Unique to You

A couple of days ago, when I wrote about my first day post-full-time-job, you all had SO MUCH to say about this new season of my life. I don't remember the last time I've enjoyed reading comments so much! {Well, to be fair, I do enjoy reading a good comment thread on Facebook when it just goes crazy over something ridiculous, but this was an entirely different kind of enjoyment. This was productive.}

It seemed like many of you have a passion to stay home/work from home yourselves, and I think that's great! And I know many of you have a passion to work outside the home too...and I think that is great as well.

I wanted to tell you about something my friend Polly said in response. Polly comments here all the time, so you've probably read her encouraging words before, but I met her through my job at the station. She's a listener and came to meet me once at a Sticker Stop. We've been blogging/texting friends ever since and my life is richer because she speaks joy into it MANY times every week.

After she read my post, she sent me this text:

 I just heard an amazing message by Andy Stanley, and he said, "Why would you trade what is unique to you for something someone else can do?" Amen! Why trade time and energy for a job lots of people can do, even though you were great at your radio job, for the ONE job you and only you can do - be Ryan's wife and best friend.

I share this with you today not because I want to start a debate between working and staying home {because I so do NOT want to start a debate} - but because I want to remind all of us, myself included, of the absolute stunning BEAUTY in the great diversity of passions and causes that the Lord has placed on our hearts.

Sort of feels like to me that with the advent of the world wide web and social media, we suddenly have this intense pressure placed upon us to love every single cause in the world. And by love, of course, I mean devote our lives completely to each thing.

In the years I worked in radio, Lynne and I interviewed dozens of people who were crazy devoted to a passion the Lord gave them. I interviewed a mom who created a line of nut butters to help adopted kids adjust to a diet that wasn't largely orphanage porridge. I interviewed a lady who organizes underwear drives so kids in the ER or a women's shelter can have clean underwear and not be embarrassed at what they don't have. I interviewed a mom who created a planner system for homeschooling moms so they could be effective teachers without feeling overwhelmed. I interviewed a young mom from my own stomping grounds, who created a ministry to send bracelets to moms who had lost their babies - because she knew their pain and wanted to give them something tangible to hold a memory of what they'd lost. Lynne interviewed a gentleman who rescued retired racehorses and gave them a new career in helping veterans with PTSD go through some therapy. She also interviewed a young man who works with an organization that takes junked cars and uses them to help at-risk teens learn practical life skills in rehabbing them and selling them.

I loved hearing their stories.

And I loved it that at the end of each interview, we'd connected one person's passion with thousands of listeners, and maybe a handful of those listeners would connect with the story in such a way that they'd also want to help. They'd want to become part of that ministry or that vision.

But I also loved it that we all didn't have to take on every single cause. Out of that whole list I gave you...my heart beats faster for only one of those causes. Not that the others are not worthy or wonderful. They all are. But the Lord has given me a tender heart toward one in particular.

And that is the beauty of the Body of Christ and the heartbeat of people working together. We can all be passionate toward different things, and when we each devote ourselves to those things the Lord has pushed us to invest in, we'll find the needs of the hurting around us being met in the most beautiful rhythm.

The fact that I'm able to be away from a standard work day right now means that I have the chance to pursue some of those passions I might otherwise not have time for. It doesn't mean I have to invest in everything in front of me.

I don't know what your passion might be. But I urge you to think about what is unique to you...the passion God has put on your heart. Do that. You don't have to do it all. But do what He calls you to do, and do it with all your heart.