Have Faith, and Be Faithful

If you're anything like me, Sunday afternoon can bring an onslaught of anxiety and realization of all that remains undone. As I look forward at each week, I am always still carrying much from the week that is coming to a close; much undone, much unresolved, much unknown.

 Homeschooling provides very little opportunity for the satisfaction of checking tasks off of a list, without others immediately filling their place. The work is never done, and nothing is, by definition, "accomplished".  Particularly with a living education, so much is immeasurable and not tangible. Homeschooling is a long game, and it is an act of faith. Education, like faith, is evidence of things not seen.

As we set out on another week of seeking to train our children in the admonition of the Lord, and invite them to a feast of the true, good and beautiful, we must do so while clinging to the goodness of God. Might I encourage you, sweet mommas, by reminding you that your children's education is not dependent upon your abilities and your knowledge and your energy. You children's education is dependent upon the Creator that knitted them together, and that loves them infinitely more than you do.

The most important thing that you can do this week for your homeschool is to be faithful with what God has provided while trusting Him to make good of your imperfection. Your children don't need your carefully curated and accomplished lists nearly as much as they need you to show up to the table ready to feast with them upon the goodness spread before you. When I feel myself on the verge of spinning out of control each Sunday, I return directly to two things that I have invested the time to tether myself off to.

Those two things are: 

1. Investment- 

This involves sitting down to make a plan for the week ahead, letting go of my death grip on perfectionism, but still choosing to invest in my children, my home, and my homeschool with a plan. This requires both the humility to acknowledge my own finite limits AND the choice to be a good steward of the work God has given me to do. As I trust His infinite and sovereign control over what is to come, I also obey His call upon my life by organizing and stewarding my hours and my energy to the best of my ability. 

2. Schole- 

I know, without one doubt, that I can't show up to brand new week depleted and malnourished. I refuse to show up empty. So, on Sundays, no matter how much there is that needs to be done, I read and I keep and I restfully learn. A few years ago, the reality that I have absolutely no right to show up to facilitate my children's education devoid of any ideas hit me square in the face, and drove me to my knees. Since then, I have (imperfectly) made it a non negotiable habit to fill my own soul and mind on Sundays so that I show up to the week with an overflow. 

Faithfulness AND faith, my friends, is what I have come to understand that homeschooling requires. I must be faithful, and I must trust the Lord to make something far greater than the sum of my fragmented parts. We look through a glass dimly, but God is working together all of our homeschool efforts for the good of our children and for His glory displayed beautifully in the hearts and lives of our children.

Monday threatens to steal the peace of each and every Sunday, but we don't have to let it. We can't control the future, not of our week and not of our children's lives.
But, we CAN be faithful to the work God has given our hands to do. 

Right here, in the trenches of homeschooling, when it seems that days both drag on and fly by simultaneously, God is at work.
In the midst of our imperfect faithfulness to His calling,
God is always perfectly, and beautifully, faithful.

Your children don't need your perfection, but God will make use of your faithfulness.

You love your children, mommas, but God loves them more,
and He has proven Himself worthy of our trust. 

As you stand at the end of one week and the beginning of another,
whatever lingers from the past days and threatens in the coming ones,
be faithful and have faith, friends. 

Invest in the week to come, and rest in God's sovereignty over all that you plan and hope for. 

This is a long game, but His grace is sufficient for all of it.

There is no instant gratification, but there are mercies ever new.

You can't follow the right formula and guarantee the ideal results, but you can believe that God has loved both you and your children with an everlasting love. 

You can't be everything, but you can be faithful. 

You can't know what's coming, but you know the God of the cosmos. 

Have faith....and be found being faithful.

May All Your Days Be Spent....Delightfully Feasting
Love, Crystin