As countries one by one start encouraging their citizens to stay home or enforcing lockdowns, my social media feeds have filled up with ideas of activities to do with children stuck at home, advice on homeschooling, lists of resources for families, and messages of support to parents: You’ve got this! You can do it! Think of it as an opportunity to dig deep and invest in family relationships! Take the opportunity to get out the board games and get baking with the kids! Yes it’s all a bit scary and unknown but we’ll get through it!
Although the schools here in Turkey are closed, we home educate our eldest child anyway and the other two are too little for school, so we have been spared the sudden adjustment of having the children at home all of the time. And yet it hasn’t been until we’ve been cocooning ourselves away at home that I’ve realised how important the time is that we spend with friends and church family during the week. That time adds so much value and structure to our days and weeks in so many different ways. With the reality setting in that social distancing and self isolation is going to be our new normal for the coming weeks (at the very least), I’m grateful for the free resources and tips floating around on the Internet.
But I also realised that I cannot dare risk being taken in by the social media mantras that proclaim that I can do it, that I can wrest good out of this situation, that I can totally get through this strange period of time without losing my sanity.
Because the truth is, I can’t.
I’m weak. I lose my temper too easily. I struggle to summon up the right words to deal with yet another argument over the toys and who has taken whose piece of Lego. I don’t have the reserves of grace and patience to power through these weeks, one baking session and Playdough activity at a time. I don’t have the energy and goodwill I need when I’ve got two small children bouncing off the walls at the end of the day and a baby who likes being within touching distance of me at all times and dinner still to make and I haven’t spoken to an adult in real life other than my husband for days.
But when I realise that I am not enough, when I come to the end of myself, when my grand ideas of creating a clean, tidy, peaceful house while at the same time educating my children, looking after the baby, feeding everyone, keeping up with my Turkish, staying in contact with friends and family virtually, trying to keep up with the Coronavirus news but not be consumed by it, and loving my husband are all in shards at my feet, then Jesus can get to work.
His grace is sufficient for me. His grace will be sufficient for every day of quarantine. His grace will be sufficient when I think I just can’t do another day of this.
I have to give up on thinking I can do it all myself though. I have to put down my Pinterest list of ‘fun things to do with my children that are also subtly educating them’ and forget relying on crowdsourced tips and tricks for the ability to get through the day. I have to humbly admit that I am not enough.
And I can trust that Jesus’ strength is more than enough and just like my nine month old sees that I’m within a one metre radius of him and lunges out of the arms of the person carrying him and towards me, with the complete faith and expectation that I will be there for him, I can completely and utterly throw myself onto Jesus and rely on his power. For his power is made perfect in weakness.
