want to enter in and worship to that amazing song. The reality of what Christ did for me on that cross stuns me; it humbles me. I wanted to cry....for about 30 seconds...and then I wanted to cry because I was not allowed to do so!

In my desperate attempt for "a moment with God," I ended up becoming a fire-breathing, evil-intented, insane woman who was about as far from holy as you'd want to be.

That's the juxtiposition that most of us live with each day. As the band, Stellar Kart epically sings, "we were meant to be part of something Holy." I absoutely believe that. However, the world in which we live is most often anything but. We don't get to live in a convent surrounded by penitents who pray and worship all day. We rub shoulders with sinners. We *are* those sinners.

It's that tragic struggle that keeps us coming back to Jesus. Because without Him, we're just raving lunatics throwing socks and underwear from the laundry basket at our children so they will get the idea that they need to vacate the room.

I probably should have just given it up in that first 30 seconds. Holiness would have said, "this isn't going to work. I should have done this earlier. The worship leader will just have to understand. I'd better go mediate the kung-fu kick battle (even thought it was the 5th of the day) and feed my little guy his tube of yogurt."
But Heather didn't want to do that.

I had some repenting to do in the van en route to pick up the sitter -- some apologizing to do as well.

In the end, it all worked out. With that 15 minutes of drive time and the 20 extra minutes we had once I realized that I rushed to rehearsal 30 minutes too early (it's always been 6:30...getting there so early and in a crazed mood just shows how frazzled I was), we all had plenty of time to sing along with Kari.

Thankfully, the last thing I got to hear before we all exited the van was the beautiful true refrain,

"It's the blood....it is my victory."