Faith - An Analogy

This book, Desperate, Hope for the Mom Who Needs to Breathe, has been in my bag for a week or so in anticipation of going to a Christian homeschooling mum conference just down the road from where I live this last weekend.  The conference was based on similar ones run in the US by Sally Clarkson, a co-author of the mentioned book.  In the end I couldn't go due to a tummy virus that just lingered and lingered and lingered.  I couldn't take it to a conference where travelling mums with babies would be.  Just wouldn't have been right!  So I missed it.  :-(

This morning I read a few chapters which led me to thinking about faith as I restarted the fire from its morning embers.  After 6 winters in this house and 1 winter in Tasmania I am better than I used to be at restarting a fire from small coals.  (I am from a tropical state so it hasn't been easy!) 

It takes some tightly scrunched paper, some small dry twigs and then small splits usually left over from the "men" splitting the logs laid just right so that air can flow, and they don't fall out the door.  I can restart the whole fire now without a match just by breathing on it.  Sometimes it takes a small puff, other times a sustained gentle breath until the larger pieces of timber catch into flame and stay lit.  But most days I can do it.

I thought to myself why do I do it the way I do?  I realised that over time I have gained confidence in myself and my skills and that I knew that even if my first attempt didn't work I knew how to gently adjust the twigs, the paper or how gently I blew until it could catch.  I also knew that I could restart again, and if the embers really weren't enough I do have matches.  But I like the challenge and I believe I can do it.  I have faith in myself.

Maybe I need to consider this as I contemplate homeschooling all my boys again.  Maybe I don't need to have it All Right right now.  I can be gentle, I can readjust the "twigs", I can blow gently or I can be firm but I can have faith that it will work out because I care, I love them and I do not want to let them down.  I am willing to learn, I know it takes time.  All I need to do is Do Something, Anything... as long as I care, and I do.

Best wishes
Jen