She Did What She Could.

I am so excited the Lord has allowed me to come back home and be at home with my kids full time. I never fully appreciated that position until I had the opportunity to work outside the home. That drew my heart more completely towards home.

Now, I am here. Excitedly, I can already find myself planning and hoping to be Superwoman and Super Mom, all at the same time. I know me. My heart is so IN IT. I can easily make myself overwhelmed. I put this pressure on myself to pour into my kids lives with well-planned and well-executed daily learning activities, all the while perfectly managing a well-run, clean and frugal household, and serving up perfectly prepared, delicious meals daily, to top it all off. All things working beautifully and synergistically. Sounds crazy as I even say it, doesn’t it?

I wanted to share a beautiful message I heard on Friday by a National MOPs leader, Elisa Morgan, that so profoundly speaks to my heart, at this perfect time in my life.

It’s the story we’ve heard so many times about the night Jesus was having dinner in the home of Simon the Leper. He sat reclining at the table when a woman came in with a very expensive alabaster jar of perfume, made of pure nard. She broke the jar and poured the perfume on the head of Jesus.

Some of those present were quite offended by her action, saying it was ridiculous behavior, seeing as that jar of perfume could have sold for more than a year’s wages and the money used to easily take care of the poor.

Jesus said, “Leave her alone. Why are bothering this woman? What she has done for me is a beautiful thing. You’ll always have the poor around to take care of. You will not always have me. She did what she could. She poured perfume on me to prepare me for burial. Wherever the gospel is preached throughout the world, what she has done will also be told, in memory of her.”

Elisa Morgan was pointing out that one phrase that I’ve read so many times, but obviously read over with no thought to it’s power. She did what she could. This woman loved Christ so much. She wanted to give of herself. She didn’t choose at that moment to make him an elaborate dinner. She didn’t choose to weave him a new tunic. She gave of what she had at that moment, out of pure devotion and love for him. But the Word does NOT say, “she did more than she could”. It also doesn’t say “she didn’t do anything”. It reads, “she did what she could”. How powerful is that?! How freeing is that?!

For me, as a Mom and wife, who long to love my family in such a way that Christ is honored and he is taught to my children, this text is freedom. I do what I can. I don’t do less than I can, but I release myself of the pressure to do more. I will pray each day that God will be glorified in my “doing what I can” today.