Much of this message I wrote a year ago, yet it is so critical for my weak little heart that I needed to dive back into again this year. This message is a gentle reminder from our patient Lord, who never tires of reassuring a needy heart.

“YOU ARE THE BEST” once just a plain sheet of old pink construction paper that has been carefully pruned and snipped by the dull edges of small scissors and eight-year-old hands.

When I read these words that were strewn out in front of me on Mother’s Day last year, my heart skipped a beat. In a quiet room, I sat in bed sipping my warm cup of coffee after the hustle and bustle of little people delivered the most exquisite and childlike breakfast. But, as I snuggled up to the edge of my bed I continued to stare at those words. In front of my weary eyes were words laid down by the children who have seen the cracks, felt the let downs, heard the harsh words. “The BEST? No I can’t be!” I was overcome with the truth that I was anything but the best. 

But this is the lie we tell ourselves, the heavy chain of guilt we wear around our necks never letting the weight of it to be lifted. I could sense our Heavenly Father whispering quietly into my heart as I re-read the delicate scraps of pink paper. 

I pause… and I hear “You are not perfect and you never will be so let that go. For I have not created you for a worldly perfect.  You are not a perfect mother but YOU ARE THE BEST MOTHER!” It’s a message that he has quietly been dancing around the edges of my heart for months, or rather years. 

He has not created me to be a perfectly polished, never late, always clean, no sugar, no screens, never losing my temper, always smiling, never too busy, never needing to apologize kind of mother. He gently plays the background of hum of 10 little feet, 10 little feet that race, pitter patter, stomp and dance around the house . Feet that are dirty from rolling around in the mud, that I’ve tickled dozens of times and cringe with excitement when “…this little piggy went all the way home.” These feet, these hands, these hearts, they don’t need perfect, they need the best! 

He has created each of us, every mother alike as the best, the best mom for this child that He has given us the honor of watching over for him. No other woman was more perfectly designed than YOU to be the mother of YOUR child! He knows that it would be your gentle, yet often calloused hands that would wipe the tears off of that sweet face, that it would be you rearranging your family’s dinner because that tiny mouth just can’t and won’t eat mashed potatoes. He knew you would lie awake at night tossing and turning over how to best get them to learn how to read, or worrying how to help them not only make but also be a good friend. He gave you your heart and knows that it is your heart that is best suited to love your child.

But we will not be perfect. We will fall. We will discipline too harshly. We will yell, we will cry and we will spend hours crying over the moments we yelled. We will secretly have times when we resent our duty to care for these little souls that He has entrusted to us. But what a good God He is because His mercies are endless and His redeeming power can restore all of our broken moments to wholeness once again. 

So we must not listen to the lie that often creeps in… The lie that I am not enough, that I will fail, that someone could’ve done better than me because newsflash when God chose YOU to be mom, He said NO ONE could do it better for that child than YOU. But answering that call to be the best He has created us to be is the million dollar question.  Will we dig our heels deep in the ground refusing to let His graces pour out upon us because we just can’t get it right? Or will we fall to our knees allowing His mercy to take over so that we may allow this “BEST” to radiate within our hearts and homes? 

You were not perfect and you never will be but that’s OK because He gently whispers in each of our hearts that YOU ARE THE BEST!

~ Suzanne Bilodeau