Being A Good Wife (To A Great Husband)

In the age of Pinterest and Facebook and blogging, I think it can be easy to look at other people's lives and feel like you don't really add up.  Okay, maybe that's not so easy for you, but for me, it's a cinch.  If I spend more than ten minutes on Pinterest, I often start to feel inadequate.

"Why doesn't my table have a burlap and lace table runner that I hand stitched from the lace from my grandmother's wedding dress??  I must be the worst homemaker ever!"

A couple of weeks ago, I began to implement a cleaning schedule for my home to try and get on top of the mess that three kids can bring.  I was tired of always feeling overwhelmed when I looked at the laundry and dishes, and the internet gave me ample solutions.  Mondays, clean the bathrooms.  Tuesday, grocery shop and run errands.  Wednesday, wash sheets and vacuum and dust.  It worked like a charm...for about two days.  It didn't take long for me to need groceries on Thursday and the floor to need to be re-vacuumed on Saturday.  I skipped two days of laundry, and all of a sudden, I felt overwhelmed again.

But it was worse.  Now I was a failure, too, and everyone who came into my home and saw the pretty schedule print-out hanging on my refrigerator would know it as soon as they looked at the pile of dishes in the sink.

So I did what every great wife and mother should do to fix it.  I cried.  A lot.  And let me tell you, it totally fixed everything.

Oh wait.  I meant "nothing."  It fixed nothing.

So I began to pray, and I began to seek scripture.  If the Bible told me that being the best wife meant a never-full laundry hamper, I was in serious trouble.

Thankfully, though, the bible never mentioned a laundry hamper.  You know what it did mention, though?  Marriage.  And how marriage was created to display the relationship between Jesus and the church. Specifically, I read and re-read Ephesians 5:22-33, especially verses 22-24.

²² Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord. ²³ For the husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior. ²⁴ Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands.

 I also spent a good amount of time meditating on Proverbs 31.  Did you know the Proverbs 31 woman never went on Pinterest or read anyone else's blogs?  True dat.

 An excellent wife who can find?

    She is far more precious than jewels.

¹¹ 

The heart of her husband trusts in her,

    and he will have no lack of gain.

¹² 

She does him good, and not harm,

    all the days of her life.

So there it was.  That is how I can be the best wife (and ultimately mother and homemaker) that I can possibly be.  I submit to my husband, and I do him good and not harm.  Well...huh.  

I'm blessed beyond belief with the husband I've been given.  He loves God and His Word and strives so hard to obey it.  He is kind and loving, and never ever harsh with me, so I talked to him.  I cried and told him how I felt like a failure when I couldn't keep up with the chores I'd set for myself.  Then I did the best thing I could possibly do.  I asked him what it was he wanted.  How could I do him good? I didn't assume an empty laundry hamper and a nightly four-course meal was in his mind.  I asked, and he gave me one very simple task.  

"Can you keep your clothes off the floor?"

I can submit to that.

Of course, I recognize that being a Godly wife means more than doing the daily chores my husband would prefer are done in the same way that the church doesn't just feed the needy and expect that to be enough to satisfy the bridegroom.  

So I will continue to pray and ask God to mold me into the best wife and mom and homemaker that He created me to be so that I can attempt to display the beauty of the Biblical relationship between Jesus and the church...and I'm not going to cry when I look at Pinterest anymore.