murmuring thanks

I'm murmuring thanks soft. 

it's barely audible. 

Mustering up a gladness in my weary bones has been left to the side for the last few weeks, but it's my soul that's going bankrupt in the absence of the thanks. It's revolutionised me before this giving thanks in the mini blessings, the unseen music that I hear playing in the background of doctors visits, desperate prayers to be well, tears that I let sneak down my face when it's just me in the bathroom. Because it's not all sad. It's deep too.

When I swallow the thanks that sparks small and soft I am left empty. Because there's always thanks to be murmured to my Jesus. He sustains me when my soul is heartbroken and I don't know I can wake up and do another day. He is watering the garden in my soul, inhabiting my heart.

Yesterday I woke to terror. The terror of the night where fears roam free and take over, gaining ground and size. Too big for me to reign in, too big to wrestle. Huz held me close, spoke truth to me. It was still early, but True and Brave came in, wrapping little bare arms and legs around me on each side, snuggling as close as possible and showering kisses on my cheeks. 

And my God who sees it all gave this gift just when I was at my lowest. His mercies are new every morning. And I murmured thanks soft because I couldn't help it. And then I remembered how long it has been since I have thanked Him for anything. 

He hasn't stopped giving gifts, both the hard and the welcome ones.

Mothering is at once the hardest and the holiest and the happiest 
(Ann Voscamp One Thousand Gifts)

I never knew being a mother would revolutionise me, break me so I could be mended and see everything entirely differently. God's greatest gift to me in so very many ways. How could I have known? And it's taken me years to get comfortable in it, years to warm up, see how my selfishness needed to be broken into a thousand pieces by ways of little hands and hearts needing all of me when I have longed for silence, peace, less housework.

Jesus you knew what I needed so much better than me. I have been sanctified in so many ways through motherhood. What a gift.

And so this begins my list. My little list of thanks.