Cedar N' Steel

Luke 10: 38-42
As Jesus and his disciples were on their way, he came to a village where a woman named Martha opened her home to him. She had a sister called Mary, who sat at the Lord’s feet listening to what he said. But Martha was distracted by all the preparations that had to be made. She came to him and asked, “Lord, don’t you care that my sister has left me to do the work by myself? Tell her to help!” “Martha, Martha,” the Lord answered, “you are worried and upset about many things, but few things are needed—or indeed only one. Mary has chosen what is better, and it will not be taken away from her.”

I’m currently sitting in the Phoenix airport faced with a 7 hour delay on my flight to Atlanta. Thankfully I have nowhere to be anytime soon, so I’m content to write, read, watch movies on my iPad and generally rest from the last two weeks of what I like to call “growing relationships.” I’ve spent the past 4 days in Phoenix showering my sister-in-law (Michael’s brother’s wife) with baby paraphernalia and enjoying family time with my husband’s side of the family. Prior to that, we were in Fort Worth, Texas for the Colonial tournament where we’ve stayed with the most wonderful host family for the past three years and also get to see family. It’s been a whirlwind of socializing which for an introvert such as myself can be quite exhausting.

One of the best things to come from our infertility journey is the deepening of our relationships with family and friends. We’ve had such an outpouring of love from everyone who learns about our situation and we are so thankful for everyone’s texts, emails, phone calls, conversations, and prayers. In a world where culture expects us to keep our difficulties to ourselves and present ourselves as “having it all together,” I’ve found that sharing our pain and imperfections, showing the real us, has grown our relationships infinitely more than keeping it all to ourselves. It’s presented opportunities for us to share about God’s powerful love, healing, and strength as we continue through something that often shatters relationships.

Over the past two weeks, I’ve wanted to write about something but had no idea what to talk about. I’ve asked God to inspire me so I could do this for Him, but the only thing I’ve gotten back was “sit and engage with those around you.” God’s wanted me to be Mary. He put people around me, my husband, my in laws, my nieces and nephews, and my friends, who needed me to just be engaged with them. To metaphorically sit at their feet and spend time “growing relationships” rather than wracking my brain trying to come up with a blog to write. It’s been wonderful spending one on one time with family and friends and God has deliberately surrounded me with the perfect people to elicit deep conversations about God and life. With my previous two miscarriages, He used his own words to heal me. This time He’s using relationships with other believers. He’s showing me I’m not meant to live isolated, but in community growing myself and helping others grow.

God’s two greatest commandments are to “…love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind…and love your neighbor as yourself.” (Matthew 22:36-40). If I’m understanding those commandments correctly, it sounds like God’s telling me that the most important things to Him are relationships. First and foremost is our personal relationship with Him and second is how we relate with other people. As an introvert, relating to other people is challenging for me because I’m naturally inclined towards solitude and a good book. I’m the kind of person who likes to rely on herself and not burden others. I’d rather be Martha, making all the preparations and plans and avoiding people altogether, than Mary sitting and engaging and “growing relationships.”

Mostly, God’s been showing me that even though He’s not calling me to be a mother yet, there are still many children in my life who need me. It’s been delightful spending time with my nieces and nephews, the three school age children we stay with at the Colonial, and my sister-in-law carrying my niece or nephew who comes in July. It’s allowed me to take off the blinders of my desire to have my own kids and focus on the kids who need me now. It doesn’t take away my desire for children, but expanding my tunnel vision to see the whole picture has allowed me to recognize the importance of being Mary to all the kids, ages newborn to 22 years, I find in my life now. We’ve also started sponsoring two kids from Compassion International and are looking forward to supporting them for many years to come.

When I find myself working hard to fulfill my own goals and they don’t go as planned, I become frustrated like Martha and ask God to intervene, to give me what I want. Instead, God’s calling me to sit and listen, to Him and to those who need me. As far as I can tell, my situation isn’t changing anytime soon, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t others who need me in the meantime. When we choose to engage with people, to grow relationships, we fulfill one of God’s greatest commandments. My single most important goal when engaging with people is to point them towards God, by my words and my actions. I’m not perfect and I know I constantly fail in thought, word, and deed, as all people do, but my heart desires for everyone on Earth to know about God’s love and what Jesus did on the cross. How can I point people towards God if I’m Martha, caught up in my own world, worries, plans, preparations, and goals? He calls me to be all things to all people (1 Corinthians 9:19-23) to show them God, and the only way to know what people need is to “grow relationships” and engage as Mary did.

Love is not a feeling; it’s an action. Love means getting to really know people and being what they need. It means taking time away from your own desires to help others achieve theirs. It means sitting, listening, engaging, and growing relationships. Most importantly, it means guiding people to God, the author and perfecter of true love. Even though I’m not a mother, I still wear many hats as Christian, wife, daughter, sister, aunt, granddaughter, cousin, niece, PGA tour wife, and friend. That’s a lot of relationships and a lot of opportunities for God to use me how He wishes. We never know what impact our devoted attention to someone can have on their life, but I hope I can continue to recognize those who need me and sit and engage deeply, loving them as God loves them. Though I think there’ll still be time for a good book 🙂

John 13: 34-35, 1 John 4:11-13, Galatians 2:20, Proverbs 8:17