I Am The Parent Now

Nobody ever said it.

There was no afternoon where somebody sat you down and explained that from here on you would be the one who decides, who remembers, who notices the thing on the stairs, who worries at four in the morning.

It happened the way weather happens. A form here. A phone call there. And now you are the parent, and she is not, and neither of you has ever once used that sentence out loud.

And what nobody tells you about the reversal is that it does not feel like promotion. It feels like something being taken.

Because as long as there was somebody above you in the world, there was a person you could still be a child in front of. And that room has quietly closed, and nobody sent a notice.

The two loads

Let me separate two loads, because they are being carried as one and that is why it is unbearable.

The first is the work. Appointments, forms, meals, the calls that have to be made in office hours. That load is real and it is heavy and it can be measured, and people can help with it.

The second is invisible and nobody has ever named it to you. It is that you are the last line. There is nobody above you now. Whatever happens, the decision arrives at your desk, and there is no higher authority in this family to hand it to.

You have been carrying two loads and calling them one, and the second one has never once been the sort of thing anybody could see from outside. Isaiah 46:4 says even to your old age I am he, and even to hoar hairs will I carry you, which is the written word putting somebody above the last line, and the Holy Spirit is the one who stands where you thought nobody was standing.

And she is a whole woman in that chair. She has lost more than you have. She was the one people came to, and now she is the one who is asked whether she has eaten, and she has her own grief about that which she has probably never described.

She is right about at least one thing you have never conceded, and she did not choose any of this either.

You are able to grieve this while she grieves it too, and two people losing the same thing from opposite ends has never once meant one of them is being ungrateful. The Spirit of God is what holds two losses in one hallway, and it is written in Isaiah 46 that He carries even to the gray hairs.

Even to your old age I am he

And even to your old age I am he; and even to hoar hairs will I carry you: I have made, and I will bear; even I will carry, and will deliver you. (Isaiah 46:4, King James Version)

Four verbs in the second half of that verse and every one of them is God doing the lifting.

I have made. I will bear. I will carry. I will deliver. That is not a promise to help somebody carry. It is a description of who is underneath the whole thing.

And the context is important. Isaiah 46 opens with idols being loaded onto animals, a picture of gods that have to be carried around by the people who worship them. And then God says the opposite about Himself: those have to be carried, and I do the carrying.

You are underneath a God who carries rather than one who has to be carried, and no weight in that house has ever once been resting entirely on the last line. It is written in Isaiah 46:4 that I have made and I will bear, even I will carry and will deliver you, which is the written word putting four verbs of lifting on His side, and the Holy Spirit is the one bearing what nobody in the family can see.

And notice the whole span in that verse. Even to your old age. Even to hoar hairs. He is speaking to the far end of a life, which means He is speaking to your mother in that chair and to you at fifty two in the same sentence.

Both of you are inside the promise. Neither of you has aged out of being carried.

You are still being carried at the age where you became the one who carries, and taking responsibility for a parent has never once moved anybody out of being a child before God. The Spirit of God is the one who holds the person everybody else is holding on to, and Isaiah 46 runs the promise all the way to the gray hairs.

The room that closed

Here is the honest part, and it deserves saying rather than solving.

Something in that house has been lost while she is still alive. Not the woman, who is in the chair. The role. The person you could bring something to and be small in front of, and that room really has closed, and it is a real loss, and it is one of the least acknowledged griefs there is.

Nobody will send a card about it. Most people will not know it happened.

You are permitted to grieve a role while the person is still here, and no loss has ever once needed a funeral in order to be genuine. The Holy Spirit is the one who names a grief nobody else can see, and it is written that even to hoar hairs will I carry you.

And there is one place that room still exists. It is not a person and it is not a substitute. It is that there is still somebody above you in the world, and being small in front of Him is not something you have aged out of.

That is what praying looks like in this season. Not requests. Being the child in the room again for ten minutes.

You are able to be somebody's child today, and becoming the one who decides everything has never once cost you that. The Spirit of God is the one in whose presence a fifty year old can be small, and Isaiah 46:4 puts the carrying on His side from the making all the way to the end.