Background: I frequently tell myself that I am the best mom for my kids and the best wife for my husband. I’ve been tailored to meet their specific needs and I’m convinced that no one can fill my shoes when it comes to them.
Proverbs 31:29 (GNT) He says, “Many women are good wives, but you are the best of them all.”
I believe she was the best. For that family. When we take the time to get to know the players on our team and we allow them to get to know us, and we respect everyone’s strengths and weakness, you end up with a good team. I think it would be hard for that man to say this about his wife if she treated him great but did the kids wrong. And I’m sure he wouldn’t give her such high reviews if she was a big spender, always draining the cash flow.
I have good friends whose marriages work well and their families are a success, but if they put me in that family as the mother or wife, oh my. Wife Swap disaster. But imagine thousands of years ago when choosing your spouse was rarely an option, for a woman. Think of being sent to some man you haven’t had time to investigate, you for sure don’t love him yet and what if he has no aspirations in life. Same principles apply. That young girl of old had to learn that man, how he likes his food prepared, how to manage her house. She had to make a few mistakes that revealed the right way to go. She had to see what her family could be with her influence. So would I make it in my friends’ families? Maybe. But only if I had gotten there first. It’s hard to follow a good act.
We all do our best work in the right environments. We can do good work in most environments, but our best work is done in the right environment. The right environment is not always handed to us when we start a family. But a woman with vision can help her family find a flourishing environment. The right environment doesn’t always correlate to location. Wonderful families have emerged from 1 or 2 bedroom shacks with 10 or more members in the family. A better word may be atmosphere or tone. The atmosphere you set in your home will always trump your physical environment. Yeah, the environment may be inconvenient, but the atmosphere set in a home makes it tolerable, with hope of a better environment one day.
The role of a wife or mother in a family is so pivotal. The woman has so many attributes that everyone in the family draws from. All of the attributes and actions described in the P31 passage are what was drawn out of that woman in order for her household to run well and for the people in the family to be successful. Sometimes it takes new or stressful experiences to see what we really can do. And it takes confidence to see what you and your family can be and actually move towards what you envision.
Your family was given to you, so be confident that you are equipped to be the best mom, wife or caregiver for that group of people. Other people are good at being the maternal figure, but for your family, you are the best.
References: Proverbs 31:29
