Praying

I've been kind of out of sorts lately. I feel kind of blah...not a sick blah, but a blah that looks like this -----------.
I feel like I've let Satan attack me on every front and have kind of lost touch with myself and with others. I read Jeff's blog about our anniversary yesterday and where he talked about the life of a pastor's wife and the expectations that people put on you, you put on yourself, or thinking you've offended some one for good reason or no reason at all. I will tell you straight up that I'm not that Pastor's wife (anymore) that thinks she should be at everything, take on every job in the church, or take phone messages for her husband...OR know where the church key is and how you can get it. I have, over the last couple of years, asked God to show me who it is He wants me to be...for ME...and not because I have the title of pastor's wife. You may have heard me say before - at age 16 I knew God called me to be a Pastor's wife. I didn't know all that meant, even having grown up the child of a Pastor, but through a lot of trial and error, I'm trying to muddle my way through it. This is what I know so far. I'm not perfect! I DO, very much, love people though. I know God has shown me a desire to encourage and be encouraged. He has given us a home that we try to use for His glory, because He knows He's put a passion in my heart to minister to people through my home. But even there, I don't always do it, or if I do it, I feel I sometimes come under scrutiny. It's hard some times to feel like you let people down. I don't feel like I always understand it. It's hard to know that in all of our churches that we have served, the times we've eaten in someone's home I can count on two hands...that's three churches over 12 years. For a person that likes to surround herself with people, I some times feel people hold our family at arm's length because they think we would be appalled if we saw who they really are. Did you read the part here where I said, "I'm not perfect"? Being in the midst of people's junk is where we have been called to be. We want to serve you, but there's a little something I would like to ask of you..."would you pray for us?" We sure do need your prayers. I, at the same time every year, am like the average person that re-evaluates one's life as a new year approaches. I continue to see myself as that person that isn't quite over being hurt yet at the hands of people, and I'm finding it hard to trust people, myself and God! I don't want Satan bringing me down at the hands of petty stuff like knowing people might just be talking about us, or criticizing our every move, or knowing I fall short everyday and I could throw my hands up in the air and quit. I don't understand this calling placed on my life to be a Pastor's wife all the time, but I know that if I were sitting back not loving people, not getting my hands dirty or subjecting myself to some uncomfortable situations a lot of the time, would I really be serving the ones that Jesus died for? So, how do I see myself. Well, I can tell you that I feel free to no longer care what people think of me (OK, well I do care if I feel like you're trying to intentionally hurt me), but I don't want to fit some mold of what you may have grown up thinking a Pastor's wife should do. I want to fit that mold that is shaped by the Potter's hands. I just happen to think God allowed me to be a Pastor's wife because everyone is looking at everything you do, so they get to see you fail, but Praise God...they get to see you get picked up by the Potter as He keeps molding!
I write all of this because as the New Year approaches, I am taking a lead from a Pastor's wife's blog I read and asking you to pray for our family, and for the families of the other Pastors and wives on staff. In doing so I hope you will see that when God makes us better people, that allows us to help make LifeSong a better place. I'm not only asking you to pray for our families, but I'm asking you to pray for our Church, for the rest of the staff, for each ministry that helps to shape LifeSong into what God intended. I write this as your Pastor's wife...a woman who madly loves a man who just happens to be a Pastor...but, I also write this to you as Amy, a woman that seeks to serve God and obey Him. He has put a burning love in my heart for you, and I cannot sit back and not share it. The only way I can ever get out of the funk I feel in now is to pick myself up and start picking up the pieces and being who it is God made me to be...AND, right there is where I find freedom.
So, take time to read this blog today. She is encouraging you to pray for Christmas. What better place to start as we begin to go through specific ways to pray for the things I mentioned for the New Year.