I just listened to this. I am listening again right now. SO good. So true. All you wives and aspiring wives. Listen up! It reminded me of how challenging it is to have the right–godly balance between housework and relationships/life. Sometimes I feel like I can’t function if the house is a mess and the floors are grimy. I think I am finally coming to terms with the fact that it is OKAY to let the house be messy—provided I am letting it be messy for good reasons: like loving people and living life. If I am focusing on the right priorities my house will probably BE MESSY. If however I go around with a mop and a broom twice a day I probably won’t have the energy not to mention time to focus on people and life in general. I guess sometimes housework can be a selfish indulgence for me. Sure, I feel great when my house is squeaky clean but the truth of the matter is this season of my life is fleeting and HOUSEWORK WILL ALWAYS be there. Always. So maybe be I should take a breather and step back and cook that messy meal, dump the toys out with Michaela and let her finger paint on the floor with shaving cream. Okay you get the idea. Maybe not the last one yet at least–she’d end up eating it rather than playing. Gag. Finally sigh, peace with housework and a baby?! I hope so…although I think I am probably going to have to learn this lesson again sometime within the next 20 years.
SIGH. I don’t think I ever realized how difficult this Proverbs 31 life is. Being a home maker is something people should study for years before undertaking. Man, it’s a high calling. But I think there is room to say that Proverbs 31 has a lot to do with the gospel too. Every day I fail in Proverb’s 31ing it. That is why I need Jesus. I need redemption.
Back to that book He Calls Me Beautiful again (by the way it came in the mail–winner to be announced soon) I need Jesus’ beauty to shine through my life. Well, that is for another post. I’ll just leave this all to say being a home maker is about more than your home. It is about your heart. Because in the end that is what matters most. The superficial house work is just an easy way out of the harder heart work I find. It is easy to have a sparkling house in comparison to a sparkling heart. It is easy to neglect the spiritual to keep the externals beauitful. There is more of an instant reward too with a clean house. Man, there is a high associated with a clean house at least for me there is. So hopefully my house is going to be messier over the next few years. Ouch, that was hard to say. But I think you know what I mean.
Oh, how true, every word. Lately I’ve started to be really bothered by my NEED to have the dishes done and the house tidy before I will sit and play with Damien or read him a book. Worse yet is when I let Georges watch him while I cook or clean, even though Georges has something else he really needs to do. I’m sick of hearing myself say, “I’ll be there in one minute!” and it never IS one minute only; it’s more than that. I, too, have come to see this as selfishness. Yes, there is a HUGE feeling of accomplishment when the house is clean, but sometimes it’s obsessive in my case.
I don’t know about you, but I’m finding that doing some chores–nothing big, just like making sure the kitchen is tidy for the next day or cleaning up the living room–after the baby is in bed for the night makes things much less stressful. I actually find it relaxing. So, I’m trying to do that more often. It has to be done sometime, and I figure it might as well be when the baby is asleep and no longer needs my attention.
You know, I think if we allowed ourselves to be content with just cleaning the house, changing the diapers, feeding the baby, etc., as mere chores, with little or no affection behind our actions, we wouldn’t feel the demands of love so much, but because we DO want to do these things in love, for God, and see them as essentials in our vocation as wife and mother, the struggles are more noticeable. That’s because Satan wants us to abandon our good intentions and be satisfied with just getting through the day with a sigh, but God is asking us for more–to give of ourselves completely and not count the cost. That is always hard, and we often feel it! It’s true that no love is real if it is not sacrificial love, and no one said that it is easy. If it is easy, it’s not true love.
Thanks again for sharing your insights. I really can’t tell you how much these very same things are on my mind lately. I am so grateful to know another mother with the same struggles but also the same hope. Keep at it!