I often tell people that I believe that the feelings I have towards “missing work” and having the longing desire to want to be back out on patrol again, more often than not, is because I made work my idol, and I now deal with the consequences of that sin. The career was my whole personality for so many years. I did not know God’s word, therefore did not obey it, as I “grew up” on the job.
Sins have consequences. Some sins cast long shadows. And I deal with some of them shadows to this day.
Recently a new movie called “David” came out in animation. My oldest son LOVES it. I will admit that it’ kind of became an obsession. The movie is supposed to be a picture film telling the story of David we read in the Bible. Clearly, with artistic freedom. My oldest son began to have a lot of questions about David, King Saul, Johnathan and so much more. Questions that I did not know the answer to. I told him to give me a few months to study the life of David and then we would go through the story, in scripture, together.
So I am now, currently, studying 1 and 2 Samuel, and have been for a few weeks. David was a man after God’s own heart. It is clear he trusts the Lord with all his heart and mind, as we see it clearly demonstrated in the battle against Goliath in 1 Samuel 17. But fast forward with me to 2 Samuel 11. Where the enemy moves in on him. David comes across a beautiful woman, Bathsheba. He commits adultery with her and then in order to cover up his own sin, demises a plan to have her husband killed.
Baffled, is the only word that comes to mind when I came across this story. Like excuse me, I’m sorry, what? Even David, a man who clearly believed and loved the Lord, fell into that dumb of a sin, like THAT?! So whats up, did he not actually love the Lord after all? Or is he just a fallen sinner, like you and I ?
Well friends, he was a real sinner. Like us. But Vernon McGee says this “When God’s man gets into sin, they don’t want to stay there. Like when sheep fall into mud, they want to get out. But when Pigs fall into mud, they want to stay there.”
David loved God. David knew he had sinned against the Lord and he didn’t get by with such a sin. In 2 Samuel 12 we read about the consequence he faced from this atrocious sin. David would deal with hard consequences the rest of his life. I can imagine how this must have stayed with David forever. The loss of a child, the consequences he bore for a sin he committed against the Lord. How hard.
Why did I go there, you wonder? well because there are consequences to sin. And while I am not saying being a working woman is sinful…being a working woman who puts the job outside of the home above Gods word, her husband and / or children, I believe, CAN be. But if we don’t know God’s word, we wouldn’t know it to be going all wrong for us. As it was for me.
I did it and didn’t even really realize it…for so long. The job I was in , demanded it. The job was not a 9-5 where I could clock in and clock out. The job required training hours on days off, court appearances on days off, late arrests that demanded me to stay at work for up to 18 hours in a 24 hour period. If my husband wanted me home so that we could have dinner as a family, sorry bout it, wasn’t going to happen. In my mind, what was I supposed to do? tell my sergeant “I’m sorry Sir, I cannot arrest this man for the theft he just committed because I need to be home in an hour to have dinner with my husband and child.”…lol …seems silly but THATS THE POINT. The job demanded a higher priority over what the bible tells us IS the priority. “…train the young women to love their husbands and children, to be self-controlled, pure, working at hime, kind, and submissive to their own husbands, that the word of God may not be reviled” Titus 2:4-5.
I didn’t see it then. But I do now. I was falling in to sin, time and time again, and not turning from it.
Sit with me in the self controlled and pure aspect for a moment. I can sit here and come up with excuses on why I “had” to the act the way I did on the job. The cursing, making fun of the evil in this world, being frustrated and having a lack of compassion for all these people created in God’s own image. NOT loving others well (even my own co workers), NOT turning my cheek when one has slapped me on the other (Matthew 5:39). Officers are exasperated in many of the areas I just described. Exasperated to a point where there is a camaraderie culture to behave a certain way on the job, because it’s kind of just survival mode, literally. And listen friends, I now , wholeheartedly believe, that is not a place for a woman after Gods own heart.
I have joked about how I would rather be in a police car, a bad guy in the back seat, a Starbucks iced coffee in the cup holder and my favorite country song on the radio , than in my home with my three screaming children all under the age of 5 from 5-7pm. I’m not proud of that joke I’ve thrown out, but I’m sure some of y’all can picture it, and nod.
Parenting, to me, is HARD. I never saw it or even wanted it for myself. BUT what? … you guessed it. BUT GOD. (Story of my life). The Lord was kind enough to entrust us with three beautiful little souls created in his own image. Officer T and I pray daily for them to see the Gospel lived out through us, choose to love the Lord with all their heart, mind, and soul, and love and serve others well. We need to model these things and help guide them in the ways of the Lord. The task can seem impossible some days, and others I feel like the Lord done CHOSE THE RIGHT WOMAN FOR THE JOB…lol
“Yet she will be saved through childbearing—if they continue in faith and love and holiness, with self-control” 1 Timothy 2:15 . If our goal in mom hood is to honor God with actions , words , and our heart attitudes , it will be sufficient in Gods eyes.
“Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing” James 1:2-4.
Google defines steadfastness as the quality of being firmly fixed, loyal, and unwavering in one’s beliefs, purpose, or loyalty. My definition ; hard work for the Lord. Pull up them boot straps a little tighter, keep your eyes fixed on Christ and count the trials you face as JOY. Tough to do. Don’t I know it. But hard work in the home, with all these tiny little sinners and the one we are married to, is WORTH it. Proverbs 14:1 tells us “The wisest woman builds her house, but folly with her own hands tears it down.” So I tell you,, as I tell myself, let’s build our homes up for the Lord, together. If you are not married or don’t have kids, hard work, wherever the Lord has you ,is WORTH it to bring Glory to His kingdom. But I caution you, be on watch. Don’t get into a career, job, or role (even within ministry) that will take you away from what God has called of us or become an idol in your life.
There is blessing in obedience. Also…don’t I KNOW it.
SarahNakamura 