This is Not Love

 

This is not love, when you neglect each other’s soul. Do you believe that you have immortal souls, and an endless life of joy or misery to live? Then you MUST know that your great concern and business is, to care for those souls, and for the endless life. Therefore if your love does not help one another in this which is your main concern, it is of little worth, and of little use. 

~Rev. Richard Baxter (1615­-1691)

Receive Blessed Homemaking in your inbox. Subscribe here.

Created by God

 

"The rest of the populace is more wicked than even the heathen themselves. For most married people do not desire offspring. Indeed, they turn away from it and consider it better to live without children, because they are poor and do not have the means with which to support a household. But this is especially true of those who are devoted to idleness and laziness and shun the sweat and the toil of marriage. But the purpose of marriage is not to have pleasure and to be idle but to procreate and bring up children, to support a household. This, of course, is a huge burden full of great cares and toils. But you have been created by God to be a husband or a wife and that you may learn to bear these troubles. Those who have no love for children are swine, stocks, and logs unworthy of being called men or women; for they despise the blessing of God, the Creator and Author of marriage." 

~ Martin Luther

Receive Blessed Homemaking in your inbox. Subscribe here.

The True Wife's Kingdom

 

Home is the true wife's kingdom. Very largely does the wife hold in her hands, as a sacred trust, the happiness and the highest good of the hearts that nestle there. In the last analysis, home happiness depends on the wife.  

Her spirit gives the home its atmosphere. 

Her hands fashion its beauty.  

Her heart makes its love.  

And the end is so worthy, so noble, so divine, that no woman who has been called to be a wife, and has listened to the call, should consider any price too great to pay, to be the light, the joy, the blessing, the inspiration of a home.  

The woman who makes a sweet, beautiful home, filling it with love and prayer and purity, is doing something better than anything else her hands could find to do beneath the skies. 

A true mother is one of the holiest secrets of home happiness. God sends many beautiful things to this world, many noble gifts; but no blessing is richer than that which He bestows in a mother who has learned love's lessons well, and has realized something of the meaning of her sacred calling. 

~ James Russell Miller (1840 - 1912)

Receive Blessed Homemaking in your inbox. Subscribe here.

When Men Honored Women

 

"Men used to hold doors open for women, remember? They would rise when a lady entered the room. They guarded their tongues in their presence, protected their honor, shielded their virtue, and paid them homage. Why? Because women are worthless, weak and inferior? Only a fool would parrot such outmoded feminist rubbish! Men honored women out of devotion and an instinctive sense of self-preservation." 

-Michael Matt

Receive Blessed Homemaking in your inbox. Subscribe here.

Husbands' Duties

 

"Part of the duty of godly and loving husbands is to free their wives to be women so they will not have to do what has been Divinely assigned to men."

~Blair Bradley

Receive Blessed Homemaking in your inbox. Subscribe here.

Two Adams?!

God didn't make two Adams to go out from the home and leave the children. He made an Adam and an Eve. He planned for the mother to be in the heart of the home and embrace and nurture children. 

~Nancy Campbell

Receive Blessed Homemaking in your inbox. Subscribe here. 

The Married State is Happiest

 

"The married state is, after all our jokes, the happiest, being conformable to our natures. Man and woman have each of the qualities and tempers in which the other is deficient, and which in union contribute to the common felicity. Single and separate, they are not the complete human being; they are like the odd halves of scissors; they cannot answer the end of their formation."  

- Benjamin Franklin, 1783

Receive Blessed Homemaking in your inbox. Subscribe here.

Helping Your Husband

If you want to put a bounce in your husband's steps & keep a song in his heart, say something good about him EVERY DAY. 

~Gwendolyn M. Webb

Receive Blessed Homemaking in your inbox. Subscribe here.

From Adam's Rib

That the woman was made of a rib out of the side of Adam; not made out of his head to rule over him, nor out of his feet to be trampled upon by him, but out of his side to be equal with him, under his arm to be protected, and near his heart to be beloved. 

~Matthew Henry

Receive Blessed Homemaking in your inbox. Subscribe here.

Loving Marriage

"The husband should show his love to his wife by covering infirmities; by avoiding occasions of strife; by sweet, endearing expressions; by pious counsel; by love tokens; by encouraging what he sees amiable and virtuous in her; by mutual prayer; by associating with her, unless detained by urgency of business. The pilot who leaves his ship and abandons it entirely to the merciless waves, declares that he does not value it or reckon there is any treasure in it." 

~Thomas Watson, Godly Man's Picture, pg. 156

Receive Blessed Homemaking in your inbox. Subscribe here.

Love

This is not love, when you neglect each other’s soul. Do you believe that you have immortal souls, and an endless life of joy or misery to live? Then you MUST know that your great concern and business is, to care for those souls, and for the endless life. Therefore if your love does not help one another in this which is your main concern, it is of little worth, and of little use.  

~Rev. Richard Baxter (1615­-1691)

Receive Blessed Homemaking in your inbox. Subscribe here.

Adultery Begins in the Heart

Christian men and women all need to take heed to our Lord's words in the Sermon on the Mount, where the Lord informs us that for a man to even look on a woman with lust in his heart is adultery.  It is interesting to note that the Lord addressed this to men, who more knowingly, are prone to this sin of lusting.  Christian men must give no place whatsoever to this wickedness in their lives, especially with our culture that is rampantly given over to such wickedness as pornography.  We also see immodesty everywhere, but this is no reason or excuse for Christian men to give in to looking and lusting, for, as we will see below by a thorough commentary from A.W. Pink, that this is truly adultery.  And if looking with lust is adultery, how much more so is it when men seek out wicked videos and pictures of women in ways that they should only seek their wives.

I have even heard some very deceived women state that it is only in man's nature to look and be attracted to other women.  Yes, it is in their sin nature, and that sin needs to be mortified (put to death).  If a husband is in this sin, he has broken his marriage covenant and is an adulterer.  If a husband truly loves his wife, he will have no desire to be with, or even look at in this way, other women.  A Christian husband must take whatever steps necessary to avoid temptation whenever possible, and flee temptation whenever it presents itself.  He will make a covenant with his eyes, as we see in Job 31:1, and will keep himself, body and mind, for his wife.  A Godly wife is a gift from the Lord, and a husband should not take her for granted.

But also, we know that this warning from our Lord applies to women as well.  There are several times in my Christian life that I have been shocked to hear "Christian" women swoon and gush over some actor or other celebrity they find attractive.  Ladies, is this not adultery of the heart?  Yes, indeed it is!  How can we ever allow ourselves to be attracted to and gush over another man and excuse ourselves for it?  We women must also keep our hearts pure in this manner, and have eyes only for our husbands.  If we are not yet married, God's Word tells us we are to be busy about the things of the Lord--so our eyes should be upon him.

Let us look below at the wisdom Mr. Pink has to show us on this passage.

  'When the Lord Jesus affirmed, "But I say unto you, That whoso looketh on a woman to lust after her, hath committed adultery with her already in his heart," had not the Pharisees as much occasion to demur and say, "The seventh commandment says nothing about lustful looks:  You are reading into it what is not there"?

  Ere passing on, a few words need to be said on the special heinousness of this particular crime. Adultery is the breach of wedlock.  Even the Pharisees did condemn it, for though they made light of disobedience to parents (Matt. xv, 4-6), yet they clamoured for the death of the woman guilty of this sin (John viii, 4, 5).  The grievousness of this offence appears in that it breaks the solemn covenant entered into between husband and wife and God, it robs another of the precious ornament of chastity, it defiles the body and ruins the soul, it brings down the vengeance of God upon the posterity which Job called "a fire that consumeth to destruction" (xxxi, 12).  Be not deceived; neither fornicators, nor idolators, nor adulterers...shall inherit the kingdom of God" (I Cor vi, 9, 10). "Whoremongers and adulterers God will judge" (Heb. xiii, 4).

  "But I say unto you, That whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her, hath committed adultery with her already in his heart" (verse 28).  Here we have an exposition of the seventh commandment by the supreme Prophet of God, wherein He reveals the height, depth, and breadth of the spirituality of the Divine Law. That commandment not only forbids all acts of uncleanness, but also the desire of them.  The Pharisees made it extend no farther than to the outward and physical act, supposing that if the iniquity was restricted to the mind, God would be indifferent. Yet their own Scriptures declared, "If I regard iniquity in my heart, the Lord will not hear me" (Psalm lxvi, 18), and Christ here made it known that if a man allows himself to gaze upon a woman till his appetites are excited and sexual thoughts are engendered, then the holy Law of God judges him to be guilty of adultery and subject to its curse; and if he indulges his licentious imagination so as to devise means for the gratification thereof, then is his guilt that much greater, even though providence thwart the execution of his plans.

  Our Lord here declared that the seventh commandment is broken even by a secret though unexpressed desire.  There is, then such a thing as heart adultery---alas, that this is so rarely made conscience of today.  Impure thoughts and wanton imaginations which never issue in the culminating act are breaches of the Divine Law.  All lusting after the forbidden object is condemned.  Where the lascivious desire is rolled under the tongue as a sweet morsel, it is the commission of the act so far as the heart is concerned, for there is then lacking nothing but a convenient opportunity for the crime itself.  He who weighs the spirits judges the going out of the heart after that which is evil as sin, so they who cherish irregular desire are transgressors of the law of impurity.

  "But I say unto you, That whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her, hath committed adultery with her already in his heart."  It is not an involuntary glance which constitutes the sin, but when evil thoughts are thereby prompted by our depraved natures.  The first step and degree, then, of this crime is when lust stirs within us.  The second stage and degree is when we deliberately approach unto--a feeding of the eye with the sight of the forbidden fruit, where further satisfaction cannot be obtained.  Then if this lust be not sternly mortified, the heart swiftly becomes enthralled and the soul is brought into complete bondage to Satan, so that it is fettered by chains which no human power can break.  Such was the deplorable condition of those mentioned by the apostle, "Having eyes full of adultery, and that cannot cease from sin" (II Peter ii, 14).

  Well did Matthew Henry point out, "The eye is both the inlet and the outlet of a great deal of wickedness of this kind; witness Joseph's mistress (Gen. xxxix, 7), Samson (Judges xvi, 1), David (II Samuel, xi, 2). What need have we, therefore, with holy Job, to make a covenant with our eyes' (xxxi, 1) to make this bargain with them:  That they should have the pleasure of beholding the light of the sun and the works of God, provided that they would never fasten or dwell upon anything that might occasion impure imaginations or desires; and under this penalty, that if they did, they must smart for it in penitential tears.  What have we the covering of our eyes for, but to restrain corrupt glances and to keep out defiling impressions?" How much sorrow and humiliation would be avoided if such wholesome counsel was duly laid to heart and carried in practice.'

~A.W. Pink from Sermon on the Mount

A husband and wife should always be lovingly devoted to each other, through thick and thin.

Receive Blessed Homemaking in your inbox. Subscribe here.

A Beautiful Marriage

I have the utmost respect for a woman who says, "Let me check with my husband first", or a man who says, "Let me run it past my wife, and I'll get back to you."

It's not that you can't make a decision on your own. It's just that when you're married, you value your spouse so much that you don't make important decisions on your own. A good marriage is including your spouse in your decisions.

This is especially true for wives in showing respect for their husbands. But it is lovely to see a husband also do this for his wife.

Receive Blessed Homemaking in your inbox. Subscribe here.

*Painting is by Emile Munier

Ways Women Take on a Masculine Role

We need to be supportive of our husbands in their masculine role of being leaders, providers, and protectors.  We should be aware of the ways women take on masculine roles so that we do not do the same to our husbands.  It is easy to adopt a feminist mindset, as it has become so deeply ingrained in our society.  We may have certain feminist views that we are not even aware of.

Women take on masculine roles when they enter the workforce and compete with men for greater achievement, higher positions, and earning more money.  We learn all the way back in Genesis that it is the man's role to be a provider and not a woman's (Genesis 3:16, 19).  If a woman is working, a man will not feel as great a need, if any, to work by the sweat of his brow to provide for his family.

Women also take on masculine roles when they try to take over leadership in the home instead of trustingly looking to their husbands for guidance and a strong arm to lean on.  The leadership position was given to husbands by God Himself.  This doesn't mean that we have no opinions or wisdom, especially in our own sphere of the home, but often women neglect looking to their own husbands for guidance.  Even taking over the masculine chores around the house takes over something a husband can and should be doing, unless there is a real emergency where he is unable.

Some women think they are "helping" their husbands by doing these things.  But really, they are hindering their husbands, because the wives are taking on the husbands' role instead of focusing on their own duties.  When we take on masculine roles instead of letting our husbands do them, it harms the family.  It is detrimental to our husbands' feeling of being needed as the leader, protector, and provider for his family, which God created him to be.  It also causes us to be less feminine and creates more stress in our own lives.  We also neglect important functions in our own role as wife, mother, and homemaker.

Receive Blessed Homemaking in your inbox. Subscribe here.

Are You Taking Your Marriage for Granted?

A marriage from the Lord is something to be preciously guarded and upheld.  It can be destroyed if husband and wife do not take care to maintain the sweetness and uniqueness of the marriage bond.

Husband and wife should be best friends.  There should be nothing they cannot or do not want to share together.  Intimacy is not just a physical union. If you have left becoming "one flesh" at just physical intimacy, you are really missing out on what one flesh means.  It is a joining of spirits and sharing thoughts and dreams, being vulnerable to one another, in a way that is not done with any other human being in the world.  (Song of Solomon 8:6-7)

Hearken back to the time of your courtship and engagement, and remember how there was nothing you liked better than to spend time with your husband- or wife-to-be.  You talked together, shared your feelings with one another, made plans together.  You included each other in whatever you could because you loved to be together.  You couldn't wait to tell them what was going on in your life and to share news with them.  You shared about what happened in the time you'd been apart.  There was no one that could replace this person, because you had eyes and heart only for them.  These feelings of love and oneness should only increase during marriage, not decrease!

Husbands and wives would do well to involve each other with extended family relationships.  Once a man and woman are married, they should endeavor to keep each other involved in the news of each other's families.  Sometimes, husbands and wives maintain separate relationships with parents or siblings that have absolutely no involvement with their spouse.  When we marry, we are told to leave our families we grew up with and to cleave to one another (Genesis 2:24).   This does not mean that we cut off ties and communication and visits with our parents, siblings, etc.  But it means that we have begun a new family wherein we always put our spouse first, and keep each other involved with our family.  Too often, wives go with complaints to their mothers about their husbands, or wives have long, deep conversations with their mothers or sisters about things that they will not share with their husbands.  I daresay this happens with husbands too.  Sometimes extended family members will try to pry into the couple's private relationship and make suggestions or inquiries into what should be private domestic life. This is not conducive to the "cleaving" we are supposed to be doing in marriage.  I knew a couple who kept each other involved with their extended family by having "catch-up" calls with each other's family when they were both on the phone.  This way, they each knew about what was going on and were part of the conversation, and the husband and wife maintained a united front.

We should not keep secrets from our spouse or hold back information.  We should be upfront about things that have happened during the day and struggles we are having.  Wives would do well to share with their husbands what has happened in the home during the day.  Husbands would do well to share with their wives about the goings on at his place of employment.  Our modern era has us spending much of our time apart, so to keep our relationships strong, we must make the effort to speak to one another.

Wives are mainly protected in the home, which is a wonderful place of shelter.  She may go out to do the shopping, but shouldn't she share with her husband if another man was showing interest in her?  In the same way, husbands must carefully guard their hearts in the workplace.  Because of our upside-down society, men often spend their working days with other women.  They are having conversations with these women and often spend more time with them than they do their own wives.  Husbands may come home from work having talked all day to other people, and may hardly have a word for their wives.  This will not lead to a fruitful marriage, nor strengthen the marriage bond.  Husbands would be wise to tell their wives about the people they work with, keeping an honest and open account with their one-flesh partner.  This will bring a great element of trust into the relationship, and also build accountability.  There are many adulterous relationships that begin in the workplace that never were intentional, but a bond was built between two people who spent much time together in the day-to-day.  Remember that adultery begins in the heart, and often starts with seemingly harmless conversation.  Wives, though they may be tired by the end of day, should take an interest in their husband's work and happenings at his place of employment.  After all, he has been at work all day to provide for her and the children.

We must remember, that though the Lord has first place in our hearts, we are to very much be about pleasing our husbands (and husbands to please their wives) once we are married (1 Corinthians 7:32-34).  Let us not take our marriages for granted.

Receive Blessed Homemaking in your inbox. Subscribe here.

Christianity Begins in the Home

Please join me today at Raising Homemakers where we ponder our Christianity as it pertains to home.

Receive Blessed Homemaking in your inbox. Subscribe here.

Christian Women's Ministry

A married woman's first obligation, her first ministry is her husband and then her children. Most women are meant to be married, raising children and tending to the needs of her husband.

It is rare that God calls women to full time ministry separate from marriage. A woman's greatest influence is over her husband and children.

Why do so many women think they are not engaging in ministry when they remain in the home offering a standard and character example for the rest of those in her household.

The greatest calling any woman can have is the affect a woman has is on the lives of those who live with her every day. If she does this well she has fulfilled God's mandate to serve Christ.

A woman's example and reach for Christ extends to the community in which her family lives. As she walks faithfully with God she will leave a sweet smelling aroma of God's love and purpose everywhere she goes.

If you are a homemaker, wife and mother, your influence is far greater than those women who neglect their home domain in favor of a career that brings them personal aggrandizement and a pay check.

Married women are not called to enter any other ministry apart from the family.

Proverbs 31 clearly states that homemaking, child rearing and care of husbands is the most important job the married woman can do.

We see in the Proverbs 31 passage that the woman who does her job well is very busy and even brings admiration from the community to her husband. The wife has the ability to make or break the career of her husband by her own conduct.

Far too many Christian wives have fallen into the trap of working outside the home to elevate their own status as well as gaining more money in order to be seen as prosperous and accomplished.

Sadly these women have no idea of the fulfillment and hard work involved in running a home with diligence and perseverance. If a woman did all the jobs a homemaker does for a wealthy family while obtaining a paycheck, this woman would be seen as having a career. But when the homemaker does all these things for her own family she is rejected and mocked as "just a housewife."

The devil has managed to intimidate women into believing they are not worth very much if they dedicate their lives to their families. They are viewed as unproductive and lacking intelligence because they do not receive that coveted pay check and "career" status.

There is nothing more fulfilling for the self motivated homemaker than caring for everyone in the family as well as volunteering in the community. Our homemaking skills are diverse and exciting, even more so than another job outside the home.

Never let anyone else intimidate you into believing you are not productive when your job is your home and family.

Those homemakers who are at home and do very little while in it, must repent from the attitude of laziness and begin to do well those things God has placed in their charge.

And lastly, never compare what you are doing with what anyone else is doing. God never called every woman to do exactly the same things. We have been called primarily to have husbands and children, they are our ministry.

Never allow others to intimidate you into thinking your job is not worthy. If you are obeying God and working as hard in your home as you are able, then you are in the center of God's Will.

~Gwendolyn Wehage

Receive Blessed Homemaking in your inbox. Subscribe here.

A Meek and Quiet Spirit

Are you doing everything you can to have a meek and quiet spirit?  Are you truly being your husband's help meet, or do you expect him to cater to you?

I am not writing this to women who are in abusive situations.

As women, it is easy for some of us to become selfish and demanding in day to day life.  We need to examine ourselves and see if we are seeking our husband's good instead of pursuing our own interests.  If we have concerns, there are times to bring them up, if we can do that while keeping a meek and quiet spirit, and also knowing it is of utmost importance.

If we have husbands that so generously want to please us, we may get into the bad habit of being demanding, instead of keeping a meek and quiet spirit, which is in the sight of God of great price (1 Peter 3:4).  We can wear our husbands out with our good intentions of pointing out every little thing to them that we think needs fixing or changing.

Instead, we need to have a view to respect, admire, appreciate, and accept our husbands, just as they are.  Then they can feel free to be themselves around us, and know that we support them like no one else does!  (Of course, we never support or submit to sin, but we should never have a self-righteous attitude about it either.)

Prayer is a wonderful thing as we take our concerns to the Lord Who knows all, and certainly knows better than we.

Receive Blessed Homemaking in your inbox. Subscribe here.

Against the Proletarization of Women ~ Antonia Cunningham, 2003

Until the latter half of the nineteenth century, the American family was viewed and regarded as a legitimate sphere of powerful economic and influential government, complete with land, an armed defense, a covenant head, and that covenant head's subjects. (The word "economy" literally means the law of the home.) Christian men often held positions as statesmen and justices in the civil sphere as well as ruling positions in the ecclesiastical sphere.

However, as men became influenced by the Jacobin, egalitarian philosophy of the French Revolution and began to follow Unitarian religious philosophy rather than the Calvinism of their eighteenth century Puritan heritage, the family began to be much less influential. Biblical covenantalism and federalism gave way to anti-biblical democratic individualism.

The doctrine that a woman's place is in the home was as recently as 50 years ago held by most Americans, not just Christians. It was only challenged when the humanistic Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s began to influence our nation.

Marriage is an economic institution. God has created the woman to be the helper of man, not to be a provider. The woman is an object of provision - otherwise the man's role as provider is meaningless. If the husband is not providing for the home, he should be severely rebuked and disciplined by the Church, until he demonstrates that he is providing for his wife. However, it is just as wrong for the wife to provide physical food for the home in response to her husband’s abdication as it would be for women to provide spiritual food to the congregation if male elders are teaching heresy. It was Adam who was given instruction to till the ground and provide.

As politically incorrect as the biblical view for the woman's place in the home is today, the biblical mandate on this issue (as any other) must be upheld, and God's Supreme Law-Word must be obeyed over the rules of men (Acts 5:29). When the Bible gives examples of women working, this work is always home-based. Some examples are Dorcas (Acts 9:36–42), Lydia (Acts 16:14,15,40), and the woman of Proverbs 31.

A married woman who works for another man is literally forced to obey two economic masters, and is consequently unable to be subject to her husband in everything as the Lord commands (Eph. 5:24). The husband also disobeys the Lord when he gives his wife to another for economic support. He is no longer providing for his wife. Instead, another man is now providing for her, and she is in his charge. On a collective level, this abdication leads to the tyranny of socialism and statism, a phenomenon that is increasingly prevalent in the United States as biblical, familial, ecclesiastical, and civil federalism and localism continue to be eroded by antinomian pietism, secular humanism, and mob rule.

As shown in Marx and Engels' Communist Manifesto, one of the first objectives of socialism is to seize private property that God has authoritatively and graciously given to mankind through the positive sanctions of His eighth commandment. One of the ways a socialist society is built is through taking the woman out of her biblical, natural sphere of the home and placing her in the workforce alongside the men - all in the name of an economic and social egalitarian, utopian ideal.

It is already clear at this point that the emancipation of woman, her equalisation with man, is and remains impossible so long as the woman is excluded from the productive work of society and remains restricted to private household work. The emancipation of woman first becomes possible when she is able on an extensive, social scale, to participate in production, and household work claims her attention only to an insignificant extent. And this for the first time has been made possible by large scale industry, which not only admits women’s labor over a wide range, but absolutely demands it, and also strives to transform private household work more and more into public industry ~ Friedrich Engels, co-author of The Communist Manifesto

I believe there is a direct correlation between feminist careerism and the high property taxes that are forced upon property owners today. Unemployment skyrocketed in the 1960s when women left the home and men were forced to compete with women for employment. Herein lies another reason why I believe a woman should not leave the sphere of the home to work. We cannot, in good Christian conscience, be employed in jobs that men need for the support of their wives and children. 

A married woman is employed in the most important job in the world. She works in her and her husband’s home - under their vine and fig tree, on their land, under God's primary and her husband's secondary federal and economic authority. No firm can pay a woman to care for children or an elderly parent. No business can pay a salary worthy of a woman praying with a hurting sister over muffins and coffee at 11:00 a.m. on a Tuesday. No president of a company can pay a wife to give her husband a much-needed foot massage after a good, hard day's work. No CEO in any corporation can pay a woman to make a home-cooked meal for her family or for a bedridden brother in Christ.

During the War for Southern Independence 140 years ago, many black Confederates fought for the freedom to be stewards of their own land and that of their masters, refusing to be subjected to the tyranny of a coercive, centralized Unitarian State in the name of emancipation. In the same way, let us, as married women, contend for our God-given right to be full-time housewives to our husbands and servants to other members of the Body of Christ, forsaking the world's current administration of centralized government, socialism, and statism.

To be sure, I am in no way saying that a woman should be confined to the home or that she cannot make money from the home. Indeed, this is the hallmark of the Proverbs 31 woman. I believe that as long as it does not interfere with the work of the home, the wife is also free to work in her husband’s office or with him in a partnership situation (such as a legal or medical practice). I teach and have taught piano lessons from our home for some time in order to earn money for the household. However, this is not meant to be provisional income (as our role as women is that of helper and not provider), but income used for the improvement and beautification of the home. I am under deep biblical conviction that this economic arrangement serves not only to protect women from their usurping, independent, sinful tendencies, but also protects the man from his sinful tendency of abdication. This type of administration also collectively fulfills the dominion mandate, since it helps to benefit society as a whole and strengthen familial government. 

It is no wonder that so many evangelical Christian women today are entering seminaries with what I believe is mostly a sincere desire to provide spiritual nourishment to starving, backslidden, or apostate congregations; this same generation of women has been told the lie that it is their responsibility to provide economically for their own households. It is inconsistent to tell women that they may not have a career in the pulpit or in the armed services (this includes combative roles) if we as a Church are unwilling to specifically tell women that their role or "career" is to be their husband's helper as keeper of the home. Egalitarian roles in the powerful and influential sphere of the family will inexorably create a secular humanistic state, leading to both spiritual and economic slavery and tyranny (1 Sam 8:1-18; Isaiah 3:1-12). The only way to avoid this tyranny is for married women to be keepers at home, that the Word of God may not be blasphemed (Titus 2:4).

I would give a woman not more rights, but more privileges. Instead of sending her to seek such freedom as notoriously prevails in banks and factories, I would design specially a house in which she can be free. ~ G.K. Chesterton

© Copyright 2002-2009 by LAF/BeautifulWomanhood.org

Used by permission from the author

Receive Blessed Homemaking in your inbox. Subscribe here.

Happy to be Home

Dear Ladies at Home,

The enemy of our souls would like us to think of our work here as drudgery.  He would like us to pick on our husbands.  He would like us to waste away minutes that turn into hours.  He would like us to see teaching our children at home as "too much work" and "too hard".  He would like us to tire of training our children.  He would like us to be dreadfully unhappy, and to see that unhappiness as stemming from the work we do at home.  He would like us to tire of cooking, of cleaning, of making a beautiful and peaceful home.  Why?  Because our Enemy knows how important our task is--this kingdom work, and he'd like to take us away from it as much as possible.

How far our Enemy has succeeded.  How many Christian women are at work these days instead of being at home, keeping it?  How many Christian women shuttle their children off to someone else to take care of and then go out themselves to provide an income?  How many times are young ladies pressured about going to college and asked what career they are going to chase after?  And we think this is normal, but it's not.  It blasphemes the very Word of God (Titus 2:3-5)

I am so thankful that my husband sees the need for him to be the provider, and for me to stay home, taking care of our home and our children.  It is so good to show our husbands that we are happy at home and are thankful for his hard work which allows us to be here.  There will always be something that I could find to complain about.  I could look at my work here as drudgery, but instead, I want to be thankful, I must be thankful.  This is the work the Lord has given me to do, and I am so glad.  I am the only one who can be our children's mother.  I am the only one who can be a help meet for my husband, and there is no one else better to take care of our own home.  Every day we have at home is a gift from the Lord. Let us not take it for granted.

Receive Blessed Homemaking in your inbox. Subscribe here.