Baby Steps...(or Shrek Layers)

If you have seen the movie Shrek, (the first one)...remember when Shrek was trying to explain the complexities and layers of an ogre to Donkey?  Shrek used the example of the layers of an onion (while Donkey tried to persuade him to change his analogy to a layered parfait).

I was  reflecting and grateful today, how God reveals in layers, and leads us with baby steps. (And what a great model for us to imitate.)

When I am prone to drop to the floor, hands flung in overwhelmed discouragement, it is most often because I am thinking (wanting) to move from A to Z in one step..with out b,c,d,e,f,g,...etc in between.

I am so grateful the pattern God has set in place is not A {ZOOM} B.  Precept upon precept, bit by bit, from glory to glory, enough lamplight for the next step.

In the past 9 months, I have seen this over and over again.  In becoming a better steward of my finances, in home management, in sorting out the chaotic tangle of sibling relationships, in my spiritual walk, on learning and setting boundaries, on becoming a parent through adoption.

All of this has been (and still is) a gradual learning, stepping, progressing.   Sometimes it seems, in the middle of this layer, in the raising of the foot for this step, that nothing is changing, all is stunted, static, stuck.  With the lens of time, I reflect back and see...wow!  This is different now...we are no longer like then...

It happens over and over.  and yet, when the light shines in a yet to be uncluttered corner of my life, my emotions first react with..OH NO! MY GOODNESS!  What now??!!  I have to fix this in the next 3 minutes or else!   lol...  And just today, I am reminded.   Layer one...baby step one.   Take that first baby step.

And all those babysteps lead to something...something big, and good, and right and joyful.

Today I am grateful...

• closing my eyes and praying to see the gift in the middle of kid squabbles
• children owning their own laundry
• home baked cookies in little gift bags for us...surprise
• organic milk (babystep)
• Saturday routines different from the weekday routine
• watching a funny movie with a friend
• floppy teddy's stare from my pillow
• a pregnant kitty (yea, really, weird, huh? remind me of that one..later, when I have kitty babies to tend)
• plans for the girls room
• having finished my work presentation for Monday on Sat am..rather than very late Sunday pm. :)
• smiling girl with a little curl
• shiny earring joy