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As a young girl, the image I had of a stay-at-home mother held a cosy appeal. I pictured a sweet, huggable lady wearing her apron and a sunny smile, welcoming her children into a fresh home where freshly baked cookies were waiting on the table.
But I wasn’t sure if this was my cup of tea. Our local culture told me that with the extent of education and career choices available today, choosing such a path of motherhood would seem backward. Could I really do this all day?
Right after my first child was born, the maternity leave gave me some time away from work, which gave me a taste of what a life at home was like. It also influenced my and my husband’s thoughts on how we would raise our child.
As a new mother, I felt the magnitude of being bestowed with a great honour. God had given us a child, and now, we had a life and soul to steward.
Deep down, I felt that God was moving me into a new season. I had a yearning for our home to be a vital wellspring of life, a place where our family could love, seek, and serve God together.
So, I decided to jump in with both feet. I resigned from my job as a teacher, determined to devote my time and effort to this endeavour of full-time mothering.
It was scary to have the security of a job pulled out from under my feet, and it came with considerable sacrifices. But I looked forward to it, expecting to enjoy greater peace and focus. I was full of anticipation of what the coming years would hold.
Beyond a child, God had given us a vision for our family. And the home was where this vision would begin to unfold.
The Unending Tunnel of Motherhood
That vision, however, very quickly became an unending tunnel of tedious, laborious, and mundane days. It was especially so in the beginning, when running a home and tending to a baby were new to me—and absolutely exhausting and dishevelling.
As the days stretched into months, I began to lose track of time and my bearings. It was a far, far cry from the image of the sweet, sunny lady with her apron and cookies.
Desperate to learn the ropes of mothering, I turned to Google for tips on every imaginable thing about caring for a baby, about how-tos for efficient meal preparation—and, most importantly, strategies for sleeping through the night!
I also sourced for ideas from family and friends. Some of them encouraged me to take any opportunity I had, such as when nursing my baby, to pray to God for joy, strength, and guidance. In the spare time I could afford, I read books about Christian motherhood, which gradually and powerfully reshaped my perspective of mothering with God’s intent.
Interestingly, this meant rethinking what work really meant when seen in the context of seemingly mundane and laborious chores.
The God of Order in Homemaking
In Genesis 1, our Creator God revealed himself as a God of order. From dark chaotic waters, He called forth the sun, moon, stars, waters, land, vegetation, and every living creature to take their rightful places, producing order and harmony.
There was order in hierarchy, as God placed Adam in authority over the earth (Genesis 1:26–28). There was also order in repetition, with the sun rising and setting every day, to distinguish day and night.
I realised that God has established an orderliness in this world that is so predictable and stable that we often take it for granted. Yet, it is this predictability that the premise of our daily lives and sense of time rests upon.
In the same way, homemaking and mothering may seem repetitively mind-numbing on the surface—get the house cleaned, laundry done, meals prepared, children fed, children bathed, children put to sleep, repeat, repeat, and repeat.
Yet, these are not just tasks that serve a mere logistical purpose. They are, in themselves, tasks that restore order out of mess.
I’ve come to appreciate the routine aspect of my work as a homemaking mum, because it gives our home a sense of stability.
There are countless tiny, seemingly inconsequential decisions being made on how, when, and why I do the chores. But when strung together and repeated every single day, they add up to something that has a huge impact on the environment, atmosphere, and dynamic that characterise our home life, as well as on the people and relationships that grow out of it.
I’ve come to appreciate the routine aspect of my work as a homemaking mum, because it has given our home a sense of stability. The repetitive work creates the base rhythm on which our family flourishes.
For example, I have learnt to protect every late afternoon as a time for rest, refreshment, and reset. We schedule the day around it, and try to be home for it as much as we can.
This afternoon block is when a lot of menial and repetitive work happens, like cooking and cleaning. The children chip in before their nap, with my older child sorting and cleaning alongside me, and my toddler keeping away the toys he’s been playing with. (Sometimes, though, he takes out even more toys, or goes on a spraying spree while cleaning!)
Their help may seem insignificant—and sometimes can result in even more mess that requires fixing—but I see it as them learning to bless others with the gift of orderliness.
In my heart, the menial, repetitive work holds a bigger purpose: it helps to build a home that nourishes and flourishes. And so, I’m motivated to do homemaking well, and to seek God’s strength to persevere in it.
The effort we put into tidying and cooking every afternoon allows our family to enjoy a welcoming atmosphere for bonding in the evening, especially when my husband joins us after work. It is a time when we ask God to draw us closer to one another and to Him, as we give thanks and share about our day together.
In my heart, the menial, repetitive work holds a bigger purpose: it helps to build a home that nourishes and flourishes. And so, I’m motivated to do homemaking well, and to seek God’s strength to persevere in it.
Breathing God’s Beauty into Our Days
God created the world not just for the purpose of order and function, but also with beauty and creativity in mind. The sun rises and sets with magnificence, drawing us into worship of Him. As Genesis 1:31 tells us: “God saw all that he had made, and it was very good.”
Figuring out a suitable rhythm for our life at home has required constant adjustments to meet our family’s evolving needs. But we have tried to apply this principle to one staple: our gathering at the breakfast table.
Every morning, the children and I gather around a hearty breakfast to nourish both hungry stomachs and souls. A sumptuous meal hopefully invites the little ones to stay longer at the table. We pray and sing our favourite songs to God, and read and talk about Scripture, a Bible story, or books that narrate and illustrate Scripture.
When sinful behaviour (my own included) threatens temperaments and relationships, God’s stories and statutes from our morning time help us to come back together in repentance and forgiveness.
As He meets us in His Word and Spirit, there is a palpable sense of a new beginning. Some mornings, our time gets abruptly cut off by milk spills and meltdowns. Other mornings, we linger for a read-aloud from a beloved Bible story or two.
This time of beauty weaves its way through the rest of our day. When sinful behaviour (my own included) threatens temperaments and relationships, God’s stories and statutes from our morning time help us to come back together in repentance and forgiveness.
Even in seasons when our home life unravels or is undergoing an upheaval, this source of beauty has anchored us and helped me to find my footing again.
As I think about how God’s beauty could be breathed into the order of our daily lives, I also feel led to pray from Psalm 27:4:
One thing I ask from the Lord,
this only do I seek:
that I may dwell in the house of the Lord
all the days of my life,
to gaze on the beauty of the Lord
and to seek him in his temple.
I ask God to guide our home life so that we might devote ourselves to Him as a family, and that we might seek, dwell with, and behold Him as the One who is perfectly beautiful in character and creative power.
Reflecting God in Chores and Childcare
I have learnt that homemaking and mothering are extremely creative endeavours—works that produce order, harmony, and beauty that is God-honouring and life-giving.
God had created a garden in Eden where every tree was pleasing to the eye and good for food, and He had placed Adam to “work it and take care of it” (Genesis 2:8–9, 15). Similarly, our homes can be a sanctuary that mirrors this garden—a place of beauty, abundance, and rest that is cultivated through chores and childcare. Prayerfully, they will become a place that beckons us to delight in God.
Homemaking and mothering are extremely creative endeavours—works that produce order, harmony, and beauty that is God-honouring and life-giving.
As I seek to reflect God’s character of order and creativity, I am encouraged to build a home that is a wellspring of life for our family. And while I neither wear an apron nor bake cookies often, I hope that my daily homemaking helps to usher my family into a welcoming freshness, like the stay-at-home mother I had pictured all those years ago as a young girl.
