I'll Miss It

 My wife and I haven't done anything medical to make this a sure thing, but we believe we're done having children.  I was 30 when we welcomed our first child and I would be 40 if we had a baby now.  

This is stereotypically something moms talk about, but it's sad thinking of this stage of life likely being done.  It's weird to think that my time fathering little kids is slipping away.

I'll miss so much.

I'll miss seeing my beautiful wife's body change as a brand new person grows inside of her.  I'll miss the first time I feel my child kick my hand pressed against her belly.  

I'll miss them sleeping on my chest as I sleep.  

I will never again rock them until they're asleep and keep rocking them just because I'm not ready to leave them.  

I'll miss kissing them on their foreheads and saying, "I love you.  Jesus loves you.  Close your eyes. Go to sleep."

I'll miss storybooks with pictures that they just have to tell me an observation about one of the pictures before I can turn the page.

I'll miss playing Pycho-Jaws and the doo-doo-doo-doo-doo-doo-doot game as they giggle.

My eldest son Joshua is eight going on nine and he has trail blazed our parenting into an awesome new world of camp, chapter books, deep discussions and more grown-up moments.  I have loved all the new things he's done and Anna just behind him.  I really, really, really enjoy where we are currently and I look forward to the many amazing thing each age will bring with each kid, but I know I'm going to miss the era we've left and are leaving.

It's weird to know that much of what I miss will need to wait until I enjoy it with my grandchildren or until we re-enter the world of foster care.

What's the point of this?  The point is this: Do I/we spend time dwelling on the blessing that is God's gift of children?

"Behold, children are a heritage from the LORD,
the fruit of the womb a reward." Psalm 127:3

Some of you are long beyond the stage I'm beginning to miss.  Some of you are in the thick of it and need reminding that it will be missed in the day-to-day weariness.  Some of you long for this stage but singleness or infertility or miscarriage has robbed you of the joy you seek.  I feel for you.  

Yesterday was officially Celebration of Life Day.  A day to remember the gift of life and new life and young life and old life.  Well, I missed that arbitrary day, but I hope you take time to celebrate life and smile when you think about the stage of life God has called you to live and perhaps to raise today.

4 Themes After Soaking in the Psalms

 In 2025 my New Year's Resolution was to read a psalm every day and write in my journal about it.  I read the entire book of 150 psalms twice and ended on Psalm 65 my third time through.  During this year I got some great personal devotional time in Psalms and I also got to share what I learned through texts to friends, talking with my small group, preaching on Psalm 46 and praying the text by myself.  I will say without reservation that my favorite way to experience Psalms in 2025 was reading and studying them with my eldest son (explaining has always made me slow down and think so much more clearly).

In past years I have resolved to read more books and to stay in the Gospels for a whole year.  I thoroughly enjoyed both but there is a distinct blessing to soaking in one particular genre or book of the Bible for an entire year.

In 2025 soaking in Psalms a few themes stuck out that come to my mind now.  These themes are by no means exhaustive... 365 days bathing in 150 songs can't be boiled down into one short post here.  However, I do want to share a few themes that have engrained themselves into my mind and hopefully my soul and character.

1) Pour Out Your Heart to God

This theme can't be missed while reading Psalms.  Many of us are strangely polite in our prayers.  Not the psalmists.  Whether it's David, the sons of Korah or an unnamed author the words of the songs are shockingly honest.  

Pour out your heart to God.  It's not disrespectful or sacrilegious.  Pouring out your heart honestly is encouraged and at times demanded.  I hope my 2025 in Psalms will vastly improve my prayer life and therefore my intimacy with my God.

2) Only the Humble will be Saved

If you read all 150 psalms and come away thinking that God is okay with your pride then you might be illiterate.  Humility isn't a nice attribute for the most holy of people to weave into their character.  No, humility is necessary for our salvation.  God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble (James 4:6).  Psalm 138:6 tells us that God knows the haughty from afar.  Jesus tells us that only the humble will see God (Matthew 5:8).  No one will enter Heaven's gates and experience God from afar.  If God is opposed to you, who could be for you?

I pray that the last 365 days in Psalms has decreased my pride and increased my humility.  I pray looking at the psalms has given me more looks at God in His high position and fewer looks at myself in a poorly perceived high position.

3) God Loves the Lowly, Down and Out, and the Righteous

God loves everybody the same is not a statement you would say freely if you soaked in the psalms.  It is clear over and over that God has a special affection for the lowly, down and out, and the righteous.  It is clear over and over that God has a combative relationship with the fat cats, the oppressors, and the wicked.

If God is near to the brokenhearted, the lowly, and the despised, then why aren't I?  If God has a particular distain for the fat cats of society, then why do I desire to cozy up to them?

I hope that my 2025 resolution has helped me have a more godly approach to who I value, who I associate with, and how I see myself.

4) God Alone is Our Refuge and Strength

When the words of the 150 songs in this book wash over you again and again you end up with a lower and lower view of man and a higher and higher view of God.  We functionally put our trust in a myriad of things.  Pastor Craig Groeschel titled his 2011 book perfectly when he called it The Christian Atheist.  Horses and chariots, high walls, strong leaders, wealth, and great strategies are nice to have but they are not and cannot be our refuge and strength.  Over and over we are implored in the psalms to lift up our view of the Almighty and to lower our view of the things we lean on.  

After spending the last year in this one book I expect that in 2026 I can more honestly sing, "I dare not trust the sweetest frame, but wholly lean on Jesus' name."  I pray that I will trust more and rely more upon God and less on my propped up functional saviors and comforts, especially the abominable fleshly self.

There's so much more that I gleaned from a year in the same Biblical field.  However, these four themes, I think and hope, will stick in my pores this year.  In 2026 my resolution is to read the epistles of the New Testament all year.  I'm not sure if I will do whole chapters each day or partial chapters.  I tell you this so you can hold me accountable and ask what I'm reading.  I tell you this because I have an expectation that I will have much to share in 2026 and that it will begin today.