Once upon a time, (almost ten years ago) I had a little baby, she was so very tinny and she fell in love with a little bunny my sister bought her. I remember vividly when we got Kopy, I was almost a week late with Maddy and my sister wanted to get her something cute so we went to Toys R Us to look and to pass the time. My sister approached me with an adorable stuffed bunny and she said she wanted to gift that to my very late lump of meat! I didn’t know then that this little bunny would become such a beloved part of our family! We have loved Kopy ever since; Me, in love with the “magic” in Kopy that soothed Maddy when she felt distressed and Maddy In love with the feeling of being connected and safe with her plush little stuffy!

Kopy was all Maddy ever wanted when she was sleeping or awake. It’s truly a miracle that we still have her. Once we forgot her in Ventura and my in-laws had to rush-ship her, like she was the cure to something or something!

Recently, Kopy was diagnosed with an illness called, Flat-a-no-stuffing-left-on-the-head-iatis. My little girl has been asking me to mend Kopy! She kept saying she wasn’t as comfy and plush as her old self. Her right ear had a tear from many nights chewing on it for comfort! Coincidently my father is battling stage four brain cancer and we are in the throws of grief and watching someone we love feel horrible. I have always been weary of being “soft” on my kids to the point where they’d think that a stuffed animal is their safety because I want them to learn that their safety comes from Christ alone. And it’s been an everyday journey to teach them that God is the only thing that never changes. Even when we lose Kopy or people, God remains our safety and comfort. And I think a part of me wanted this rigidity to remain mainly because I didn’t want to allow the “Little Libier” in me to fall pray to falling in love with a stuffie I would sometime need to say goodby to. As I delve deeper into the heart of Christ here’s what I’m learning …..

Kopy has been a representative of Christ to my Maddy her whole life; Jesus’s hands and feet, if you will. Kopy has been with her through many a trial. From her first upset stomach to feeling scared to be in a “big-girl” bed. To the dreaded day, we had to pass the binky onto a little baby who really needed it, ha! To the fun moments of learning how to ride a bike, and getting to go on long road trips, Kopy has seen it all! Who am I to minimize the importance of a stuffed animal to my little girl’s life just because I'm secretly afraid of connection and relying on relationships?

I’ve been going to a lot of therapy since this has been one zinger of a year for me and what I’ve discovered is that when I feel afraid of being abandoned or rejected, my reaction is to become independent in my emotional heart. I want to push away the love the comes to me because I’m terrified of losing it. But by keeping it out, I isolate myself and feel lonely even still. So I guess that opening up my heart is actually the way I overcome this fear because the fear of losing someone or something is already feeling like I’ve lost. It’s a fantasy in my own head and I’m discovering that God’s peace and grace is tailormade for the moment not for my anxious thoughts about a future that I’m not actually experiencing! Tailormade grace for the moment! When I give my trust to Jesus and open my heart to allow love in I’m able to delight in the emotion I’ve been afraid of losing all my life! When I am hurt or disappointed God will ALWAYS be my comfort at the time of the actual loss not before it! See, God will never abandon or reject me. But when someone does; Christ will be there to comfort me. What freedom right. It’s like I just discovered that I can love and be loved.

As I become softer and have more self-compassion, I have noticed myself being able to extend that to those I love. My little girl asked me if I could help her Kopy and stitch her up; the stuffing inside her was almost nonexistent. I heard my little girl’s plea and instead of minimizing her and thinking something like, “Kopy is just old, you’re going to have to rely on Jesus more! Get over it! let’s give it away!” I took my patookus to Joanne’s Fabric and bought fiberfill for the surgery of a lifetime. See, I’ve been praying to God to show me how to help my children grieve about my father’s cancer. They are experiencing their grandfather in a delicate state; I’m sure this is impacting their little hearts in a very big way. Since I’m also grieving and learning how to cope with this season, sometimes I don’t know what to do or say to my children. I’ve been praying that God would help me know what to do. And to become a safe place for my children to be emotionally supported by me, even as I find my own support in the Lord!

You’d think God would’ve directed me to do a more impactful thing other than re-stuffing an old friend. I think sometimes I want to overcomplicate the simplicity of God’s tender love through meeting the “little” needs of my children. Patching up Kopy might have not meant so much to me at that time, but that’s what God called me to do. Aaaaaand it ended up being a HUGE blessing to our entire family! I didn’t know that God would also be ministering to my little heart as I helped my daughter regain her lifetime friend.

My view of what matters right now is so ultra-focused because I feel like I’m losing my dad. I’m feeling so grateful for life itself right now and the people that God is allowing to love on me! I’m hyper-focused on the small details of life that will bring peace and healing to our household. As I stuffed Kopy and threaded the needle, I realized that that’s how God works with us. He finds us lifeless, a little tattered and he doesn’t just count us as a too broken to help. He delicately stuffs us with his grace, mercy, and forgiveness. When we ask him into our hearts he puts his beautiful Holy Spirit within us.

And he seals us up with a MIGHTY seal that NOTHING, moving forward can separate us from him ever again! IT is finished. What he did on the cross for us we don’t deserve but he sacrificed his life so you and I would never have to wonder if we belong to his family. Romans 10: 9 says “If you declare with your mouth, "Jesus is Lord," and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.”

As my fingers threaded through Kopy’s plush, I felt so much hope in that God is the only thing we can ever truly count on to never change, but he uses the little details in our lives to give us encouragement. People we love will get sick, we might lose our stuffed animals we’ve grown to love. We will experience tragedy and loss. We will inevitably go through pain in this life that is for sure. People, all people can disappoint us. We can also disappoint those we love. We will react in strange ways when we feel scared and hurt, and in all of this, Christ will remain steadfast and mightly to help us at the moment of need!

But this is true, we are free to LOVE. We can choose to lean into connection and relationships, even to a stuffed lovey that we might have to say goodbye to because God is in the tiniest of details of our life. And when we face disappointment of any kind, God’s tailored made grace meets us miraculously! And
God can use the simplest of things to bring us comfort and if my little girl wants to love Kopy who am I to stop her?

Kopy has had 10 years of life as her old self and yesterday she was filled with NEW LIFE! Kopy can stand on her own again and is ready to be of help to my not-so-little girl who is grieving her grandfather.

Friend, I pray that wherever you are at in life, that you’d feel the love of Christ like never before. I pray that your heart would be encouraged that whatever suffering you ever go through will NEVER be in vain. That your suffering produces something in you that God uses to prepare you for everything he has for you! Trust in him with your heart as you navigate the hardships in your life. Focus not on the storm but on his name alone and watch as your fears and worries start to melt away as if you had a stuffie supporting your every need! I love this passage from Romans 5:3-5 “We also glory in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope.  And hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us.” You are not alone God’s got you! I’ll see you next week!

HOW TO MAKE AN OLD STUFFED ANIMAL LOOK NEW AGAIN

1. Buy your supplies/ I got thread that match the color of our stuffed animal and needles / I bought Poly-fil

2. Find a place in between the seams of a stitch, where it might be not noticeable to the trained eye where you cut open a space wide enough to stuff your stuffed animal, with good scissors, make a the cut!

3. Stuff as much of the Poly-fil as you need to restore the new feeling again!

4. Thread your needle.

5. Sew the cut securely.

6. Voila! A new stuffed animal!