When I Grow Up

I have always been a person who looked for examples of who/how I hoped to be in my next phase of life. I don't have 'a hero' or 'an idol' per se, but I prefer to admire multiple women for the different ways they model grace, strength, integrity, passion, love, etc.

This started in high school when I was blessed through the women involved in leading small groups for Young Life, a group called Teen Advisors and my youth group at the First Baptist Church of Columbus, GA. This has rarely involved formal mentoring, but more often their positive examples and godly encouragement as we 'do life' together.

Last night, my husband and I went to Atlanta for a lovely evening of dinner and big band music and dancing. His parents hosted several couples and neighbors to thank them for the care, concern and physical help they provided in the weeks of their displacement and flood recovery. It was a very nice evening of being together in an environment that was a far cry from the muddy, smelly sludge of the post-flood homes that a few of them are still dealing with.

As I interacted with many couples that I have not had much contact with since our wedding festivities, I was struck by such regard for my mother-in-law and her friends. They are beautiful inside and out, full of grace, humor and encouragement. The fruit of the spirit is evident in their lives.

I watched them admiringly on the dance floor with their husbands--recognizing they are wives who each represent 40+ year marriages. They are grandmothers whose eyes twinkle as they discuss their children and grandchildren. They are friends who have seen each other through births, deaths, illness and floods. And for me, last night, they were encouraging Titus women.

³Likewise, teach the older women to be reverent in the way they live, not to be slanderers or addicted to much wine, but to teach what is good. ⁴Then they can train the younger women to love their husbands and children, ⁵to be self-controlled and pure, to be busy at home, to be kind, and to be subject to their husbands, so that no one will malign the word of God.

Titus 2:3-6 NIV

As I look down the barrel at my 35th birthday, I realize I am edging out of preschool Mom into elementary Mom. There are teenaged girls, young unmarried women, newlyweds, moms of infants...all in stages of life where I have been. I am reminded that we are each Titus women to someone. I pray that I may carry that torch with the godliness, strength and dignity of the women before me.