This is a post I have wanted to create for a while.....and bear with me...it's not an easy one to do.
When you think of a "wife of a pastor", what comes to your mind? Whether you are reading this as a lifelong Christian, a baby Christian, or a full fledged athiest, what is the first words/thoughts that come to your mind? I am sure lots of words, or very few at all, are filling your mind right this second.
If I may, let me introduce myself if you are new to my blog.
Hi, I'm Sara. I am the daughter of a pastor. A daughter- in- law of a pastor. A wife of a pastor.
When I was young, I could think of nothing more than wanting to be a mother and a wife....but for sure, I was NEVER going to marry a pastor. Yet, here I am! 43 years old, a mother of 4 amazing kiddos and the wife of yes...a pastor!
In one regard, I know nothing different. I was born into a home of where church attendance was as expected as using the restroom. (sorry, best analogy that popped into my head). I was always "the pastor's kid." Every breath I inhaled, every move I made, every step I took, every mistake I did...I was being watched. I wasn't only being watched...I was being critiqued, criticized, analyzed, and judged. Everyone else could make a mistake, say a naughty word, like a popular song...and it was fine. But not Sara! "What?! Your dad's a PASTOR! How dare you? What's wrong with you? What would your father say? You're suppoosed to be PERFECT!" (Literally, I have heard all of these).
I'm sure every child who is in any sort of spotlight deals with the challenges in their own way. But this is my story. And I want to be honest, because if ( and I know there are) other humans out there who have been in my shoes now, or were in the past, I want you to know you are not crazy/bad/wrong.
You are you. You are human. You are a beloved child of the One True King.
I've written in blogs past on some of my growing up/history, and this post isn't aiming at that. This post is geared more towards the "today" of Sara....."That pastor's wife."
Those who know me well, know that the past few years have been filled with a VERY heavy load of scrutiny for me. Life as a pastor's "offspring" has never been easy, but this is just the last, let's say, 6 years of my existence.
Politics.
Yikes. What comes to your mind when you see that word?
I bet lots.
I'll tell you what comes to my mind:
POLITICS. ARE. DEAD.
Yup. I said it. As a Christian. As a daughter of the King. As a pastor's daughter. As a pastor's wife....I can tell you with 100% certainty I am fully aware and IN AGREEMENT with the "separation of church and state." (That quoted phrase is not in the Bible FYI, yet God makes it clear there are two kingdoms. His, and Earth). However, I am not one to argue with anyone about where and how they believe their taxes should be used. Yes, I am 100% against my tax dollars being used to help fund murdering of infants (they call it '"abortion" these days) or children, or any humans of any age in cutting off their genitalia and using synthetic (or even bioidentical) hormones to "change their gender." In cases like this, Christians, truly, are we talking politics anymore or are we battling principalites and darkness? Yet, I don't get to decide that as of now. I could, stop paying my taxes, because of these issues alone, which yes, are 100% happening as of today in my state of Wisconsin and even at the Children's Hospital of Wisconsin just over an hour away from my place of residence. Yet, here I am. Still paying taxes which I sadly know have allowed these atrocities to happen.
Lord, forgive me.
However, because I stand up for life, all life. Because I stand up against the mutilation of genitals of children under 18 years of age, I am harassed multiple times a week. I am harassed by local people, who "call themselves Christian" yet turn around and tell me I can "rot in hell", because I stand against murder of ALL stages of life, against genital mutilation, and against pedophilia. I have had one local woman (yes , we found out because cyber investigation and caller ID still exist) , create over 28 profiles on Twitter alone to harass me, spread lies and extremely hateful and vulgar verbiage about and to me. I don't know how one human being who has never physically interacted with other human soul, can have so much hate inside to spend so much time creating a fictional fantasy online world, but apparently, it happens. I am living proof. I have tried multiple times, to try and have conversation with this "person", citing Matthew 18, yet they continue to choose to live in their fantasy world and not identify who they are.
Coward.
That is the only word that comes to mind.
(If you have a better word, by all means...)
So..because I am the woman who doesn't play organ, have perfectly well behaved children, direct the choir, say all the right things, be all the right places at the right time, look the perfect way, do all the right things, I am criticized.
Now, to be fair, any pastor's wife should know with 100% certainty, that they COULD technically do all the right things, and still be "wrong."
I have only ONE thing, and one thing alone to say to ANY pastor's child or wife:
YOU WILL NEVER MAKE EVERYONE HAPPY.
EVER.
PERIOD,
Play the organ every Sunday, don't miss a note. Sing loud and beautiful. Have perfectly, well behaved children. Look amazing, every Sunday. Smile. Engage. Stay after. Do altar guild. Direct choir. Teach Sunday School. Arrange the flowers. Clean the church. Arrange the bulletin. Do it ALL!!
They will still find something wrong in you.
"Wow Sara. You sound like an ornery, bitter old hag."
Truly, I'm not. :)
I'm just being honest. I had the privilege of being born in a fish bowl, so I understand the tricks and trades of this business. So many PW's (pastor's wives), never experienced an ounce of this life until the day they married their man and became a PW. It can be challenging. It can be hard. It can be overwhelming. For others, it's a breeze, it's full of life, it's the wind in "her sails." She wakes up pondering her next Sunday's organ music line up, and has all seven of her children's Christmas AND Easter outfits lined up for the next two church years. :). God bless you.
That's just not me. And for any of those women out there who lean more towards my "degenerate" PW life, ( I kid I kid) , then this is the article for you. I TRULY do not mean to make ANY women of any vocation feel out of place. We are all so blessed and SO called by our Heavenly Father to do the will He has sent us to do. Let's be honest. Without the type A, organ playing, 7+ violin playing offspring pastor's wives, we would be one IMMENSELY boring synod of called workers. I learn so much from the women who are opposite than me, and some of those same women happen to be some of my BEST FRENDS! I too hope, in my inattentive ADHD, mother of 4 (still contributing to society) children, rarely on time, "political" (gag..politics are dead remember) PW life, I am encouraging another PW in her walk with Jesus.
Here is the thing: I. Love. Jesus.
In all of my messy, not "on time", radical, unconventional, sloppy ways, I love my Savior with every fiber of my being.
To the person who just today told me to "rot in hell," I love my Savior, and I know He loves me.
And? HE LOVES YOU TOO!
I support the second amendment ( for many reasons, but one large one being the sacrifice my grandpa made in his military years overseas), oppose murdering infants of any stage post conception, support legal measures of obtaining citizenship, believe consequences have actions, ,believe in the FACT that only two genders exist, and that marriage is between ONE gender and the OTHER gender only. Yet, this doesn't make me a "political" person. This makes me a "biblical woman."
I once had a church member ask me, "How does your husband feel about all of your 'political talk' on social media?" (Now, this member actually is a very staunch conservative, so he agrees with the views, I share, but I am sure also comes from the thought process of church and politics being completely obverse of each other. ( Remember, I too believe in church being a place where the Law and Gospel of Jesus Christ are preached, but when we are told to obey God over men and the heaviest subject of government deals with murder and genital mutilation, than we talk about it. Period.) I looked at him, smiled, and said, "Well, being him and I have very opposite personalities, this has definitely been a subject we have discussed. However, I will say, biblically, we agree with each other 100% on these things. So, I don't look at me posting anything political. I look at me standing up for God's Word and His children." I think that gave him an answer that he couldn't really respond to. I will say this as well: If the government did nothing that was asking me to go against my Lord and Savior, I wouldn't have a thing to say about the government. "You do you, boo!"
Yet, that is not what the government is asking of me right now. Rather, it has gone way beyond asking into, "commanding" and maybe that is because we, the church, sat still and quiet for way. too. long. We asked the organist to "play the music louder" as we heard the cattle cars of screaming women and children being hauled into concentration camps.
It's ok to stand up in church and say, " We need to help those people being taken to their deaths for no reason but hate!" I refuse to drown out the noise because it's uncomfortable. I refuse to play the music louder because hate-filled liberals subscribe me to oodles of leftist emails and volunteer positions like Planned Parenthood and GLAAD (just to mention a few). Who has time to sit there and unsubscribe from one, after another, after another, after another email newsletter from a hateful liberal who has gone bazerker, because her choice of murdering her unborn children has become more difficult in her state? I refuse to be silent when children of ANY age, but let alone still in their single digits, are being given hormones and having their genitalia removed because they want to be the opposite gender at that time in their life.
THIS IS INSANITY!
So yes, I am "that pastor's wife."
I love Jesus with everything that I am. I make mistakes. I get angry and say things I shouldn't sometimes. But, when I am called out, I will gladly have a conversation about it, and if I am in the wrong, I will EAT CROW, and apologize and make it as right as I can, because that is what God has commanded me to do. Whether I "feel" it or not.
You can still disagree with me. You may still think I am wrong. I may think how you are "doing life" is wrong too, yet in the end, it doesn't matter what I, or you think. It matters what God thinks. And that is what and where we should be checking ourselves in every area of our life. We are to be Bereans, checking all things to what Scripture says about that particular situation.
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