Pretty please, with a cherry on top

My boys have learned the endearing phrase, "Pretty please, with a cherry on top" from one of their cartoons that they've watched multiple times. They often use it now, and always in the right context. I, however, am taking it completely out of context right now.

You see, this was to by my one night to really put my head down and prepare for my next talk, which happens to be this Saturday morning. Every moment of every day has been so packed and the evenings worst of all, so tonight was my time to see it all come together. Oh, it's all written, I just wanted to go through it a time or two more. "Pretty please, with a cherry on top," has been my prayer.

Only I did not know that the cherry that would top my actual evening would be little Asher's bright red behind. He has spend the past 2 + hours getting out of bed over and over and over and over. At first it was a simple lesson for me to not get frustrated at my little guy just because I had an agenda for my evening. And so I read him books, rocked him extra good, giving extra kisses and hugs and prayers and songs... and still he came out for more, time and again, these past two hours. Finally, now, he is down. And now I have my notes open before me.

But what a reminder that this Mother's Day Brunch for Single Moms, that I'm slated to attend in two days, is going to be chalked full of ladies who are always setting aside their agendas for those of their children. With no one else to shoulder the responsibilities, not just at bedtime but most all the time, these ladies have known many of their own plans thwarted.

It's been my most consistent prayer as I've prepared to share with these women, that God would increase my love for them. And so as I gave up my time of preparation to correct, discipline, and finally just give in to the obvious needs of my little one, I spent my time stroking his hair and praying for the ladies I'm to minister to.

I remember one night, as I was particularly nervous over speaking to a group of ladies, my husband Matt wrote me a text message just moments before I went on stage. He wrote: "love them well."

Tonight's thwarted plans reminded me yet again that the crux of serving God by serving others is to love them well, for God is love. If I bring my perfectly sculpted talk but have not love... I'll just be a clanging cymbal. And who would that benefit?