First Things First: What is the “Ministry of Reality”

I’m a (mostly) Stay-At-Home-Mom. I’m an introvert, but I love hosting friends in my home. Over the years people have often commented how comfortable they are in my home. It’s not spotless or super-organized, but it’s usually neat and usable. I love people making themselves at home by getting themselves a drink (even searching in my cabinets to find the glasses!) and plopping down on my couch for a chat.

I’m honest about my struggles to parent well and to wife well. I generally let my flaws be obvious. I decided a few years ago to call my lifestyle my Ministry of Reality.

So many moms struggle to maintain the perfect image of their families that it becomes a burden. The worst thing about this burden is that it cannot be shared.

In my experience, those of us who are Christians are sometimes the worst about maintaining this perfect image… which is really silly since we are *supposed* to be aware that all of us are imperfect sinners.

My Ministry of Reality involves acknowledging that marriage is hard, houses are lived in, kids aren’t always dressed adorably (or even cleanly!), we’re not all rich, and life involves hard questions that don’t have easy answers. None of this is permission to not serve our families as we ought… we strive to keep our marriages strong, our homes live-ably neat, our children clothed, our budget reasonable, and to minister to those facing hard questions that don’t have easy answers. We acknowledge that all of these things are on a continuum and that we rely on God for the strength for it all.

In true Ministry of Reality fashion, I won’t be posting every day, but I hope to post frequently enough to keep my reader (I’m not even going to make that word plural!) interested.