many of you are going to think this post absolutely nuts. eh, so what. here goes.
so i've been struggling almost daily with the decision to stay home with the kids. is it better to extend our time of financial toil in life, possibly affecting the kids' futures and education opportunities, or is it better to be home daily with them giving them (hopefully) a sense of emotional security that I didn't really have. it's constant, this questioning, and it's quite intense. i feel like everything relies on my decision here. but, something i'm actually feeling in the last few weeks is this tug at my soul, like, whatever happens, God wants you home right now with these kids. This feeling of something quite specific being requested of me from God. Uh, wow, that's a new one for me. Point is, the few times in life i've felt something like this, my spiritual ears perk up. and i'm feeling this. more and more all the time. even as the bills pile up and credit card companies call constantly...i have this voice saying, you're not doing this for you. you're doing this for me. stick with it. you're making a tough call but trust me to stick it out. i'll let you know when you're done here.
i know, it's a little nutty sounding. again, even though i've felt the hand of God here and there in life, i've never felt it so vividly.
Also, i've been going to a mom's group where we are reading books that i would've never picked up on my own, and they are centering around being a Christian wife and mother and woman. and, to my complete surprise, i feel like i'm getting some powerful stuff out of this.
Anyway, 4 or 5 days ago, I was dreaming about my grandma being brought back to life by this weird Re-animator-esque Svengali type. It was creepy and pretty weird and just hard to understand. then, like a title frame in a movie, black text on white background, comes across my pov and it says Romans 4:35. ok, well there isn't a Romans 4:35 but there is a Romans 4:3-5. THe text was just so vivid and I'm Catholic ok, I don't really 'know' the Bible. I've never seen something like that in a dream of mine. One, to have words, two to remember them and have them stuck when I wake up. In my mother's group the other night we looked it up together. It talks about Abraham benefiting from his faith and the motif Paul uses is that of a worker and his wages. Essentially stating that faith, believing the instruction given you from God, not works heh or working, is the measure of righteousness in the eyes of God. As we read it, I kid you not, we all got goosebumps. I've never felt this level of personal connection with God. Having kids man, it's heavy, serious shit. That responsibility entrusted to you as a parent to care for these little children of God, it's nothing to be trifled with -- and when something so vivid comes across telling you so, telling you that indeed you're on the path, such a direct invitation to set your mind at ease with your decision, that's powerful, powerful stuff. i actually kind of equate this with asking God for a sign that he exists and him actually like setting a bush on fire and talking to you with it. i mean, i never asked for a sign of any kind. that's totally out of my purview. it wouldn't have occurred to me to ask such a thing. that kind of thing strikes me as sort of, i dunno, spiritually stunted. Jay is not overly impressed by any of this. He said he would be impressed if the bible verse were burned into my forehead when I woke. Sure, that would be impressive an X-Files kind of way, but so is seeing a bible verse flash across your dream cam. Someone who has never actually even read the whole Bible. I mean, it's actually kind of shaking up my sometimes overly logical approach to spirituality. it's that vivid for me. it hasn't killed off my wish to go back to work, to be able to afford stuff i like, or wish to make financial progress in life. it's just that i have this great certainty now that those material wishes are pretty much irrelevant to the path my life is on. that's extremely liberating.
For what does the scripture say? "Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness." A worker's wage is credited not as a gift, but as something due. But when one does not work, yet believes in the one who justifies the ungodly, his faith is credited as righteousness.
Also note, this same sentiment is repeated throughout the Bible and especially in the New Testament, so why this passage in Romans of all places? With this employment motif. this is a unique passage in that way.
