Mom, I’m so glad our life isn’t boring.
We were buckling our seatbelts in the plane, preparing for takeoff. Our family was in the middle of discerning and confirming a major ministry move, and it required several trips back and forth out of state. My teenage daughter’s statement stirred emotion in my heart. At age 17, where relationships are everything, she had the most to “lose,” and for this moment, she was embracing the adventure of it and acknowledging that ministry life is anything but boring.
Sarah’s very un-boring story
Reading Genesis and examining Sarah’s story from her debut in Genesis 11 in Abram’s genealogy to her burial in Genesis 23, Sarah could also have made that statement: I’m so glad my life isn’t boring. A few of the situations she could’ve referenced:
- Packing up their belongings and traveling to a new place of ministry that God would show them, leaving home and relationships behind
- Hosting last minute dinner guests and getting to overhear supernatural “God-stories” and conversations in her home
- Walking alongside her husband as he received vision and direction from the Lord and was called to walk by faith
Does any of this sound familiar, ministry wife? I bet it does. On my good days, I embrace the privilege of having a front row seat to God’s transformative work in people’s lives. I also see the backstage—the sacrifice, the loneliness and the exhaustion that can accompany ministry life.
God’s character even when
When I examine Sarah’s story in Scripture, I see God’s character and consistency revealed despite Sarah’s inconsistency and other people’s inconsistency. We see God affirm His character and covenant over and over even when His people acted in fear or selfishness, trusting in their own thoughts and their own hands. His kingdom plan advances even when we get impatient in our “faith plank” and feel like we just can’t hold that posture one more day.
This vibrant narrative of Abraham’s family reminds me that when I let my soul get distracted by the circumstances I see before me, I lose sight of the stunning arch that is over every detail and every situation of my story. GOD IS FAITHFUL. When obedience costs more than I thought it would or the strain of obediently walking in the same direction gets tiring, I need to revisit this truth that is over the entirety of Scripture, and over all of time.
My story and your story is tucked up underneath His Sovereignty just like Sarah’s was. We see Sarah laughing a few times throughout those chapters in Genesis . . . sometimes in unbelief, and then with overflowing astonishment as she holds baby Isaac in her arms. I want to laugh like the woman in Proverbs 31:25, who is able to “laugh at the time to come” (NET). She knows that God has orchestrated her story, and He is faithful in every detail of it. She embraces the adventure and a life that is anything but boring.
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– Jennifer Roberson, contributing author
Jennifer was a small-town girl, living a big city life, until God called her family back to rural Oklahoma a few months ago. A lover of comfort and routine, she is trying to embrace new things that require courage, like golf, writing, and being a home health nurse. She loves teaching students and women to love God’s Word and His ways, and she adores being “Momma Rob” to her two teenage girls and all their people. She is wife to Matt Roberson, pastor at Marlow First in Oklahoma.