What's Next?

Seven years ago, I graduated from Divinity school thinking I would work for a year or two, pay down student loans, and return for a PhD. Six years ago, I took a job at a church on a whim, and never thought about that PhD again. Five years ago I had a baby, and then I had two more, and I became so busy balancing motherhood and ministry that I never thought about my ten year plan again.

Two months ago, we packed up our first house, loaded up our three pets and three kids and moved halfway across the country to Texas. Today, I find myself in a new town, a new house, and with a very different life than I’ve ever known before. I am now, for the first time ever, the designated, full-time, Stay At Home Parent.

I thought staying at home with my children would be difficult, and it has been, but not in the ways I suspected. I thought the constant onslaught of diapers and dishes and snack dispensing would be the challenge. These things are difficult—and I have tremendous respect for the parents who have been doing this long before me—but, for me, the hardest part of this shift has been the identity crisis. The wondering who I am if I am no longer a Director of Christian Formation at a 200 year old church in Hillsborough, North Carolina. The loss of a ministry and a job I loved. The mourning of who I was and the people I left behind.

But.

It’s also been so, so good for me to hit pause. To close my eyes, take a long deep breath, and dream up new dreams for myself—even if they scare me. For the first time in years, I have the space to ask God, “What’s next?” and “Who am I?” And of course the answer is, I’m still me. I just have to figure out how to be me in a new place.

So that’s what I’m going to do. Be someone who creates space for people to ask questions about God and find answers. Someone who empowers others to live faithful, intentional and abundant lives in Christ. Someone who talks about beauty and liturgy, children and parenting, practices and traditions, books and culture, our homes and what we do in them, and how all of these things can form and shape us in the way of Jesus. I’ll just be doing it in a new place: here, at Chapel of the Little Way.