Playing House

                  These last few days have brought fond childhood memories to mind as Alex and I have adjusted to our newlywed homemaking life together. How strange it is to be in a home that is entirely our own. I look around at the boxes still half unpacked and the piles of random clothes waiting for a place to call their own and it feels like those long days I used to play house. The kitchen is my favorite place- that is where I make meals for my husband as was my favorite part of playing house. I dreamed all my childhood of the day when I would be a wife with a husband to care for and a home to manage, but now that the day has come I stand here feeling not a day older than those blissful days of games and  pretend.

                It is funny how we look forward to and dream of something through our childhood and we have a fantasy of what it will feel like, look like, sound like, but when the day comes and those dreams take a very literal form it often times feels like, looks like and sounds like something entirely different-not necessarily in a bad way, just different and often times disappointing. It is amazing that when my focus is on the things of this world-those momentary material moments that fade away as quickly as they came-I stand to be disappointed, still feeling empty having not fulfilled the fantasy's of my heart in the depth I had imagined it to be. On the flip side, I am discovering as I often do, that the moments and desires I seek out in Christ through my walk with Him, the more blessed and fulfilled I actually am. It is a rare occurrence to have a childhood fantasy fulfilled to the depths of our hearts when our focus is on living to the fullest for ourselves. Life isn't necessarily about living to fulfill our dreams. Scripture is so clear that as believers in Christ Jesus, we are actually laying down our lives-sacrificing our dreams for the sake of Christ's Will for our lives which is clearly drawn out in the Word as living as disciples for the sake of the Gospel, to give, to love and to serve. I am finding that when I am not living for Christ as I am called to as a believer, I end up feeling more like I am playing house- living a fake artificial reality with no substance-but when I put aside my dreams of fulfilling my own desires I discover a deep and overwhelming fulfillment, encouragement and blessing in abundance. The less I expect the more I discover.


          The last few days my focus has been so much on making our home everything I imagined it to be instead of focusing on what God has given us, and the beauty in having a husband to love and care for and a home that we can call our own. Regardless of what it looks like or feels like if I can focus on where God has us today and what I can do as wife for my husband as God would desire I would find and have found such a deep fulfillment and blessings beyond imagination.