On the night before kindergarten...

We've all read the sappy post of the mom talking about how you'll feel on the night before kindergarten. Or at least those of us who are moms have. I've read it more than once with both tears and laughter as I thought through everything leading up to this day. Let's be honest...I've been PRETTY dramatic with my own sappy posts.

Honestly, I've felt a heavy weight since the moment my eyes opened this morning. For months, the suspense of this whole experience has been building, and the culture around me has been selling a specific message: you should be sad and afraid. Some other tunes I've heard are that I should feel inadequate or unprepared or untrusting of the people who have had years of training and dedicate their lives to educating my child. I have specifically given a little too much weight to the select times a kid has been ugly to Noah or he has had difficulty making friends believing that this could be his new normal.

This whole experience reminds me a little of how it felt when we were getting married. Almost everyone we encountered wanted to tell us how hard marriage would be. Very few people actually took the time to tell us how amazing it is. Trust me, it was harder than they could have prepared us for, but mostly it was (and still is) the most incredible thing. Maybe we do this out of genuine concern or maybe misery loves company, but I'm not sure I was somehow more prepared for marriage because someone said it might be hard. It really just made me more afraid of it.

Tonight, I was feeling physically ill from the weight of the anxiety and fear I had picked up. I was having trouble focusing or enjoying our last day of summer. With the help of the best community ever, God reminded me of something very important.

"For God gave us not a spirit of fear but of power and love and self-control." 2 Timothy 1:7 

Over the past months, I have chosen to pick up a spirit of fear that is not from my Father. I have agreed with some lies that are completely contradictory to who God says we are. In the spirit of power, I have the choice to reject every lie and pick up something much better. So tonight, on the night before kindergarten, I am feeling something altogether different.

I am feeling proud that we have raised a boy that is kind. I am feeling confident that he has been well prepared to handle the rigor academically and the social expectations of kindergarten. I am feeling excited for the friendships he will develop and the way he will grow under the leadership of a new teacher and school. I am feeling reminded that we have been obedient to what God has called us to, and He will be faithful forever to that calling. I am feeling reassured that Noah is a light to everyone he knows, and sending him out is how we share that light. 

Kindergarten, here we come. We were made for this.