Under Pressure

I was excited walking into the first week of homework for a new-to-me Bible study on marriage. I’ve been doing women’s Bible studies for years on a variety of topics and books of the Bible, but this is the first time I have focused on my marriage with other women. Given the solid relationship John and I have enjoyed for over a decade, I was confident that this would simply build on our secure foundation.

Fast forward to the second week of homework and I found myself sitting in my bed doing said homework amidst a pile of pillows and tears. I wanted to throw the book onto the floor, stomp on it, and walk away. Instead, I scribbled my answers onto the blank lines with a passive aggressive attitude that would make a teenager proud. “I’m gonna answer these stupid questions, but I’m not gonna like it.” And each day as I began the homework it felt like an elephant would saunter into the room and sit on my chest.

This book held great things for my marriage. It explained promises of God that I wanted to experience with my husband. But each time I picked up the book it felt like I wasn’t getting closer to those promises but instead sinking down further. I begrudgingly stuck with it, because I’m just that stubborn. But I started to feel resentful, like the book was telling me that the well-being and intimacy of my marriage was on me. That the one and only person responsible for the health of my marriage is me.  Me, who also happens to be the one responsible for the cooking and the cleaning, for the appointments and therapies and prescriptions, for the scheduling and maintenance of general family activities, and oh yeah, for the health and well-being of my four children as well.

Like the straw the broke the camel’s back, feeling the responsibility of one more thing made me begin to crumble under the weight. Until I finally realized the name of that elephant. Pressure.

As someone who’s been forced to test my limits more than I ever wanted, I have discovered that I’m a fairly capable person. Capable of holding things together when my life is crazy, capable of adapting to circumstances that I never anticipated, capable of caring for my family in ways that have pushed and pulled me in too many directions. Capable of withstanding a great deal of pressure.

But that isn’t really true, is it? That’s me taking credit for God’s work. I wasn’t capable, He is. I’m not the one who sustained us, God did. I’m not the one who holds and controls the health and welfare of my children, that’s God’s job. And I’m not the one who makes my marriage thrive, it’s in God’s hands.

Not that I threw my hands up in the air and said, “It’s all up to you God, I sure hope you send that refill my daughter needs without me calling it in, and by the way, please make my marriage great with no effort.” It means I acknowledged that these battles I’m facing are not won by how much I do or manage, but by letting God fight them for me. It means that bettering my marriage is done by taking it to God instead of following a self-help to-do list.

This is exactly what the study was telling me, but Satan had used the opportunity for all out spiritual warfare, attacking the one place that felt secure and using my weakness to do it. Pride; the misconception that I’m fully capable of handling everything that comes my way. He knew that I would be blind to the self-inflicted, undue pressure I was piling on, hence why it was so effective.

I’m positive I’m not alone in this pressure cooker. I’m part of an Instant Pot generation of women sold a bill of lies that everything depends on us. That we are the ones responsible for our marriages, our kids’ happiness and safety, healthy meals, clean HGTV worthy homes to make Joanna Gaines proud, an attractive but “authentic” social media presence, limiting plastic and increasing volunteerism and hospitality, practicing self-care and regular exercise, on top of balanced work/homes lives fueled by coffee in the morning and wine in the evening. Pressure. PRESSURE. This is crazy and maddening and exhausting. Not to mention unrealistic and unbiblical.

Jesus doesn’t say “Try harder.” He says,

“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.” Matthew 11:28-30

God doesn’t say, “Buck up little buttercup, you’ve got this!” He promises us better.

“‘Do not fear or be dismayed because of this great multitude [of pressure], for the battle is not yours but God’s.” 2 Chronicles 20:15b, parenthesis/inference mine

There is no way that I can stand up under all of this pressure. But I can give it to God. I can trade my heavy burden for His light one, and I can stand back with an attitude of obedience and watch as God accomplishes my desperately needed victories in my marriage and family.

“In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make straight your paths.” Proverbs 3:6