More than one type of noise...

Today I caught myself being short with my children.

Now, don't get me wrong. This is by no means an isolated event. But today, the realization of what it all meant hit me hard.

I have a lot of irons in the fire right now. I'm frantically trying to finish up an Advent edition of Seasons of Joy. I'm homeschooling a kindergartener, a third grader, and a fifth grader. I have a toddler underfoot. I have a short story I'm working on. I'm trying to work out at home or get to the gym anyway. And it's the Week of the Kitchen, so I'm trying to scrub out the fridge and scour the sink and clean the woodwork and degrunge the floor.

So when I went down in the basement to switch the laundry and put in a new load, I actually took a deep breath and lingered for a moment, enjoying the quiet and peace of being in the only level of the house with no children.

"Mooooo--oooooooooommmmmmm!!!!!"

And I have to admit, my response was a not very nice, "WHAT?!?"

And right away, I felt ashamed.

You see, the other things are important. The new Advent guide will (hopefully!) help pay for Christmas. A clean kitchen will help us all feel more peaceful. And the pesky state likes to be assured that I am properly educating my children.

But the most important thing of all is that I love them.

If I speak in the languages of humans and angels but have no love, I have become a reverberating gong or a clashing cymbal.

In that moment, it hit me. Those other things are important, but they're only a means to an end. In the end, I'm not commanded to write or clean or even to educate, but to love. Sometimes, all this business and busyness is nothing more than another type of noise.

So I went upstairs, and tried to breathe the busyness out. I snuggled the baby, read to my kindergartener, kissed my daughter, and took the time to listen to my oldest. And somewhere deep inside, my soul breathed a sigh of relief, recognizing that this was what I was supposed to be doing.

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails.