seven months old

Thompson, you are seven months old. Where has the time gone? This stage of life with you is so much fun! You are eating everything in sight and prefer "table food" over anything else. You still love avocadoes and bananas, but we've also added strawberries, blueberries, chicken, turkey, cheese, yogurt, artichokes, rice, bread, squash, waffles, and much more to your expanding palate. You love it all! The only thing you've ever turned your nose up to was peas. :)



You are rolling all over the place, and occasionally you get one leg underneath your body and try to push off. It won't be much longer before you crawl, but Mommy is happy to keep you immobile for a while longer. You love to chatter and squeal, as you are a very vocal baby. You still sleep 13 hours at night and take two 2-hour naps during the day. You're wearing size three diapers and your clothes are 6-12 months or 12-18 months. You weigh 20 pounds, and you're nearly 30 inches long!

 

Your hair keeps getting lighter, and it's finally long enough to lay down without too much coercing. You are sitting up all by yourself, and you love to spread out and play in the living room floor. Phineas is probably your favorite member of the family, and you absolutely love his puppy kisses.


During the last month, you had the opportunity to meet your great-great-grandmother from Missouri. It's incredible that you have four living grandparents, five living great-grandparents, and three living great-great-grandparents! The picture below represents five generations of Bennetts.

You've become quite the wiggle worm, particularly on the changing table. We keep you distracted with a toy so we can get you changed and dressed. You love to read books and play with your blocks. You still love the bathtub, but you especially enjoy sitting on the floor of the shower while Daddy takes a shower. You laugh and play and splash in your bumbo seat.

 

We can't believe that in a few short months we'll be celebrating your first birthday. Mommy may have already reserved the location for the big event!

We love watching you grow and change and learn new things each day. You brighten our mornings with your smiles and giggles. You are honestly the happiest, most content baby we have ever met. You've spoiled your parents rotten! You've been an incredible gift to this family. We love you, Thompson!

a beautiful mess

The longer Ryan and I are involved in ministry and doing life with other people, the more we are reminded that people are messy. Life is messy.

My life is messy.

Grace covers our self-inflicted messes. And love covers a multitude of sins (1 Peter 4:8).

How grateful I am for a loving Father who makes beautiful things out of my mess. And even more, He allows me to walk alongside others as He crafts masterpieces out of their messes too. Galatians chapter 6 paints a beautiful picture of our responsibility to one another as members of the body of Christ.

“Brothers, if anyone is caught in any transgression, you who are spiritual should restore him in a spirit of gentleness. Keep watch on yourself, lest you too be tempted. Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ. For if anyone thinks he is something, when he is nothing, he deceives himself. . . So then, as we have opportunity, let us do good to everyone, and especially to those who are of the household of faith.”
– Galatians 6:1-3, 10

We’re called to restore. We’re called to shoulder the burden. We’re called to do good. God will handle the consequences, repair the heart, forgive the sinner, and restore the soul. But we have a part to play in this mess.

It’s a sad indictment of the church that many who find themselves in a mess fear the church is the last place they can turn. We’ve met too many messes with condemnation, ridicule, gossip, and hate, instead of gentleness and good as seen in the passage above.

A friend recently reminded me of these wise words:

“Where no oxen are, the manger is clean, but much revenue comes by the strength of the ox.”
– Proverbs 14:4

Where there is life and fruit and growth, there will be messes. Clean, neat, tidy lives come from hollow souls who aren’t really living. I’m not saying that Christians should be flinging messes right and left. But our maturity in Christ comes with its fair share of messes and growing pains and stumbles and failures.

There was a mess in Abraham’s adulterous rendezvous with Hagar. There was a mess in David’s rooftop proposal to Bathsheba. There was a mess in the belly of a great fish. There was a mess by a charcoal fire as a rooster crowed thrice. But in each story, there was greater grace and redemption beyond the mess. And there have been messes along my journey…and probably a few more in my future.

But it’s one of the beautiful things about community. My favorite part of Galatians 6 is the word “opportunity” in verse 10. In the Greek, this is the word “kairos,” and its meaning will blow you away. The word implies not the convenience of the season, but the necessity of the task at hand, whether the time provides a good, convenient opportunity or not.

Read those words again. Slowly.

The word implies not the convenience of the season, but the necessity of the task at hand, whether the time provides a good, convenient opportunity or not.

The truth of the matter is that other people’s messes are usually not convenient for us. They interrupt our schedules, get in the way of our plans, and disrupt our routines. They require more of us than we’re often willing to give.

But Paul instructed us “as we have opportunity,” knowing it wouldn’t be convenient. Or easy. Or fun. But it’s necessary. And’s it’s costly. It’s the embodiment of love and grace. It’s a picture of God in flesh.

So slow down. Make eye contact. Listen. Become involved in someone else’s mess. And find yourself caught up in a beautiful, thrilling display of the creative, redemptive abilities of our God.