Dress up?

The majority of my week is spent homeschooling my daughters, watching them struggle in one subject and conquer another. This is the greatest joy of my homeschooling journey, being a part of each win the moment it happens. When my daughter who has fought to learn to read, finally "got it" she danced and jumped with abandon throughout the house. Another daughter so enamored with the romanticism of algebra that she covered my mirror is dry erase equations because the paper was too small to hold this new knowledge. Getting to see the look in my youngest's eyes, as she tries to keep up with her sisters memorizing state flags and continents, winning at the who can answer first game. The look of "the win" is so authentic, so capturing that it drives me to keep going when I want to throw in the towel. It inspires me to try harder on the days each of us are so distracted by the beautiful weather outside, or the sledding hill finally covered in enough snow to coast down. 

Its the win that drives me to keep moving ahead. 

As children do, my daughters mimic what they see me doing by playing school in the room, on the trampoline, even while camping. I hear them laying out lesson plans, and pretending to search the web for that just so right unit study on frogs, or tutor each other through fake subjects with side by side writing in the dirt. The problem is, when they win at this version of school there is no rejoicing, there is no smile. There is no light shining from their eyes, because the win is fake, the result of nothing truly materializing. It didn't go on the transcript, it didn't mean anything other than being a great way to spend an afternoon, a wonderful time killer. 

When they play school, there is no celebration of the wins, because the experience is a forgery.

This began my mind reeling with the idea that I, too, may be playing at life. I asked myself, "How often do I "play" at Christianity?" My initial instinct is to say, "Never, not me, I'm solid." The reality is that I have caught myself on more than one occasion acting like a Christian more than thinking like one. My mind will be telling me that this situation is impossible while outwardly I express my trust in the Omnipotent God. The result of hours spent as a youth pretending o be something I wasn't, I suppose.

As a child I dressed up to become new and exciting characters in life, as a young teenager, I hid my truest thoughts wanting to skate by unseen by those milling in the school hallways around me. Even into adulthood, not knowing who can be trusted with the truth of who I am, too afraid of the vulnerability that left access to my fragile heart.

When my husband officially went into church leadership, out lives became a swirl of tasks mixed with the weight of responsibility over those who are involved in the ministry he leads. The fresh excitement wore off, as it too often does when taking on a new role, leaving me with a list that seemed to grow faster than I could have foreseen alongside a profusion of complaints about the job we were doing and suggestions of how to do things better. It has even gone as far as people expressing opinions on how we ought to run our private life. the result, a total sum leaving me hurt and lonely. I found myself running from the real thing to act out a scenario with no tangible results.

The last two years have shown that I know nothing, I am lost as to what step to take next, because I have found myself playing at Christianity more than living it.

It is easier to play at a task than truly engage in it because if you get hurt, simply put all the toys away and imagine a new scenario next time. 

Its time to evaluate if I am asking God to speak and with a servants heart listen, or am I putting on the oversized clothes and shoes of those who have gone before and mimicking their behavior. 

When the battle is real, the devastation is real, however, the victory is genuine. Its time to put away the dress up clothes and start being a true Christ follower, allowing God to capture our hearts and experience the unfeigned victory in all our Savior has planned.