Today I found a marble while doing the laundry. There it was, blue and shiny among the grey folds of my son’s sweatshirt.
My heart leaped as I picked it up and admired its beauty, thinking about how Michael would smile when I showed him his lost treasure.
But just as suddenly as I found it, the marble slipped from my fingers and bounced into the dusty unknown beneath the hot water heater. Sighing in defeat after peering into the darkness, I shrugged and continued with my work.
Later, though, thinking of my son’s smile, I tried again, getting on hands and knees to grope beneath the fiery heater. At last, I found it once more, the marble’s sheen glinting through the dark.
Cupping it carefully in my hand this time, I finally could show it to my son, who waited expectantly, trustingly, as if to say, “It was there all along. You just had to look harder.”
Seeing God in our lives
So too are the glimpses we have of God — fleeting moments of beauty we creatures of clay can grasp only for seconds.
Sometimes I can really sense God’s presence, especially at Mass while contemplating the mystery of the Consecration and being caught up in the unfathomable love Our Lord has for His children. I bask in the beauty of that love, marveling at its existence and thanking God for it.
But the moment is short-lived as my youngest child pulls on my sleeve or throws his pacifier down the aisle. And just as the marble slipped through my fingers, so too the God-moment is gone. Because I am made of clay.
Having felt the warmth of that all-encompassing love, I search for God again, and if I don’t find Him due to a period of spiritual dryness or life’s distracting challenges or despair, I fumble in the darkness of my own sin and self-centeredness.
But obedience and prayer and the powerful desire to get my family to heaven push me onward in my search, and eventually I learn to trust in Jesus, to open my heart to Him so that He can set up a dwelling place there. Gently He leads me to see for myself that if you put Christ first, truly all else will fall into place.
There will always be struggles
It will not always be easy. Of course struggle is necessary so that you can feel what it means to solely depend on Him. But your resulting love will be rewarded far beyond anything we creatures can imagine.
Slowly I begin to find God again, not only during Mass, but also in my children’s laughter, in their trusting faces, in their mischievous grins. I learn that, with practice, I can remember to talk to Him while folding laundry, changing diapers, making dinner.
It’s hard to hold onto Him while disciplining children, but He is there, too, and I can offer those challenging moments as small sacrifices. “I am with you always, even to the end of the age,” Jesus promises. It is the Truth.
And like children clutching treasured marbles, we must savor the glimpses of God we see in everyday life and offer those moments in prayers of thanksgiving. Like small children, we must trust Him, knowing that He is there beneath the surface of our lives — always.
His love is there for the taking. All you have to do is trust. And ask. And you will find Him. He is, was, and always will be there all along.
Julianne Nornberg, mother of four young children, is a member of St. John the Baptist Parish, Waunakee.