During the Lenten season, God invites us to turn inward, to pause, to rest so that we can find spiritual renewal. We are invited to step back and look at what is and isn’t working in our relationship with God and others.

We are a society of DO-ers; we value work and activities that produce measurable results. Yet, we cannot thrive without balancing work with rest, play, and prayer. Our families need this same balance to thrive. We experience God’s grace and mercy when we slow down long enough to pay attention to the movements of the Holy Spirit guiding and holding us.

Many parents can feel overwhelmed by these reminders because we are often attending to the needs of many children and even extended family members. Our dishwashers break and the plumbing backs up. Our babies stick their fingers in our eyes and our teenagers cry over their homework. We’re distracted! We feel we’ve been left behind in some way when others talk about spiritual rest and renewal during Lent.

Now, it’s likely that some of us are distracted from a life of prayer because we don’t prioritize it. I get this. In this case, we need to prioritize, work with our spouse, etc., to get the time we need to deepen our prayer lives. Ideally, every parent has time daily for quiet prayer and contemplation. Yet, the ideal is impossible at certain moments and on particular days.

So, I have a message for you today:

You can find spiritual renewal even amidst the chaos of raising a family.

Hopefully you can carve out some time every day for prayer, play, and doing-nothingness, but you can still tap into God’s grace and care during and through the ordinary tasks of caring for children and running a home.

In many ways, God is most evident to me in the real, messy, loud moments of mothering. In ordinary exchanges with my children, through the give and take of living together, every now and then grace breaks in and I am surprised, astonished by some small truth, and I realize what a gift my life is, what a gift each moment is with my family.

Once I was sitting in a chair in our front yard while my young children rode their bikes up and down the street with their friends. As I listened to their laughter and observed their complete and abandoned joy, I felt a rush of gratitude – gratitude that I had the privilege of raising these children; gratitude for their openness to every experience life threw at them;  gratitude that I sat down at that moment and just watched them. I recognized God in their joy. It was a moment of clarity about the gift I had been given in my motherhood.

If I practice looking for God in moments like this and preparing my heart for such encounters, my mothering becomes more contemplative no matter the circumstances.

So when you’re running on empty, look for the signs of God’s love right in front of you. Kids wrestling on the sofa? Digging up worms in your flower bed? Where is God in these encounters? He is a God of delight and discovery. Yes, he is even a God of wrestling and worms! How is God revealing his Goodness and Love in these moments, and how are your children reflecting God?

Sometimes we can be physically present but emotionally and spiritually absent. Our kids can draw us out of this funk. While I pray you will find quiet and calm at many moments this Lent, know that you don’t always need complete quiet and calm to find rest. Pay attention. Contemplate the goodness of your life.