All I Need is GRACE

Sometimes romance is the last thing we need and according to Kate Elizabeth Conner, for her right now, it's GRACE. This came from her blog Lily Pads.

I have been fortunate enough to live virtually every day of my life feeling remarkably, confidently, okay with myself.

Until last month.

I’m now three months pregnant with my third child.

I believe that rock bottom occurred the other day as Dan was walking out the door to work.  I caught him, and with tears in my eyes I begged,

“If you see a girl who is skinnier or prettier than me, remember that I am carrying your child.  Remember that I’ve carried all your children.  And that I’m smart, and I write, and that I love Jesus a whole lot.  Remember that you love me.  Okay?”

Yikes.
I am in such desperate, desperate need of grace.

I need grace because recently, I’m not the Kate that my husband signed up for.  She is joyful, magnetic and the victim of chronically excellent self-esteem – and she is lost somewhere inside of me.

I need grace because I’m myopic, weepy, and self-absorbed.

I need grace because my dishwasher is broken, giving me the pathetic excuse I need not to cook anything, ever.

I need grace because I can’t keep my eyes open after 2:00pm.

I need grace because I have absolutely no interest in making friends, finding the library, or post office, playground, or coffee shop.

I know that I need God’s grace indefinitely, like air – but I need people’s grace too, and that is much harder to swallow.   We all need God’s grace because we all need forgiveness and purpose and love and stuff.  It’s very clean cut.

Years and years ago, I was talking to my most wonderful Aunt Mary about marriage.  She recounted to me a time she’d said something snide about another person, and about the way her husband looked at her – caught completely off guard.  She said, “I’ll never forget the way I felt; it was the first time he’d seen how ugly I could be.”  She went on to say that her husband’s love for her was bigger than her own ugliness in that moment; that he showed her grace.
I am humbled and thankful to say that my husband’s love, too, is bigger than my ugliness, and that he has shown me grace.
Please, decide to be a giver and a receiver of grace today; we all need it like crazy.

Thanks for this big dose of santifigumption, Kate!