Checking on my Chickens

In the summer of 2012 I went to Scotland for 12 days to help my church run a camp for teens. Earlier that year my husband had prayed for a short-term missions opportunity to open up for me, and looking back I know why God made such a big deal out of it. That trip changed my life. I was 11 years in as a stay-at-home mom and had quite literally stayed home from from everything, but that trip opened up life for me again.

Although travel and missions weren't new for me, working with teens, at a camp, was terrifying. I was desperately afraid that I wasn't cool enough, and I was right, but the kids I met there didn't care. And camp? Camp is home.

Scotland is obviously one of the best places in the world anyway, but it's special to  me because it was the first step on a long path towards reminding me that I'm a person apart from my children; that God gave me gifts separate from them, and that I'm not just a mom. As I've said here before, 'just a mom' is a tricky phrase. Being a mom IS a special calling, but I just really think that those of us that are moms are also something else.

Scotland was my first glimpse into the something else, so for me it's the most special place there is.

I went for 3 camps total, and even now I have memories so fond they are almost visceral. The youth camp is still going on there, and after two years of being away, I'm going to Scotland in ten days to visit my people. I had been praying for a chance to go and visit, and when my husband encouraged me to go, I decided not to be a contentious wife, but to submit as a wife should. And God, who is always on our side no matter whether or not we think so, provided a stupid cheap fare, so I thank him for that.

Not that I'm comparing myself to the great Apostle Paul, but I do feel a bit like I'm going to check on all of my chickens. The problem with having my heart in two places is that their lives go on as mine does, with an ocean in between. I really do have to entrust them to God-just as Paul tells Timothy, "I know whom I have believed; and I am convinced that He is able to guard what I have entrusted Him until that day."

When I tried to explain to my husband how special it was, he simply said, "it smells like home." And that about covers it. And I am doubly thankful that out of all the places that God could write on my heart, he chose a place as beautiful and wild as that one.