I didn’t grow up in a military community and no one in my immediate family served. So it was a bit of culture shock when 13 years into our marriage my husband commissioned into the Navy and we arrived at our first duty station. The only images I had of the identity I thought I needed to emulate were from the highly processed images on the brochures. This was a couple of years before Instagram, so I didn’t have a lot of images to choose from or real military wives to connect with! All I saw were beautiful, happy wives in summery dresses of red, white, and blue next to two perfectly pressed children, each holding little American flags as they looked up at their hero dad in uniform. The family looked like they were just issued to this lucky Sailor. Was this the standard issue family? Did my husband somehow miss out?
I had 13 years of marriage experience not even remotely resembling that tidy, put-together little family who didn’t seem the least bit concerned that their husband and dad was about to leave for seven months at sea. I had no experience with PCSs, living in base housing, working around gate traffic at 0730 and 1600, navigating Tricare. I had never lived more than an hour and half away from my family, and there we were 1300 miles away from all that we had even known. I didn’t know who I was or who I was supposed to be in this new place and space, and all I had for reference was that shiny family, their smiles never once fading. And I did not measure up.
Have you ever felt that way? When you see that wife who volunteers for everything, do you wonder if you aren’t doing enough to support your husband? When you walk around your neighborhood and see that wife waving from her gorgeously decorated front porch, do you feel like you haven’t made your home enough of a haven for your husband and kids? When you scroll through the images of the spouses in your husband’s unit who post cute, confident, happy pictures on all their socials, do you worry that you aren’t happy or independent or pretty enough?
Beloved, you are exactly what your husband and children need. You. Are. Enough. And God’s grace is more enough. What we see on the outside, the things we are so tempted to hold in comparison with others, are not the things He values in you. He sees you for exactly who you are, and loves you with depth beyond compare. He knows where you need to grow, and He loves you with an everlasting love. He knows your strengths and your weaknesses, and He delights in you as the apple of His eye. He knows your hopes and deepest desires, and He longs to meet your every need. He will never give up on you.
I’m reminded of the promise in Philippian 1:6. “Being confident of this, that He who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.” God isn’t finished with you yet!
I wish I could say that after 15 years as an active duty family that I still don’t struggle some days wondering if I’m enough, but I’m a bit of a late bloomer. Just when I’m about to give up on myself or I’m convinced everyone around me has given up on me, too, I’ll see the slightest rays of light breaking through the clouds and I’ll notice the tiniest new bit of growth in me that wasn’t there before.
And when I’m tempted to fixate on the ways that I feel I’m lacking, God is always there to lift my eyes to Him alone. And He is enough.