lessons from lullabies

We’ve been fortunate to have such an easy-going child that we rarely hear him cry. Maybe once a week he’d squawk briefly about something, but that was about it. We’re just not accustomed to him being upset ver yoften.

Well, after hitting the ripe old age of 6 months, Riley’s begun to express his discontentment with various situations that he finds himself in. Yes, we have a willful, self-centered child (hmmm, must take after his mom!) who’s beginning to express his objections to choices that we make for him. He cries at meals, in the Bumbo, in the car, in his crib…on a daily basis. I know what you're thinking -- how normal!

This afternoon, I needed to run a couple of errands after picking him up from daycare, so he hollered in the car seat from Reading to the North Shore Mall. He was perfectly content to be in the stroller (lots to look at!) and as soon as I put him back in the car he started wailing again until we got out at Target. When we left Target, he started up again. I remembered that I had my iPod which had all the Indelible Grace albums on it. (For those who are not familiar with Indelible Grace, this is a series of cds of old hymns put to new music by a group of musicians in Nashville.)

Anyway, I was flipping through the songs and found “The Love of Christ is Rich and Free” which is a William Gadsby hymn that I’ve been singing to Riley since he was a newborn in the NICU at Children’s Hospital. It’s become one of my favorite hymns as it reminds me of the eternal, persistent, unchanging love of God for those who are His, regardless of their performance:

His loving heart engaged to be

Their everlasting Surety;

’Twas love that took their cause in hand,

And love maintains it to the end.

He loves through every changing scene…

Not all the wanderings of her heart

can make His love for her depart.

Love cannot from its post withdraw;

Nor death, nor hell, nor sin, nor law,

Can turn the Surety’s heart away;

He’ll love His own to endless day.

Riley hadn’t heard the “original” version of the song, so I put it on to see if he’d calm down a bit. As soon as Derek Webb began singing, Riley went from a wail to totally quiet. It was as if he recognized this song from when I sang it to him as a lullaby. I thought of John the Baptist, leaping in his mother’s womb when the Messiah drew near. It’s not impossible for me to believe that my infant son is already beginning to be affected by the gospel – something he cannot understand cognitively and yet can respond to by quieting himself, listening and accepting what he’s given.

It’s our deepest hope that Riley will know that he is eternally loved by the God that created the heavens and the earth and made a way in which sinners can be adopted into His family. Riley’s understanding of the love of Christ will be shaped by how Jonathan and I love him and that puts us on our knees begging for wisdom and grace to make the right choices in our parenting. At times we will need to say no to the thing that Riley wants because we want to give him something infinitely better. I hope that our son will begin to understand what it is to walk by faith when we ask him to obey even when he doesn’t understand why and that I will more readily accept my Father’s will even when I don’t understand. Lessons to be learned by all. God have mercy.

Shelby