Help came in an unexpected way. One morning I was reading 1 Thessalonians. Suddenly a vivid metaphor jumped up and waved at me, and my life has never been the same. Paul said he was gentle, like a mother caring for her children, to the Thessalonian church (2:7). I was dumbfounded. I had never thought of myself as a mother, and I certainly had not thought of my ministry as motherhood. The idea simply simply exploded in my head.