the Best Years

A recently-returned student who spent the last year of his life in China wrote a song with a particular phrase that keeps circling 'round my brain these days. I'm sure I don't know it well enough to quote it, so I won't, except to say that it says something along the lines of wasting the best years of my life pouring out the oil for the Lord.

I simply can't get that phrase (or the idea of it) out of my head.


Next week I turn 25 years old. Usually, when people find out how old I am, I get astonished looks about how young I am. I assume this is because they are considering my age in light of the number of children I have and/or years I have been married and not because of some overwhelming air of maturity.

But I can't believe I'm almost 25.

Because in my mind, I'm still the teenage girl who takes dance lessons and is afraid of getting behind the steering wheel and isn't quite sure what style clothing she likes and still has her whole life before her. In my mind, I'm still the young girl with hands raised and tears streaming, offering what seems to be a totally clean slate to the Lord, singing, I'm giving You my all, Jesus, without a single clue as to what that might really mean.


All I knew was that I wanted to waste the best years of my life on Him.

I had no idea what that would look like.


Now, I'm not for a minute saying the best years are all behind me, because I don't and won't believe that they are. But play along with our culture for a minute and then tell me if it says all girls in their early 20s should spend their days changing diapers, making soup, folding laundry, and vacuuming. Because I think that's the idea of what the song stuck in my head is going for.


This past week I had a familiar revelation yet again: I've given Jesus my all many times, but I'm still learning how to truly give it. Yes, I made the choice to waste my life on Him, but when the rubber meets the road, I often want to waste my life on myself and so I'm having to choose Him over and over and over again.


These years of early motherhood have been lonely ones in many ways. I can't say that I'm surprised by this, because seasoned moms have told me to expect as much. But that doesn't make it any easier to be the one standing at the window waving good-bye, facing another day that will mostly be thankless and very likely won't include a single genuine, How are you? (Toddlers don't know to care about how their moms are, after all.)

These have been insecure years, wondering if what I'm doing really matters and whether or not it counts that my most significant relationships are with people who don't know their alphabet or how to tie their own shoes.

They've been tiring years. So tiring I'm not even sure when the last time I slept through the night is-- if I ever did. Tiring because I've been through a Diligence & Discipline boot-camp I didn't even know existed before I was already enrolled.


I've cried because His idea of wasting my life on Him isn't as grand as I my ideas are. I've cried because I know the privilege of eternal investment is so much better than my self-centered heart can wrap itself around, and I desperately want to understand.

I've cried because there doesn't always seem to be much light at the end of the tunnel; and there are many days when the very thing I am-- a wife & mom-- seems like something I am destined to fail at.

I've cried because I don't like to work. I've cried because I'd pridefully hoped for recognition and didn't get it. I've cried because I don't see the point. I've cried because I do.


In the end, I come back to wanting nothing more than to keep wasting the best years of my life pouring out the oil before the Lord. Though there is at times a gnawing temptation to agree with the culture around me-- to regret the seeming lack of adventures, experiences, and successes I've had-- one look at the Cross tells me that nothing can compare with the way my Heavenly Father can make my life count. He knows how to spend my days so much better than I ever could, and the best choices I've ever made have been when I've let Him choose.


Yes, I cry because I am so moved by the fact that He answered the tearful prayer I prayed as a young girl, even though He knew I didn't have a clue about what I was praying.

Take my life, and let it be consecrated, Lord, to Thee
Take my moments and my days; let them flow in ceaseless praise
Take my hands, and let them move at the impulse of Thy love
Take my feet, and let them be swift and beautiful for Thee

Take my voice, and let me sing always, only, for my King
Take my lips, and let them be filled with messages from Thee
Take my silver and my gold; not a mite would I withhold
Take my intellect, and use every power as Thou shalt choose

Take my will, and make it Thine; it shall be no longer mine
Take my heart, it is Thine own; it shall be Thy royal throne
Take my love, my Lord, I pour at Thy feet its treasure store
Take myself, and I will be ever, only, all for Thee