Red door today

Today at Red Door Josh talked about Nehemiah 6. For background, Nehemiah was the cup bearer to the king (which apparently was a big time job back then, something like a cabinet member to the president or a congressman or something). Anyway, he left that position to rebuild the wall in Jerusalem. Josh focused on this verse:
Sanballat and Geshem sent to me, saying, "Come and let us meet together at Hakkephirim in the plain of Ono." But they intended to do me harm. And I sent messengers to them, saying, "I am doing a great work and I cannot come down. Why should the work stop while I leave it and come down to you?"
He said that we all have things that we're doing (he focused on jobs) but those things will just be jobs with no real purpose until what God is doing meets what we're doing. He pointed out that Nehemiah left a position of extreme importance to become a wall builder, then these people were oppressing him and basically saying, "hey, stop doing that and come hang out with us. That's not very important". His response was awesome: I am doing a great work and I cannot come down. He knew how important his work was because he KNEW that it was what God had called him to and he saw the eternal purpose in it.

Josh talked about stay at home moms a few times (probably because there are a lot at Red Door) and at one point he was going through different jobs and positions in life and he said, "you're not just a stay at home mom. You are a person committed to training and teaching the next generation to know and do the works God has called them to." That's my paraphrase cause I can't remember exactly, but I thought the whole talk was really great. After graduating with two bachelors degrees I've often heard, "So you're just staying home now?" It's easy to feel the pressure of society (even if it's only in my head sometimes) telling me that I could do something much more important. Today Josh encouraged us to remember that when what we do meets what God is doing we have to remind ourselves that we are doing a great work and we cannot come down from it. Even if what we're doing doesn't seem like it's such a great work.

This is so good to hear for a person with young kids. It can be easy to feel like what I do has no eternal purpose sometimes. But the truth is that without doing what I do, Ian, Mary and Noah's lives would be drastically different. If I didn't stay home with Mary and Noah they would turn out to be completely different people. There's a reason God has me here and even if I'd decided to become an actuary at some huge company and made a big salary, it wouldn't be more significant than what I'm doing now. Sorry world, I'm doing a great work, and I can't come down!