What You Are First

Let me begin with this brief but necessary statement: I am not an expert. Looking back at my last post, I guess that's what most bothers me about A LOT of people getting access to platforms, big or small, and presenting opinions as truth and using their lives as a sort of cornerstone from which we all should build ours.

But I'm less fired up today so suffice it to say: God is not a copy and paste God. Truth never changes. But in order for us to work out Truth in our own lives, we have to stay close to the Holy Spirit because it does NOT always look the same.

"All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work."
2 Timothy 3: 16-17

This diversity in how we walk out our callings carries a very beautiful tension in it. I rub shoulders everyday in friendship with women who are living by the same Truth and the tasks we are called to are very different.

I got a phone call with a friend this weekend that my heart didn't even know it needed.  She'd called wanting clarity on something that recently God had been talking to me about but I hadn't had time to fully process. God's sneaky like that. He knew I needed to rehearse those same truths, and I was not going to do without impetus from somewhere else.

Her initial text said this:
"Hey Charis, I remember you sharing a few years ago how sometimes motherhood is hard for you because of the different dreams that were on your heart. I am totally in the throes of that right now and I'm really wanting to learn how to find peace in this season."

In all honesty, deep into this fourth kid business, my dreams have shrunk to both the immediate and practical:
to have empty laundry baskets and a floor that cleans itself,
to teach Cade to aim when he pees,
to work out in peace,
to literally be in a hut on an island where there's a whirling fan, a massive bed with white linens, and I am told to sleep for as long as I like- and since my quality time bucket has a hole, Chad can be there too but he has to be watching football on his ipad with earphones in and my kids can be playing in another room being supervised by my favorite highschooler Chloe.
THIS IS THE EXTENT OF MY DREAMS LATELY.

But while we talked, I grabbed my journal and went to an entry I had written just a few weeks before that I'd almost forgotten about.

About a year ago I was asked to step into a role at our church that felt so out of my comfort zone and gifting zone (to be honest) and while it's not a part-time or full-time job, it requires a lot of my emotional and mental space some weeks. Ever since I accepted it, I've had this new wrestle in my heart. Is this "yes" stealing from my kids? How can I possibly be a good mom and a good anything else right now? Can I do both things well? Did call me to be a mom, or to be this?

I am not sure if men deal with this struggle. I've never heard Chad consider quitting his job because he thinks its taking him away from the kids. He has never once said he felt guilty for leaving them with me. Maybe some men do feel guilty. In our home, that's not the case. So Chad hasn't really understood me when I'm anxious for my children, wondering if they'll look back on their childhoods and not think they were truly epic. And if it wasn't, could it be because Mom was distracted, irritated over a million other things, and half-hearted? (Because somehow in my messed up thinking, if I didn't have this "job" to think about, I'd be Mary Poppins. Surely, right?!)

I took all this mess to God. I have so many friends who work part-time, full-time and feel CALLED to what they're doing. And I don't doubt them. But the wrestle is real. I was trying to sort through my own callings, leadings, promptings, purpose, designs, etc. As I journaled, I felt like God said it all boiled down to one question:

WHAT ARE YOU FIRST?

As Bill Johnson says, when God asks a question, I don't assume I know the answer. So I wrote out what I felt like He was saying.

First, you are a daughter. This teaches you worship, and identity. You are not an orphan. You are not a victim.
Second, you are a wife. This teaches you love and faithfulness. You were created to be a lifelong companion to Chad, equal in worth, suited to best walk out life with him.
Third, you are a mother. This teaches you leadership, how to champion people, and how to cover them well.

Everything else is fruit of those roles. I learn who I am by prioritizing being a daughter of God. I don't have to fight for my giftings, for my advancement, for my recognition, for my "time" in the spotlight. I can trust the Father with all my dreams, island get away and all.

In my life, the second role I received after being a daughter was being a wife. I learn how to love and how to be consistent and helpful, truly useful and practically beneficial by creating a safe place for my husband. It is a gift to walk with him. It is a privilege to know him. It is good to tell him that I believe he was created to lead our family well, and he doesn't have to be passive. Eve showed us all what happens when we take the reigns from our men. NOTE: IT DOESN'T END WELL.

And after I was made a wife, I became a mother. I learn how to lead others, how to believe in others, how to forgive, how to fight on behalf of others, how to inspire others, how to make others great by being a mom. Motherhood has taught me self-forgetfulness in the truest and sweetest ways. I am not jealous of my kids giftings, I am not trying to vicariously live through them, I am so proud of who they are and what they're like and they haven't even begun to try and impress me.

If I can be a daughter, then be a wife, and then be a mother, in my heart first, I can take on other roles without getting them confused. Being anything else doesn't take away what I am first and foremost in my life. I don't know what roles you'll walk in, what things you're taking on, and I don't have a cut and clear vision for what to say yes to and what to say no to. It will probably shift for so many of us all throughout our lives. Women's lives are so seasonal and transient that way. But staying connected to the Father, staying connected to what we are FIRST, as a daughter, teaches us how to live everything else out.

"So friends, take a firm stand, feet on the ground and head high. Keep a tight grip on what you were taught, whether in personal conversation or by our letter. May Jesus himself and God our Father, who reached out in love and surprised you with gifts of unending help and confidence, put a fresh heart in you, invigorate your work, enliven your speech." 2 Thessalonians 2:15-17 MSG