Joy in the Journey: drawing from sources

Last week I posted about the question that plagues our generation today. Unfortunately, our girls.

"What are you going to do with your life? Don't throw it away with fairy tale ideas."

Since when did becoming a wife and mother merit the term "fairytale."  How did we as a nation go from having high school classes devoted to helping girls fulfill their God-designed and planned roles to pumping up the feminine success that drives our current culture?

Sad, very sad.

Seeing as I am not the norm, I have never really cared for the norm, nor will my thoughts be changed anytime soon (or easily for the matter), I choose to break the pattern my generation has laid firmly. I choose to be career minded in the blueprint written and sketched in the love letter from my Father. My job description can be found here and the requirements/qualifications can be found here. Just as I wrote in my last post, I am in training. I am working hard!

Like I wrote, it is sometimes trying. Sometimes, it is hard. However, I wanted to follow up with some helpful hints. I can't say it enough, DRAW from sources around you! This will be your most helpful text book!

1. Surround yourself with people who have done it, are doing it, and want to do it. Gain insight, encouragement, and passion. When you are with like-minded individuals you will grow in your love for the subject. It's like music. Alone, a guitar or piano sound nice. If you put the two together, and add drums, electric, bass, maybe a little wind, all of the sudden you have a fantastic sound all because you added it together. Same in life. If you feel discouraged about the next step in obedience, get some encouragement. After a while the sounds together will become a wonderful and big sound.

2. Read about it. There is a whole new world of encouragement out there thanks to the internet. Some of my favorite reads are moms young and older who I find full of information and passion for their positions. They post, funny stories, recipes, family activities, ways to add fun to teaching your children, and fun organizational or budgeting tips. Thier resources are endless if you stockpile enough of them in your bloglovin'!! Try it out! Some of my favorites are:

Raising Arrows
Grace Full Mama
Raising Homemakers
Time-Warp Wife
Serving Joyfully
Simply Helping Him
Blissful and Domestic
Unveiled Wife

3. Teach, teach, teach. It is said that your retain more information if you are teaching someone else what you're learning.  That is exactly why I turn the tables on my ESL class and have them "teach" me or each other a new phrase they learned or why a word is pronounced a certain way. In order for them to teach they have to learn and once they tell the others they are more apt to remember. Same principle applies here. Grab a sister, or honorary sister, have a baking party, plant a garden, babysit, clean something, make a meal for someone, do a project, the possibilities are endless.

God has provided not one, but 2 built in learners. Being in the middle of 5 girls, I have 2 older to learn from, and 2 younger to teach (and sometimes learn too! =D). I have the best of both worlds!

4. Draw from where you find the passion in the first place. Lean heavily on the Father. He is your source of strength. He planted in your heart the desire and He will finish in you the work He has started. In His Word he has printed time and time again that He is your joy! Find it!

5. Remember you are already a Bride. As Christ followers, bought with a price, we are already brides of Him. We may not be able to cook Him meals, and rub his tired shoulders, but anything we do to the least of these, we do to Him. He says in His Word, everything you do, do ALL for the glory of God. Your life of service will praise His name or tear it down. So living the right now to HIS glory is our ultimately calling as brides of Christ.

Take heart! Enjoy the journey!

Joy in the journey: the things they don't tell the trainee

"you aren't going to just sit around and wait for prince charming to come along are you?!"

Can I get a, "mmhmm," if you've been asked this question?!

I did. I have for the last 5 or 6 years. When it became evident that God was clearly leading me away from the "further education" route, so many well-meaning, godly individuals questioned my decision. For a choice that seems so foreign, I was being so judged. From those in authority, brothers and sisters in Christ, pastors, leaders, and the like all casts eyes of disapproval with sighs of disappointment and sympathy as to voice thier concern for me "throwing my life away."

I hurt, literally, by the comments, well-meaning or not, that people gave freely and in abundance. I didn't see Sally Mae get the same treatment for her choice of school or Billy Jo for his choice of country to be a missionary. Unfortunaetly all these were lofty, grand, humbling, and bold statements of thier faith to step out from the childhood and into serving God on college campuses and locations around the globe.

And me? Well, I wasn't. I wasn't grabbing my passport and heading to the airport. I wasn't cashing in my highschool books for college edition. I wasn't packing my things and headed to a discipleship school. To them I wasn't doing anything.

Is any of this resonating with anyone? Am I playing a few familiar cords? What I heard as obedience from my heavenly Father, to others was laziness, an excuse to sit around and loaf, and a poor example of a "good Christian girl." To me, oh to me it was much different. I felt a calling of a different kind. To Sally and Billy they followed Jesus onto a college campus and into the middle of a remote village in Uganda. My calling wasn't to a school or overseas, yet. My calling was for my life. I wasn't devoting 2 years post graduation to a people group or 4 + years to a degree and eventual success. I was devoting my life to the the calling that I find clearly laid out in His Word for me.

When asked as a child what I wanted to be when I grew up it was always one thing. A wife and mom. End. of. story.

I knew then God's call on my life would follow close to this. As I have grown and matured, I have seen it play out slightly different than I expected but it remains the same call.

Allow me to explain. I didn't jump out of my cap and gown and into a wedding dress, followed by a baby by anniversary #1 and house with a fence, jobs set, and 3 or 4 consecutive small ones to follow. I didn't stay home with my rooms all tidy and mannerly children. It hasn't happened that way and I wouldn't want it to. As with any job I need training. That, my friends, is where I am now. I am in training.

You would never lay down to open heart surgery preformed by a man who woke up one day and put on scrubs, would you? NO. And you wouldn't hire a man to file your taxes who never heard of the various forms and filing systems, would you? NO. And you would never ask someone to plead your case in court who never cracked the cover of a law book, would you? NO.

All of these occupations and so many others require schooling, training, hours of practice, observation, attention, work, and a desire to complete said job. For most careers on this earth you can't just walk in and express that you woke up and wanted to be whatever it is. It takes time.

To be clear here, the moms who had less training this doesn't make you less equipped. God knew what you needed and how much you needed. If you did jump from one thing to wife in a matter of months God designed that for you. For me, He plotted out a few more months/years. However the amount of time, you still need training. To be a wife and mother requires work and training. Those two occupations hold so many hats and take so many talents.

So, to answer the question, no. I am not going to sit around while I am waiting. I am training. As with most things the waiting and training are hard, draining, and difficult at times. The things you don't hear are often the things we don't want to admit for fear of "failing."

Things like:

#1 At the end of the day, it's still training. You will tuck in someone else's children, clean someone else's kitchen, and put away someone else's food. You won't come down your stairs at the end of a long day and curl up next to your hubby.

#2 You are going against the grain of our modern culture. Any time you go against the flow it take a LOT of work.

#3 There is no time line. No "end in sight" at any given moment. You don't know when your training will be over and you can't plot out the events of your days accordingly. You have to devote your time and energy to training and God will decide when you have completed it, not you.

#4 You're being watched and that is weary. It is hard to be constantly observed. So many are just watching you and what you do mostly because of #2.

It doesn't make this job easier to express these things. The only thing it does do is help you realize that others feel the same way.

I have struggled with perfectionism for a long time. I am learning that it is rooted in something not eternal seeking and I need to s.t.o.p. However, for so long that fed my need to NOT admit that I had feelings of failure. It is a work and a striving after Him and His ways. It is not an overnight feat and I thought that if I voiced my concern for a issue, problem, or shortcoming I had altogether failed. NOT TRUE! Not at all my friends. Admitting where you come short shows His strength all the more.

So, dear readers, if you are reading along and feel like it is a little tiring right now rest on these things.

• God is with you and promises to always be. He will never leave you or forsake you and He will give you strength to get up and do it again.
• You are not alone...There are so many out there who feel the same way. Take heart that there is Joy in the Journey. 
• Strive with all your heart for the end result and that is to glorify the Father. I heard it said last weekend, "God, if you are glorified, I am satisfied." Be satisfied in that. 

Happy Wednesday!  

the great 9 week to-do list!

Earlier this year I made the choice to chop my job. I cut out 2/3 of the kids effectively reducing my paycheck to 1/3 of the normal amount and taking out 90% of the occurrences causing some major draining on my emotional and physical bank accounts. I know the math there was kind of faulty, just roll with me on this one! 

Many are the plans in a man's heart...many! But it is GOD'S purposes, plans, and priorities that will prevail! 

After making this decision I waited until Friday. You see, Friday was the horizon I had been working at seeing over for 3 months. On the other side was 9 whole weeks of freedom! Yes, you read that correctly. For 9 weeks, 45 workdays I will only be working a grand total of 8 hours each week. Doable? I think yes! 

With the other time I plan on getting some projects DONE! I can't wait to roll up my sleeves and attack some serious Proverbs 31 woman jobs! My goal will be to post 1 job each week that I accomplished! Follow along and tag along if you care to and post some of your summer projects! I'd love to get inspired! 

I have no rules for myself because I am taking this new approach that says, "if I finished a job I succeeded." (more on that later)! I want fun and work to tango to provide a refreshing and rejuvenating few months!

As many projects as I can do, 

1 post a week about said projects,

and 9 weeks to do it! 

Let's begin!

mirey clay

He brought me up out of the pit of destruction, out of the miry clay, And He set my feet upon a rock making my footsteps firm. Psalm 40:2

I promise, I am still in existence. It's been a whirlwind month or so. Learning lots and tons to be thankful for. I am headed away this weekend after I wrap up the last day of full time work for not one, not two, but 3 whole months of 1 day a weekers! Praise the Lord for some time off! God knew I needed it! 

Working on some posts...promise! Excited about the directions I'm being lead.

Praising Him from the rock and wish you all a happy weekend!