I have issues. (I am sure Isaac would enthusiastically back me up on that statement).
Why is it that every women’s bible study is mid-week in the middle of the day?
I have moved my fair share and as a result gone to several different churches.
This is always the case.
The older I get and the more desperate I have become to forge friendships with people my own age and a similar station in life, the more frustrated I become.
I would love to be a part of a women’s bible study.
I would love to be in the fellowship of other Christian women.
But the church does not offer this to women like me.
I work.
It has come to my attention that the church assumes two things:
1. All Christian women must not work during the week.
2. All women or men have copious amounts of childcare options unless you are attending a church event mid-week in the middle of the day. AKA women’s bible studies.
Seriously? This pisses me off (I know, my language sucks).
The only way you can attend a women’s bible study is to be a stay-at-home mom, retired, or unemployed.
I’m angry, I’m left out, and I am jealous.
Maybe us working moms should just attend the men’s Bible studies that always seem to happen on Saturday mornings.
Oh wait, no childcare (they have women at home to do that for them)….
Without fail lately I have been rousing both children and heading to church every Sunday morning.
It has been a few months since I have gone to church so faithfully and I wish I could say it was solely for my desire to grow in my relationship with God.
Realistically,
I need to get out of the house.
Maternity leave has a way of secluding you from the rest of the world.
My friends are at work.
I can’t join a mommy group and make new friends because I only will be home and able to attend for 6 weeks.
Oh…and there is that new infant, the whole point of maternity leave, who really shouldn’t leave the house a whole lot.
Come to remember, small babies are rather needy.
And although I will, have, and am not ashamed to breastfeed in public. It is easier in the comfort of our home where I can just whip out a tit without any form of modesty or consciousness.
So church.
I have been going.
It is funny how God can lead you somewhere when you most need to be there. I truly believe he can.
He knows things. He reaches you where you are.
Like maternity leave.
But we are involved in a series on the book of Mark and three Sundays ago our paster spoke on the wilderness.
The wilderness being a real crappy place in your life.
And I got to thinking, am I there? Am I in the wilderness?
Sometimes I think so, but other times not so much.
I feel lucky a lot of times. Specifically every night when I pray over my little Linc I feel so lucky. Thanking God for such a beautiful boy does not even begin to reach the depths of my gratitude for such an amazing gift.
But there are other aspects of my life right now that feel very “wildernessy.”
Finances are my wilderness as well as my relationship with Isaac.
Isaac and I can’t seem to make it work despite the fact that we love each other. And financially, ends just don’t meet right now and that is stressful.
When you don’t have enough money to actually pay all your bills it becomes a stressful game of faking it.
I can honestly pay all of my bills on time without actually making enough money to cover my monthly expenses just by being very crafty about when I pay each bill.
It’s a science and a skill that I have honed through necessity.
And to be honest I am pretty proud of myself for figuring it out.
But one wrong move, one bill paid to early, one unexpected expense, and the whole house of cards falls.
It’s stressful.
And when you are alone you shoulder the stress of this situation alone. And go figure, it’s lonely.
So sometimes this feels like my wilderness, but I don’t want to jinx it because I know things could get so much worse.
And there are things so much more valuable to me than the thought of a late bill.
So Isaac and I had our “dating” conversation on Saturday night. And I decided that my first independent activity would be to go to church(although I did ask Isaac to come with).
I have not been to church in about a year. When I was married my husband and I attended a church that I loved. The message was right on, the people were great, and I was an active member in the children’s ministry.
But when Joe and I’s relationship started to crumble I moved out of our house and stopped attending our church. I have never been back.
I was embarrassed that my marriage was falling apart. And I didn’t want people to reach out to me. I was hiding from God and my church community.
So today I went to a church that I have never been. And it was great.
The funny thing is that todays service was all about relationships. And the pastor spent almost the entire service talking about how God feels about cohabitation and how it does not lead to the marriage and relationship that He strives for us to have. (The pastor made this great graph demonstration that I will try to show on here because it was really helpful visual for me).
But I just thought it was amazing how God knew what I needed. Of all the times for me to decide to go back to church and all the churches I could have attended and all the topics the pastor could have spoken on.
And somehow this Sunday’s message was all about me and what is going on in my life right now.
Mom and Boys 