Posted by Rodetta Cook

Rodetta Cook has been a pastor’s wife for over 40 years. She and her husband, Ron, have actively served the Lord together in ministry during the entire time and are co-founders of Care for Pastors. She understands the expectations, loneliness and how hard it is to find balance in ministry as a pastor’s wife. Rodetta also leads the pastor’s wives initiative at Care for Pastors called The Confidante and ministers to hundreds of wives each week. She strives to share blogs with other pastors’ wives that will help them in their ministry walk.

Posted by Rodetta Cook

    Who Am I Trying to Please?

    Monday, August 31, 2015

    Do you find yourself constantly working hard to please everyone? Do you find yourself having unrealistic expectations put on you, whether by others or by yourself? Do you feel like you are running on a hamster wheel trying to be everything to everyone?

    If you answered yes to one or all of those three questions, you are probably trying to be the “perfect pastor’s wife” and there is not one in existence

    Most of us have probably heard, “you don’t act like a pastor’s wife” and we walk away and wonder what does that mean? Does that mean I am not a good pastor’s wife or does that mean I have done something that people think has disqualified me as a good wife? Our mind goes crazy when we hear things like this, but I want to encourage you by saying that God has made you who He wants you to be. Therefore, quit trying to be something or someone you weren’t designed to be.

    I will never forget in one of my first secular jobs there was a young lady that I had been witnessing to and we had become close friends. One day she said to me, “You don’t act like a pastor’s wife.” That just killed me because I thought I had done something inappropriate and discredited all that I had shared with her, so I asked her if I had done something that caused her to think that. Her reply was, “No, I love it that you don’t act like the typical stick-in-the-mud pastor’s wife.” Whew, was I relieved because I wanted so badly to win her to the Lord. Of course, I never wanted to be the “typical pastor’s wife” because I knew that stigma, but when someone I had been witnessing to said it; it was like a knife through my heart.

    I want to encourage you to not work so hard at others expectations but know that the only one you need to worry about pleasing is your Lord. We can get so caught up in the expectations that are put on us as pastors’ wives that we lose sight of the one we need to be focusing on every day.

    Help us continue providing resources of care for pastors and their families.

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