I finished Jennie Chancey’s and Stacy McDonald’s new Passionate Housewives Desperate for God this week. You’ve gotta read it for yourself, but I will let you know that one of the chapters I most appreciated was about how God has established a Christian culture that is not affected by the times and places that people live. On the contrary, our times and places must – and will – be affected by God’s culture (also known as *His kingdom, come*). The most powerful source of God’s kingdom is the Home.
Chancey writes, “God has given women a sphere that is naturally and wonderfully their own to manage and wisely govern.” This sphere is the humble and miraculous home. It’s a woman’s privilege and responsibility to “make this small kingdom a picture of God’s greater kingdom – a kingdom in which the subjects are in order and obey their king; a kingdom where beauty shines in every word and deed; a kingdom that welcomes friends and strangers with abundant hospitality and gracious care…”
“He designed the culture He desires us to pass down to the coming generations. After bringing the Israelites out of Egypt, God declared that all other cultures were “backwards,” but He was going to create one that modeled His kingdom to the world. When other nations looked at Israel obeying God’s perfect law, they would marvel:
“Keep therefore and do them; for this is your wisdom and your understanding in the sight of the nations, which shall hear all these statutes, and say, Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people. For what nation is there so great, who hath God so nigh unto them, as the LORD our God is in all things that we call upon him for? And what nation is there so great, that hath statutes and judgments so righteous as all this law, which I set before you this day? Only take heed to thyself, and keep thy soul diligently, lest thou forget the things which thine eyes have seen, and lest they depart from thy heart all the days of thy life: but teach them thy sons, and thy sons’ sons…” (Deut. 4: 6- 9)
Needless to say, I am overwhelmed – in a good way – by the privilege of listening to God’s wisdom as I help to build our home and submit my whimsical world-informed concepts of “lifestyle” to God’s timeless, perfect design.
The wise woman builds her house, but with her own hands the foolish one tears hers down. Proverbs 14:1
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