One Job

I don’t know about you, but this parenting thing can be pretty difficult. There are so many things to think about, so many things to worry about, so many things to keep up with, so many “do this” and “don’t do this.” As my kids get older, I seem to have less and less figured out. As soon as I feel like I have a grasp on one thing, something else pops up, or changes, or there’s some better way of doing things or there’s some new rule to the game.

The other day I was chatting with another mom as we waited together to pick up our four-year-olds from preschool. She asked me if my preschooler was our only kid. I smiled (almost the same kind of smile I used to have when the grocery clerk would ask me for my ID when I felt I looked way too old for her to still be asking), and answered that we have five kids ranging in age from 17 to 4. She looked totally surprised then exclaimed, “Well, you must be the expert. I know who to ask now when I have questions!” 

I can say with great certainty that I do not have things figured out and I would be the last person on this planet I would call an expert. But in all of my years parenting, I have come to one conclusion. It has sort of become the test I use when making decisions both big and small. 

I have realized that in this life, we really only have one job. We have one single job to do and that is to get ourselves, our spouses, and our kids into heaven. That’s it. One job. 

Before realizing this, I would get bogged down on making the right decisions for my kids whether that was which kid vitamin was best to which book series they should start on next. I used to worry so much about my kids taking the right classes in school and making sure they had a good GPA. I would fret over which extra-curricular activities the kids should involve themselves in and then what it would take for them to be the best. 

Now, don’t get me wrong, academics are important and activities are important, I have just come to realize it is not what is MOST important.

I had to sit back and really think. How did minutes spent reading become more important that minutes spent in prayer? How did worrying about test scores become more important than how we react when we are tested? How did planning for our kids’ future become more about filling their time and less about pouring into people’s lives?

We realized we had to shift our focus. We had to place importance on faith and family. When deciding if something is worth pursuing, we had to ask, will this matter in the long run? Will this help us get into heaven?

Now let me tell you, our daughters take tumbling classes. Do I think tumbling will get them into heaven? Not necessarily.  But as a way to focus on family, the girls take classes at the same time, and most weeks the rest of the family goes to watch. It is something that brings us together for that one hour one evening each week. 

We also used this test when our two older kids wanted to drop from taking all advanced classes in high school to taking only one or two. In weighing if this is a big deal or not, I just had to ask myself, will taking advanced classes increase their chances of getting into heaven? Does it really matter? I couldn’t see any reason it would matter so much we shouldn’t allow them to make the change. Of course we realized this decision will affect their GPA and they will not be as competitive in class rankings, but so what? That’s not my number one job in life. 

Since we allowed some leeway in the kids’ schedules, they had more time to focus on both faith and family. During that “down time,” the time not spent doing hours and hours of homework, they have both become more involved with the things we are doing at home and have become more involved in their school and our church. The truth is, that seems like time well spent!

I often remind myself of the quote by Mother Theresa, “If you want to change the world, go home and love your family.” Think about that…she said we could change the world! It says nothing about make sure your kids have the latest and greatest, it doesn’t say anything about make sure your kids are the best at a specific sport, it doesn’t say anything about make sure your kids are highest ranking in their classes. We just need to love our families. 

The truth is, as families, I think we do hold the power to change the world.

I know, parenting is hard and there seems to be decisions to make at every turn. I will be the first to raise my hand and admit I have no idea what I am doing. I have tried along the way to learn how to find the things that matter. I try to see what things are important today that will still be important tomorrow. The longer I do this, the more I see there’s not so much that matters beyond today except for the way we spend our time and the way we treat others. 

The truth is, I really don’t care about grades, or class rank, or test scores. The truth is, I don’t think any of these things will really matter. I can’t think of a single time I have helped someone and they have asked me my high school GPA!

The truth is, we can do all of the things to help our kids be successful, but we cannot forget to do our number one job. As parents, we are called to holiness and we are called to bring that to our children as well. I think that if we can shift our focus to our faith and our family, if we can work hard at our one job, if we can be selective in how we spend our time and be thoughtful in how we treat others, we just may have something figured out!