Dear Weary Mom, Dig In!!

Oh friend! I wish you were here next to me.  This little note would be so much better as a long chat over yummy chocolate cheesecake and some really good coffee.   I’ve been thinking about this topic often since I started writing these weekly letters for the weary moms.  We can be a pitiful little sisterhood, you know?  We’re frazzled and worn out.  Sometimes we end up in a puddle of tears on the kitchen floor wondering if we’ll survive.  I know … I’m there more often than I ever dreamed I would be.

If you were here, I’d remind you that you are seen and known.  I’d lean in and look into your eyes to tell you with all kinds of hope and love that you are chosen as the mom for your sweet children.   And I’d make sure to remind you, we will make it!!

But today, what I would really say is … Girl, I feel you!

I could give you the list of all the things we’ve been dealing with here at the Underwood abode but it really doesn’t matter.  You’ve had your own busy days and exhausted nights.  I know.  We could swap horror stories and maybe even end up laughing a bit at our craziness. Lately it’s felt like life is asking more of me than what I have to give.  My family needs more from me than what I can do.  And, really, those things are true.

Sometimes, we have to give more than we have.

Sometimes, we have to do more than we can.

Sometimes, we have to push harder than we want.

Sometimes, we just have to dig in and do the work.

The Bible talks about this digging in.

Digging in grows our faith.

Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness.  And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.  {James 1:2-4}

Digging in is vital to the process of spiritual growth.

For this very reason, make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue, and virtue with knowledge, and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with steadfastness, and steadfastness with godliness, and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love.  For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they keep you from being ineffective or unfrutiful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. {2 Peter 1:5-8}

Digging in ultimately produces hope in our lives.

Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope.  {Romans 5:3-4}

Isn’t that what we long for?  Hope — the confident expectation of God’s work in us coming to completion. Reaching out for hope means we have to dig in when the days are long and the battles are fierce.  So, you dig in, my friend!  And I’ll dig in beside you.  Because these babies of ours, they are worth it!

With love,

Teri Lynne

 

 

image source: Boarding1Now