As a child, I spend several years attending weekend theater classes at a place then known as Lakewood Little Theater in suburban Cleveland. I’ve always had a flair for the dramatic: I love to tell stories (mostly with my hands), I love to sing, and I love to get a reaction from people.
That’s mostly my stage persona, as all performers are wont to have, but that’s not to say theatrics don’t ever creep into my day-to-day comfort zone. I’m sure my husband and children could tell many stories of my histrionics; me, my memory fails me regarding specifics aside from something about trying to crawl out of a bathroom window while 8 months pregnant .
In my own defense, however, those are blips on the horizon of my life, especially with the passing of time. Generally, by God’s grace, I yield to my prayerful, analytical side. And that puts me at odds with the women I’ll call Drama Mamas.
You know them. They’re the ones whose phone numbers we program into our phones so we know not to pick up when they call, the ones duck around the corner from when we see them in public settings, the ones who sometimes even show up at our doorsteps uninvited just to dump upon us and then we pray they didn’t see us through the frosted glass.
Their husbands are invariably cruel and uncaring. Their children were born with the express purpose of being a blight on their existence. Their coworkers are inept. Their extended families are dysfunctional. And don’t even ask about their in-laws. I guarantee you won’t want to go there.
The truth is, if it weren’t for all the problems in their lives, they would have nothing to talk about and, more than likely, nothing to do. Given the choice, they would park themselves in the Complaint Department. They wouldn’t bother taking a number because no one else would get a turn anyway.
What’s worse is that Drama Mamas create drama everywhere they go. They pit family members against family members, friends against friends, church members against church members. And their stories become bigger, sadder, more incredible and more infuriating every time they tell them.
They are alternately magnetically attracted to one another or magnetically repelled, depending upon the combustibility of the moment. And they are also attracted to the meek and the naive, whom they take into their confidence and hustle down the path to destruction.
Drama Mamas are busybodies – busy making the lives of everyone around them as miserable as they have made their own.
Let your adorning be the hidden person of the heart with the imperishable beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which in God’s sight is very precious. – 1 Peter 3:4
What are the hallmarks of a gentle and quiet spirit? Such women are peacemaking, sincere, loving, trustworthy and faithful. They are the ones whose counsel you seek in a crisis.
Not so the Drama Mamas. Not even their own family members can count on them in the day-to-day stuff, let alone in a crisis.
A quarrelsome wife is like a constant dripping on a rainy day; restraining her is like restraining the wind or grasping oil with the hand. – Proverbs 27:15-16
It appears women in Paul’s day had this same bent, this same proclivity to poison the well from which they drink.
Teach the older women to be reverent in the way they live, not to be slanderers or addicted to much wine, but to teach what is good. Then they can train the younger women to love their husbands and children. – Titus 2:3-4
God wants women to be reverent. He wants women to teach what is good. He wants women to love.
But the greatest of these is love. – 1 Corinthians 13:13b
In love, there are no Drama Mamas. So to all you Drama Mamas out there, take off the mask, and cloak yourselves in love.
And this is His command: to believe in the name of His Son, Jesus Christ, and to love one another as He commanded us. – 1 John 3:23
That’s the end of it all. And also the beginning.
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