Game, set, match!

Picture if you will...you're standing on a tennis court, racket in hand. Across the net from you stand four players, all of whom are hitting tennis balls at you as hard and fast as they can. You have no hope of hitting them all as they zing past, narrowly missing your head. Forget hitting any winners, you will simply settle for surviving. Finally in frustration, you throw down your racket and begin picking balls up and throwing them back at your four daunting opponents.

You've just pictured my morning as a homeschool mom. Had my quiet time this morning, picked up my racket and was ready to start the game. Before I knew it, I was being bombarded on all sides by those four opponents - my kids! It was all I could do to throw my hands up to protect my face! We finally called a time out mid-morning to regroup. After a few minutes of prayer and quiet, I shared the tennis analogy with them. I also apologized for throwing the balls back at them when I should have gathered them all sooner and made the choice to redirect the day.

Count it all JOY when you face trials of many "kids"...I mean "kinds". Believe me, that joy James wrote about is definitely a choice. I must chose to play the game in such a way that we all come out winners.