I am on the beach at Whidbey Island looking for sea glass. This is my favorite place, and my favorite pasttime. I walk along the water’s edge with my three children: Camden way ahead, Ellie right beside me, and Mitchell in a pack on my back. My phone plays worship music. Ellie and I hold hands, and I sing to the Lord. A new song starts and grabs my heart, so I stop and face the ocean, close my eyes momentarily and sing to Him: OH LORD, YOU’RE BEAUTIFUL.
And He is. It is July in the Pacific Northwest, and the salty ocean breeze is crisp and almost cold. The water is too cold for me, but the children don’t seem to notice. In the distance beyond the water, somewhere out in the Sound, mountains rise up out of the ocean like brushstrokes in shades of blue. YOUR FAITHFULNESS REACHES TO THE MOUNTAINS.
The water is out with the tide, and the sand at our feet is a treasure chest of marine life. Ellie holds up a crab claw for my inspection. She then drops the claw and picks up an empty oyster shell. YOUR JUSTICE FLOWS LIKE THE OCEAN’S TIDES.
Behind me is a forest of tall, evergreen trees. Where the cove wraps around, the trees continue and become smaller, jagged lines against the sky. A Great Blue Heron swoops down and glides silently over the water. THE TREES OF THE FIELD CLAP THEIR HANDS.
I am now crying, because I almost always cry when I worship. Ellie realizes this and wraps her arms around my leg in a huge hug. She then tries to wave Cam over and shout-whispers: “Mom is worshipping again!”
Yes, Mom is worshipping again.
I turned 37 yesterday. I am mindful of where I have been, where I am today, and where I will go. That I am halfway through or so, but still have so many things to learn, books to read, and places to see. But also, a new thought in my thirties: the truth that if I didn’t learn those things, or read those books, or see those places, I am content.
Content, humbled, and grateful.
I point to sea glass with my toe and Ellie scoops it up and puts it in my hand. This one is blue, a very rare find here. Brown and white are most common, then green, then lastly, blue. Something to do with the colors of glass in Asia where it begins as trash. I turn it over in my hand.
Proper sea glass is frosty and smooth, and this one is, too. It tumbled in the ocean for so many years and lost all its rough edges and glassiness, and it is now a treasure that only time and friction could have made. YOUR KINGDOM IS LIKE A PEARL OF GREAT WORTH.
It all takes time— sea glass, pearls, diamonds— time and resistance. YOU HAVE COME TO MAKE ALL THINGS NEW IN THEIR TIME. Even litter. Even a grain of sand stuck in an oyster shell. Even me.
These days I don’t feel young. My face is aging faster than I’d like, and my three kids have changed my body. (During my last c-section the doctor kept saying, “sorry it’s taking so long, there’s just so much scar tissue.” Which is an odd thing to hear when you’re on the table.)
But I don’t feel old either. My body is stronger than I ever knew. It carries my children on my back and in my arms, and in the lines of my face. It goes all day, and then some more. I feel able. I know I am in the middle of it.
These snapshots I take today of tiny feet in the sand are the ones I’ll look back at and think “those were the days…” (Hopefully not followed by, “…before we messed it up,” or, “…before so-and-so fell off the wagon.”)
Inside the cabin at the end of our beach walk is a cross-stitched pillow. I’m not really one to have a cross-stitched pillow speak to me, but this one says: “Use it up, Wear it out, Make it do, Or do without.”
Yes. That is good. That sums up my thirties. And motherhood. And the quiet confidence that has come in this season. I am being used up, worn out, made to do, made to grow, made to repent, and at times, made to do without. So much of my twenties was spent trying to turn heads. In my thirties I’ve said my goodbye to all that, and now am just trying to turn my kids’ heads. And there is so much peace in that transition.
I am certain that others in their thirties would disagree. They are at the height of their striving: for more money, or a bigger house, or a better spouse, or a new thrill, or still at trying to turn heads. Or they are super mindful of places they could be that they aren’t. Or they’re striving against fear about their kids, or their own mortality, or aging.
But I feel content. I am at peace with all people; I feel love for mankind and this world. I feel so blessed— blessed beyond dream or hope or expectation, pressed down and shaken together. I feel loved by a God so much bigger and deeper and stronger than I am. I feel content with what I have and what I don’t. I would love to live more days, but if I didn’t, I trust Him to watch over all I’d leave behind. I feel every day used and tired, but in the most satisfying way. I feel poured into and poured out. I feel less preoccupied with the appearance of my vessel and more interested in what’s inside. I feel sinful and humbled, and like I have so far to go, but I also feel as though there’s no rush in getting there. I feel as if I’m tumbling in an ocean, wearing down and wearing out, in the best possible way.
Which brings me back to the sea glass. I find another piece and Ellie acts as my arms to scoop it up for me. This one is green. I walk a little farther and find a white, and then a brown. And this is my favorite thing to do. It is relaxing to walk along the shore and look for that little glimmer, a glint in the light, that calls to me: Here I am. I am not wet seaweed, I am not shell. I am what you are looking for. And when I spot one, my heart lights up, and my eyes squint (there are those pesky wrinkles again) as they narrow on my treasure, and I feel joy when it is in my hand. I delight in it.
And that’s Him, too, isn’t it?
I pray that He delights in finding me, and you, along His walks. You know He takes them as He did in the garden. He walks in the cool of the day, looking out for one that is His, worn down by an ocean of resistance into the perfect treasure to stand out among the grains of sand and among the seaweed, to bring Him joy in His hand.