The dream of a mom and wife. There are those that read the starting sentence and think of a spa where everything is peaceful, and they are being pampered. While that is something, we would all enjoy, it only lasts for a few hours. I’m talking about a dream that becomes a reality and lasts a lifetime. This dream may not become a reality until your children are almost grown, and your marriage is way past the honeymoon stage. It is the time in your life when your children “rise up and call you blessed” and your husband praises you.
The words “rise up” in Hebrew are translated as “to accomplish, to endure, to build or establish, to strengthen, to succeed.” This is what we are to do with our children. We are to build, establish, and strengthen them in the Lord. So much of the time we focus our attention on things that are temporal. We are worried our children won’t have all the experiences in life that will give them great choices for the future. We have everything backward. The most important thing is not for them to know how to diagram a sentence, or figure out math equations, the most important thing for them to know, is what God says. Please, hang on. I’m not saying they don’t need to know their schoolwork. However, if they know what God says, and they want to please Him, they will want to do their school work. The Bible is very clear that children are to obey their parents, and the authorities He has placed in their life. Our priority as a mom, is to teach them about God and what He says, and how to obey God’s commands. When we teach them how to apply what they have learned, then we are building and strengthening them for eternity, not just through the first grade, or preschool. We are establishing them for their entire life, not just their earthly life.
Proverbs 31:28 “Her children rise up and call her blessed; her husband also, and he praises her:”
We all want our family to feel this way about us. Yet, that feeling is not our goal as we teach and train. The feeling just happens to be a result if we do it right. We want our children to feel that we have trained them to be exactly what God wants them to be. They may not desire that when they are growing up and you are correcting them, but one day they will. I cannot tell you the number of times my children have apologized since they became adults for their behavior as children. They thanked me for the discipline we gave them. Remember we train them by example, by direct teaching, and by discipline.
All the work you do in the home is kingdom work. The laundry, cooking, cleaning, wiping noses, feeding, and even cuddling, are acts that we are to do “as to the Lord.” Don’t grow weary because it seems unimportant. In your everyday events, your children are learning much about you, and how to be a godly person. Keep it up and one day your children will call you blessed.
Colossians 3:23 “Whatever you do, work heartily, as to the Lord and not for men,”
I like what the famous pastor and expositor G. Campbell Morgan’s Son had to say in reference to his mom. G Campbell Morgan had 4 sons who all became pastors. At a family reunion, a friend asked one of the sons, “Which Morgan is the greatest preacher?” The son looked at his father and then replied, “Mother.” He saw his mother as the greatest preacher in their family because she was there the most, teaching them the great truths of the faith, through her words and example. What a great testimony to her.
The last part of Proverbs 31:28 is about the way her husband views his wife. He also praises her. She has kept the home front going in the right direction, while he was making a living to provide for the family. In Proverbs 31:23, we see the husband taking care of business outside the home. He was able to take care of business because of the way she took care of the children and the home. Most of the opinions the children have of him are because of the mother. She never belittled him to the children or pointed out his faults. She taught them that he was the final authority in the home. She taught them to love and respect their father. She understood that the way they viewed their father had a direct correlation to how they viewed their heavenly father. If she disagrees with her husband, they talk of it in private. To the kids, they have a united front. Children are sinners just like adults, and they will seek to get their way. They will try to pit one parent against the other if you give them an opportunity. The virtuous woman never allows this to happen because of the way she honors her husband. Her husband sees the value that she has brought to his life, and to the family. He praises her for it, and her actions only cause his love to grow.
Let’s do a check-up to see if we are going in the right direction to have our children and husbands view us as virtuous women.
- Are you critical, nagging, overbearing, stubborn, or whiny? Proverbs says this woman is an odious woman in Proverbs 30:21-23. She acts this way to the point of irritating her family.
Proverbs 30:21-23 “For three things the earth is disquieted, and for four which it cannot bear: For a servant when he reigneth; and a fool when he is filled with meat; For an odious woman when she is married; and a handmaid that is heir to her mistress”
Proverbs 27:15 “A continual dropping in a very rainy day and a contentious woman are alike.”
- Are you lazy, putting off the things that need to be done in the home, or half-doing them just to get by? The Bible has much to say about being slothful
- Do you take care of your appearance?
Proverbs 31:22 “She makes herself coverings of tapestry; her clothing is silk and purple.”
I Corinthians 6:19 “What? know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own?”
- Do you reverence and adore your husband, especially in front of the children?
Proverbs 31:12 “She will do him good and not evil all the days of her life”
- Are you selfish with your own time?
Proverbs 31:27 “She looked well to the ways of her household and eats not the bread of idleness.”
- Do you seek to find ways to make the home more inviting and a place the family can enjoy?
Being, or becoming, a virtuous woman may seem like a task that is beyond you, but it is not. God would not ask us to do something that was impossible for us to do. It is also a prescription for our own happiness because we will never be happier than when we are serving and pleasing God, the way he designed us to do. When your goal is pleasing God your dream will be your reality.
