Changing Diapers is Ministry
Unfolded laundry, clothes sitting in the washer forgotten, bottles beginning to pile up, this mama of twins is exhausted.
“Lord, I want to make an impact on peoples lives. I want to shine your light and share about you but I feel too tired and ‘busy’ I feel this isn’t doing anything”.
I think so often we as mothers feel we don’t make an impact, or can’t, when we are stay at home mom’s changing diapers. We think we must have this huge following like we see others have, or going out in the streets sharing the gospel, yet here we are, at home trying our best.
As I was nursing my littles last night, my beautiful twin boys, I began to hear from the Lord “changing diapers is ministry.”
Never did I think changing diapers could be ministry. But it is. I may not be able to go out to prisons, go feed the homeless, go out to the streets and do outreach because this season is a season to change diapers, feed, and do home service work.
And by doing home service work we do it unto the Lord with grateful and cheerful hearts knowing that everything we are doing in our home is for the Lord.
As I change diapers, it becomes ministry when I minister to my children. With each dirty diaper we change, we can pray something like, “Lord cleanse the sin off our children, each sin they come in contact with knowingly and unknowingly.”
With each wipe we grab and swipe to clean we could say, “Thank you Father for the blood of Jesus that cleanses and blots out their transgressions.”
With each bottle we are preparing we can pray “Lord may it touch every fiber being, nourish and fills their cup up. May it overflow and empower others.”
With each new diaper we place on them we could say, “Thank you Jesus for making my children new, placing on a new mindset and heart.”
I know it sounds silly, but dear beautiful mom, in these seasons we change diapers consistently, we are doing ministry right within our home and in our children. Pray over them each time we nurse them. Each time they cry soothe their cry with a new song the Lord places on your heart, say a gentle prayer the Lord tells you to pray, speak scripture the Lord brings to mind. Hear unto the Lord.
Ministry doesn’t have to be this big platform we see others doing.
Sometimes ministry is done in the secret hidden places. In the places others overlook. In the places that seem it couldn’t be done but really, it is more done than we think.
Ministry shouldn’t be labeled only with big platforms or many followings. Ministry is what the Lord draws our hearts to do, to minister to the ones close to us, even if it’s in the car pool line as we pick our kids up and we share the gospel to other moms, or the laundry we fold praying over our husbands and kids clothes, or changing the diapers and sheets once again.
Changing diapers is ministry friend. We are reaching and touching their lives, planting in the Word of God in their tiny little big hearts. And as we minister to them, we are ministering to ourselves, being shaped as we are shaping their hearts.
So friend, don’t let anyone tell you that changing diapers isn’t ministry because if the Lord says it is, His Word should be the only one we believe.