The Proof is in the Pudding

Have you ever been enlightened by a little old lady? Well, I recently was super encouraged in my role as a mother from a sweet old lady that used the phrase, "Well, bless your heart honey..." numerous times during our conversation. It's not my standard response to call someone a "little old lady," but this lady really was, and she was happy to call herself "old" and reminded me that she was in her late seventies.

My experience reminded me just  how refreshing it is to talk to someone who is down the road a bit from where I am. She has the perspective of being a wife and mother on the opposite side of me. I was at a recent MOPS meeting and during our discussion she sat in as the Mentor Mom since our Mentor Mom was busy with her grand-kids. I had brought up a situation that I had with one of my kids that really stumped me--I really had not known how to respond to this child, and so I asked her opinion. The wisdom that she gave me was so direct and so...well, far from my thinking as a mom with much less experience.

I have a great mother and mother-in-law (hello to both of you!) who give me great wisdom, but I think it's also important for me to seek out other ladies that are older than me. An older woman may be the seventy year old sweetie I met, or maybe someone who is actually younger than I am but more mature in the faith, or someone who is younger but has children older than mine or has been through more events in their marriage.

I often have conversations about mothering with friends of mine who are at the very same stage of parenting as I am. I really enjoy these conversations, but at the same time I wonder--are we just the blind leading the blind? The bible is very specific about parenting, don't get me wrong. But I think it's easy when you are in the midst of parenting with lack of sleep, whining children and spit up on your shoulder that it's easy to let your emotions and your heart dictate how your home should operate. A lot also falls onto the husband's shoulders of how the home is being run, what disciplines are in place, and his role in general with the wife and children. So many factors, and yes God is adequate to answer all of our questions in life--even the question of the whining toddler. But there is something about talking to someone older who is not merely still figuring out how to do things. If moms were in relationships with older (and wise) women, then I think it would dramatically change the relationships between mothers in the same walk of life. Because we would have a deeper understanding of motherhood we could better encourage each other to keep the faith, seek God for counsel, and be fully there for our families.

This is something I want to work on. I want to seek out to have a relationship with an older woman or women. I know I don't pick the brain of our MOPS mentor Mom enough, and she has so much wisdom to share, and the reason she is a part of MOPS is because she wants to mentor younger moms. This relationship may initially just be a proof to the younger moms that her mentor is someone who is a mother, and she has survived the years of parenting preschoolers! As well as finding women in my life to seek out for wisdom, I need to be available for younger women to learn from me. This may even be harder than finding someone older to glean from. It's easy to think "I have nothing to teach someone else," simply because I am still in the middle of it, the "proof is in the pudding", isn't it? I think it must be a balance of sharing with each other things that are working and also sharing the things that didn't work--and the mistakes we've made along the way.

Well, there are my thoughts for tonight. All based upon these verses in Titus 2:3-5

"Teach the older women to live in a way that honors God. They must not slander others or be heavy drinkers. Instead, they should teach others what is good. These older women must train the younger women to love their husbands and their children, to live wisely and be pure, to work in their homes, to do good, and to be submissive to their husbands. Then they will not bring shame on the word of God."