Most women have an ideal of what their home should look like. It tends to resemble something out of the pages of a magazine or off my Home Decorating Ideas & Inspiration Pinterest board.
Some are able to achieve this, but a vast majority of women are quite dissatisfied with the state of their homes. This is particularly true of women who have purposefully chosen the title of “homemaker”. They rarely seem to keep a home that meets the standard they envision in their minds as “the way it should be”. This is even more evident when children are thrown into the mix…and doubly so when those children are homeschooled.
Titus 2 presents a picture of what young married women are to be doing (much more so than Proverbs 31 which presents an ideal), and when you look at the ESV version, you see,
“working at home”
as one of the things older women are to be teaching the younger women. Nowhere in those verses does it say you are to be keeping a perfect home. It doesn’t speak to perfectly organized shelves or immaculate kitchens. It says “working.”
Working (or “keeping”) is a process and does not imply perfection, or that if you do it right, it will be perfect. You are simply to be doing it rather than avoiding it.
The passage also speaks of loving your husband and children. If God chooses to bless you with children, your home will forever be changed. As a Christian mother, it’s your job to adjust to the changes with grace – toward yourself AND your children (and yes, even your husband). Your house will be a different sort of clean, and your “working at home” will take on a new flair. And again, it isn’t going to be perfect.
I recently watched a BBC documentary entitled Time Warp Wives. At first, I was intrigued as the women on the show gave tours of their homes and lifestyles, some 1930s, but most 1950s. I found myself wondering where the children were, and musing about how insane it would be to try keep up that kind of lifestyle with kids in tow. Toward the end of the documentary, I learned where the children were.
There weren’t any.
Most of the couples had chosen to forgo having any children in order to keep up their lifestyle. Their immaculate homes, crisply ironed clothing, perfect hair and nails, and ultimately fake sense of reality, were more important than the real (and often raw) beauty of bringing children into the world and raising them.
It was a sad commentary on the price of “perfection.”
As followers of the Lord, Jesus Christ, we seek Him with all our being, but perfect we are not. We are made perfect in Him. The translation of that for the housewife is a woman who is constantly striving to do her best within her realm of responsibility out of love for those God has placed in her life and out of reverence for the God she serves. It has nothing to do with looking just so or meeting some arbitrary standard. It has everything to do with surrender, grace, and a desire to be a living sacrifice.
Look around your home…does it speak to the love you have for your family? Does it glorify the Lord? Remember, “perfect” isn’t the goal!
Jenni says
Thank you for this post. I like Pinterest and don’t feel like it breeds discontent in me because I don’t evaluate myself by the pictures – they are more inspirational to me than anything. But I do struggle with feeling frustrated (and honestly, sometimes resentful) when there are messes at home that are not my own, or feeling like I can’t get everything done because I have to homeschool too. I think that there must be a balance between allowing for life’s messes but also training your children to be responsible and helpful around the home. I am working toward training them better so that the general state of things is orderly, even if it is not perfect.
Brook Dykstra says
Thank you, Amy, I needed this today. We have our house up for sale (and homeschool our 7 children still at home). It has been difficult finding a good balance. While I believe God is a god of order, He has certainly put our hearts above our homes in order of importance. Thanks for touching my heart today. 🙂
Amanda says
I just have to share the video on my own blog. What a great post. A big family is messy…it is a beautiful mess around my house. Thank you for sharing this.
Audrey says
Hi Amy!
I enjoyed your post this morning. I just watched the link and I am left rather speechless. ????
This is one more example of how Hollywood can distort our views of true happiness. Only, instead of making women desire a feminist role, these ladies have chosen the other extreme. As a teen and young married woman I struggled with my views of what life should look like, due mainly from all of the romantic movies I had soaked in. As I grew in The Lord and realized that the sweet ending in the movies were a SCRIPT, it wasn’t reality, it freed me to love my REAL life.
I can’t help but see that these women are fulfilling themselves through living out an ideal that was based on a script and only certain scripts, obviously. They weren’t watching the movies or shows with the children running and playing and helping.
Our family has chosen to live very differently than the culture around us. In that respect I can relate to the ladies in the show. God’s Word has become our script that we model our family by and in it there is true fulfillment.
You were right on about the house not being perfect…. Another cultural distortion from magazines and web images. Just as an airbrushed model is unrealistic… So are the showroom perfect houses. We need to strive for peace, beauty, & order, but not allow ourselves to attach our self worth to the dirt on the floor and dishes in the sink.
Amy says
What great insight about life not being a script! Sounds like a great blog post topic. 😉
Audrey says
Yes, I was thinking the same thing! I am just starting my blog and I thought…. Hmmmm, I’ll have to write about how God has worked this all out in my life. ????
Jessica says
Thank you for the encouragement, I really needed that today. We moved into a two bedroom apartment from a different state with the intention of quickly finding something more suitable for a family of 8, but that wasn’t His plan apparently because we’re still here and now there are 9 of us! I’ve been feeling at the end of the rope with the lack of space and organization and just plain discontented. I appreciate your wisdom!
Tamara says
Thank you Amy!
I love the idea of asking the question “Does my home reflect the love that I
Have for my family and for Jesus”.
I was feeling frustrated and overwhelmed by how much cleaning and house work I was not getting done the other day with a new baby and 7 other children. I went for a walk
And was praying about the overwhelm I felt. I felt reminded that the important thing is that we are a house of prayer and a house of praise:)
Gods priorities can be so different than ours. It was a reminder to me that outward appearances aren’t as important as the matters of my heart.
Loved your post, thank you!
Kathi says
thank you so much! I’m always amazed (foolishly, i should expect it) at how perfect God’s timing is! i really needed thus today! I’ve been on the verge of tears all morning with my four little ones just moving so slowly, to the beat of their own drums. I’ve been letting it get on my nerves and then beating myself up over it all! so your post was a much needed reminder. As i type this one handed, holding the baby, my kids are finishing lunch. I’m able to regroup and look forward to sitting down with them and getting to some reading for school and trying to really be present. I’ve rambled enough! thanks again.
Kathi
Amy says
I am a homemaker and wife of a busy Sheriff’s Deputy. We have a busy three year old daughter, are in our second year of homeschool preschool, and are expecting our second child in June.
For the first three years of Annabeth’s life, my housekeeping went between two plans of action: 1. Wait until Annabeth finally went to bed at night (she has never napped) and run around getting everything done. This left me very tired and very much in need of some quiet time to myself. OR 2. Wait until Mark got home and then run around getting everything done while he and Annabeth played or read books. This also left me very tired and very resentful of their special time together.
Finally, after Annabeth’s third birthday and after we realized we were expecting again, I kept everyone at the table after dinner one evening and just said: “I need your help at night.” I explained that I needed them to help with the dishes or table cleanup or folding laundry or something… It went much better than I expected and now after we play and read as a family we pick up the house TOGETHER.
I thank and praise the Lord for my family and the blessing of serving them and serving with them.
Natalie says
We recently had this same revolutionary idea for evening family chore time! My 5 yr old daughter helps me clean the kitchen, while my husband supervises the 4 & 2 yr old boys picking up toys. Then we can all sit down for story time together, rather than me doing all the work and missing out.
Joy says
Oh I needed this today!
I often get stressed about my home…I have 5 kids 7,6,5,2 and 6 mos.
We just started homeschooling this year and I often struggle with keeping house, I mean, things get done but they are definitely not “perfect”. After an unexpected visitor yesterday, I stressed about the crumbs on the floor and my hubby gently reminded me “If Jesus came to your door would he care if there were a few crumbs?”
It served as a reminder to me that the most important thing is the spiritual state of my family and not my floors.
Your blog has been such a blessing since I have started following.
Thank you!
Josi says
Great encouragement Amy. About five years ago my husband remodeled our son’s room and it looked beautiful, complete with window trim, crown molding and fresh paint (at that point it was the only room in the whole house that looked this good). We no longer wanted his loft bed so we were going to post it on Craigslist for sale, but first we needed to take photos of the bed. We had to scoot all of our son’s junk out of the way so it wasn’t in the pictures. Wow, those pictures looked like a home out of a magazine! It looked like I lived in a perfect house but my husband and I laughed knowing what the reality really was…..and still is! We all could have the Pinterest house if we didn’t choose to put relationships as our number one priority. I always say, “something’s gotta give” and it’s better that it be the perfectly organized book shelf that goes rather than our marriages or other relationships. My current housewife goals are to continue weeding out the excess and unused items that have become burdensome and to decorate with scripture verses.
Also, in case this encourages other housewives, I just want to say that I am so blessed when I go into another woman’s home and she has set aside “perfection,” choosing to have me over for fellowship despite her desire to have her home just right. Tea and store bought cookies in the midst of toys, homeschool projects and laundry suits me just fine. And when I invite others over they get some of the same at my home! 🙂