It is definitely one of the hardest things I have ever done.
I was married at 18, mom to 2 by 21. I have raised children and served my husband for half my life. I know how to make $100 last longer than humanly possible. I know how to do without. I can teach a Sunday school class like it's nobody's business, and when it comes to whipping up supper when all you have is frozen chicken and a drop of milk, I am the queen. I have sold real estate with a baby on my hip, and planned Disney vacations down to the minute.
But yall, nothing could have prepared me for what this homeschooling gig would require of me.
I have never felt so poured out in all my life, yet at the same exact time I feel so useless. And just like Simcha says, It isn't really the pouring out that bothers me. It is more the guilt and worry I have over how pitiful of a job I am doing that gets me when I lay my head down at night.
I struggle with not starting by 8am which of course is what good homeschoolers do. I struggle with the amount of learning that these 2 are doing and are capable of. Am I doing enough, teaching enough, inspiring enough? I struggle with the commitment level that comes in the teenager package. We have theater, piano, co-op, etc... I struggle with the co-op commitment I have made to my 5 best friends in the whole wide world, "Teach your children writing and world history, oh sure no problem."
But, if we are being real here, all of those things are secondary. The cold hard truth is this....
I want to be drinking coffee at the local cafe.
I want to watch 8 hours of Little House on the Prairie, uninterrupted, and pretend I am Ma. (She never complains...heifer.)
I want to have my supper cooked by 9:00 am and then head to town to rummage through the sales racks at Marshall's because I have nothing else to do.
I want to have warm cookies on the table when my girls come in from school and hear all about the happenings.
I want to garden all day.
I want to put somebody down for a nap....ANYBODY!!!!
The cold hard truth is that it is ALL.ABOUT.ME!!!!
But hasn't it always been this way? Since the fall hasn't it always been about us? Remember the Israelites in the wilderness? I always say that I was born in the wrong generation and really should have been a pioneer (like Ma....I am such a poser), but the truth of the matter is I should have been an Israelite. No sooner than God himself delivered them from slavery and torture, they would like to know how much longer they had to walk, and hey what about some food, and we are thirsty, and no, we don't like manna THAT IS MIRACULOUSLY FALLING FROM THE SKY we would rather have some meat. The Lord God had just parted the Red Sea AND THEY WALKED THROUGH IT to safety from the Egyptians who were torturing them, yet they were complaining!!
And if I am being honest today that is exactly where I am at. That is exactly what I am doing. The Lord God parts the Red Sea in my life for me to walk through to safety DAILY, yet I forget as quickly as those Israelites did.
I am tired of this mundane life of raising children. I want more. I want to please myself. I want to do what I want to do.
And that, my friends, is what keeps me going down this road. I need to be broken, daily. I need the Lord to remind me of why I do what I do. And homeschooling these folks He has left in my care is about the fastest way to be broken that I know of.
Homeschooling is turbo speed down sanctification highway.
There is no other occupation, no other life's work, that will break you and keep you on your knees like homeschooling will.
And yes, I fail....alot of days. No, we aren't in college yet, and no we don't really study Latin. But day after day after day after day, I am laying my life down for these girls....just like Christ laid down His life for me. I am praying that somehow they will see Christ in me. Because isn't that really what our job here is? Isn't our purpose really to lead our children to Christ, to guide them in His way and teach them? Isn't it really to raise them up in the way that they should go, so that when they are old they will not depart from it? I think it is. And that is why I don't give up.
I don't give up. Even though it is February and the sun hasn't shown its gorgeous face in months, we haven't been outside in days, everyone is ready for something new, and all we want is summer. I don't give up. I don't call it quits. {But I do start researching curriculums...its February for crying out loud.}
Lord, please let this work I am doing here on this Earth please you somehow. Let it in some way be a tool that draws these precious girls to you. Lord, I pray that you will break me and use me for your purposes here in this house day after day. I am imperfect and I am ungrateful. I am resentful and I am lazy, but Lord you are MORE. Please use me for your purposes and remind me of why I am here and how important this work is. I want to do your work Lord. Amen.
