In contemporary times, both males and females are active in the marketplace. Males and females compete for the same job responsibilities. We should ask ourselves what the real motivations are behind women’s increasing quest for employment outside the home setting. The article examines the role of parents in the family.
Is it the quest to fulfil God’s purpose for their lives, or the pressure to acquire more power, money, ego, acceptance, recognition, rights, and material possessions?
Introduction
Some women are selling in the market because they are convinced that the income will allow them to have things they need, like a better house, a new car, and private education, and thus, meet their endless list of needs.
However, surveys show that when just making money is the motive, taking several jobs brings more money but leaves a vacuum and other motherhood responsibilities in the family, especially if the husband is also very busy and the young children in the family.
1. GOD’S MANDATE FOR FATHERS
The roles and responsibilities of the husband/father as head and partner in progress in an ideal Christian home cannot be overemphasised. The position of a father as the head in the head in the home is graciously conferred on him by God as recorded in the book of Genesis.
God has confidence in a Christian man, expecting him to provide godly leadership, care, and love for his entire home in the Lord. This position is that of trust, which must not be betrayed is a position of authority conferred on him by God to which the husband/father will be accountable.
Every Christian father has the mandate of representing the Lord Jesus in his home as accurately as possible, in love, in selfless sacrifice, in sanctification, in washing and cleansing, as enunciated in Ephesians 5:23-33.
However, the biblical concept of head that the scripture calls a man involves the entire coordination and giving oneself for the benefit of another, even at one’s expense. In the head with all the sensory organs, so also is the father.
It is, as the entire coordination of the human body is located in the heart, that the entire plans regarding the body are hatched. If the head is bad or rotten, the body has no place to stand at all.
Understanding that the husband/father is the head of the home and partner in progress, just like Jesus Christ is the Head of the Church, is a crucial and serious responsibility.
God desires that fathers in homes will responsibly lead their families as He demands. He must have the ability to give quality leadership to both his wife and children. God does not expect anything less.
How Does Father Carry Out Those Divine Mandates?
Where was Jerez’s father when his mother was christening him the son of sorrow? His father was nowhere to be found. The responsibility of the father ahead and partner in progress in a Christian setting is multidimensional.
He is seen as a leader, husband, and parent, whereas his primary responsibility is to provide Christian leadership for his family, going ahead to show the way. A husband who is spiritually stagnant and blind is in no position to lead his home and can never be a partner in progress.
Matthew 15:14 says, “If a blind man leads a blind man, both will fall into a pit.”An ideal Christian father must lead the family in terms of spiritual, economic, and physical progress for his home.
The reason God brought Eve to Adam to be named is that He intended the man to take dominion in the home, not as a king wielding his sceptre and lording it over his subjects, but rather, as a loving spiritual leader whose purpose is to sanctify and edify his bride.
Father Leads by Example
Father serves as a partner of progress who must provide leadership quality through humble services. (Matthew 20:25-28:Jo13:13-17). A good husband and leader should place the needs and comfort of his children and wife above his own, as Jesus Christ did for the church.
A father as a partner in progress must be the shepherd of his home, guiding his home in paths of righteousness and making them lie down in green pastures.
A true Christian father should not be a leader who just directs and gives orders; he must hear the Lord and His Word for his wife and children. He must see far ahead of those he le, giving leadership in vision and revelation of what God intends to do in the famiProverbserbs 29:18).
As the head of the human body gives interpretation that comes to the body, so must a father be able to give meaning and interpretation to things that are happening in his family. The family’s vision and dreams will only find meaning when the father comes to put them in perspective. He must lead by godly examples.
Who is Responsible for Success or Failure in the Family?
The success or failure of a home is primarily dependent on the man upon whom God has conferred authority and leadership. God will hold him accountable for the success or otherwise of his home. Therefore, the father as a partner in progress in a Christian home must love-Titus 2:4, pray-1 Chronicles 29:19; Job 1:5.
Timothy2-4, nurture/nourish to promote physical and spiritual growth-Ephesians 6:4, discipline, discover and correct in love Proverbs 324;19:18;23:13-14, provide – Job 42:15, Proverbs 19:14;2orinthians 12:14 et c.
The purpose of the father “wearing many caps “leader, husband, and parent, is to teach, organise, lead, and stay in the presence of God so that he can know where his family is going and can go.
Also, being the pastor and priest of his home demands a heavy responsibility. He must maintain a high standard of excellence exemplified in 1 Timothy 3:1-7.
2. MOTHER AS HOME KEEPER
The place of a mother in a home cannot be with nor can it be over-emphasised. Womanhood has a special place in the creation order as purposed by God. The woman has God-given roles and responsibilities as a wife to her husband, mother to children, and, of course, a team leader in the home.
The wife can be regarded as ‘the neck’ that gives support to the head, which is the husband. Note that the head cannot stand or operate independently of the neck and vice versa.
The tripod: ‘head (husband), “neck'(wife), and the body(children)make up the social unit called a family. They are interdependent on one another and flourish in the atmosphere of love.
Virtues of a Godly Home Keeper
We cannot talk about a woman as being a mother or a homemaker without referring to Proverbs 3 10-31. She was created to be a mother, parent, and team player.
She is to make her peace, joy, and blessing primarily to her immediately to her immediate family and by extension to those who live around her so she can witness to them.
Aside from being a helpmeet to the man in running the home, the woman is also made to be a helper fit for the manasenumeratedinProverbs 31. There are lots of things to learn in this passage from others who desire to be what God has designed them to be.
A godly mother should reverence God, have outstanding abilities, wisdom, and foresight, be resourceful, intelligent, modest and virtuous, have integrity, and be prayerful. She should have great love and warmth for both her husband and children.
The woman, in Proverbs 3, was not a liability to her husband. She was creative, innovative, viable helpmeet for her husband.
What are her God-given responsibilities?
The woman’s role and responsibility in the home are paramount to the success of the home. This is why she is called a “homemaker” Many people even believe that a home is only as good as the woman makes it, and, to some extent, that is true.
The reason is obvious: she probably spends the greatest percentage of her time in the home when compared with other members of the family. A Woman’s role in the home is relative to her responsibility as a wife to her husband and as a parent to her children.
However, to be a good homemaker, she must be conscious of the reason God created her.“And the Lord God said it is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper comparable to him.”(Genesis 2:18).
Unfortunately, many women have turned out to be stumbling blocks rather than helpers to their husbands. A woman should ask herself this question: ‘Do I support my husband in carrying out his daily tasks of running the home, or do I oppose the things he does?”
Her Home must Be Valued above all Things.
Looking at the role and responsibility of a mother as a timekeeper, such a mother must value lives as Moses did. Moses’ mother went the extra mile to preserve her baby’s life.
She also exhibited some courage in her sacrifice of time, safety, security, and comfort to protect Herbaby. She did not merely pray and wait for a miracle. This is also expected of another in an ideal Christian home.
Consequently, it takes more than good looks and beautiful dressings to be a good mother. Rather, it takes God’s grace, commitment, devotion, diligence, and courage. We receive all these by God’s grace. Read more related posts on our family ministry page of the site.
Conclusion
For husbands and wives to be what God wants them to be, mothers, as homekeepers, have a lot to do quietly and consistently. May God depend on our mothers to manifest His glory for our generation. Amen.
