The Perilous Journey

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“The Perilous Journey”

per-i-lous adj. full of danger or risk

We hear Lent called a “journey” all the time.  I say it is a journey inside a journey inside a journey inside a journey inside a journey…

         From the moment of our conception, we are thrust on one perilous journey after another.  As we mature - as our callings are revealed – and we answer them (hopefully with grace), we find ourselves battered again and again from all sides. Even from inside ourselves!  Sometimes especially from inside ourselves.

How do we stay on that path we’ve been called to tread without “losing our way”?  When we falter in our ability to find joy or see the worth or just feel too weak to continue, how do we come back to a place of spiritual contentment?  

As a mother of eight, ages 15 down to 4 months, I am constantly wondering what God was thinking when He thought I could handle all this.  I falter most often when my gassy baby just won’t stay asleep, the toddler is doing headstands on the sofa and trying to kick his 5-year-old brother who’s playing so nicely, the 8-year-old is crying over subtraction and borrowing, and the three oldest are just trying to get their school done in the din of it all. Yeah, we homeschool, too.  If I didn’t feel His calling so strongly to both of those vocations, I would be in the “Funny Farm”!

I’ve heard from my well-meaning family that I don’t have to do this to myself.  Strangers have no qualms about telling you you’re nuts.  “Send your kids to school!” “Get better cable!” “Do you have a good gun?” (That was from some old guy in the grocery store; I didn’t hang around to figure out what he meant by that.)

My journey as a homeschooling mother-of-many is not easy.  AT. ALL.  Guess what??  It’s not meant to be!!

But I must watch myself.  I have to do my best to put a label on all those naysayers, especially the ones in my own head; it’s the devil doing his best to put Doubt and Fear in my mind, my soul.  I MUST look to the Light…I MUST stay the course…this battlefield is mine to conquer with the love of my Lord as my shield.  My GOAL is to get my husband and my children to Heaven, despite my failings.  This journey is so very perilous, but I – with God’s grace -  will prevail.

This Lent will be a tiny workshop within This Big Plan that is His Will for my life.  A spiritual workout that will only strengthen my might and my will.  A redirection towards the “light” that always leads us to the right place.  It makes me think of the story I read to the children, The Squire and the Scroll by Jeanne Bishop.  The main character always turns to the “words of the scroll” to direct him no matter the situation, and the scroll always leads him the correct way.

I pray for you all this Lent.  I pray that you, too, find your direction, stay on the course, and hopefully find joy in your journey.