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Monday, May 10, 2010

Visionary Monday



Lastnight, I thought to myself that I should begin a thread of posts on my blog dedicated to Biblical home/family life of the roles that the Lord has assigned to husbands, wives, fathers, mothers, children, etc. Every Monday I shall post some visionary quotations on these topics. I think it will be an inspiring way to begin every week as it will be an encouragement to think on the Lord's purpose for each of these family roles and the home-life.

Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.
~ Phil 4:8

One of the main sources that I shall quote from is The Family by J.R. Miller. When I first began my pursuit of Biblical womanhood, I found that the Lord was taking me into an area in which I had abandoned for quite some time: family and home-life. My womanhood and how it relates to family and home took on a whole new meaning! I found that my womanhood was not separate from but intimately tied to family/home life. I spent years through high school dreaming of my college days and hoping to one day be independent. Although I have had desires to be married, I cannot say I grew up with them. In addition, I never really desired to have children. Even to this day, I'll admit, I'm not particularly desirious of having children. I adore and love children, but to have my own? I've always seen having my own as a huge task. After all, there's no way I'd ever send my children to public school to be raised by those who hate the Lord and His Word. Never for a moment would I consider anyone else raising my kids but my future husband and myself. They would be home-schooled just as I and my siblings have been raised. Certainly, having children of my own would mean an enormous amount of selfless dedication, discipline, and sacrifice (all of which I desire to be if the Lord so wills it). As a teen, I did not regard motherhood as a beautiful, noble, honorable role. And yet, I knew the Bible praised mothers. I just never learned to place my personal beliefs in submission to the Word until this past year. While I might still wrestle from time to time with the thought of having children (and all that would entail!), I have been deeply encouraged by many of the blogs that I follow (many of them wives and mothers!), the Vision Forum ministry, and books on this very topic. Through these, the Lord has shown me that wifehood and, especially, motherhood are not monotonous, dull, vision-less roles. They are glorious when done in daily dependence on Him and submission to the Bible. They are full of His splendor and beauty and, through them, we are brought into the depths of His grace. They teach self-abandonment, discipline, and sure reliance upon Him. They are roles that He ordained to make known Himself. They are roles that echo for an eternity through multi-generational faithfulness and blessings!
I hope my readers enjoy my Visionary Monday posts. I realize I have only three of these posts to make before I leave for the summer. But I shall certainly begin them again when I return home!
J.R. Miller was a husband, father, author, and pastor during the late 19th century.

The benediction that falls upon the homes of a country is like the gentle rain that descends among the hills. A thousand springs are fuller afterward, and along the banks of a thousand streamlets flowing through the valleys the grass is greener and the flowers pour out richer fragrance.
Homes are the springs among the hills, whose many streamlets, uniting, form like great rivers society, the community, the nation, the Church. If the springs run low the rivers waste; if they pour out bounteous currents the rivers are full. If the springs are pure the rivers are clear like crystal; if they are foul the rivers are defiled. A curse upon homes sends a poisoning blight everywhere; a blessing sends healing and new life into every channel.
Homes are the divinely ordaiend fountains of life. It is not by accident that men live in families rather than solitarily. The human race began in a famile, and Eden was a home. The divine blessing has ever rested upon nations and communities just in the measure in which they have added to these original institutions and have kept marriage and the home pure and holy; and blight and curse have come just in the measure in which they have departed from these divine models, dishonoring marriage and tearing down the sacred walls of home.

A writer closes a book on home-life with this earnest word: "The great care should be so as to live in the home that when it shall any way be lost there may be no accompanying sting of memory harder to bear than any will of God. A little constant thought, self-denial, fidelity, a true life each with each and each with God, will not only save all unavailing regret and ensure the purest peace under all experience, but make the thought of reunion and life again in the Home of God chief among incentives to his service."

In home-making each member of the family had a part, and the fullest happiness and blessedness of the home can be attained only when each one's part is faithfully fulfilled. If any one member of the family fails in love or duty, the failure mars the whole household life, just as one discordant voice in a company of singers spoils the music, though all the others sing in perfect accord.
One person alone cannot make a home what it ought to be, what it might be. One sweet psirit may spread through the home the odors of love, even though among the other members there are bitterness and strife, just as one fragrant flower may spread through a hedge of thorns a breath of perfume. The influence of one gentle and unselfish life may also in time soften rudeness and melt unselfishness, and pervade the home-life with the blessedness of love. Yet still it it true that no one member of a household can make the household life full and complete. Each must do a part.

As to the part, or the rule, of each member...that shall come with each week's post.

As I typed out these quotations, I thought about the resounding truth of each statement. Look at America - broken families, single parents, angry, rebellious children, abortions, teen pregnancies, the feminist movement, the feminizing of men, the masculinizing of woman, homosexuality, etc etc. The family is no longer the backbone of America. When we rejected God, we rejected God-ordained roles. As we look at the pitiful state of our country now, is it really a wonder that we have become such a wicked, perverse people? Sin is very subtle and it very easily ensares. America started slipping off the Rock a long, long time ago. And it began in the home. Fathers who stopped trusting in God to equip them with grace and wisdom to raise their families. Mothers who became idle, stopped nurturing and teaching their daughters, and lost sight of their purpose. Daughters who became selfish. Sons who became negligent. Families who replaced prayer and the Bible with social hour, popular trends, television, etc. Families who became separated, independent individuals instead of a solid unit, each individually dependent upon the grace of the Lord. Families who stripped the Gospel from their lives little by little, day by day until it suddenly lost all its meaning to them. Families whose focus became self instead of God and the other. That is how America has become what it is.

"For what great nation is there that has a god so near to it as the LORD our God is to us, whenever we call upon him? And what great nation is there, that has statutes and rules so righteous as all this law that I set before you today?
Only take care, and keep your soul diligently, lest you forget the things that your eyes have seen, and lest they depart from your heart all the days of your life. Make them known to your children and your children’s children..."

~Deut. 4:7-9

Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.
~ Deut. 6:4-9

“There is no doubt that it is around the family and the home that all the greatest virtues, the most dominating virtues of human society, are created, strengthened and maintained”
~ Winston Churchill

1 comments:

Benjamyn said...

This is a great thought! I agree with what you say in this post and even though I'm not a woman, I feel very inspired to be who I am as a man. Thanks again for your wonderful words.