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Sandy's Sunroom
                         
                                   A Path of Passion

                                                                                  by Sandy Willoughby

Let us paint a portrait of what a passionate home maker might look like. A home maker living out the details of her life with liveliness, true joy, beauty, grace, freedom and... passion.

What IS  passion?

The definitions I found on some various online sources were these:

  • intense emotion compelling action
  • emotion that is deeply stirring and ungovernable
  • implies warm and steady emotion
  • applies to lively or eager interest in or admiration for a proposal, cause or activity
  • implies energetic and unflagging pursuit of an aim or devotion to a cause

We want to take a few minutes - right now or consider printing this out and doing this when you get a few moments - to close our eyes and concentrate on a few things. The first thing we will reach deep to draw out is our very own descriptions of a passion filled life as a homemaker in Christ. We must allow ourselves some silence to really ponder what this vision will be illuminated by.

This woman has "intense emotion" compelling her to action. She isn’t dragging herself around with no signs of emotion barely existing but not truly alive! No! This lady is moved to action BY her intense emotion. She digs deep into the well of her soul each and every day by filling it to overflowing with the Giver of Life and the Author of Love! What can have more passion than the CREATOR of LIFE? What can possibly hold as much righteous fire as the ONE who IS LOVE? Do we sometimes keep an image of God in our minds as this boring white shadow that floats over the skies humming all day? I’ve mistakenly thought similar things in the past. This isn’t the way of our active and pursuing God!

He is actively and intimately involved in every fiber of our being... every center to every corner of our lives. There is not one emotion... no thought... no concern... no anything that touches our lives that He is unaware of. Do you realize how passionate His love for us is? We can gain a more passionate love for our husbands, children and even in our homemaking if we are more intimately and actively aware of them. We can pursue a greater knowledge of who they are and of what our homes are made of by making ourselves students of our husbands, our children, and our homes. What do I mean by becoming students of this sort? Let’s start with how well you really know your husbands? Would he say you know him... his desires... his dreams... his interests... his likes/dislikes...his needs and concerns?

What about the children? Do you know these things about them? Their strengths and weaknesses to pray for?

Your home... do you know what it needs to be maintained? Do you have ideas/dreams for things you’d like to do to make it more cozy, more pretty, more a haven? OR... have you lost hope? Have you given up and "let it go"? Have you lost your passion? Have you lost your passion with this man you married? Do you still light up inside when you see him... enjoy the warmth of holding his hand... cherish his kiss?

Did you lose the passionate mothering acts you always dreamed of with your kids? Do you still marvel at the gift they are to your life? Do you hug them and feel the wonder of their growing bodies... bodies that God Himself created in the body of you?

Have you lost a passion in life? Are you living with feelings that stir your soul... so much so that they seem to have no boundary or are your feelings so weighed down with everything else that they have become quite numb to these things?

A woman of righteous passion for the roles God has given her does all of these things. She doesn’t expect to just FEEL the passion...she makes it happen... she creates it... she brings it back when realizing it is hidden. The woman of this passion works to keep her soul alive! This lady learns the wisdom that emotions can only remain warm and steady when she makes the choice to actively pursue the awareness needed to keep herself alive.

Do you feel like Nicole Johnson describes in these words from her book:

"Fresh Brewed Life" ... "Who am I? Do you ever feel that you’re faking your life? That you’re living someone else’s life, and you’re not sure whose? You wonder how you got to this place of disguise. You want to give yourself to God, but what self are you going to give"?

You cannot change any of this on your own. We simply do not have it in us UNLESS... unless we go to the "in us" that is JESUS. JESUS in US is where the changes come from... where the emotions are balanced and the passion restored. The more of Him in Us... the more life we will have in the hours we spend. More PASSION cannot be had than the passion of JESUS CHRIST... our Savior, our King, Our Lord.

Now that we have finished our portrait of this woman who looks to the ways of her household with eager interests... let us move on to the next thing I wanted us to focus on and that is this: How much passion... how much energy and inner joy is ours as home makers in our own homes? Ask yourselves these as I will be doing with you... It takes " energetic and unflagging pursuit of an aim or devotion to a cause" to make things ALIVE and EXCITING in every single moment. WHAT is our devotion... our cause? Number one is Jesus. He is our reason for everything in every moment. We must fill our souls with HIM, HIM, HIM every single chance we get.

After Him we have to with energy pursue the aim of our husbands, our children and our homes. This is a fantastic journey, my sweet friends. This doesn’t have to be drudgery... this doesn’t have to be boring, lonely, or numb!

The woman --- the daughter of God, wife, mother, and home maker --- of true and real passion designs her life by God’s Words... by His standards. She is willing to "wash the feet" of the Father with her daily commitment to time with Him. Going to Him and bowing her soul at His very feet... blessing her life just by being there. She is willing to "wash the feet" of her husband by doing what things are needed in gratitude for the opportunity. This mother is willing to "wash the feet" of her children by placing their needs above her own wants. How does this homemaker "wash the feet" of something? She washes the floors! That’s it... she is willing to wash the floors that all the feet walk on because she can find happiness ... even there. "Peter saith unto him, Thou shalt never wash my feet. Jesus answered him, If I wash thee not, thou hast no part with me. Simon Peter saith unto him, Lord, not my feet only, but also my hands and my head." John 13:8-9 I would go on to provide a better picture of the passionate woman for you but I am choosing not to. I could add many different ways, ideas, and thoughts on what she looks like... what she does... how she feels... who she is. I choose not to so that YOU can paint her yourself. I cannot paint her for you and have her come out right! God has a unique and special way for each woman to live her life and she must search out to find that way herself. Only she... only YOU can know the life God wants for you where you are.

Here are some things to ponder in order to get you started on your "path of passion"...

Am I as passionate as I want to be?

Do I understand that passion isn’t only found in the bedroom with the lights out but instead is available to us inside each of our moments? Have I allowed myself to become stagnant... allowed my LIFE as a Christian, Wife, Mother, HOMEMAKER to become dull and dreary? What are some things I can do to create some passion in this home? With my Lord I can find instant passion when I pick up His Word. When I read things like ... "And saying, Sirs, why do ye these things? We also are men of like passions with you, and preach unto you that ye should turn from these vanities unto the living God, which made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and all things that are therein:" Acts 14:15 You can also find passion when you pray to Him... when you go to Him with every chance to talk to Him and listen for His voice in your life.

With your husband you can find passion when you love him the way you really want to love him. God gave you the desires to love him the way you should but the world has a way of dampening those passions. The world has a way of watering them down to make them fit into a basic mold instead of letting them run wild and free ... just with the man God joined you with. You can find passion by looking deep into his eyes, looking --- really looking --- at his hands... feeling --- really feeling --- the warmth in his touch.

With your children you can find passion by meeting them at their level... wherever that level may be. Allow yourself to enter into their world and play with them there at any age they live in right now. You can bring back the innocent pleasures of your youth by visiting it in your children’s present life! You can discover unmatched happiness in letting go enough to hang on to these memories while you can.

With your home... you can be AWARE... aware of anything you can with any task you do. While you are making beds... think of the loved one God blessed you with sleeping sweetly on the pillows... note how beautiful their hair is to you... hear in your mind the sound of their breathing. When you shower and the water is pouring over every part of you... think on the fact that the blood of Jesus is more pure than your water and cleans you... purifies you... like nothing else can. As you are washing dishes, cleaning off the table --- yet again --- sweeping the floor and doing the laundry... be aware of each task as you do it. The hot, soapy water rinsing clean, the shine of the wood when all of the crumbs and hand prints are wiped off, the look of the floor , free of debris.

Become involved in your every moment! Make something beautiful of your every move... your every thought... your every thing! There is nothing... nothing... nothing that you cannot learn a lesson from or see some beauty in when you choose to make yourself aware.

He is there... GOD ALMIGHTY HIMSELF... HE is right there with you! Aren’t we just utterly amazed that this divine LORD is not only with us but deeply IN us as we move about in the motions of our day? Right now... this very second... stop and let yourself feel His presence. He is there so it isn’t like this "won’t work". If it isn’t "working"... stay still longer. Stay until you feel Him from your inner soul to surrounding you. Feel Him in the very air... feel Him like you can feel nothing else in this life.

Start today to become a woman of passion. If you are already there... start today to be even more so. Passion doesn’t mean in the world what it means from heaven. From heaven... it is beautiful... pure... lovely... Godly. I pray that you will begin this moment by taking the very first step onto your path of passion. This path is filled with so many wonders you could never count or even fathom them all. Your God will indulge you in so much wonder and heighten your senses that you will look forward to everything you do. Start now... on what passion’s path will be in your life.

Sandy Willoughby  ©2001


To consider covering here:  Cleaning (washing dishes, watering plants, mopping the floor, laundry, making beds, scrubbing toilets, vacuuming carpets, cleaning windows, sweeping cobwebs), cooking (passionate meals, food preparation, to go, dinner time, ) , organization (orderly drawers, closets, purses, and more), Spiritual (quiet time, Bible reading, prayer, journaling, ) Correspondence ( letter writing), Marriage (beauty, fire, romance, ) Motherhood (hugging, loving, time together).

Sandy Willoughby  ©2001

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