While we wait for Jesus

Most of the Christian Church is waiting for the Rapture wherein Christ comes for His Bride, the Church. It will be instant and unannounced. But hardly kept secret.

The Scriptures have told us for millenia about the need to keep busy and keep our hearts prepared as we wait for Jesus. But what should we be doing as we wait?

We are urged to keep oil in our lamps which means to be alert and watching for the signs that Christ is at the door. We are to be spiritually aware and physically pure and holy.

The bible also tells us to be minding our own business and keeping looking up. So how do we do this?

We need to be living in a way that is pleasing to the LORD. We are expected to do these things even if we are chronically ill. As when we were saved, we need to be serving Him in whatever calling He has placed us in. 

If we are at home, we are to keep serving our family. With all the turmoil in the world, we need to be loving as a wife and mother and diligent as a home maker. 

We are to continue working outside the home if that is where you are called and we are to witness through our daily living that we are Christians who have hope.  The world needs to see that we are not moved by world events.  

Whilst it is true that we are to mind our own business, we are expected to pray for others, both saved and unsaved and to give a reason for the hope that is within us, if asked. With meekness and humility.

It is imperative that we keep studying the Word, praying and worshiping. We must remember that our redemption is closer than when we first believed and we must keep close to the LORD.

Without clinging to Jesus, our hope will dwindle and we must be full of hope and love in order to firstly function for our family, then the world... 

In everything we do and everywhere we go, we need to share the hope that is within us, for the lost have never been more in need of Jesus than now with His return imminent. Time is short.

Resolve to keep close to Christ and to share to others whenever possible that they need to know Jesus as their Saviour NOW. But, be glad for whatever calling you are in now, and keep on keeping on.

© Glenys Robyn Hicks

For which cause we faint not; but though our outward man perish, yet the inward man is renewed day by day. For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory; While we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen: for the things which are seen are temporal; but the things which are not seen are eternal. 2 Corinthians 4:16-18 

The foundation of a happy home

If  I were to sit down with you for a  cuppa and we started to discuss housework,  it wouldn’t take us long to agree  that it can  be terribly boring and monotonous!   It is  thankless and repetitive and  there often is very little instant job satisfaction! I think we would do well to remember something…

Although we tend to find keeping home is often a lonely business, we must consider that housework is indeed a valid occupation and a worthy chore and it is virtually the same the world over. As we start our daily routines, we join millions of people worldwide who must do the same thing if they want to live in a home that is relatively clean and inviting…

Chris and I recently went  around Victoria in a fifth wheeler, driving many long miles, and I remember thinking of the many clothes lines filled with clean clothes along the way. Testimony that someone had taken the time to do it- probably lamenting the tediousness of doing laundry just as we are!

As we passed the high country and it snowed, it was so comforting to see the smoke billowing from the Coonara fires and open fireplaces, again testimony that someone had chopped the wood, prepared the fire and most likely cleaned up the ashes and dusted down sooty places. But be that as it may, the end result would have been worth it. I pondered how cosy it would have been to return home to the warmth of this homestead after facing the extreme cold doing farm chores!

I love collecting graphics of cosy homes and homemaking scenes…and I often reflect on the work behind the well-lit cottages with their chimneys and the kitchen scenes with baked pies cooling at the open kitchen window. Often there is a beloved cat or dog sitting in front of the fire….all making a very captivating homely scene. But have you ever stopped to think that said animals must be fed? Those cooling pies must have been prepared and to do that shopping must have been done and apples peeled….and then there would have been a mountain of dishes to wash!

Every facet of housework actually builds the foundation of a happy home. And tedious as it is, it is something we would do well to embrace with at least a willing spirit, if not a happy heart. I am speaking to myself as I write this, for I am chief among murmuring and indolent homemakers at times…

My personal prayer is that God will help me develop a grateful heart and a willing spirit….I do long to be a good wife and homemaker…so as soon as I complete this post, I am going to bless my home and family with a thoroughly cleaned house. My heart is prepared, and I am willing: I just need God to give me the strength….but I think of the end result and push onwards: the end results will be most gratifying even if short-lived! Cleanliness is the foundation of a happy home.

© Glenys Robyn Hicks

“Therefore I desire that the younger widows marry, bear children, manage the house, give no opportunity to the adversary to speak reproachfully” 1 Timothy 5:14

Keeping peace in your home revisited

Dear Friends,

Our membership is world wide and every religion! We are the keepers of our homes. It is up to us to set the tone for our families. This may be hard, but we can do it! We can do anything for 15 minutes.

Watch your words to yourself and to your babies. We cannot stereotype a people or a religion because of a few bad men. Fear is their goal! When we let go of this fear we have succeeded at allowing peace to enter our homes.

All any of us can do is take care of our little corner of the world; our homes! You can do this by turning off the TV and Facebook. I fell victim to television many years ago. It literally made me sick from watching the negativity of the news all the time.  I am not saying to put on blinders or not to be concerned for your family members who are in the middle of the news, but what I want you to do is keep the home fires burning. Limit the influx of the media. Their goal is to make it sound as bad a possible and I don’t want their one-sided exaggerations to hurt you or your family!

Focus your fears and sadness by doing something to bless your family! Go shine your sink! Fold laundry! Clean out that craft room! Work on your control journal! Pay your bills! Do not spend all your time in front of boob tube having your brains sucked out by fear! Or checking Facebook every 5 minutes. Unfriend people who spew nastiness and hate. Only friend or like pages that lift you up. 

Your children and your pets are very intuitive. You can’t hide your feelings from them. So you have to insulate yourself from those by limiting your exposure. What you think about your bring about! It is up to us to think good thoughts instead of expending energy on worry; use that power to bless your tiny little corner of the world.  Now is the time for us to do what we can, with what we have, where we are! So what can we do?

Feed our families. Get food in the house. Plan your meals so you feel secure. Pull out your family’s favorite recipes and fix their comfort food. Do it together! Set the good dishes and light candles!  Entertain yourselves with your favorite movies. Make a list of your family’s all time favorites. Look for them at yard sales and clearance racks. Gather up some of your favorite books to read aloud.

Play classical music, gospel music, or your favorite music! Let your spirits be lifted in song your special way! Sing together! Play music on the piano, keyboards, or other instruments. Have a sing along! Sing your favorite holiday songs! Go Caroling! Learn how to sing in harmony! What fun! Drag out the karaoke machines!  (if you haven’t flung them LOL)

Pull out the family board games or a jigsaw puzzle. Sit around your dinner table and play games and talk.  You are not going to be able to isolate your children from all of this, but you can edit what they hear and have it come from you! Worry never made any situation better! If you catch yourself doing this, it is time to take care of you!

Remember what the flight attendant always says when you board a plane: You have to put your oxygen mask on first, before you start to help your child. This means keep up with your simple morning and evening routines, continue to declutter for 15 minutes a day and do the missions for your zone.

Your routines will give you structure and comfort! Do Them!! This means getting dressed to lace-up shoes, fixing your hair and face too! When you start to feel yourself get stressed, then change gears and take care of you! This means give yourself a hug! If you don’t know what to do, then go to our homepage and read the Pamper Section, get in the tub, take a walk, or just sit and listen to the birds sing, light candles, turn on all the lights in the house, open up the curtains and let the sun shine in!

Winter is tough on all of us. We can dream about spring, plan our gardens, and plant seedlings. Dream big! Let’s be ready for any emergency. They keep saying we are going to have a long hard winter.

We can do this. We don’t have to let the bad news disrupt OUR peace in OUR homes.  Are you ready to FLY with peace as your guide? by Marla Cilley aka FlyLady

So teach [us] to number our days, that we may apply [our] hearts unto wisdom.  Psalm 90:12

Back to the simple life

By today’s worldly standards you are considered poor if:

1. The family only has one income

2. There is only one car per family

3. There is only one bathroom and toilet per house

4. Your house doesn’t have a bedroom per person

5. Your house doesn’t have garage space for each car

6. And woe, woe, woe, if you don’t even have a garage!

7. You don’t have a theatre room, rumpus room or den

You are considered deprived and underprivileged if:

1. You don’t have a TV in your room

2. You don’t have a computer

3. You don’t have Internet connection

4. You don’t have a DS or Wii

5. You don’t have your own room

6. You don’t have your own mobile or cell phone

7. You don’t have designer jeans and shoes

And I am sure you can think of other things to add to the list! But really for all this affluence, is the world any happier? I don’t think so!

What about bygone days? What made it better whilst seeming to be hard?

1. In bygone days the average family had one income and one car

2. Houses had one bathroom

3. Children played in the street

4. Boys wore trousers with patches at the knees

5. Money was in short supply and thrift was practiced

6. Creative homemakers used leftovers

7. Families sat together watching the one TV set in the home

Mother was always home and enjoyed looking after her family and homemaking was considered honourable. Home cooked meals (often with left-overs) were the norm and dining out and take away was for an occasion.

Father went to work and enjoyed coming home to a meal on the table and a read of the paper and wasn’t expected to help with the chores after a gruelling day in a factory or office for a meagre wage.

Children were fed and bathed and put to bed at a reasonable hour and Mother would sit and knit or practice some creative craft that today is slowly dying. They would sit and enjoy a companionable moment together before retiring around 10.

For all our advancements in choices of life styles and extra incomes and possessions, we aren’t any happier than then. For then families had time for each other and marriages were stronger and memories were fonder.

So how do we fix the problem? The answer is not hard at all: it’s time to go back to the simple life.

Author unknown

Blessings, Glenys

“Not that I speak in respect of want: for I have learned, in whatsoever state I am, [therewith] to be content”. Philippians 4:11

Empty buckets

I did an enneagram test for fun the other day. It said I was a 2 which basically is a helper who needs to be needed. It sounds like me. Or the past me.

Always trying to help and indeed, called on often in time of trouble, it has been my pleasure to respond to the call. Until recently.

Since we had so many changes in the last 6 months, I have found my spoons are lacking. I cry easily, both when I am sad and also when happy. I hunger for solitude and just watching the bird life around us. I need time to heal not only from the meniscus tear in my left knee, but emotionally. I am tired.

No matter how tired I feel, I drag myself to church because I need it. I am indeed grateful to the LORD for so much.  I love to listen to the Bible on You Tube and I play hymns in the background most of the day. Prayer is often ongoing for hours and I am gradually finding peace again.

It's good that we are now retired as there are days when the fibromyalgia flares and I can't stay awake, and I now just go to bed and have a nana nap whenever it is necessary. 

It has taken me 66 years to realise that it is true that 

1. I am not responsible for fixing everything or everyone who is broken. But I can pray for them.
2. It is OK to say no if I honestly can't cope with a request. I don't have to feel guilty 
3. It is OK to admit to being over something and not to be stoic and push myself mercilessly

It is important to recognise burn out and to take steps to heal. Taking care of yourself is not being selfish. There will be time after your healing to be a helper again. Not recognising burn out will result in you having a physical or emotional meltdown. And no one is going to benefit if you have lost your joie de vivre or your milk of human kindness is dried up and you have only empty buckets to give.

© Glenys Robyn Hicks

And he said unto them, Come ye yourselves apart into a desert place, and rest a while: for there were many coming and going, and they had no leisure so much as to eat. Mark 6:31

Footnote: since writing this post, I have learned that enneagrams originated from new age practices and automatic writing. I will not be doing any quizzes etc regarding this again. Thank you, Janine for making me aware of this. 

It's a beautiful evening

The sun is sinking under the nearby hills, leaving pink streaks in the sky. I have drawn the drapes and lit the lamps.

My dishes from dinner are drying in the drainer. Xena has been fed and is indoors sitting with her Dad, Chris.

The weather is slightly cool and we have put our fire on low which gives a cosy effect. I love my home, my husband and my cat... and of course, my God.

Not only has He blessed us with a lovely home to live in, but He graciously gave me a few surprise spoons (energy) this afternoon. I managed to do what was on my list, plus I finished off putting all my clean washing away.

We live a simple life, but it is one of contentment and joy. I am believing for a good sleep tonight. I have already taken my medications and I can retire any time after an hour. I must remain upright and awake for an hour after taking them or my sleep is fitful and sore. I know that if I lay down soon after taking them that I can either have GERD or aspirate some acid and develop pneumonia. I have had pneumonia three times. I don't know why my sleep is fitful and my muscles sore if I don't wait an hour, but I am sick of trying to work it out: It is what it is.

Soon I will join Chris in the lounge room and no doubt Xena will jump up onto my lap for a cuddle and cat nap. As soon as she hears me say I am going to B.E.D. she springs off my lap and nearly trips me up to get there before me. I have to spell B.E.D. because she knows the word- yes she does. She's a smart girlie!

As I lay thanking God for the good in each day before I sleep, I can be sure of one thing: my little feline mate will be under the covers, pressed up against my back. She is always purring at night and I have no doubt that she too is grateful for the ending day. And for a Mum who overlooks cat fur and her tickling cat whiskers!  All in all, it's a beautiful evening! 

© Glenys Robyn Hicks

It is in vain that you rise up early and go late to rest, eating the bread of anxious ... To take rest late, To eat the bread of toil; For so he giveth unto his beloved sleep. Psalm 127:2

God values the homemaker

All of us Christian wives who are seeking to live life according to God’s Word, are bombarded by feminist teaching and other unscriptural advice. We are further alienated from our sisters who work part-time because society sees them as contributing whereas it portrays us as parasitic!

So great is the attack on us, that often we sit scratching our heads and wondering if they could be right. As in all things, we would do well to seek what the Word of God says.

I have compiled some feminist and ungodly views and I have answered them with the Word. As always, we see the Truth of a housewife’s value in God’s sight is revealed in His Word. I am sure you can find other verses such as Proverbs 31 and Titus 2 that show how God feels about our work in the home.

Feminist and worldly view

“A parasite sucking out the living strength of another organism…the housewife’s labor does not even tend toward the creation of anything durable…. Woman’s work within the home is not directly useful to society, produces nothing. The housewife is subordinate, secondary, and parasitic. It is for their common welfare that the situation must be altered by prohibiting marriage as a ‘career’ for woman.” The Second Sex, 1949 by Simone de Beauvoir
Isaiah 3:11-13 Woe unto the wicked! it shall be ill with him: for the reward of his hands shall be given him. As for my people, children are their oppressors, and women rule over them. O my people, they which lead thee cause thee to err, and destroy the way of thy paths. The LORD standeth up to plead, and standeth to judge the people.

“[The] housewife is a nobody, and [housework] is a dead-end job. It may actually have a deteriorating effect on her mind…rendering her incapable of prolonged concentration on any single task. [She] comes to seem dumb as well as dull. [B]eing a housewife makes women sick.” — Sociologist Jessie Bernard in The Future of Marriage, 1982.
Proverbs 31:27 “She watches over the affairs of her household and does not eat of the bread of idleness.”

“[As long as the woman] is the primary caretaker of childhood, she is prevented from being a free human being.” — Kate Millett, Sexual Politics, 1969.
Proverbs 31:28 “Her children arise and call her blessed…”

“[Housewives] are dependent creatures who are still children…parasites.” — Gloria Steinham, “What It Would Be Like If Women Win,” Time, August 31, 1970.
Proverbs 12:15 The way of a fool is right in his own eyes

“[Housewives] are mindless and thing-hungry…not people. [Housework] is peculiarly suited to the capacities of feeble-minded girls. [It] arrests their development at an infantile level, short of personal identity with an inevitably weak core of self…. [Housewives] are in as much danger as the millions who walked to their own death in the concentration camps. [The] conditions which destroyed the human identity of so many prisoners were not the torture and brutality, but conditions similar to those which destroy the identity of the American housewife.” — Betty Frieden, The Feminine Mystique, 1963.
Psalm 127: 3-5 Lo, children are an heritage of the LORD: and the fruit of the womb is his reward. As arrows are in the hand of a mighty man; so are children of the youth. Happy is the man that hath his quiver full of them: they shall not be ashamed, but they shall speak with the enemies in the gate.

“[A]s long as the family and the myth of the family and the myth of maternity and the maternal instinct are not destroyed, women will still be oppressed…. No woman should be authorized to stay at home and raise her children. Society should be totally different. Women should not have that choice, precisely because if there is such a choice, too many women will make that one. It is a way of forcing women in a certain direction.” — Simone de Beauvoir, “Sex, Society, and the Female Dilemma,” Saturday Review, June 14, 1975
Titus 2:4-5 “That they may teach the young women to be sober, to love their husbands, to love their children. To be discreet, chaste, keepers at home, good, obedient to their own husbands, that the word of God be not blasphemed.”

[I]f even 10 percent of American women remain full-time homemakers, this will reinforce traditional views of what women ought to do and encourage other women to become full-time homemakers at least while their children are very young…. If women disproportionately take time off from their careers to have children, or if they work less hard than men at their careers while their children are young, this will put them at a competitive disadvantage vis-a-vis men, particularly men whose wives do all the homemaking and child care…. This means that no matter how any individual feminist might feel about child care and housework, the movement as a whole had reasons to discourage full-time homemaking.” — Jane J. Mansbridge, Why We Lost the ERA, 1986.
1 Timothy 5:14 I will therefore that the younger women marry, bear children, guide the house, give none occasion to the adversary to speak reproachfully.

We who make marriage and home our career usually do so at great personal expense. It is much more difficult to make ends meet on one wage and it is often made more difficult because of society’s general view of the stay at home wife and mother.  We become unwise when we look at our life's work in service to God and family through the world's eyes, not God's.  We must bring our thoughts into captivity of Christ....

In order to grasp the freedom and beauty of being a full time homemaker, we must come back periodically to the Word. Only in doing so will we see the true value of our calling in Christ, Who Himself came as a Servant to redeem us...

© Glenys Robyn Hicks

But made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men: Philippians 2: 7

Occupying until He comes!

As we have already discussed, it is harder to be a Christian as the days are getting darker. The time for the LORD'S return could be soon and we need to keep our lamps filled with oil so as not to be caught unaware.

How can we as chronically ill women keep our lamps filled with oil? It is hard enough coping with just breathing some days. But there are things we can still do to be prepared for the LORD'S return.

*  We can pray

* We can listen to scripture even if we can't read the Bible anymore.

* We can bear our illness with courage and fortitude

* We can exude faithfulness in tribulation

* We can encourage others in compassion and wisdom

* We can serve God by our witness as women of faith even in our most trying of times

* We can let our light shine in spite of chronic pain and tiredness

* We can show an integrity of faith and trust in God that shines like a beacon to the unsaved. 

We are called to serve God in whatever circumstance He calls us in. Sometimes that service may be from our sickbed or wheel chair.

In the eternal, that would not be a thing of no consequence. Your service to God will be rewarded.

We are only given this one life and whatever state we find ourselves in, we can still serve God and occupy until He comes. 

© Glenys Robyn Hicks

And he called his ten servants, and delivered them ten pounds, and said unto them, Occupy till I come.  Luke 19:13

True vintage housewife

Growing up, I have observed both my grandmother and my mother's housekeeping practices. Practices which have not changed much in routines, but definitely in convenience.

There are better appliances to shorten laundry duties and I can remember my Nana washing her clothes by hand after boiling them up in an old copper. She would then place them in a centrifugal spinner and grind it by hand. My earliest memories of her are of an old woman propping up her washing on an outside line with a wooden pole, attaching the clothes with wooden dolly pegs.

She cooked in an outside kitchen on an old stove called a Metters. No electric toaster, my fondest memories of her food were jaffles: toasted sandwiches heated with a jaffle iron. Her fridge was an ice chest.

My mother on giving birth to my twin and myself, boiled up our nappies in an old kerosene tin, hand washing them and hanging them out to dry, sharing Nana's old clothesline and dolly pegs. There were no disposable nappies in her day, in fact here in Australia, they didn't become available until the early 1970's. 

When we moved out of Nana's, my memories of her housekeeping were replaced by those of my Mum's as she took care of her own home. Mum had a definite routine.

Monday mornings were her do through day. That rarely took second place to anything else, in fact the whole week was organised round it. Polishing furniture, mirrors and linoleum floors with an electric polisher (twice, once to spread the polish, then again with lambswool pads to buff it) and bath cleaning were uppermost in her routine.

Everyday was wash day. Mum boiled up her copper and transferred the water and clothes into her wringer washing machine. She then rinsed them out in her concrete laundry sink, wringing them out again, then she hung them out on the Hills hoist clothesline. She didn't have a dryer.

Also everyday was maintenance day. Mum never ever left dishes unwashed or beds unmade. The bathroom and toilet were attended to daily as well. Mum ironed clothes as soon as they came off the line. Carpets were swept with a carpet sweeper, vacuuming done on Mondays.

We children always dried the dishes and Mum first had to boil the kettle as she had no hot water service in the early days. She used Velvet soap to wash her dishes whilst the kettle boiled a second time to rinse them. Then we would be called to dry them. We made our own beds with Mum changing them on Monday.

Mum cooked everything from scratch as there were no easy instant packets back then. She made lambs tongue for our sandwiches, pressing them under the heavy kitchen table leg, in a bowl with a saucer as a lid overnight. In the morning they were set in lovely gelatin. We  were happy to eat tripe cooked in onions and milk and even enjoyed the occasional treat of lambs brains on toast.

Although we were classified as poor, Mum refused to feed us dripping but brought butter for our sandwiches. Like her own mother, she kept a good table.

Most of the housewives in my childhood had their children off to school and their houses clean by 9am and only then would they socialise. There was a different attitude to home making than today, with women having a generally contented feeling in looking after their home well.

I am grateful for all our labour saving devices today, but I lament the chats over the fence that we still enjoyed when I was a young mother and homemaker. If one runs out of sugar, no one is home now if you want to borrow some!

There was a supportive camaraderie that is hard to find these days as a stay at home wife. It's times like that that I envy the vintage housewife.

© Glenys Robyn Hicks

They helped every one his neighbour; and every one said to his brother, Be of good courage. Isaiah 41:6

Peaceful home making

Can you imagine living in a world where it is still acceptable to stay home with your children, serve your husband, and dare I say it - keep your home? Where marriage, home and motherhood are held in high esteem and the women caring for their families are blessed by and for their efforts? Picture the scene of past era wherein young woman usually left the workforce after marriage to serve her husband and keep her home and await the arrival of her children. She was not looked down on at all, rather the role of wife/mother/homemaker was elevated into something to aspire to. For it is an honourable calling.

We all know that the disdain we stay at home wives and mothers feel today from the world (and even some churches) is contrary to the scriptural role, and we know that it wasn't always so. And as more and more women are pressured into having less children and putting their babies into day centres, a lot of women are feeling cheated and discontented. If the truth was told, I truly believe that most of the women in the workforce today would prefer to be at home having more babies and loving their life! Why isn't it like this today? 

Firstly, I believe a lot of women have bought the lie of feminism. We have been buffeted about and overloaded with so much of their rhetoric that we have slowly come to accept a great deal of what they say. Bowing under the pressure of the world, we have become discontented with our God-given role as wife/mother and keeper of our home.

Secondly, I believe women have generally been so highly educated that they are afraid that they will waste it by staying home. I think nothing could be further from the truth. All education is profitable for a woman- especially if she plans to home school her children. This is slowly gaining popularity in Australia, though nowhere near as much as in the States. But the point I am making is that as mothers, we are teachers. Our knowledge will only serve to benefit our family. And make us more interesting to our husbands.

Thirdly, I think in general we have set our sights on worldly things- the biggest home, cars, furnishings, designer clothing and expensive holidays etc. We have been sucked into the worship of the ravenous god of materialism and commercialism. Homemade is no longer good enough, home cooked is often a rarity, home keeping is a rushed chore and a burden- yet even so, home still is the sweetest place to be and always beckons us back. Are working mothers really getting value for their money? No! By the time we add up the work clothes, gas and fares for getting to and from work, the bought lunches, the more expensive packaged foods for faster meals, and last but in no way, least- the childcare centre, we have very little money available for spending. Are we starting to feel a little bit disillusioned? I would guess: yes a tad!

Now I am not naive: I know about mortgages, or renting, I know how hard it is to keep food on the table and clothes on the family's back- but what I know too is that a lot of extraneous spending could be curtailed and it would be far more profitable to stay at home. I know this, because as have previously shared- I did it for a while. It is more profitable not to work outside the home. And infinitely more satisfying for the whole family.

Frugality, budgeting, and cutting one's cloth according to income are not dirty words: they are words of life- family life. With a bit of planning and foresight, I believe a lot of women would be able to stay home and not suffer for it. The tools are planning, budgeting, frugality, wisdom and desire. I believe it is possible still today to manage on one man's wage- if we learn to be content with what we have or to downsize to make staying home with the children feasible. It is a heart issue.

So back to imagination: can you imagine rising and getting your husband off to work, having made him a leisurely breakfast and a cut lunch, guiding your children through bathing, dressing and breakfast in a calm manner, filling them with the best of breakfasts, then homeschooling or sending them to school with a nutritious packed lunch? No frantic last-minute hunt for lost notebooks or library books-or hearing your child read whilst you are hurriedly applying your makeup for work? Or worse still, from the other side of the bathroom door? No, you have had plenty of time last night to do these things and to be organised for the early morning rush. You are looking well to the ways of your own household.

As soon as the children are at school or setting about their lessons at home, you start to work your way through your chores, making beds and doing laundry whilst the crockpot bubbles away with some soup for lunch and the meat defrosts for the evening meal. You know exactly what you are having: you made your menu and shopping list and you are in control! Doesn't it feel good? Tonight when your husband gets home from work, you will be there to greet him with the children working steadily at their homework and the table set and dinner's delicious aroma wafting through the house to welcome him home. And if Dad works late shift, the children will at least get to see him at breakfast instead of being dragged out of their bed at some early hour to go to daycare.

Imagine if this was a reality in your life- would you want it? Thousands of women are turning their back on materialism, small families and feministic ideals and are turning back to God's Word for their lives and families. They are coping and they are gaining strength as a force that is pro-life, pro-family and pro-marriage. Their children are reaping the benefits of having a full-time mother who fills their world with soundness in a world she knows is anything but.

What is the future for the stay-at home mother? I believe job satisfaction: the knowledge that because she has applied herself to live her life according to godly principles and used wisdom, frugality and ingenuity in order to do it. Her marriage is stronger, her children happier and her home easier to manage. She knows that she is really free at last to be all God created her to be- a loving wife, mother and keeper of her home. And she rejoices at the days to come. Her husband is well looked after and well loved, as are her children. She doesn't worry what the world thinks about her life choices- she is following God's plan for her life. And her life is good- for all God's ways are good.

Imagine if all married women vetoed the work force, applied themselves to living frugally and returned home as stay at home wives and mothers…I imagine a lot of people would return to peaceful home making.

© Glenys Robyn Hicks

"I will therefore that the younger women marry, bear children, guide the house, give none occasion to the adversary to speak reproachfully." 1 Timothy 5:14