My Advocate

As women we are natural nurturers. We do our best to really see other people. We help, we care, we guide, we teach, we give, we love. And if we spent time on each of those descriptors alone, we could create a pretty long list that would keep us here all day and night!

I never realized the extent to which I could love the role of wife and mother more than any other role I could ever have in my life. These people that God has entrusted to me have enriched in my life in more ways than one. For them, I would give it all. Easily. Every. Single. Day.

While this fact brings me fulfillment and purpose and immense joy, it’s amazing how it can simultaneously exhaust me. I cannot do it all in my own strength and do it well. I need a power source. I know that I desperately need a never-ending supply of grace to first receive, and then to give.

Recently, one of my devotions lead me to Romans chapter eight. So timely in so many ways for me. Even in ways I didn’t know I needed. Aren’t those the best realizations sometimes?

“And in a similar way, the Holy Spirit takes hold of us in our human frailty to empower us in our weakness. For example, at times we don’t even know how to pray, or know the best things to ask for. But the Holy Spirit rises up within us to super-intercede on our behalf, pleading to God with emotional sighs too deep for words. God, the searcher fo the heart, knows fully our longings, yet he also understands the desires of the Spirit, because the Holy Spirit passionately pleads before God for us, his holy ones, in perfect harmony with God’s plan and our destiny.” Romans 8:26-27

There it was! A sigh of relief that made me tear up as I read and re-read it over and over again for a week. I spend so much of my time advocating for my family, meeting their daily needs, and here is Jesus meeting mine when I don’t even know what to ask for myself. He never stops, never sleeps, never sweeps past me for even a moment. He understands me deeply and intimately, and goes to God on my behalf daily. What a sense of comfort and security to know that I am fully seen and Jesus is speaking up for me. And He is doing the same for you.

So tonight, once my fingers stop pitter-pattering away at this keyboard, I will rest in knowing that God “fully knows my longings” and that He “passionately pleads before God” for me. (Sigh!)

To New Beginnings and Embracing Uniqueness

Let’s be honest: we all fall privy to the comparison trap.

We see others’ lives and question our own motives, choices, lifestyle, and even who we are. Sometimes I wish I could live with blinders over my eyes. “Stay in your lane,” I say to myself. As if this would make it go away. But it doesn’t. Not always.

And this isn’t necessarily a bad thing. This is just our human nature. This becomes a bad thing when we let it hinder our instincts with the specific tasks that are set before us. It is often those instincts that make us who we are. They add to our uniqueness, and so it is important we do not neglect them. In fact, we need to feed those instincts so we become more comfortable with fully embracing our true selves and who we were created to be in Christ. So here I am, typing away at an “all too late for this mama” hour of the night, so I can embrace my “uniqueness.”

“For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, in which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.”

Ephesians 2:10

Let us not get so lost in the daily to-do lists that we forget to give time to the things that allow us to take a few deep breaths and rest. Bake the cupcakes, pick up that paintbrush, finish that journal entry, go for another walk, finish that sewing project. Do not lose sight of who you are. This attention and care is not just for you. When you take time to focus on the things that enhance your spirit, you are making room for opportunities in your life to share that beauty with others around you. The light that gives way in you, will radiate to others, too.

So let it shine, friend! The time is now.