I sat in my car close to tears, my most recent parenting failures played on repeat in my mind.

My niece had failed her spelling test that morning. My son was cranky because of dental pain, and I still hadn’t managed to arrive on time to gymnastics practice even once.

I owned all of these failures and let their weight crush me until a familiar verse shed a new light.

“Our days on earth are like grass; like wildflowers, we bloom and die. The wind blows, and we are gone—as though we had never been here,” (Psalm 103:15-16 NLT).

I’ve always seen this verse as sobering—even a little sad. But on this day when my cares mounted, it set me free, because it reminded me that I’m grass—not God.

It made me feel lighter somehow. I felt silly for fretting. If my life seems like a blade of grass in the expanse of eternity, then I need to get busy being a happy blade of grass.

Maybe you’re like me, and you take yourself way too seriously. You worry and forget to pray.

That day in the car God reminded me to do my job—the trusting part, and leave orchestrating the cosmos up to him. Our days here are short, and God’s numbered them already, (Psalm 139:16).

Next time I’m tempted to see a world that orbits around me, I’m going to remember who breathed supernovas into existence. And I’ll think about grass—or the wildflowers growing in my backyard.

Before the layer of ice formed across my back yard, I was growing some blue ribbon, Texas-sized dandelions. They bloom on borrowed time, because if the ice doesn’t kill ‘em, I will.

We had finished lunch, and my son slid down from his booster chair and took two steps from the table before he started howling in pain.

I noticed agony written across his face.

I carried him to the couch and cradled him in my arms for several minutes. He didn’t want to walk or put any weight on his left leg. As tears fell down his face he pointed to his left kneecap

The pain sent him back to the couch all afternoon. He tried to hobble away a few times, but he never made it far.

I didn’t worry about it too much. Somewhere along the way I had read about growing pains and knew a growth plate lived near the kneecap.

As we walked down the stairs the next morning, his hand in mine, I reassured him, “Those were probably just growing pains.”

And in that moment I heard the Lord whispering the same thing to me. These pains of the past few months have been growing pains.

My spiritual bones have stretched forth in all directions. And it hurts. It explains the bone-deep ache and soreness I’ve felt the last few months.

But pain often points to growth. It’s evidence that we’re moving forward. Growth shows us we’re living, and I’m trying to welcome life every chance I have, even when it’s mixed with pain.

Sometimes growth can only be appreciated in retrospect, when heads lean against door frames and pencil lines sketch the progress.

Parents know when a growth spurt threatens. They see the ramp up in hunger just like I noticed my son devour three pieces of egg casserole that morning.

If you’re in the middle of a season of growth and pain, increase your intake of the Word of God. You’re going to need it.

And take some time to relish the fact that God, “the author and finisher of your faith” (Heb. 12:3), is growing you.

“And I am certain that God, who began the good work within you, will continue his work until it is finally finished on the day when Christ Jesus returns,” (Philippians 1:6).