Like fish flowing all in one direction, we would take one step at a time downward until we all wandered the same white hallway towards the same cold musky platform. Perhaps a jazz player entertained in the distance or some rats ran across the rails down below. We’d simultaneously watch the clock, counting the seconds until the next train. As the scheduled transport arrived, bringing with it a great wind, the lady on the echoing speaker would say “Mind the gaps”.
It became a joke for any friends and family that visited me in London, this “mind the gaps” phrase we had never heard. Watch out for what could hurt you! Watch out for the gaping hole beneath your feet! Step carefully. Danger danger danger! And if you go there today, I’m sure the same lady on the same intercom on the same windy train platform will beckon you again, to mind the gaps.
But I think God says something different to us.
When I became a mom, I very quickly realized I did not know what I was doing and that there would most certainly be gaps in our children’s lives. There was no way that both Troy and I could meet their needs physically, spiritually, emotionally, financially, relationally… and so forth… for the rest of their lives. We are human and would inevitably make mistakes that required repentance and long conversations.
It was then that I began praying, “Lord, fill in the gaps in their lives. Bring the people they need to bring redemption to what we inevitably can’t meet.”
Meet them in their gaps, really.
It was also around the same time that I began realizing the gaps I’d had in my own life; that we all have. Something about becoming a parent projects you into both grief and grace at the same time.
God saying to my heart – Don’t mind the gaps. I meet you in the gaps. Grace meets you in the gaps. It’s in the gaps that redemption takes place.
Perhaps we should define what a gap is… “An empty space or interval, a break or opening, a wide divergence or disparity, perceived as creating a problem.”
I like that word “perceived”. Our perception of the gap determines its affect on us.
So why do we all fear the gaps so much? Why do we fear messing up our children’s lives or our own and live endless days in pursuit of perfection?
Because we don’t understand grace.
Grace isn’t an excuse to do whatever we want. Grace is not a coverup for a life lived in broken communion with Christ. Grace isn’t about me, it’s about Jesus, the One who gives me the grace.
2 Corinthians 9:8 says, “And God is able to make all grace abound to you so that, having all sufficiency in all things at all times, you may abound in every good work.”
The purpose of grace is to empower us to do good. To show God’s goodness to others. To transform us into holiness, little by little, to reflect more of Him wherever we are.
It’s only grace that makes us like Him.
So, when we worry about gaps in our lives and in our children’s lives, we’re forgetting grace. Grace enables us to pray big prayers. Grace enables us to change to be more like Jesus.
Now I’m not saying that we can live flippantly and look past all gaps in our lives because grace, like spray foam in a new home, fills up all the gaps. I’m saying don’t let the inevitable gaps – in you and your children’s lives – cause you to lose hope. Because I’ve come to realize it’s in the imperfection of gaps that we meet our desperate need for a Savior. And that is a good thing.
My gaps stare at me daily and my endless pursuit of perfection has been strong. Exhausting. But when I welcome His Spirit to come and change me in my gaps, meet my marriage and my children in the areas I feel weak in… He comes. He leads.
And suddenly those gaps that seemed to be a wound that once needed rushing to emergency for triage, become the very conduit of His hand at work.
Grace comes to fill in the gaps that life left out.
Dear reader, don’t mind the gaps. If you’ll look for it diligently, it’s right there that you meet the redemptive hand that made you.
