Christ-Like Middle-Aged Womanhood

What does it look like for a middle-aged female to be “Jesusy”?  Jesus wasn’t a woman. Jesus didn’t face the loss of youthful beauty and the tortures of perimenopause.  Even though I can’t see a literal picture of what I’m supposed to look like, God tells me to open my eyes and look around.  He put some Jesusy women in my life to show how I, a middle-aged woman, can be more like Him. 

My Jesusy girlfriends just seem to ooze God’s love and grace through their pores.  It’s not that they go around with cheery smiles and happy dispositions.  It’s a quiet, joyful strength in the midst of raging battles.

They wrestle with the flesh, with relationships, with low self-esteem. They experience deep suffering through financial disaster due to job loss or difficult marriages or the death of those they love.  Yet they grow stronger in their faith and are full of hope in Jesus.  Their joy runs visibly deep.  The element they all have in common? Jesus is their everything and it shows in their work and in their lives.

They didn’t go to seminary or Bible college, but they long to have more knowledge. So how did they get to be so Jesusy?  George Barna says, “Some people reach the ultimate stages of wholeness and maturity within just a couple decades while others failed to achieve such maturity after more than five decades of consistent religious activity and positive intent.” Why do some grow and mature while others stagnate? 

With menopause approaching, more than ever it seems that life careens out of control while I simultaneously grasp for control of things I have no business controlling.  Add to that a face that is growing more haggard, a waistline that expands when I look at a cookie, freckles peppering my body in places they’ve never been, and ‘silver’ hairs taking over faster than I can pluck them, things that I can only control to some degree by artificial measures – getting older doesn’t necessarily mean it’s easier to be Jesusy. 

But I can choose – choose to try to be in control or relinquish everything to Jesus, to continually turn to Him inwardly, and outwardly to seek to overflow His love.  I can choose to open my eyes and ears to see and hear what He is speaking into my life to grow me, so that I, too, can be more Jesusy.

Jesus did suffer. He suffered loss, battled the flesh, and endured inconceivable pain. And He was victorious.  He gives us women the power to endure, to grow and even find victory through the mountains and valleys of middle-aged womanhood.

Linking up with: Soli Deo Gloria Party at Finding Heaven and A Pause on the Path