Motherhood and Ministry

I have not been blogging as actively, as you may have noticed. I do go through weeks where blogging once per week is about all I get to. This most recent stint has been due to pastoral care emergencies/ tragedies/crises. I have not spent this many concentrated hours in tears and prayer for such circumstances in a long time- perhaps ever.

Last night, I was at the hospital with a family and a friend of a woman who had nearly succeeded in her suicide attempt. After I got home around 11:15, I sat on the sofa with munchies watching TV, winding down. I did not get to sleep until after midnight. After a somewhat sleepless, allergy filled night, I awoke this morning to several hours of catching up on email work. By lunchtime, I was tired!

So, I treated myself to a nap. I got into bed and slept for two hours. It was heavenly.

God bless my children- they just want to be around me. My oldest is able to contain herself when she knows that I am asleep. Not so for my son. The minute Ray got on the telephone, he took advantage of his opportunity. He dashed into the bedroom...and began throwing up on me. Apparently, his mad dashing caused him to choke on a wheat thin. He flung open the door, ran over to me, and began wretching. Poor guy. He was sobbing. My sheets needed washing. I needed washing. He only needed a new shirt. Neat little guy he is.

So off we went to the bathroom. I just got into the tub because that was about all I had in me. Ray came in, fresh off the telephone, to report another tragedy. Yet as we sat there, in the bathtub, with me covered in regurgitated wheat thins, and my son in my lap, all I could do was laugh! God works in mysterious ways.

Laughter

Tuesdays are always a difficult. I generally rest well on Mondays, and put off most/all thoughts of "work" on that day. I am trying to live into Sabbath, trusting God in meaningful ways.

But Tuesday, my thoughts turn to my unending to do list. As I said, I am still living into Sabbath. One of the things I am still trying to do is keep from being a work-a-holic the rest of the week. After all, I'm not really trusting God if I only trust for one day, and then work the rest of the week like everything is up to me. Clearly, it is not!

At the conference in Indianapolis last week, one pastor had reflected, "like the poor, to do lists are always with us." Yesterday felt especially draining. I went home at 4:30 to spend time with my family because I was out of energy and had a 6:30 meeting. As I sat in my chair at 6:10, I found myself wondering if I was getting sick. That set off a new stream of thought and mild anxiety about my to do list.

But then we had our meeting. It happened to be a Jacob' s Well leadership team meeting. We laughed- a lot. As we discussed the items on our agenda, laughter seemed to fill us at every turn.

By the time the meeting was over, my headache was gone, and the weight of exhaustion had lifted. What a gift.