I Wonder???

Recently, I was reading a young (approximately 30ish), single, Christian woman's post where she was writing about her desire to get married and have children ASAP. I won't link to it here, mainly because her identity and actual post are not relevant to this particular discussion. For one thing, I know many young women who are in the exactly same situation that she's in -the old "biological clock" is ticking away and no decent prospects for a Christian husband are in sight. Each of them could've written the exact same words with the same lament and sense of urgency.

As I've ministered to high school, college age, and young singles for over 25 years, I have heard these words over and over again. I've seen some find good guys and get married, just the way they envisioned life for themselves, but I've also seen those for whom the "right man" never came; so they are left with either settling for someone far less than their ideal or suffering in their singleness. Since singleness is called "the gift that nobody wants", I know far more of these ladies who settled for Mr. Wrong and now are either single again after divorce or are miserable in their marriage.

As I approach the point of being nearly 20 years beyond that life stage, I reflect on my own life and whether or not it has turned out as I expected. Of course 20 years ago I didn't think that I would still be single either. But as life, and I believe God, soon showed me, not everyone is meant to be married or have kids. That truth in and of itself is more than okay although I didn't come by it in an instant. For me, not having a mother around when I entered my twenties, probably took some of the pressure off. It also helped to have a strong grandmother who spent most of her adult life without a man. Even my maternal grandmother, although married for more than 50 years, saw the advantage of only marrying for an outstanding godly man over settling with any old guy that showed an interest. That fact helped me to focus on building my career and ministries instead.

I think our society, particularly our Christian community still puts a premium on becoming a wife and mother as necessary to one's being and calling. From the time we are little girls, we are programmed to aspire to be a wife and mother. Even career women are told that they can "have it all " by juggling these roles as necessary. In reality, we seem to gloss over Paul's recommendation in 1 Corinthians 7 that singles stay that way to better serve the Lord. It is not helpful when singles' and young adult's ministries are designed around helping them find mates rather than becoming a faithful follower of Jesus Christ. (For more on this subject, I found Kristin Aune's book Single Women to be a great resource.)

Has my life turned out the way I'd dreamt it 10, 20 or even 30 years ago? In some ways, yes, in others, no. Thirty years ago, while I was in high school, I only thought about being a rich engineer (an oxymoron I know now); I got the engineer part right and compared to a lot of my peers from high school I'm doing pretty well. However, that was a life planned that had no room for God in it. A few years later, much of that thinking had turned a different direction with a new focus on Christ. I think that girl would be surprised at the present one that I was not further along in Christ-like behavior and godliness. Somehow that envisioned one would be highly regarded as a Christian speaker, wife and mother (who just happened to have an engineering degree, too). The me of 10-20 years ago by then would not have been disappointed to be single still, but would be sorry to hear that I was out of youth ministry again (perhaps, she'd wonder why her church would still be choosing people in leadership that would initiate such things). Oh, and I'd have travelled more and done more interesting things too.

Well, what does the future ten years from now hold? Should the Lord tarry, I will be retired and free to minister full-time on my retirement money and investments. But, the thing is we don't know, we are not guaranteed of tomorrow and you know what they say about the best laid plans... The point is, we don't (or aren't supposed to) live life in an holding pattern, treading water in place until the right man, the right job, the right ministry or the right opportunity comes along. God, like the master in the parable of the talents, has given us the wherewithall to serve Him and live life to its fullest in the now. I am responsible for what I do or don't do with it. That applies equally to my 30 something gal pals who are desperate for Mr. Right to come along and change their life. If he comes, great, if not, you will have helped to build God's kingdom or reflected Christ's love. There are no regrets for that life.

March Madness

No, I'm not going to post about men's college hoops (although I am pleased that UCLA is in the Final Four) but just about what's been going on this past month.

March is that incredibly long month halfway between my first paid holiday of the year (New Year's Day) and the next one (Memorial Day). For those of you who think that's totally uncool, remember I do get 13 or 14 paid holidays a year -just none of them are in the first quarter of the year. It is hard though, to hear about your friends getting MLK day, President's Day off while you have to go off to work. March is also the month that my regular sick leave gets zeroed out so the notion of taking a "mental health day" is not so attractive either. Taking a day or two of vacation is possible, but it seems dumb to use it "just because" and not go anywhere.

Anyway, in the midst of all this my life has had enough craziness and things to get me down that it's time to blog about them. Consider:

1. Actually it happened last month, but I'm now only recovering from the laughability of it. You see, just about a year ago my work group moved out of our building (and our lovely hardwalled offices) into what's called "the factory", in an area with a cubicle farm that holds several hundred people. The area we were moving into had been largely vacant for several months prior and the cubicles themselves (carpeting, paint) were in need of repair. We were told that there was no money for upgrades and that we had to vacate our old building as quickly as possible so that the leased people could be turned back to save money. So we moved and made the best of our surroundings.

Within three months after we settled in, word came that we would have to move out "temporarily" while they did the carpet and paint. They would do a sort of musical chairs -one group would move out and double up with others in an unaffected area while the cubicles were taken down, new carpet laid and then everything put back together. So six months after we had originally moved in the first group did that very thing and two months later moved back to their new digs, this time with the second group bunking in with them just before Christmas. Two months later (and almost a year exactly from when we first moved here) we were back where we started. Go figure.

2. Sometimes I think my church is inhabited by lunatics. The things we do for the short run seem to make little sense over the long run. There is always the tension between demanding excellence versus giving grace (I'm applying this to quality of effort). It makes me wonder why/how the same people who would not allow a plumber to come out and leave a faucet still leaking after they paid for a repair are folks who allow ministry decisions/leaders that are just barely okay or make excuses for failures like, "well, they did their best", "it's all we can do for now". (I don't have as much a problem when a person really tries and fails- what I do have a big problem is when they don't really give it their best effort and it fails, that there are some who make excuses for the other's lack of diligence, laziness or downright sinfulness.) I do not believe that's giving grace, something that we as Christians need to do with one another constantly, but rather it is an enabling of co-dependent behavior. It frustrates me to no end. (BTW, if you think I'm talking about you right now, I probably am!!!! See yourself and knock it off. Jesus deserves your best, not your excuses.)

Ok, that's it. I think I had more when I started out but I forgot what they were. When I remember, I'll post some more.

Our Women's Retreat - The Chocolate Boutique

I just noticed that I forgot to post on the TFB Women's Retreat we had last week at Pinecrest(probably because there was too much insanity at work this week). I mentioned last fall that we were doing Group's Chocolate Boutique: Where Women Taste and See That the Lord Is Good. This retreat-in-a-box format was new for us -normally, we have a speaker at a program camp like Forest Home or every other year we plan our own hotel retreat. This year we were unable to go to Forest Home and so we had to scramble to come up with our own in less than 5 months.

As I mentioned in an earlier post, I was the Director of the retreat which meant recruiting the various leaders of the breakout sessions -the boutiques, crafts, worship, Big Group sessions and small groups. That turned out to be easy since we had an incredible team that volunteered for everything without me asking them. The facility was great, especially the food and I know that the ladies had a wonderful time. Our Worship Team of Karla, Casie and Laura did an excellent job all weekend. I liked how it spread the tasks out among so many different women -we had 14 total on the Design Team and it allowed for a variety of women to exercise their talents and spiritual gifts. Most of the women in attendance preferred the small group format to a lecture-style speaker although some thought it was a bit too light on Bible teaching. A couple of them thought I should've assigned a mandatory one hour quiet time before free-time (I guess 20 minutes of prayer and meditation by yourself in the prayer boutique was not enough.) Some complained it was too much like a Children's VBS (probably because we do Group's curriculum for our VBS too). Of course, they all liked eating chocolate. Whether or not this will have lasting spiritual impact, it is to early to see.

I posted a picture of the ladies here. You can see more down on my flickr banner at the right margin.