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1. His Yoke Is Easy, His Burden Is Light
2. Free At Last
3. Above All That Ye Ask or Think

Love Your Husband

I am a 30 year old, childless homemaker in Louisiana. I have been married for 9 years and the Lord has not blessed us with a child. But he has blessed us in being contented. My husband and I are both saved. I have been a Sunday School teacher for 15 years and my husband is a deacon in the church.

I started working in public the day after high school graduation. I worked for 4 years in a garment factory, I started out sewing and rapidly got promoted to payroll clerk and finally promoted to the company's vice president's secretary position. I wasn't happy here though because I didn't "fit in" with my coworkers who liked to drink, cuss and party. So, I found another job being the secretary at the local high school. I was working for a Christian lady principal and things were fine until she transferred to another school and was replaced by a non-Christian man. I started to become "uncomfortable" again. I worked for two more years under this principal. I was becoming a person that I knew God did not want me to become and I had to do something about it. So I prayed and I prayed.

During these years that I worked, I realized my marriage was suffering. One reason was because while I was at work, I received compliments from other men during the day and when I got home all I had waiting for me was a pile of dirty laundry, dirty dishes and a husband who had been farming on the tractor all day and wanted supper. I was constantly comparing the way my husband treated me to the way the men at work treated me. Another thing I realized was that I did not know a thing about our farm and the activities my husband did to keep the farm going.

One morning after praying for weeks about another job I realized that I no longer had the desire to work for other men. I truly believe the Lord took away my desire to work outside the home. I turned in my resignation. Everyone that knew how much I loved working told me that I would be back in a year because I would be bored at home. Well, that was in December of 1995 and I have never once regretted my decision. And believe you me I have never been "bored" at home.

To my surprise, when I told my husband that I was going to quit work to stay home and tend to what I should have been tending to all along, he was totally 100 percent in agreement.

The Lord has supplied all of our needs. But the devil sure has been doing his best to get me back into the workforce. Especially after this past disastrous crop year. I had considered going back to work to help out until we make a crop this year. But I realize this is just a ploy of the devil.

I am so glad I found this website. I have really enjoyed it, especially...the emphasis on being a homemaker even if you don't have children. The other web sites I have visited always puts emphasis on stay home to take [care] of your children but what about women like me who have no children. It always left a question that maybe it's OK to work since I have no children to take care of. Thank you, thank you, thank you for reassuring me that "keepers at home" don't always have children but they do have a husband and a home to keep!:-)

Robin R.
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Editor's Note:  Thank you for your honesty, sister.  How many homes would have been saved from divorce if the wife would have admitted this problem of association with men at work polluting her view of her own husband?

It is odd that so many Christians have this idea that it is completely normal for a woman to work outside the home as long as she is either not married, or doesn't have kids yet.  The Bible does not say this. How can a woman learn to be a content and capable keeper at home when she is working out of it? Titus 2:3 The aged women likewise, that they be in behaviour as becometh holiness, not false accusers, not given to much wine, teachers of good things; 4 That they may teach the young women to be sober, to love their husbands, to love their children, 5 To be discreet, chaste, keepers at home, good, obedient to their own husbands, that the word of God be not blasphemed.

Also it is often difficult for the aged women to teach the younger women to be all these things when they are working outside the home themselves.

Working as the church secretary, or at the church school or Bible Institute doesn't somehow make it all right either. The requirement of keepers at home isn't somehow nullified because you are working for the local church. No room is made for this in scripture and God knows the beginning from the end. He could have made allowances if He had wanted them there. Beware of those that will try to read things into the Bible or change it to excuse women working, or that pass this off as not applying somehow in order to keep the staff at their Christian school. If they will overlook this doctrine in order to keep their ministry or school going, they will overlook other doctrines as well, soon or later.

Many women can testify to the sad experience of marrying and then having to learn how to keep house, cook, wash, and care for babies and children, because they were out doing the world's thing - working - when they should have been learning from their mother. I had a friend that started to take a college course in Home Economics. After returning home because of financial problems, it dawned on her that there was no better place to learn home making that from her own mother! This is not possible for all; but if you are in a good church, you should be able to find a godly, older woman to instruct you  in these matters. And woe unto such an one who attends a church where all the women work!

Also, notice in the above verses that "to love their husbands" is separate from loving their children. A woman can stay home and take care of her husband and be a "fulfilled" housewife. Proverbs 31:11 The heart of her husband doth safely trust in her, so that he shall have no need of spoil. A wife still has a trust to keep even when she does not have children. She must see to it that the home is kept and that her heart is for her husband only. She must still fulfill her calling of being a help that is meet for his needs. This was Eve's first calling, before they had any children. Whether children come or not, this remains a woman's first calling, and when she fulfills it, her husband has no need of spoil. Oh, the shame of a man having his heart betrayed and his home spoiled by his own wife! Sam Jones the old-time Methodist preacher once said, "It ain't whose wife you are, but what sort of a wife that fellow has got where you live."

Finally notice, that wives are to be "obedient to their own husbands", not somebody else's husband or anyone else, not even the pastor of their church or principal of the Christian school. When a woman goes out to work, she has to do what the boss says. She ends up submitting to either another woman, or to another man. Even if she is working for her own parents it can be a problem since she is to be under her husband only now for authority. She is giving a part of her life that is rightfully her husband's to someone else. Someone other than her husband is putting requirements on her life, thus meddling with her husband's control over her and responsibility toward God for her. He cannot have her time whenever he requires it. He cannot be her protector properly. He cannot expect her to care for him and his home as he otherwise might. This is usurping the authority of the home that God has set up, thus making a mockery of the picture of Christ and His Church that God has ordained in marriage (Ephesians 5:22-33).  (For the unmarried young woman, it is the same, in that it is usurping her father's authority over her.) 

So, we see why, when a woman breaks any of these requirements, the word of God is blasphemed, both the living Word (John 1:1) and the written word (KJV in English). That's a pretty big offense, friends; a pretty big offense! Do you want that between you and God? James 4:4 Ye adulterers and adulteresses, know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God? whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God.

Mary Van Nattan