40 Courageous!

Isaiah 43:1b -- "Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have summoned you by name; you are mine."

Sunrise at Ponte Vedra


The grating sound of the alarm put and end to my sleep, fitful though it was, and I willed myself out of the bed and into the morning. I really just want to lay back down and close my eyes again.

So many things change when you're forty. Or at least, I think they do. As women, as mothers and in my case, home educator - we are working ourselves OUT of a job. I think we are the only people who really do that.  From the moment our happy little bouncing bundles are born, to the day they walk down the isle, our every effort is poured into nurture, care, growth, education and most importantly, showing them the way from which God says they will not depart. If we do our jobs and do them well, our focus will one day walk out the door and go forge a service for the Lord on their own.  Then......what do we do?

I tell my friends I'm the slowest person on the planet and it's true when it comes to actually working through things.  Things like.....I turned forty on my last birthday....which was almost a whole year ago. But today, padding through the house looking for the energy to get my  motor started it REALLY hit me.  I'm forty.  I FEEL forty.  My oldest has already met the woman he's going to marry.  My youngest one learns to drive this year....WOW.

So, for the past -- well, going on twenty years, now -- my identity has been, MOM. Yes, I am also wife, but I don't have to stand over Steven 24/7 to make sure he's turning into a man of God and a responsible, productive human being. So...this HUGE piece of who I am is about to disappear.  I feel my heart beat pick up and the little beads of sweat pop out over my upper lip.

Then I read the verse. Fear not, it says. I have summoned you by name. You are mine.

THAT is comfort if ever there existed any.  I have been redeemed, called by name. So....I CAN "fear not".

It's true that I'm about to embark on uncharted territory. I'll become mother-in-law, grandmother at some  point, and.....an empty-nester. But there are millions upon millions of women who have done this before me [including my own amazing mother]and there will be million upon millions of women who do this after me.... and God said to me today....that I am His.

THAT is who I am.  I am HIS.

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