girl talk

The Homemaker's Secret of Fulfillment

Recently, at the end of a conference session where CJ and I fielded questions, a woman approached me with a query of her own: “So what do you do on the side?” she inquired.

“On the side?” I echoed, not fully comprehending her question.

“What do you do for personal fulfillment?” she sought to clarify. “You see I’m happy my husband has his ministry because that provides him with personal fulfillment. But I pursue my own hobbies because they provide personal fulfillment for me. So,” she repeated again, “What do you do?”

I was unprepared for her question. And I’m sure my answer was insufficient. (How often I have an eloquent answer after the conversation is over!) If I had it to do over again, I’d tell her about Dorothy.

Dorothy was a woman who knew the secret of true “personal fulfillment.” A single mom whose husband left her with a son to raise, Dorothy didn’t spend time worrying about herself. Instead, she was always serving and caring for others. I knew her because she was my Sunday School teacher. And Dorothy was one of the most joyful women I knew.

At my bridal shower everyone wrote down a piece of advice on a slip of paper. I only remember one, and it was Dorothy’s. Her secret to a fulfilled life? “Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it” (Matthew 10:39).

Our culture is constantly telling us to find our life; that we’re the center of our world, and as such, we need to take care of “me” first. We need to find what fulfills us and not let anyone or anything (especially a husband or children) get in the way.

But when I’m the center of my world, my world becomes very small—because I’m the only person in it. When I try to find fulfillment in anything besides loving Christ and serving Him, I will only end up more frustrated and completely unfulfilled.

Now, don’t misunderstand. I think we as women should express our creativity, and even more importantly get sufficient rest. But the purpose of creativity should be to glorify God with our gifts, not to find “personal fulfillment,” and the goal of rest should be to strengthen us for service, not to carve out “time for ourselves.”

If we want “personal fulfillment" as women, we must not follow our culture’s prescription of selfishness. Rather, we must lose our life for Christ's sake. Then, amazingly, we'll find that our world expands. We'll know the thrill of seeing the fruit of our sacrificial service in the lives of those around us. So for true "personal fulfillment," let’s follow Dorothy’s example as she followed Christ.

July 4th

We've reprinted this post before, but it seemed a proper ending to our week on homemaking....

Happy July 4th!
Nicole for the girltalkers

Independence Day

On July 4 each year, we Americans may pause (perhaps only for a moment) in between barbecues and beach balls and “bombs bursting in air” to think about the men who founded our country. But not, too often, do we think about the women’s role.

In her book, Founding Mothers, Cokie Roberts profiles the women who lived at the center of the American Revolution. “It’s safe to say,” she notes, “that most of the men who wrote the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, fought the Revolution, and formed the government couldn’t have done it without the women.”

Speaking specifically about Abigail Adams, wife of John Adams (one of the most influential founding fathers) she comments, “Not only did John turn to Abigail for information and counsel, she was the person who made it possible for him to do what he did" (Cokie Roberts, Founding Mothers (New York, NY: William Morrow, 2004), xvi).

None of us are married to nation founders. However, all of us—married or single—have been created by God to be “helpers.” Equal to man in worth and value, we have, nevertheless, a different role. We have been given a specific, honorable, and challenging task: to “make it possible” for kingdom work to move forward.

Whether as a wife we advise, comfort, encourage, and assist our husband, or as a single woman we help others in the church and reach out to the lost—we are making possible, not just a work of historical significance, but of eternal significance. 

So, how can you glorify God by being a helper today? What great work can you carry forward, simply by doing your part?

And finally, consider: What if those dynamic feminine heroes of the revolution had been “liberated” from their “oppressed” helper role (as women supposedly are today)? I wonder if we would even be celebrating Independence Day.

On July 4 each year, we Americans may pause (perhaps only for a moment) in between barbecues and beach balls and “bombs bursting in air” to think about the men who founded our country. But not, too often, do we think about the women’s role.

In her book, Founding Mothers, Cokie Roberts profiles the women who lived at the center of the American Revolution. “It’s safe to say,” she notes, “that most of the men who wrote the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, fought the Revolution, and formed the government couldn’t have done it without the women.”

Speaking specifically about Abigail Adams, wife of John Adams (one of the most influential founding fathers) she comments, “Not only did John turn to Abigail for information and counsel, she was the person who made it possible for him to do what he did" (Cokie Roberts, Founding Mothers (New York, NY: William Morrow, 2004), xvi).

None of us are married to nation founders. However, all of us—married or single—have been created by God to be “helpers.” Equal to man in worth and value, we have, nevertheless, a different role. We have been given a specific, honorable, and challenging task: to “make it possible” for kingdom work to move forward.

Whether as a wife we advise, comfort, encourage, and assist our husband, or as a single woman we help others in the church and reach out to the lost—we are making possible, not just a work of historical significance, but of eternal significance. 

So, how can you glorify God by being a helper today? What great work can you carry forward, simply by doing your part?

And finally, consider: What if those dynamic feminine heroes of the revolution had been “liberated” from their “oppressed” helper role (as women supposedly are today)? I wonder if we would even be celebrating Independence Day.

Heralding the Homemaker

Women who invest their gifts in the home don’t usually get much attention, so today I want to highlight two of them. They are not the only women I know whose gifts and talents are utilized for the good of their family. In fact, I am privileged to know many such women. These two happen to be the most recent examples I have observed.

The first is my friend Emma. A kindergarten teacher before she came home to raise her two children, Emma also studied art at college and is a gifted artist. The other day, her husband honored her at one of our small group meetings. He shared how grateful he is that Emma uses her many gifts in the home: “No one else sees how you plant flowers on the front porch or work hard to decorate our home” he said. “But I’m grateful for the way you quietly serve and use your gifts for the good of our family.” Makes one think of the Proverbs 31 woman whose husband praises her.

The other humble, hard-working homemaker is my sister, Kristin. Always better in math than me (not that that is saying much!) Kristin worked in accounting before she became a mom. It’s been neat for me to watch her use her skills, knowledge and general “intuition” for numbers to help her family secure a loan in order to move into their new house. She demonstrated such an aptitude for the numbers process that the mortgage broker said he’d rarely worked with someone so savvy. He even told her she could come work for him if she ever wanted a job! But Kristin already has the job she wants, caring for Brian and her boys.

Emma and Kristin, and countless other women I know (you know who you are!) are living proof of Dorothy Patterson’s insistence that:

“Homemaking—being a full-time wife and mother—is not a destructive drought of usefulness but an overflowing oasis of opportunity; it is not a dreary cell to contain one’s talents and skills but a brilliant catalyst to channel creativity and energies into meaningful work; it is not a rope for binding one's productivity in the marketplace, but reins for guiding one's posterity in the home; it is not oppressive restraint of intellectual prowess for the community, but a release of wise instruction to your own household; it is not the bitter assignment of inferiority to your person, but the bright assurance of of the ingenuity of God's plan for the complementarity of the sexes, especially as worked out in God's plan for marriage; it is neither limitation of gifts available nor stinginess in distributing the benefits of those gifts, but rather the multiplication of a mother's legacy to the generations to come and the generous bestowal of all God meant a mother to give to those He entrusted to her care."

To Be All There

It is not only homemakers who need to remember that their current season is not a holding pattern or a hindrance. Two of our single readers also see that it is important to apply these truths to their lives and “live to the hilt” of what God has called them to today:

Thank you so much for your encouraging post which reminds me to try to serve God in whatever I do. I have the opposite problem to the young woman described in your post!

I'm a woman who isn't married yet and who works, and I look at my married friends with children and am envious of all the opportunities they have to share the gospel, serve their husbands and children and glorify God in a way which seems better than the situation I am in. But then comparing isn't the point is it? It is to be as Susannah Wesley says! I've been very struck by Col. 3.17 recently and am asking God to help me to do this whatever I do in work, in my church life and most particularly (this is where it has really hit!) in my courtship. Which is revealing to me just how sinful and selfish I am! But how great of God to save me, so I must keep that in mind!

Emma

I think the mindset that we are not using our gifts as homemakers can also apply to single women waiting to be married or married women waiting to have children.  We are waiting for that season where we think God will really start his plan for our lives and for our service to Him, but like you said earlier this week, we should imitate Jim Elliot's words and whatever season of life we are in, be all there for the glory of God!

Rachel

Homemaking is Not a Hindrance

I recently heard a young woman confess that she struggles with not being able to “use her gifts” because she is primarily at home, caring for small children. She is not alone in her struggle. I can remember occasionally battling similar thoughts in those early years of nursing infants, changing diapers and child training, and I know other women have as well.

It’s easy for us to look around and see “everyone else” playing a productive and meaningful part in the church’s mission and feel like we are the “only one” languishing on the sidelines.

Now, it is good and right for us to want to invest the gifts and talents God has bestowed on us for the good of the church; but when we view homemaking as a hindrance to using our gifts, I think we’re missing a vitally important truth.

You see, the gifts God has given to each of us are not only for the “common good” (1 Cor. 12:7) of those outside our family, but they are first and foremost for the good of those within our family.  In fact, I would argue that there is no place where our gifts and skills should be more heartily put to use than with the family God has given to our charge.

Are you creative and artistic? Then make your house a fun and beautiful place to be. Are you organized and methodical? Then apply your skill in the management of your home. Are you a skilled counselor? Then be the woman of understanding who draws out the “deep waters” of your family member’s hearts (Prov. 20:5). Can you sing? Then fill your home with music. Whatever gift you have been given or skill you have acquired turn around and invest it in your home.

Be like Susanna Wesley, “the incomparably brilliant and well-educated mother of sons who shook two continents for God” who wrote: “I am content to fill a little space if God be glorified” (Dorothy Patterson, "The High Calling of Wife and Mother in Biblical Perspective").

Let us be content to use our gifts, energies, talents and skills for the good of our family to the glory of God.

Homemaking is Not a Holding Pattern

Phew! Moving is an all-consuming, full-time project: Collecting boxes, packing boxes, dismantling furniture, removing wall hangings, patching, sanding, and painting the holes left by those wall hangings, sorting through everything – deciding what to keep and what to get rid of, collecting and packing more boxes, holding yard sales, cleaning…

And that was only the moving out part.

Saturday was the big move and now that my stuff is in the new house I need to start the whole process over again—albeit sort of in reverse: Cleaning, unpacking and getting rid of boxes, putting furniture back together, hanging pictures on the walls (and of course making new holes in the wall), creating a place for everything…

In the midst of all this packing and unpacking I’ve found myself thinking, “When I get through this move, then I can get back to more important things.”

This is not the first time I’ve succumbed to such faulty thinking. Throughout my career as a homemaker I’ve been tempted to look past the duties of the day to the more “important,” “significant,” or “exciting” work of tomorrow.

“When the baby sleeps through the night, then I can begin to…”
“When the children are a little older I’ll have more time to….”
“When this sports season is over than I can turn my attention to….”
“If they ever graduate from high school, then I can finally….”

But there are no holding patterns in God’s kingdom. As homemakers, we are not simply circling the skies of life, waiting for God from His control tower to call us to real kingdom work. No, we’re doing that important work today. As Dorothy Patterson observes: “preparation and care of the family shelter are important enough for God himself to assign that responsibility” (e.g. Titus 2:3-5, Pr. 31).

If God himself has assigned me the task of caring for my home, then I don’t want to half-heartedly perform the duties of today, reserving my best efforts for “tomorrow.” Rather, I want to follow the advice of missionary Jim Elliot: “Wherever you are, be all there. Live to the hilt every situation that you believe to be the will of God.” I want to unpack boxes and scrub my new bathtub and run errands for the new home and take my son to the soccer scrimmage for the glory of the One who saved me and who, by His grace, called me to this wonderful work.

Friday Funnies

Noël Piper sent us this adorable picture of her grandson with the following note:

Ever seen the capsules that, when dropped in water, turn into animals?

Here's our 3-year-old grandson, Orison, discovering the magic. His daddy's blog entry:

http://twentytwowords.com/2008/05/20/%e2%80%9cmagic-grow-safari-animals%e2%80%9d-and-the-pursuit-of-happiness/

 

In Honor of Home

Tomorrow the moving truck comes to take our things to the new house (CJ and I will be staying here until renovations are completed on our room). In Feminine Appeal, in my chapter on “The Honor of Working at Home” I reflected upon the memories of living in this home and being a homemaker. These thoughts seem especially appropriate to post today.

“The Best Job in the World”

When I reflect upon my past twenty-nine years as a homemaker, a virtual collage of memories floods my mind: Family Night every Monday. Reading with my husband by the fire. Tucking my children into bed at night with a song and a prayer. Waking them up for a surprise “pajama ride” to Dunkin Donuts. Reading Little House on the Prairie to my daughters or Paddington Bear to my little boy.

Counseling a newlywed couple through their first disagreement. Evenings of fellowship, food, and laughter with friends. Throwing a baby shower for my unsaved neighbor. Extending hospitality to overnight guests. Praying with other women in my living room.

Long talks with C.J. over a cup of coffee. Enjoying sweet forgiveness after resolving a family conflict. Extended family dinnertime conversations. Sharing with our children the good news of Jesus Christ.

And I’ll never forget this memory: I was standing at my kitchen sink, washing the breakfast dishes when Chad entered the room. Only four years old at the time, he began running in little-boy circles in front of the refrigerator. He was singing a song he’d made up, and it went like this: “You’re the best mommy in the whole world! You’re the best mommy in the whole world!”

Though his song had only this one refrain, he continued singing for a full five minutes. I stood there with the dirty dishes, watching my son and thinking. I have the BEST JOB in the whole world!

I hope, my fellow homemakers, that you agree!

At Home with Humor

Our home was always full of laughter. My dad inherited a quick wit and hilarious sense of humor from his dad. He taught us to laugh—laugh at ourselves and laugh along with each other. To this day, whenever we get together, our conversation quickly turns humorous, and we often laugh until we can’t breathe.

While the trip down memory lane over the last few days has brought tears to my eyes and a smile to my face, it has also brought that familiar laughter. I laugh when I remember the time my Mom was out of town and Nicole and I impetuously sold all of our bedroom furniture at my aunt’s yard sale. It has taken Mom ten years to laugh about that one.

I laugh when I think about my dad attempting repair jobs around the house while carrying on a running conversation with his tools. Not so funny to Dad, but hilarious for the rest of us to listen in as he blamed the leak on his faulty wrench.

We all can’t help but laugh when we recall how Mike came over to the house weekend after weekend to “hang out with Chad.” He wasn’t fooling anyone, not even Chad.

Oh, and let’s not forget the time a certain sister left the top on the hamster cage open, and four baby hamsters spent several weeks roaming the basement.

Laughter practically sent me into labor the other day while I was watching my brother mow the lawn. He ran into a few technical difficulties (which were all the fault of the lawn mower, of course) and, well, you had to be there.

We all laugh when we remember Nicole and Kristin’s poodle perms, my lime green baseball hat and Chad’s endless collection of soccer cleats.

In all this laughter, we learned humility. My dad led by example as he always laughed the loudest when the joke was on him. But whenever we did something silly (or can I say stupid?) he taught us to laugh rather than withdraw in pride. While it took the sons-in-law some time to adjust to our family culture, they now lead the way in pursuing humility through laughter.

Although I’m sad to leave this house where we have known endless hours of laughter, I’m glad that when we move, my dad will be around to teach his granddaughters the same lessons of humor and humility.

My New Old Home

My parents are busy packing to move out of their home. The boxes are piling up and the pictures are coming down from the walls. Actually, it’s still strange for me to think this way, but legally it is my home now and they are renting back from me. 

A story is ending and a story is beginning. The door is closing on my life as a daughter in this home and opening to a new role as wife and mother in this home.

I still remember riding with my dad in the big moving truck from our old home in Silver Spring, MD to our brand new home in Gaithersburg. I was eight years old. And as I walk into each room of my new (for the second time) home, so many wonderful memories come to mind….

Mom waking us up each morning with a special song.

Dad leading in morning devotions at the breakfast table.

Birthday celebrations with the “You are Special Today” plate.

Reading and talking long after dinner was finished.

Watching the Redskins with Dad on Sunday afternoon.

Sleepovers with friends.

The surprise graduation party Mom threw for Nicole and me.

The night Brian asked my dad if he could court me.

Trying on my wedding dress in the bedroom.

Rolling my luggage down the hall on my wedding day as I prepared to leave home (for what I thought was the last time!).

And, while almost all of the memories are fond ones, I also remember arguing with my sister in the bathroom each morning over who got to use the hairdryer first! (Love ya, Nic!)

My oldest son Andrew is eight years old—the same age I was when I first rode to this home in the big truck with my dad. He’s going to share the same room with his brothers (yep, bunk beds and a trundle!) that I shared with my sisters. In fact, I’ve found myself planning to arrange our furniture much the same way it was when I first lived here twenty-two years ago. God-willing, I hope Brian and I can make as many wonderful memories for our children as my parents did with us.

Most of all, I pray God will give us grace to carry on the legacy of a loving, joyful, gospel-centered, kingdom-minded, home for His glory.