Flourish (www.flourish.me) is a ministry of the North American Mission Board for ministry wives. As a national consultant for Ministry to Pastor’s Wives, Kathy Ferguson Litton leads Flourish with a team of ministry wives who understand the unique role of this calling.
By Kathy Ferguson Litton
We get you. Because we are you.
We understand you. This is a ministry for pastors’ wives led by pastors’ wives. We get you.
Ministry life is NOT a burdened life with which we are dismally saddled. It is a world that contains unique snares that may easily trap us. One common trap is trying to live up to “her.” Maybe we once heard someone referred to as “the PERFECT pastor’s wife” (emphasis on PERFECT). Immediately we felt inadequate. If this “perfect pastor’s wife” has great hair and a permanently clean car, then we are truly sunk. The carefully controlled snapshots of lives on Facebook, blogs or Twitter may lure us into thinking that other ministry lives have superpowers we do not.
Even the most well attired, seemingly peace-filled ministry wife with well-behaved kids is not “the PERFECT pastors wife.” Why? There is NO universal scoreboard for PERFECT anyway. Trust me I love to compete and if there were a universal make-everyone-happy-scoreboard I would have found it long ago.
Repeat this three times:
Do you feel better?
We get your life. Because we live your life.
We understand your life. A life you pretty much have to live to get.
We may not choose our lives but we choose responses in our lives. In this gloriously unique calling beside our husbands we hope you will choose to flourish.
Flourish is the name of this ministry. It has been carefully chosen to represent what we hope is the passion of our hearts. A passion to desire to “grow well, to thrive.” Additionally it means for us to “reach the height of development or influence.”
This industry we are called to beside our husbands is a sacred, eternal industry. We are partners in advancing the gospel. We have tremendous influence on our husband’s effectiveness in his role, whether we love that thought or not. Our need to flourish is not for him nor is it for us. We need to flourish for the sake of the gospel. An IMPORTANT FACT, we cannot lose sight of, like Paul our lives are “separated to the Gospel of God” (Romans 1:1).
We can flourish wherever we are on the journey. The roads we took to become ministry wives are as diverse as our hair colors. God chose flawed and thoroughly human women with no superpowers. God will use our unique stories for the sake of the gospel; whether we are new believers, from a strong faith heritage, or marked by broken, painful past or if the church culture is strange and unfamiliar. Despite what you may think few of us have four-year degrees from Pastor’s Wife U.
This blog post first appeared May 01, 2012 by Kathy Ferguson Litton at www.flourish.me. Flourish is a ministry of the North American Mission Board for ministry wives. As a national consultant for Ministry to Pastor’s Wives, Kathy Ferguson Litton leads Flourish with a team of ministry wives who understand the unique role of this calling.