One of my favorite books (and movies) is the Hobbit by J. R. R. Tolkien.
I love the part when Bilbo finally decides to go with Gandalf and the dwarves, and he runs out of his house as he shouts, “I’M GOING ON AN ADVENTURE!”
How exciting! What would it be like to go on a real adventure?! All too often, I finish watching this scene and then come crashing back to earth as I look around my house … the dirty dishes in the sink, the laundry on the floor, or the list of events I need to drive my kids to. As a parent, it seems like adventure has passed me by.
Sometimes it seems that when we choose motherhood, we miss out on some of life’s BIG adventures—let alone the adventures of biblical proportions like slaying giants like David or leading an army like Deborah or saving a nation like Esther.
But it’s important to remember that God gives mothers a huge and important task—to prepare our own children for the adventures of life.
“Start children off on the way they should go, and even when they are old they will not turn from it” (Proverbs 22:6).
The good news is that this journey with our children is also full of adventure, if we choose to see it. The adventure of teaching and laughing and loving. It is perhaps the greatest adventure of our lives—protecting and guiding these little lambs.
