I remember the exact moment that I realized that motherhood was harder than I ever thought it would be. I don’t remember the event, but perhaps it was between finding a babysitter so I could go to work, or even asking for money to support my children and being told no. It could have also been something less serious like wanting to go out to the club but having to choose between an outfit and diapers. Whatever it was, I was sure the feeling had come to kill me.
Fast forward to many moments after those initial ones where I would try to grasp what this new role of motherhood would look like for me. It was a quick death of the sorts mentally, if you want to know the truth. I abandoned hopes and dreams for the thrill of what I could obtain “right now” to take away my true feelings that motherhood had taken away something that I could never get back again. I was certain that motherhood had come to take away the things in my life that I truly wanted.
I guess many of us wager what the different things in our life costs us. This could be jobs, relationships, experiences, and material possessions. For those of us that have managed to find a healthy balance this is great. But for the rest of us (raises hand) we quite often find ourselves in this in between where we feel like we haven’t lived out our lives to the best of our ability yet, but we also admit that we just feel like there’s this “thing” in our lives that has come to destroy us. For me although this thing has taken on many roles, the biggest elephant in the room is motherhood.
I find myself thinking, “It’s going to kill me. This struggle is going to take me out. If life doesn’t change, I just don’t know what I’ll do.” And the truth is, I was/am making progress in many different areas, but I was allowing this idea of there being something that was stronger/harder than God to take over what he was trying to do in my life.
I can handle motherhood–only to the extent of it being easy. I can do this, only because others are helping me. I could be great if I didn’t have so many responsibilities with so little help. I just want to be able to provide without having to ask others for anything. What if my children are ruined because of my inability to provide them with the life they deserve? What if I’ve just completely messed up this time? These were the thoughts that I would have every time problems arose in my life.
Now I know every woman reading this may not be a mother, or even the mothers reading this may think, “I love motherhood, it’s not something i can understand.” The truth is that, the role of motherhood for me was not the problem. It was the helplessness associated with a decision that had already been made and that I could do nothing about except learn how to handle it. I had already given birth. They were already here. Their fathers had already been chosen. I couldn’t erase it. I couldn’t change the outcome. I could go back and think of all the ways I knew better and didn’t do better and I was still a single mother.
Every time things in my life went wrong–I would think–this is going to kill me. This struggle is going to take me out. This problem area is going to get the best of me, I just know it.
So, I ask you– What do you have happening in your life that you believe came to kill you? What area do you just believe will always be stronger than your ability to overcome it? Do you just believe that everybody in your family is obese so you just might as well get used to it? Does all the young girls in your family have babies unwed and you believe that you might as well just stop trying to prevent it in your own children? Is someone in your family sick and you’re just tired of seeing them suffer? Or are all the things in your life that you are trying to overcome do they just seem to come back harder and stronger each time that you take a step forward?
Really quick I want you to consider reading the book of Genesis and studying the story of Joseph. (You can find it in Genesis chapters 37-50) Joseph pretty much had a favored life up until the point where his brothers became jealous and sold him into slavery. This led to a life of slavery & imprisonment but eventually Joseph does end up where he was supposed to be. As the story unfolds one line that is clear in every situation that Joseph is in says, “The lord was with him; he showed him kindness…” (Genesis 39:21). You see during each situation, the author doesn’t tell us much about Joseph’s attitude but what he does show us is that Joseph receives favor every place that he goes and that Joseph learns skills that he will later on use to help save the very people that hurt him.
Here’s my point for you today…as you study Joseph’s story (and many others in the bible) I want you to begin to see that what his enemies thought would kill him and what I am sure at some point Joseph thought would kill him, was the very thing that prepared him for his destiny. Do you think it’s possible for us to see this way? Do you think that we could take a moment to see past 2019 and think of how everything that we have experienced has not come to kill us. That perhaps these circumstances have come to prepare us for the very thing that we have been praying for from God.
In the middle of struggling with motherhood, I never quite thought that I would be able to empower others. I never thought that I would learn how to press past those moments that I surely thought would swallow me whole. And I definitely never thought that I could use something as destructive as sexual abuse to find freedom in a way that only comes from being bound.
As you read this, I am not quite sure of what you are going through in your life. Maybe none of the things that I have mentioned, or maybe all of them. What I want you to be certain of is that it didn’t come to kill you. It came to strengthen you and prepare you. It came to give you stamina. It came to give you a deeper thirst for the mind of God. It came to give you assistance in the only way that it can be done.
In Genesis 45: 8, as Joseph’s story ends he says to his brothers, “So then, it was not you who sent me here, but God. He made me father to Pharaoh, lord of his entire household and ruler of all Egypt. ”
He made me. He made me. He made me.
God sent me. God sent me. God sent me.
He sent me on this journey. He is preparing me on this journey. He is ordering my steps. For me, motherhood didn’t come to KILL me, it came to strengthen me in a way that would change the way the daughters were mothered in my family. Motherhood didn’t come to break me down, it came to open my eyes to a way of relationship with the Father and how that should be taught. Struggling to eat and pay bills didn’t come to weaken me, it came to show me that discipline is needed (in finances) for where God wants to take me and future generations in our bloodline. In the middle of hard times, I don’t want to think of these things. I want things to be easy and smooth. But if I want to grow, I must begin to look at life as a conquerer and not a victim to my circumstances.
However, if we are a generation of women desiring to be used by God and fulfill a ultimate purpose that he has for us, then we must know that the trials didn’t come to kill us. We must see ourselves from a place of victory over the enemy of this world and ultimately living the lives that God has for us. And even though motherhood hasn’t gotten WAY easier :), I am strengthened by the fact that God will finish what He starts. He will complete a work in me as long as I am willing to learn and grow. And he definitely feels the same way about you too.
Until next time…
Julian