From Infant's Lips

The pitch and intensity were consistent.

MWAAAH! ah.. ah.. ah.. WAAH! ah.. ah.. ah..

The clock was closing in on forty minutes, and I held in my arms an inconsolable child who had been screaming for each of the 2400 times the hand had ticked.

I threw my head back against the rocker in exasperation. She was fed, changed, burped and swaddled. She had rejected the pacifier with all the gusto a five-week-old can muster.

I kind of wanted to leaver her on someone else’s porch steps. Like you see in the movies, it’s a dreary, damp night and a desperate mother scampers up to a respectable looking front porch, places a Moses-basket containing a squalling baby on the steps, and ding-dong ditches the poor unsuspecting homeowners who are then left to raise the child as their own. It’s terrible, and I would never actually do it, but I wanted to in that moment.

The clock was inching in on forty-five minutes.

She has to stop sometime…

I started to pray, because, let’s face it, that seemed like a more viable option than the Little Orphan Annie scenario I had played out in my head five minutes earlier.

Lord, give this child peace…and rest…and…just…make her stop please.

My child’s emphatic dirge wailed on.

MWAAAH! ah.. ah.. ah.. WAAH! ah.. ah.. ah..

It never ceased. Never changed. The consistency (while frustrating) was impeccable.

Pray like this..

Mother Teresa once said “Our greatest work is prayer;” if such is the case, it’s a wonder the Creator hasn’t fired me yet.

I can program and plan, pour out and serve all day long. But prayer, that greatest work, that’s tough.

Scripture says “Pray without ceasing.”

I pray when I think about it.

When I’m “not too busy.”

When I’m desperate.

It’s getting close to an hour, and she is still crying. Unceasing, unaltered. The same cry she’s been belting for the last hour.

Pray like this.