A New Year's Thought

I recall an old adage that goes something like "The choices you make today, determine the choices you make tomorrow."

I am feeling that adage at this time in my life.

I'm not certain if it's a good or a bad thing. I suspect it's a bit of both. It's not that I don't like my current life. I just wish for something more and don't see a way to get it.

I am a mother of 4. I love my children. I feel so restricted by my motherhood. I wish I had known how hard and demanding motherhood would be before I had become one. I wish I could have felt that it was okay to feel overwhelmed before. When I had fewer kids. Because I was. I was afraid to admit it before. I am still am a little afraid to admit it now. Because I still feel like I have to, in some respects be the do all, be all mom. The Supermom that all seem to expect me to be.

I feel obligated to pour everything into them though because if I fail them, then I am indeed failing. They are depending on me to grow and learn. I want them to be loving, intelligent people. And they are.

And yet I feel this call to be more than a mom. The call is rather unclear to me though. Because I have so many interests. I hate all this contention. Not knowing what to do. And feeling so conflicted. Because of programming I had before that I *should* just be a mom. And so many still trying to push that programming on me. And at the same time, I feel like because I'm a mom of so many kids [and some of them with special needs] I have no real alternative. *sigh*

My past choices [even if I do love them] have at least narrowed my current ones.

Am I a Christian?

What a sticky question. I would have to say "yes", but I'm certainly not a traditional one.

I believe I'm inherently imperfect. I could live a thousand lives and the result would most likely be that I would mess up a million ways collectively. I believe in a God who is perfect and probably doesn't want to particularly want to see the messes I've made because I would bring mud all over His white house so to speak. So I believe that there has to be something [or someone more accurately] to clean up those messes. That someone to me is Jesus.

The reason why I'm thinking about my own Christianity is a question I had to day in my Bible study: "Is there any part of the Christmas Story that you doubt?"

Well, yeah. I find the virgin birth rather astonishing. Immaculate conception is an awfully big pill to swallow. It wasn't a new tale either. There were tales of Greek gods impregnating mortal women for centuries prior to Jesus' birth.

Here's the thing though... He still lived a damned fine life where he taught to love God and love your fellowman. He taught service was a way to show that love. In that I think Jesus was a pretty good guy. He performed lots of miracles. He lived and died honorably. I think He may have still been able to fill that gap for me.

So yes, I'm a Christian, but I'm rather non-literal. And if the mainstream Christianity knew, it would be rather unpopular.