This past semester I was enrolled in a CL (Community Leader) class at Baylor and this meme popped up in one of our class powerpoints. Basically, our professor gave us no prior lecture or lead-in but rather opened the floor for us to share how this meme makes us feel. Not surprisingly, the first classmates to speak up were all female. Of course I can't remember exactly what they said but it was somewhere along the lines of "I don't understand why somebody would waste that much money and then become a housewife. Go to a community college". "Girls like this make the rest of us, who take our education seriously, look bad." "It's annoying that all girls get this reputation. I know girls that take easy majors and just goof around and do nothing in college." The guys in the class, on a whole, were more reluctant to speak but when they did it was basically the same arguments but less opinionated (probably because they've never been accused of getting their MRS degree). Shout out to my CL class if any of yall come across this! Love you!
For those of you who know me, you know that I have an enormous soft spot in my heart for children and parenting (not saying that I have any real knowledge or experience). My love for kids is kind of obsessive. There's not many things that tickle my heart like being loved by adorable children. Okay, sorry for getting all sappy but I can't help it! You might also know voicing an opposing opinion, especially in a group setting, can be really tough. So whenever the discussion was brought up in CL class, I listened to the class discuss the meme while I sat quietly in the front row biting my tounge. I'm sure that Rob, our professor, could tell that as the discussion went on I was getting more and more uncomfortable. So of course he totally called me out: "So Brooklyn, we haven't heard anything from you. Do you have any thoughts or remarks to contribute?" And of course I did!
...I feel like I should give some disclaimers since money can be a touchy topic...naa. Really, this post has little to do with the meme and how people responded and lots to do with my own convictions in my attitudes towards others. Here we go!
First off, I just want to mention that it's not sinful to simply desire to be married. God wired us to long for deep intimate relationships. I sometimes feel like desiring to be a strong, independent woman clashes with desires for love and vulnerability. This goes for men too, there's nothing sinful about desiring to love or be loved. It's okay to want! Just because you're content with Jesus as your boyfriend doesn't mean you should ever be ashamed or reluctant to pursue relationships. I'm not talking about excessive longing for identity found in a significant other...I'm simply talking about desire. Anyways, that's a total side note but maybe it will ring a bell with someone. Someone said that recently and I had to share. As for becoming a housewife, I just want to say that I have no idea whether I will ever be a housewife or a working mom, and I basically know nothing about either. I have hopes and dreams and desires, but only God knows. In addition, I have tons of respect for both stay at home moms and working moms. Both can be used as a ministry and are legitimate callings! Sorry I'm leaving you out of the picture, guys. I have an incredible respect for the man of the house as well but I'm not going to get into that haha. So, back to the meme...I would agree that from a financial standpoint spending a buttload on an education and becoming a full time financial analyst is going to look better on the books than becoming a housewife. From a financial standpoint, it doesn't makes sense (it was really hard for me not to be a punny nerd and put 'cents') to graduate college with thousands of dollars of debt only to stay at home and take care of children. From a financial standpoint, I agree that spending $100,000 to get a degree that you'll never use to generate income is a waste. Crunch some numbers and it's not hard to see that from a financial standpoint, becoming a housewife isn't the better decision. If we use a dollar sign as our metric, then you're right. That meme is ridiculous.
What bothers me is that I often resort to judging something's worth by the monetary amount associated with it. I often find myself assuming that the highest revered jobs are those with the highest income. They attract the smartest and most driven students. I easily fall into this default mindset. However, not all physicists could handle a day in the life of a second grade teacher, I know I sure couldn't. This isn't to say one occupation is better or worse than the other, but rather that God gives us different gifts for different reasons (sorta that whole one body many parts deal). On a whole, our society is very achievement based, and achievement is in most cases closely correlated with money. Money is the metric for gaging worth. When things go wrong, money can fix it. We enter into other cultures and think our way of life is the best, because it is economically sound and developed. I guess what I'm really getting at is that monetary value and individual worth aren't the same thing. In fact they're not related at all. How do you put a money value on transformation? Growth? Experiences? Salvation? How does it make sense to spend thousands of dollars to send a short term mission team to Costa Rica to build a church when you could save money and get more done by having simply sending a check? Apart from Christ and the transformation that the gospel brings, spending this much money just flat out doesn't make any financial sense.
I'm no accountant but monetary value is never stable or reliable. Depreciation, amortization, annuity, it's always changing. And to make decisions based solely off of making your bottom line number grow can be dangerous. If we spend more time crunching numbers than praying for and seeking guidance whenever making decisions, we aren't truly trusting God. I know this is WAY easier said than done. And I've never even really experienced it! It's kind of funny that I have two 'money' blogs back to back because I really know squat. But I what I do know is that individual worth has got to be such a better foundation than money. Know why? Individual worth doesn't change. It can't be lost or earned or stolen. Our worth is completely and solely found within our identity in Christ. We are all created in Imageo Dei, the image of God.
So God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.-Genesis 1:27Seriously, how cool is that? Every single person on this earth God has created in His image! And that, my friends, is true worth. All people are valued simply for having been created by our Creator. You can't ever take that away from somebody. Something tells me that God would rather us make decisions based off of His everlasting kingdom rather than a balance sheet. ;) The things with the most worth are going to outlast everything else. We are worth enough to God that He came down to earth, lived a life we could never live, and suffered on the cross. I can't contemplate it sometimes, I'm just totally in awe. If God went through all of that just so that he could have a restored relationship with His Children, our relationship and pursuit of following Christ has got to be pretty stinkin' important! Jumping on opportunities to share this with others means that we've got to hold a Kingdom agenda above our earthly agenda. More important than where we live, who we marry, and how much money is spent on our college tuition. I need to constantly remind myself of what eternally matters, and just how much God values all of His people. Whenever we truly live for God's kingdom, there will no doubt come times when our life choices aren't going to match up with how society tells us we should live.
It's going to seem crazy to the world that a engineer graduating with a 4.0 decides to move to Haiti and live in a apartment and share Jesus with his neighbors. Even if he never uses any of his engineering skills, who can say that his time in college was a waste? It's going to seem crazy to the world that a businesswoman decides to leave her high paying salary to spend more time with her family. It's going to seem crazy to the world that a millionaire decides to move his family into a simple house and have a simple lifestyle so that they can help support their church's missionaries. It's going to seem crazy that a teenager would skip a party to hang out with the guy nobody likes. For the sake of serving and living like Christ, the world needs more crazies. It sure seems crazy to me that God continues to love me and extend grace to me no matter how many times I screw up, but I'm so thankful this is the crazy truth.
I really hope I never stop listening to God, even when I think I've got things figured out. I never want to be so focused on my own desires that I limit myself to what God is calling me to do. Like Aaron or Jonah, God may have plans for me that I do not see coming! He's done it to me before and I'm sure He'll do it again. And even when I do veer off path I know the Spirit always has a funny way of thumping me on the head to get my attention.
In college especially, it's so easy to be consumed with myself. My grades, my food, my sleep, my time...it's a never-ending cycle of selfishness that is super easy to get caught up in. I'm constantly wanting to make decisions that benefit myself and make me (or my GPA) look good. However, college is so much more than just getting a degree. I never want my role as a disciple of Christ to be secondary to my role as a student. I'm starting to come to that realization but putting it into action can be hard. Whenever it's 11:00 at night and I have a test in the morning, the last thing I 'want' to do is to get side-tracked by someone else and have something pop up unexpected. With God's help, I have to actively try to make my relationships with others more important than my personal study agenda and to-do list. This is such a struggle! This next year I pray that God helps me to re-prioritize my college agenda with a Kingdom mindset. Think of all the transformation and life-shaping experiences we encounter during college and what a potential impact we can have on others! These are some of the most exciting and developmentally significant years of our life, and they have hardly anything to do with our classes. Just because I've had a classes in microeconomics and management information systems doesn't mean that I'll ever use it in 'the real world'. But that doesn't make it a waste! The process of learning and growing and being challenged has value apart from receiving a diploma. Looking back on my college experiences, it's so incredible how God has had his hand in everything, and this gives me even more comfort moving forward.
I can't help but think about how incredibly thankful I am for Christ and the conviction I have to share the good news with others. I pray that the Holy Spirit would continually stir my heart to be radically active and intentional in the way I approach ministry. If we could all see God's people with even .001% of the love and worth God has placed on us, just imagine how selfless and great our relationships would be. This eternal imageo dei worth should be a driving factor behind how I approach ministry, life decisions, and my walk with God. I know I am constantly falling into Satan's trap of thinking that my worth is found in things apart from God and judging others with a wordly worth. However, I am constantly humbled and brought back to Christ with every failure and false sense of worthiness I find in things apart from Him. God, help me to be crazy for you!!
