Repentance

On her blog at Buried Treasure Books , Carmon Friedrich writes,

Since she is graduating this spring from our homeschool, Gracie has been asked by more than one inquiring mind what she is going to do with her life. Many well-meaning people have assumed such an articulate and talented young lady is going to college. A few have been taken aback when she tells them that she is planning on continuing her studies at home, and that she wants to prepare to be a wife and a mother.
Another young friend was helping serve at a fund-raising event, when an older woman engaged her in conversation and asked her the same question, and received the same response. The woman, who had chosen never to marry so she could pursue a career, was taken aback. She very sternly assured this young girl that she would one day change her mind!
I have been very grateful for the strong defense Pastor Tim and Pastor David Bayly have been making for the strong and vital role of godly women in the home. Tim recently posted a tribute to his mother-in-law Margaret, widow of Ken Taylor and mother of many. My husband Steve was close to Ken’s brother’s family in high school, so we enjoy reading of the influence of this godly clan which has been growing and serving the Lord faithfully in many places.

Tim says:
"When young Christian women are ashamed to admit their choice of school, of major, and of method of financing their education is directly related to their commitment to be ready for marriage, bearing children, and making a home, who would deny that the Church is taking her cues from the world?
Christians ask their children, “What are you going to be when you grow up?” Pity the poor young thing who answers, “I want to be a mother like Sarah, Hannah, Elizabeth, or Mary,” because her indoctrination is about to begin.
“Yes dear, of course you will be a mother; but wouldn’t you like to be a doctor or lawyer, or to play in an orchestra, too?”
Being a wife and mother isn’t enough anymore, is it?"

I am so happy that Gracie is happy to say it is enough for her, and that she knows that serving God from her home is the highest calling to which she could aspire. She will keep learning, working, and dreaming, and she will embrace with joy the freedom she finds in the life our society considers a lesser choice. It’s funny. If she had said she was going to be a teacher of other people’s children, she would be lauded for her altruism and praised for her choice. Let us not discourage our young ladies from finding fulfillment in the role of wife and mother, a job which most of them eventually will be filling and which they ought to prepare for with at least as much effort as they devote to other pursuits.
No young woman should be ashamed to say that her goal is to be a wife and mother. Christians, of all people, should be encouraging girls to look forward to those noble callings, not portraying motherhood and marriage as second best or second-rate with raised eyebrows or “what ifs.” A few are called to singleness, but marriage is the norm, and from the original command to be “fruitful and multiply” to the picture of our relationship with Christ as a marriage, culminating in the marriage feast of the Lamb (Rev. 19:7, which is really a happily ever after beginning, though it’s at The End of The Book), marriage is held in high esteem. If we wish it to be so in the church, let alone the culture, then we must not denigrate the preparation for it with our daughters, insisting they prepare for singleness instead.
Family life is not mundane. I hereby grant permission for that statement to be printed on bumper stickers and pasted on billboards, no royalties required. If we can just get the church to believe this, then we will all be much richer.


Being a wife and mother was my goal back in the 70s too…

I went to college and earned a degree, and got married at the end of my senior year to a wonderful man. I stayed home for the most part until our girls were grown. Even though my husband hinted that I should go to work, and even though we never made enough money to buy a home, have proper insurance, or even pay our bills on time, I enjoyed being a stay at home wife.

Over the years medical expenses and income tax errors resulted in two bankruptcies, and if we ever own a home at this point, it will be through the grace of God alone. My husband has always done the best he could for our family, but he is a humble and unassuming man, the kind that gets run over roughshod in the dog-eat-dog world of business.

Now we are in our late 40s. We are still renting, driving old vehicles, and have NOTHING saved for our retirement. My patient, longsuffering husband is supporting both my mother and I on less than $30,000 a year, he is worn out, and now his health is failing. It looks as though I am going to have to go back to school to get still more training (a 27 year old BA in English is practically useless, employment-wise), in order help my husband and to prepare myself should I, God forbid, eventually be forced to become the family breadwinner. I should have done it long ago, gone back to work, and been a real help-meet to my husband.

Maybe he wouldn’t be ill now, if I had.

Worse still, our two daughters have looked at their father and I and have resolved that this will never happen to their families. Although both are the mothers of small children, they have chosen to remain in the work force until their families own homes and are financially secure, rather than remain at home even until their youngest children are in school .

Thanks to my example, our grandchildren are being raised by daycare providers.

Mea culpa.