A High and Holy Calling (Day 19)

Very important way that you watch over the ways of your household—that’s in prayer.

In the New Testament, we often find watching and praying linked together. Jesus said, “Watch and pray, so that you don’t fall into temptation” (Matthew 26:41, Mark 14:38). It’s a protection for you to watch and pray over the ways of your household, but it’s also a wonderful means that you provide a protection for your husband.

Your husbands, if they are in almost any work environment that you can think of, are being faced with temptations and with pressures. The enemy, Satan himself, is working to pull them down, especially if your husband is a believer and wanting to walk with God. There are lots and lots and lots of opportunities for him to fail spiritually, morally, and in other ways.

What are some of the things that can be time-wasters? What can steal our time and keep us from using our time effectively at managing our homes? What comes to mind when I talk about things that can be “the bread of idleness” for us?

Guest 1: One of the chief things I think of today is being a “news hound” on television.

Guest 2: Well, the computer! There is all kinds of wonderful things that you can learn on the computer. Then there is also cute little stories that you want to share with all your friends.

Guest 3: One of the things that I think about is simply getting up late in the morning, because if we lay in bed, there are things that aren’t getting done.

Guest 4: I was going to share, one of the things that steals my time is that nifty little snooze button!

Guest 5: Things in your house you should throw away. Mom and I kind of have the same problem of picking up things and sticking them someplace. I have a friend that says, “Oh, your stuff will be always safe until Jesus comes.”

Guest 6: I find a time-saver is when I make a list and prioritize things that need to be done. I usually do that after I have my morning devotion time and prayer time, and I ask God to show me what to do and how to prioritize. I ask Him what the most important things should be—the things that I don’t always do, but I do desire to. I can certainly see a difference when I take time and do that and then I check off things I don’t get to, and they go at the top of the list the next day.

Nancy: So, a big time-waster can be not taking the time to ask the Lord to help us prioritize our day. If you don’t get into the presence of the Lord to start your day, you will find out that you are wasting time. My dad used to love that verse in Proverbs that says, “Reverence for God adds hours to each day” (Proverbs 10:27), and God really does make those hours more fruitful and more productive, if we’re seeking Him as to how we should be using them.

Guest 8: I’ve found that bitterness and anger produced a great deal of idleness in my life because I wanted to sleep or watch television, not think—so that I didn’t have to think.

Tamara: I have found that magazines are a big time waster. You can sit down and thing, “Oh, I’m just going to look for five minutes,” and half an hour easily flies by, or even an hour.

Guest 10: I find that the telephone is a real problem. 

Amanda: For me personally, I’m a perfectionist, and I find that in my perfectionism, I think, instead of jumping into something and getting it done, that I can’t do it right. It’s not going to be perfect, so therefore, why even try. I think that leads to a lot of idleness and being undisciplined for me, instead of just asking God to help and give me the strength to do it and get it done.

Nancy: A cousin to that, Amanda, is what I do a lot—that is to sit and think about how hard this job is and how long it’s going to take me to do it. In all the time I spent worrying and fretting about it, I probably could have just gotten it done. Another time-waster?

Nancy: Now, if we think about time-wasters and not being idle, maybe that makes you feel a little uptight—just thinking about it. Life is going to be just work, work, work, and work. There’s just no fun and no joy. Well, let’s go back to define joy.

Joy is knowing and doing the will of God for my life for this season of my life. That’s joy—doing it with Christ, doing it in the fullness and the power of His Spirit.

Make sure that your schedule and your moments are under the control and the direction of God’s Holy Spirit. There’s so much freedom in being set free from idleness because then we’re free to do what it is that God has called us to do.

We’re letting some of these lesser things steal time that rightly belongs to the Lord and to our families.

If that’s where God finds you, again, as I’ve said throughout this series, don’t let that put you on a guilt trip. If you’re guilty, repent. Confess it to the Lord. Agree with God about it. Get His forgiveness, which happens by virtue—not of your perfectionism, but Christ’s perfection—His death on the cross for your sin. Receive His forgiveness, and then ask Him for the power of His Holy Spirit to enable you to walk in accordance with His Word.

We’re not talking about getting overwhelmed and frustrated by all the things we can’t measure up to. We’re talking about finding the power of the Holy Spirit to live in the way that God wants us to live. For those of us who are women, that means looking well—watching well over the ways of our household, and not eating the bread of idleness.

We think of a spiritual woman—if we were just to make a list—as a woman who goes to Bible studies, teaches a Sunday school class, or is involved in counseling. We say, “That’s a spiritual woman!” She reads her Bible a lot, she memorizes Scripture, and she does all these things that we think of as “spiritual.”

But, can I say that those things aren’t what make you inherently a spiritual woman? This woman in Proverbs 31 is a spiritual woman, and how do you know? It’s because of all the ways she serves her family.

That’s how she lives out her heart for the Lord. There’s nothing in this chapter about a woman going to Bible studies. Now, I hope if you have the opportunity to be involved in a Bible study, that you are. But I’ll tell you that you can sit in Bible studies all week long and fail to fulfill God’s calling in your life.

If getting to know the Bible and having all kinds of fellowship and all kinds of meetings doesn’t make you a better wife and mother and homemaker—then what’s the point? That’s not spiritual. In fact, invariably, that will lead to pride. “Knowledge puffs up, but love edifies” (1 Corinthians 8:1).

This woman is a lover. She’s a giver. She’s a servant. That’s her calling in life. You say, “I don’t think I want that calling.” Listen: You’re never more like Jesus than when you’re serving. You’re never more like Jesus than when you take that towel and that basin of water and wash the feet of the disciples—that’s spirituality! That’s Christianity at work: women being compassionate, givers, servers, lovers, and caretakers.

God does not want you to go through the motions of caring for your family and your home. You can have a spic-and-span, perfectly decorated home and not be a spiritual woman. But when you take the love of Christ and a servant’s heart after Christ, and you apply it in the context of your home—that’s a beautiful woman! That’s a godly woman.

What you’re doing in that home may not seem very important. It may not seem very meaningful. It may not seem very fulfilling. Where did we get that word? Fulfilling— everything today has to be fulfilling. That is so selfish!

The question is: Are you fulfilling God’s purpose and God’s plan for your life? Not: Are you fulfilling what you want to do with your life? If you want ultimate joy and ultimate happiness, then set yourself to do the will of God, and you will find there is, long-term, nothing more fulfilling.

Remember that as you serve in the context of your home, that is your supreme service to God. When you keep that home clean, when you are mending those clothes, when you are packing those lunches for your kids’ school and you’re picking up after family, and when you’re training your children and you’re watching over the ways of your household, you’re not just serving your husband and your children—you’re serving God.

Let me just close by reading this little piece of verse, called A Little Place.

Where should I work today, dear Lord, and my love flowed warm and free. 

He answered and said, “See that little place? Tend that place for me.”

I answered and I said, “Oh no, not there! No one would ever see,

No matter how well my work was done. Not that place for me.”

His voice, when He spoke, was soft and kind. He answered me tenderly,

“Little one, search thy heart of thine. Are you working for them or me?

Nazareth was a little place and so was Galilee.”

Aren’t we glad that the King of the universe, the Creator of the world, left Heaven and said, “I’ll step into that little place. I’ll serve. I’ll lay down My life, so they can have life.”

When you serve in your home, you’re following in the steps of the Savior, and there’s no bigger, grander place you could be!