Upon my death, I bequeath to the highest bidder at my estate auction my most phenomenal, amazing pair of rose-colored glasses. These rose-colored glasses have been with me all of my life and they have successfully helped me to see situations more positively than they really were.
Most of you probably know that I relocated to Austin seven months ago with aging parents being the primary motivator behind this decision. The pressing need that caused me to seriously pray about being in Austin over the last three years was my father who is an amputee, and who was facing assisted living last year. God’s hand was definitely in the timing of this move, and I am so thankful that the good Lord worked out all of the details in His typical, marvelous fashion. But I will tell you that when I made this move, I was wearing my special rose-colored glasses.
With the help of my rose-colored glasses, I was able to visualize being the daughter my father needs me to be by being available and accessible whenever he needs my help. Often the help he needs is as basic as doing grocery shopping for him since he doesn’t drive as an amputee. Since he has problems with chronic venous stasis ulcers on his “good leg”, he has faced multiple hospital admissions since I have been in Austin due to infections that develop. These hospital stays are prolonged as it takes a week just to overcome the infection, and then he faces two weeks just to rehab to make sure he is mobile enough to function safely in his own apartment before they discharge him. The primary point of moving here at this chapter of my life was to be helpful in his time of need and to really have a servant’s heart to assist him whenever possible.
Unfortunately, this adjustment has been overwhelming to me. My Dad’s needs are real and often, and as soon as I took off my rose-colored glasses, what I saw very clearly is that I am a fiercely independent person who has not experienced “being needed” by another person on such a regular basis. This move has sadly accentuated how self-focused I really am. Many requests “inconvenience” me. That’s pretty shallow, I know. Some of these requests aren’t even “inconveniences”; he just wants me to come over and see him and spend time with him, and I will resist at times by finding excuses as to why it doesn’t always fit my schedule. I find myself entertaining the hypothesis that if I had ever married and had kids, I would have learned sacrifice in relationships and learned what it means to “be needed” by a child, and a servant’s heart would have been cultivated much earlier than now. Frankly, I overrated my spiritual maturity in the area of serving others. I am apparently attached to daily routines without major “interruptions”. It’s just my tendency of making tasks more important than people.
My Dad is one of the most gracious persons you will meet. If you had stopped by his hospital room today, as I did, you would have heard him gush about how thankful he is to have me as his daughter and how helpful I am to him, and how he can count on me to pray for him, and how proud he is of me. He will tell this to nurses in my presence, or staff at his assisted living facility, or anyone who will listen. (As he sings my undeserved praise to others, I am thinking, “Those rose-colored glasses look really good on you, Dad. They are working really well at the moment!”) He is being very kind, even after having processed my struggles with him and sharing with him my own disappointment in myself. I believe he is being way too generous in his assessment of me.
The hope I have as I work through this situation is that Christ is not done transforming me into the woman of God He desires me to be in Christ Jesus. Phil 1:6 says, “Being confident of this, that He who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.” I am praying that He will give me a servant’s heart to serve my Dad and to keep in perspective that in the scheme of eternity, there is no task I am doing that is truly more important than helping my Father out when he needs me. I am learning boundaries as to what kind of help I can provide, and I am learning to scale back expectations of myself and give myself room to spiritually grow, and I am learning how to pace my daily routine so that requests don’t have to be such an “inconvenience”. I certainly haven’t arrived, but I am getting there slowly, but surely.
I will still wear my rose-colored glasses. There are days that I just don’t want to deal with reality, and wearing these glasses help soften the real picture when reality is harsh to look at. On other days these glasses are quite helpful because I can see the best in a person when they are not always at their best, or see challenging situations that are daunting and embrace them because “it doesn’t look so bad”. Just as my Dad sees the best in me, I know God always sees the best in me, even when I can’t see it or visualize the end result that He already knows I will someday achieve with His help. The difference is God doesn’t need a pair of rose-colored glasses. He sees the beauty in me and what I am becoming in Him without the help of glasses. That alone gives me hope.
Be sure to bring your checkbooks and arrive early as my rose-colored glasses will be the hottest item to bid on and the first to go.
Blessings,
Lee Ann