What Came First the Woman or the Mother?

So we’re all familiar with the old adage ‘what came first the chicken or the egg?’ I don’t think I’ve ever thought of this question in human terms. Perhaps the analogies have always been implied but suffice it to say if it had, I missed it.

So, I believe women are by nature: caregivers, helpful, intuitive, decisive, organized, and detail-oriented and of course above all else - loving. God in His infinite wisdom has created us this way. It is who we are before we are anything else. Little girls can be seen ‘caring’ for their dolls, stuffed animals, even friends. Young girls focus on the details of growing up, become aware of boys and focus on becoming women. Teenage girls have agendas and ‘stuff’ they must organize, friendships they must navigate and maturing boys who take notice. From the time we are little girls to the time we are young adult women we think about the future, marriage, children, someone to love. It is engrained in our very being. Yet, we are all those qualities of a woman before we become mothers. Some never become mothers yet they have maternal instincts that are revealed in their friendships and relationships. The caregiver in all of us, the desire to emulate what we have been taught from our own mothers or significant women in our lives comes out regardless of childbirth.

But, the question is…when we shine in our ability to organize, decide, lead a situation, help someone, intuitively ‘do’ for someone, love…are we being maternal or just women?

A man’s first experiences with women are with their mothers and so all subsequent experience with women is gauged on that. Some men want to be ‘mothered’; some are opposed to being ‘mothered’. My point is this; I don’t think women want to ‘mother’ men. I think some women want to control their men and need to come to an understanding that trying to control anyone other than ourselves is futile.

What men need to understand is that when we exhibit the behaviors of a woman we shouldn’t be accused of trying to be their mother…we should be thanked for being a woman.

Looking for Love

I am single, divorced, alone. I have been 'looking for love' for sometime. I have friends that tell me "don't go looking for love, it will come to you". But in my quiet time, a still small voice comes to me and says:
'how can you be looking for what you already possess?'

Beth Moore (my new favorite Christian author) tells us that we love because He loved us first and she profoundly points out that instead of saying "I love you God" - we should say "I love you too!" because when we feel the need to express our love to the Father it is because He's already 'been lovin' on us'. How awesome is that?

I have some incredible friends and friendships! Some long established and some brand new, but in every case if I'm spending time with them, it's because I love them...and I feel their love in return. My children, my family...they are sources for and recipents of my love. So, my friend is right, I should not go looking for love. But not because it will come to me, but rather because I already possess it. What satisfies me most, is loving people in the way that they most need it. A meal, a hug, a note, a smile, helping someone move...it doesn't matter. As I pour out to others what my Savior has given to me, it is truly multiplied and that is how it comes back to me.
I am so blessed.

The path I walk

The path I walk, or attempt to walk, is a narrow one. When I focus on the path that has been set before me it is well lit and straight, it is less traveled. When my eyes are averted and my attention wavers the path becomes rocky, slippery, sometimes tangled with weeds and other obstacles, it is broader and sometimes becomes crowded.

I know the path that has been set for me...it fills me with joy and eternal pleasures, and promises of rest. When I am tired and unsure or at a crossroads I need only to ask for my Father which is the way of the good path and He will lead me, make known to me the way.

Today, I am in awe and thankful for those that my Father has allowed to cross my path. As I stay in His presence and ask to be used for His glory, to be a vessel that pours out to others - He brings me people of encouragement, people in need, people who are hurting and people who are lost. He brings me people from my past, those that I thought I'd lost to remind me of who I am. He brings me strangers who I can relate and empathize with who become part of my furture - and I am filled when I see all of them the way God wants me to see them and love them as He does. How is it that when we ask to be used and to give, our Father in turn fills us? His love endures forever and no good thing will He keep from us.

And so because His promises are abundant, because He is always right, because in Him there is unending hope and everlasting love I will continue to say "Show me your ways, LORD, teach me your paths" (Psalm 25:4)...and I welcome all to come with me, for in Him there is no darkness.

Blinded

I was driving to work through the resevoir again today...it is my usual quiet drive. I choose it over the busier highway for its serenity and closeness to nature. As I drove over the little causeway with water on both sides I came to the center where the road is uneven, and a great puddle had formed for it was a very rainey, grey day. I slowed and saw another vehicle approaching from the opposite direction but really thought little of it. As we both hit our respective puddles a great wall of water from the other vehicle's progress through the puddle hit my windshield, essentially blinding me!

I was shocked, did not expect that! Temporary blindness while driving a car...unsettling to say the least. I thanked my Father for not sending me careening into the resevoir, gathered my wits and continued on.

How many times have we been unexpectedly blinded...but in hindsight realize we could have 'seen' it coming? In retrospect, it isn't the first time I was blinded by a wall of water. Another time I was driving on the Jersey Turnpike in a horrible storm and a wall of water came from across the Jersey barrier propelled by an 18 wheeler. I saw it coming and still, the temporary blindness seemed unexpected at the time. So my question is this...if we are to have eyes to see and ears to hear...why don't we? We, at times, play on the edge of darkness, throw caution to the wind, go about our own willful way and we are surprized when life jumps up and thows us a curve ball all the way exclaiming, "I didn't know, didn't realize, didn't 'see' that coming". Perhaps, or perhaps we looked upon the huge puddle, observed the approaching car and chose not to put 2 and 2 together. Blinded or just running with blinders on? In our own little world of our own choosing.

More of where I've been...

I had been a lukewarm, bench sitting, ‘pewsitter’ for a number of years…stuck in a tiny, quiet, legalistic church where the spirit rarely visited and was seldom spoke of. Earlier this year, due to circumstances out of my control regarding a close friend and sister in Christ, I and a few others left that church. Some saw it as a church split and so suddenly my church community of 9 years was ripped from my walk. And so, rather than spitting me out of His mouth, God saw to it that I was removed from my comfort zone, and it was painful and disconcerting, yet I drew near to Him. I continued to study and fellowship with those few who had left and prayed for something bigger, praying earnestly for the Holy Spirit to provide me a place to rest and grow. Since then God has continued to bring me situations, people, and places that have given me a clearer understanding of who He is and the direction He wants me to go. He has brought me to places I could never have imagined…as I sought His church…His people. And He continued to show me things that I needed to see…because my biggest problem wasn’t being stuck in a legalistic church, my biggest problem was me.

With His guidance and through those He has sent I have come to realize that I am fully acceptable and fully worthy. But to know that wasn’t enough…I’ve had to continue to be shown it through His love to get to a place within myself where I could accept it for myself.

Eventually God brought me here, to Victory Christian Church, where He continues to work on me. Here I have come not only to see the spirit moving but to expect it, embrace it and truly feel it within me. God continues to work on my imperfections and to reveal and remove those strongholds that have kept me from an abundant life in Him. I have not only come to understand, but I have come to BELIEVE that there is no affirmation from people, no missing validation from my past, no relationship that is going to satisfy me. I AM fully worthy and I BELIEVE I am acceptable… He is the bread of life but He is also the peanut butter and jelly for in Him I am fully satisfied.

It Surrounds Me

I drove through the reservoir on my way to work today, a bright sunny sub-zero of a temperature day.

As I crossed the tiny causeway that intersects the reservoir I observed the tiny bushes and small trees that lined the road. There was a fine, pure white frost thick on the branches making them look like something in a fairytale land and as I drove by, pure crystals of ice reflected the sun and sparkled like the brightest LED light you can imagine, and I thought....

....this, this might begin to approach how my Father's house will be. But my Father's house will be so much more than I or anyone can imagine. It's glory and beauty will be more than the most proclaimed artists can render, more than the brightest visionaries can foresee and more than the best technology can mock-up. I looked upon the beauty that God shared with me today and I slowed, and I smiled, and I said thank you.

I can not wait to put on the finest garment that He will clothe me in and bask in the beauty knowing that in His eyes I am part of what makes it beautiful!! A reflection of the Son, I will sparkle because I AM beautiful. ;-)

My past does not define my future

I talked with Leah today. I am always so encouraged by her as I hear the Spirit that is inside of me speak through me, assuring her that I am more or less on the right path, am changed from the person I used to be some 16 or so years ago since I met her. Oh my, how the time flies. Oh my, how hard I was, closed, reactive, stressed, hurting, angry a lot of the time, resentful, burdened, enslaved, cold and unloving.
I was a good person. Isn’t that what they all say? What did she see? This young woman, who seemed so innocent to the ways of the world - how could she have ever thought to consider I could be saved? After all, I was sure I didn’t need saving. I went to church, sometimes. Believed in God and thought about Him when I needed something. Why would she venture into my world, risk getting dirtied by my inequities? There is of course no answer; no earthly answer to these rhetorical questions. There is a heavenly answer though. When someone like Leah walks in the footsteps of the Savior, they see what He sees…where someone is going, not where they’ve been. They see redemption, not condemnation. They cloak the anger and pain with love and pray for a softness to take over the hardened. That was Leah’s prayer for me; that the God of all creation would soften my heart, and draw me near to Him.
I look back on the last 16 years with regret sometimes and I see how close I came to ‘getting’ it before now and also how close I came to completely falling away. Sometimes it feels as though I have wasted so much time, but I know there is no benefit from looking at my walk, my transformation, the revealing of my new self and how long it took, in a negative way. Every seed has its own germination time, every fruit it’s time of peak harvest. God knows this and I trust that while He would have loved to spare me from some of my own undoing, He allowed it as part of the process. What good is watering a seed if it is plucked from the earth before it can bear fruit? What good is harvesting the fruit if it is bitter or sour without enough time to ripen to full sweetness? Oh how I love the God who allowed me my own will in order to choose Him. Oh how I love that He chose me first. I choose my future path now…rather than wandering down ‘a’ path and sometimes veering off into brambles and thorns before stumbling on the easy path again and being moved along with the rest of the world. This path is not as easy, it is less traveled….but oh the colors. They are so vibrant, and the air is so clear and the scent of God is everywhere. This is the path I choose. It is the path that begins with acceptance. Acceptance of myself and the embracement of an attitude of gratefulness and trust that today, I am exactly where I am supposed to be. This fruit of course, is not yet fully ripened, has a ways to go to full sweetness...but the roots are on firm ground now, near running waters that give life and oh how the Son does shine!

If there are trials, they will strengthen me, when there is bounty I will share it and where there is love, my God is there and I will run to Him.