Ever Unseen Act of Love

“God sees every unseen act of love, and He is pleased.”

I read that on a random comment thread from Facebook. A friend of mine had shared an article about motherhood, and all the challenges it brings. The article was centered around the theme that God created you, given your child to YOU (not anyone else) and would equip you with the resources to faithfully raise them for Him. A woman I do not know commented, saying something like “Oh, I know, but sometimes I just don’t feel like anyone appreciates all the work I put in!” And my friend replied to her “God sees every unseen act of love, and He is pleased.”

How much that one sentence (not even directed at me) has been an encouragement and, at many points, my anthem to being a mother. Especially during those months when it’s just me and my child, when my husband goes to work. 

God sees me. He sees me take a deep breath and control my tone, my frustration and tears (and sometimes not as much). He sees me bend down for the hundredth time to clean up whatever mess has been made (food, pee, poop, snot, toys… you name it!) He sees me hold my crying babe who just bonked her head really good. He sees me lovingly prepare the thousandth meal for us to enjoy together, and the fun cookies or the playdough. 

And God sees you, mama. He sees you wake up in the morning after hearing your little one start to cry or talk. He sees you take a few moments to wake up, and get motivated for another day chasing them down and making sure they aren’t too cold, or too hot, or hungry or thirsty. He sees you read that one book for the tenth time in a row because (out of the fourteen other books) they only want to read “Goodnight, Princess” that day.

He sees the good moments when you’re both laughing and playing a game, or dancing, or learning. He sees the hard moments when they don’t stop when you say stop and that could have meant running out into the street. He sees the corrections, the “say please” and the “say thank you!”. He sees YOU. And YOU are doing everything He wants you to do. 

This world is upside down right now. We are cooped up all day (especially if the weather is horrible). There's the overhanging anxiety of not wanting to get sick, or be around anyone who even MIGHT be sick. There are all the things that we as adults are dealing with right now- the uncertainty of what is to come. How will the world look when we are finally able to emerge from our houses? What will the new rules be? Everyone is going through this weird, traumatic thing together yet separately and yet our job is to make sure our children don’t feel the worry. We can’t do anything about it, so we carry on. We continue to love and mold our children, and a lot of the effort is going to go unseen, unappreciated and unacknowledged. 

But God sees every unseen act of love, and He is pleased.