Warriors

Know that saying "It takes a village."? Turns out, I need an army.


Not long ago (October to be exact), a friend called me a warrior. I thought she had lost her mind. 

It was a Wednesday morning, Bible Study day. The day of the week that gets me through all the others. I need to give you a little description/background about our group. We've been together for three years now. This small group of women is fiercely devoted to one another. Some days we don't even make it to our study. Some days we only pray. We've been through a LOT together. We are each other's strength. The words uttered in this room, the prayers prayed are closely guarded by us all. I will say that every prayer begins with a thanks to God for each other. Wednesday mornings are my refuge. 

So anyway, it's Wednesday, and I'm coming off of a bad week. Hannah Grace's test results had come back, and all I knew was that I had to wait six more weeks to see a specialist. For me, that was eternity. I was on the edge of getting my answers, and now I has to sit and wait for six weeks. I don't remember what I prayed that morning, I just remember involving the ugly cry and not being able to catch my breath. Every woman in that room prayed for me and my family that day. They picked up the slack for me, that's just who they are. Our leader always closes out prayer time. FYI, she's one of my favorite people on this planet. In her prayer, she called me a warrior. I remember raising my head, tears streaming down my face, and thinking, "she has lost it, I'm not a warrior." 

I know warriors. A warrior is the mother who fought for her son when the doctors told her at 18 weeks he wouldn't live past delivery. A warrior is the mother who fought for the life of her twin boys while her body was trying to reject them. A warrior is the same mother who fought for the child she knew was out there in world waiting for her, she just had to find him. A warrior is my grandmother, who fought every single day of my father's childhood to make sure he kept breathing. Those people are warriors. Those women are God's magnificent soldiers. Those women put their children's lives in God's hands with no question. Those women fought fiercely for their children, trusting God the whole way, never knowing what the outcome would be. I know these women well, I know their struggles, but I didn't think I was anywhere close to being like them.

Robin's prayer sat with me for days. I was extremely shaken by it. Maybe there was something to this. Warriors are good fighters on their own, but when fighting together for one cause, they can be unstoppable. What better description could there be for Christian mothers? In a rare moment of clarity, it hit me. I am a warrior. I am God's warrior. Every single day I fight a new battle. Some days, I have my fellow warriors with me. The term "prayer warrior" has new meaning to me now. We fight every day in our homes. We fight for our children the moment we know they exist. We fight to win their hearts for Christ the moment they arrive. Somedays we have physical battle wounds ( black eyes from a head butt anyone?), but I would be willing to bet most of our scars are hidden. Before I acknowledged my warrior status, I hid my scars. I pretended the wounds didn't hurt. Now I have a whole army to share them with. Every mark has a story and a lesson. My fellow warriors get it. We know that we all fight different battles, but our war is the same. We fight for our King. Our battlegrounds may be kitchens and playgrounds, homework and chores, some of us will have to fight in hospitals and doctors offices; but we fight so our children can know their King. We fight for their hearts to love Him and trust Him they way we do so that when it's their turn to take on the fight, we will have trained them right. 

Yeah, we mess up; way more than we get it right. But, that is where having your other warriors close to you comes in handy. They take over when you can't. After all, WE ARE ALL FIGHTING THE SAME WAR. They brave carpool for you a few days. (We all know the danger there). They bring food when you're too exhausted to cook. They show up at your door and take your other kid and refuse to speak to you so you won't argue. It's a give and take. It is a constant fight. But we are fighting to expand a kingdom. We begin the fight in our own homes, we take it to schools and playgrounds and daycares.  We band together and fight wherever our families gather. It's our purpose, our job, our path as mothers. We fight for our husbands, we fight for our children, we fight for our families. We fight against a relentless enemy who seeks to tear our world apart. But we know our King has already won. So we fight with a ferocity that only those sure of the future can. I fight so my children will know the certainty of eternity. 

"Train up a child in the way that he should go, so that even when he is old, he does not depart from it." Proverb 22:6