life lately
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Mulling over the fact that it’s mid-November, and there are only six weeks left of another year—why does time seem to make less and less sense the more it goes by? I perpetually feel like my body is dragging my brain a month or two behind it, so lost in thought that it doesn’t comprehend the act of turning the calendar even though it’s my own hand doing it. Wasn’t it just September?
Anyway, I’ll spare you all my endless ability to marvel at the passage of time. I wanted to write something light today—something like a snapshot of my current life, what I’m doing and learning and thinking about.
Doing
Primarily, spending a lot of time with Clara. She is two years old now and the sweetest and silliest person I know. She is speaking in full sentences, but there are still times when I’m the only one who understands them, and I’m going to be sad when that’s not the case anymore. She is inseparable from Alfie, Pooh, Percy, and Bunny-Llama (her four favorite stuffed animals) and one of our favorite things to do together is sit in the rocking chair singing hymns before bed. “Mo see sah?”
Working out with Sydney Cummings and my sisters-in-law, via YouTube and group text. We commiserate on our pain as well as celebrate our progress. I’ve always loved working out, but I’m especially loving Sydney’s challenges and seeing myself get stronger and stronger. Clara looks forward to it every day, too!
Going through the prerequisites to become a “member” at my church. Between you and me, I find the entire concept of church membership rather strange and possibly superfluous, but I suppose it’s the best system we have at the moment and so I’m trying to get over myself so that I can become more involved in and accountable to my church body.
Learning
You all already know I’m taking Intro to the Hebrew Bible from BibleProject, if you’ve read my recent posts. I’m about 60% of the way through and totally enthralled. If you have even the tiniest interest in the subject, you should try this class. (They also have shorter ones on different topics!)
I’m also learning everything there is to know about baby and toddler sleep, because why not? I had no idea how my perception of sleep would change when Clara was born—at first, it was the biggest stressor of them all, but now it’s one of my greatest fascinations. Did you know there is an enormous amount of science around how we sleep, even as babies? That there is actually a TON you can do to improve sleep quality—your own as well as your kids’? It’s so cool. I’m currently getting certified as a pediatric sleep specialist because that’s how interested I am in the topic. Yes, my enneagram 5 is showing.
And one of my weekly(ish) highlights is learning dressage at my horseback riding lessons, which I’ve now been taking for a full year. Even though the progress seems slow at times, I can look back at where I was a year ago and see how much stronger my legs and core are, and how much better my seat has gotten. Many thanks to Pilot, Whiskey, K-Bar, and Halo for their patience with me. ;)
Thinking
Is the risk of stifling God’s work in the world worth taking Paul’s admonitions about women in the church as changeless commandments for all times and all places? I’ve been reading a lot about what the New Testament teaches about the sexes (and how it aligns with the greater story of the Bible) and I’m starting to worry that we have, as it were, strained out a gnat only to swallow a camel. After all, “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus” (Galatians 3:28)—until you are a woman who wants to teach the Bible, and then the most important (and disqualifying) factor about you is that you are female? I do understand the idea of “equal in value, separate in role,” but even so, we have enough history with “separate but equal” in this country to acknowledge that the philosophy does not actually lead to equality in a practical sense. Even if Paul was referring to all women for all time and in all places (debatable), does God care more that men should never hear the Word of God taught by a woman, or that women should be treated as equal image-bearers and Kingdom ambassadors by men? Are we capturing the spirit of the rule or only following its letter? Are we being Christlike or Pharisee-like?
It’s a little unnerving, but also encouraging, to consider how I’ve grown as a believer over the past 10 years since I was first in Bible school. Unnerving, because so many of the black-and-white beliefs I held then have shifted or been shaded in with detail; this can make me feel like a heretic at times, until I remember that it’s not heresy to allow the Word of God to correct and reprove the errors in my thinking, even when those errors were taught from a pulpit. But it’s encouraging, too, because even when I’m afraid of being rejected by those who don’t agree with me, I have seen that God is still faithfully walking with me, sharpening me, and molding me into something a little bit more representative of His image. It’s He, not any particular denomination or theological camp, that I am required to follow.
