I cannot stop thinking about them. They are branded on my heart… seared into my every thought. Every detail. Every Act. Every thoughtful thing they did. Perhaps the imprint, not necessarily that of their own, but rather how they chose to be Christ to me.
How precious those memories are. They become more so with the passage of time. I am older now then most of them where back then. Yet, their wisdom surely surpassed what I feel like mine is at this stage. In every way, they emulated those women in Titus… reverent, loving, pure and honorable.
In a recent conversation with a young mom, she shared her desperation for having communion with Godly older women. “Women who have survived the early years of family and marriage and feeling as if everything is on hold while they raise babies.” That amazingly busy “Summer Season” of our womanhood.
Her desperate cries compelled me to search for the answers for her…. as my mind dusted off the files, it occurred to me again.. She needs me.
I could feel my own heart thump louder, almost drowning out her voice….panic set in. In a quick darted prayer, I could hear my own voice cry, “Surely I am not THAT women.” Feelings of lack flooded over me.. The enemy leans in suggesting, You my dear are certainly not “pure” enough. Wise enough.” In defiance, I felt every fiber of me fight back……Really? Surely I am seasoned enough. I have lived enough life. I’ve shed enough tears. I have had to pick myself up from my boot straps enough times. I have prayed, and swore, and promised to change, and changed…. enough. I have enough awareness to see the times that God has carried me through the things I never thought I could see the other side of. I could feel the enemy shrivel. He isn’t used to me fighting back. That in and of itself is growth.
The truth is, this young mom needs the same thing I needed when I was her. Someone who can listen. Who can assure her that there is life after… this season. That she is doing a good a job, and that she is more “normal” that the enemy would like her to believe. That no, she isn’t the only one who cries herself to sleep some nights out of frustration and fatigue. And no, she isn’t the only one that feels she has nothing left to give. And, yes, she is enough just the way she is.
I am learning that the thing I need the most, in order to step into this new season of my life, is the acceptance and the gratitude that all those things that I cried out to God to provide, he did. The awareness that while I wasn’t 100% the woman I needed to be in the moment, I was enough because God picked up the slack and moved me into being “her.” He knew who I could be. And, that is why with confidence he could tell me I was enough. He always knew, who I was becoming.
The enemy can confuse us by reminding us that we are still praying the same prayer all these years later. “Make me more.. God.” In truth, if we will be honest, we should all be praying that we become…. MORE. At every stage of our life, we should be asking God to fuel that desire to be more…. More giving, more available, more aware, more wise…. More like Christ.
We just have to ask.
“If anyone lacks wisdom, let him ask.”
A Cowgirl Called 