What is Our Home to Look Like?

Who decided what the perfect home looks like? Or why have we allowed someone else’s standard to become ours?

We ourselves have been uniquely made, why would we expect nothing other than our homes to be unique? Yet, we watch home decorating or remodeling shows, or we run to our friends Facebook page, or my favorite, Pinterest, and decide our homes are not up to par. Although none of the things I just mentioned are bad in themselves, they become a detriment when they begin to stir discontentment in our lives.

We begin to change the atmosphere of our home due to our discontentment. Maybe we become frustrated and snap at the children because they are continually adding to the mess. Maybe we are short with our husbands because we want to spend more on decorating or remodeling which only adds to the debt we have on our credit cards. Maybe we stop having people over because our furniture is not new, we have chips in our dishes or we can’t make an elaborate meal for them.  Worse, we may even stop hanging out or distance ourselves from a sweet friend because she has everything we want and it seems to come so easy for her.

When this happens, we have compared our lives to others and found ourselves wanting. We have lost the joy of something so wonderful and that is the ministry of our home.

I know looking, liking and desiring is a part of our human nature. And again it is not bad in itself. It is when it turns into envying, coveting and lusting that we must not allow.

Why we do struggle with this? And how do we get rid of it? I just participated in a Women’s Bible Study and we read and discussed the book AWE by Paul David Tripp, which explains exactly why we struggle with discontentment. We have an Awe problem. God created us to be in Awe, not with the things of this world, but in Awe of Him.

We no longer feel that awe with Him, but with the things that give us pleasure and fill our longings, with things that get us admiration or praise from others. We are trying to fill a void; a void that can never be satisfied. Nothing in this world was meant to completely satisfy us: except for God.

I just recently became aware of trying to make my life happy; in my own strength, in my own way and on my own terms. I am aware that most of my life it is the things that I have striven for that made me happy. So I continued to pursue things. But the happiness fades, discontentment begins. Envy and jealousy set in.

Even when we begin to make the conscious effort to try to make things better in our home, so often we are still doing it our way and in our own strength; and our homes continue to worsen. Things continue to age and break, tension rises, relationships are strained and people leave.

True contentment comes only after we have realized we are grumbling and discontent; when we admit are homes may be in the state they are in because of our own attitude; when we acknowledge that there may be nothing we can do. It is then, in our broken and weak self, that we can humbly come to the Throne of Grace and confess our need for Him. Only He can change us, only He can change our heart, only He can open our eyes to all that He has given us. And it is only then, that we can begin to thank Him.

That is when contentment comes.

With a thankful heart comes a new outlook. Like a new pair of rose colored glasses – that allows us to look NOT at what the world says makes a home, but what God says. A beautiful home feeds those that are hungry, even if it’s on paper plates. It’s a place that gives rest to the weary and gives refuge from the storm, even if you don’t have a guest room. It clothes and warms the naked and the cold, even if it is not the latest fashion trends. It meets the needs of any who enter through its doors. With no thought of whether or not it meets “the World’s” standards.

That is a home that brings God Glory. That is a home that Sings Gods Praises. That is Home.

 

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