You are so amazing! You and Andy inspire me! God gives special people special children! You are so strong! These are the beautiful words spoken by so many of you, words that have lifted me so often. But these words also stopped me from answering God’s call to write this blog for a long time. My explanation to this is a bit tough for me because it involves discussing an ugly character flaw I’ve always had, but God sends me what He wants me to write and I just type, thanks God.

For as long as I can remember I have demanded attention. I was always the kid in the middle of the room singing and dancing, yelling LOOK AT ME with my actions. As I grew older I realized praises felt good. I have always lacked confidence in the brains department so I made up for it with my outgoing and often overbearing personality. I look back on so many conversations that revolved around me, I would typically start a phone call with, “Listen to this…” instead of “How are you today?” I can only imagine how exhausting I was to others.

When I began to grow in my relationship with God this character flaw became increasingly apparent to me and I felt shame for it. Shame for sometimes seeking the ego boost that came with these words especially when it came to Katie. The encouraging words had become a consolation for all the hard work.

Emily Kuhn Photography

So why do I crave these kind words? Because they make me feel better about myself. I was talking to my priest around Mother’s day this year and told him that the commercials about how wonderful moms are made me feel like crap. You know the ones with all those adjectives that I will never be. He said, that feeling actually comes from pride. It’s me wanting to be the perfect mom, wanting people to use those same words to describe me. As I grow in humility I realize it is okay for people to use real words to describe me, like impatient and annoying. Because when I humble myself and realize maybe they are right, then I will learn how to be better.

“This is the one I esteem: he who is humble and contrite in spirit, and trembles at my word.”        Isaiah 66:2

I’ve also learned that being humble means realizing that I can’t boast about anything because only God deserves the praises in my life. I am nothing without God.
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I have far to go, but God has definitely given me the grace to realize this humility. While journaling over the past few years God has continued to tell me to share Katie’s story. But I was fearful that bringing attention to myself would feed my ego and in turn feed this ugly character flaw. So I resisted for about a year. Obviously, I eventually gave in and what I have discovered is one of the most beautiful gifts God has given me. The compliments have poured in 10 times more than I had ever imagined. People are sharing my blog and even strangers are saying that these words have changed their lives. But instead of feeling great pride, I feel completely humbled. I feel like falling to my knees to praise God for using me to do His work. Truly I deserve no praise, God and God alone has control over these words. Why else would I write about my embarrassing character flaw? Because God knows that these specific words will help someone today.

The gospel reading this Sunday rang loudly to me as God was encouraging me to write about this post. It was the Parable of the Talents from Matthew’s gospel Chapter 25. The story about the man going on a journey and entrusting 3 of his servants with money. The first servant received 5 talents, he in turn invested them and received 5 more. The second servant received 2 and did the same receiving 2 additional talents. But the third servant, only given 1 talent, was afraid to lose it. He buried it in the ground for safe keepings. When the man returned he told the first and second servant, “Well done, my good and faithful servant. Since you were faithful in small matters, I will give you great responsibilities.” But to the third servant he said, “You wicked lazy servant!”

Harsh words! And I felt them personally, because another reason I delayed this blog was a fear of backlash, fear of being judged and fear of offending someone who has differing beliefs. The talents in this parable are all those gifts that God has bestowed on us so that we can spread His love. It is our faith! For me it was the ability to write and the gift of Katie. I had two choices, I could continue to use the challenges we face with Katie for my own self esteem or I could use the talent of writing to share her with others. For most of my life I held my faith as a very private matter, never to be talked about in front of others because who knows what they believe and I wouldn’t want to offend them. But now I know that is not right. I have great respect for all opinions and if I offend someone else I hope they will say something and speak about their beliefs. When we engage in conversation or even a little healthy debate now and then, we grow.

“I tell you, everyone who acknowledges me before others the Son of Man will acknowledge before the angels of God. But whoever denies me before others will be denied before the angels of God.”            Luke 12:8-9

Father Robert Barron had a challenge this week related to this reading. He said “…your faith will be increased in the measure in which you share it. Don’t wait until you have more faith, more knowledge to insure you don’t say the wrong thing. Share it now so your faith will grow, your knowledge will grow.” His challenge was this, “Find some path for the propagation of your faith, some way to concretely share it, maybe it is teaching Sunday school, talking more about God in your own home, maybe it’s hanging a cross at work, whatever it is, give it away. Difficult? Yes, but a great pay off.” I know so many of you reading this right now do this so beautifully already, I’ve learned to do what I am doing right now from so many of your examples! It takes humility to spread God’s love because you are taking a risk. A risk that God predicts and promises glory for in return.

“Indeed, all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted.” 2 Timothy 3:12

“If you are insulted for the name of Christ, blessed are you, for the Spirit of glory and of God rests upon you.” 1 Peter 4:14