PODCAST TRANSCRIPT | Episode 15 – Building an Exciting Home, No. 3
Episode 15: Building an Exciting Home, No. 3
FROM OUR HOME TO YOURS w/ Nancy Campbell
Rocky: Welcome to the podcast, FROM OUR HOME TO YOURS w/ Nancy Campbell, founder and publisher of Above Rubies.
Nancy: Many blessings to you wherever you are: in your kitchen, in your dining room, in your car, or maybe lying in bed listening. It is so good to be with you. We are continuing to talk about this beautiful Hebrew word naveh, which means to dwell in a home, to make a lovely fold of your home. Now we are actually talking about how we can dwell in our home, how we can make our home an exciting home because I believe that God intends us to make life in the home. We don't have to try and make life somewhere else. We can make the most exciting and greatest life in the home. Last week we were up to the point of making our home a prayer center. We'll talk a little bit more about that today, but before we go onto that, I want to just mention a few other little points about the home and bring you to one or two other Scriptures.
I'd love to take you to Hosea. Hosea 11:11, and here God says: “I will settle you in your home, declares the Lord.” I love the Knox translation of this Scripture. It says: “And in their own home, the Lord says, I will give you rest.” I love that promise. In our busy lives that we live today, we're often rushing here and there; life is overwhelming. We feel worn out. We feel just overwhelmed with all we have to do, but God gives a little secret here. He says: “When you come into the home, when you embrace your home, I will give you rest. It's in your own home, I will give you rest.”
I remember talking to a mother. She came to me and was feeling so overwhelmed and said, “Nancy, what can I do? I'm just overwhelmed.” I said, “Tell me your schedule. How does it look?” She began to tell me of what she did each day. She was a homeschooling mother, but her children were involved in, many, many outside activities, extra-curricular activities. She said, “I have to take my boys to violin lessons on Monday, and I'm taking my girls to this on Tuesday, and I'm taking them here on Wednesday, and I'm doing this on Thursday.” Every day she was going out and, goodness me, I felt overwhelmed just listening to her.
And I said to her, “Why don't you curb a few of these activities? God wants you to have rest in your home, not rushing here, there and everywhere.”
She said, “Oh, I can't change anything. I have to go to all these things. I've got to take my children to all these things.” “Well, “I said to her, “Okay, you'll just have to stay overwhelmed.” If we're not going to take God's answer and we want to do it our way, well we have to continue in our overwhelming state.
God wants us to come home. Do you know that you don't have to do everything you think you have to do? Did you know that you don't actually have to take your children to everything that all your friends are taking to them? Do you know that you don't even have to take them to every lesson and every sport and everything that's going on? Oh yes, there are some things that you will do, but you've got to work out which is the best, which are the priorities, because we're not meant to be running around here, there, and everywhere.
And most of these activities are often at this very most important time of the day when the mother is meant to be in the home. That time of the day, towards the end of the day, when it's time to prepare the meal for everyone to gather around the supper table together, to communicate, to be together, to eat together and to read the Word together, and to pray together. Instead, so many mothers are still out in the car. They’re still vying for time in the traffic and trying to get home. There they are. They're caught, and no one's at home. No one's getting the meal ready. Is there going to be time for the family to sit together at the meal time? Probably not. Most probably, you'll just eat something on the way home, and it's not how it's meant to be.
In Isaiah 32:15, God says: “In returning and rest shall you be saved. In quietness and confidence shall be your strength.” Now that's a lovely promise. Do you know what the next words are? The next words continuing say: “and ye would not.” God wanted them to return and live in rest, but the Bible says: “You would not.” They wanted to do it their way and so we have to choose if we're going to do it our way or God's way.
I'm always challenged by Proverbs 24:15 where it says: “Lay not wait, Oh, wicked man against the dwelling place of the righteous. Spoil not his resting place.” God calls our homes a resting place, and He says in this Scripture, “Look out anybody who spoils that resting place!
Sometimes it's we, the mothers, who actually spoil it ourselves because we're too busy involved in things outside the home. God wants us to come home. He wants us to make life happen in the home, and He wants life to be a place where everything's happening and where it’s exciting and where everybody loves to be, and in the midst of it all, we have rest because we are where we're meant to be.
There’s another lovely Scripture in Micah 2:9. Isn't it amazing that we find these Scriptures tucked away in the Minor Prophets and yet here they are to speak to us as mothers? In this Scripture it says: “The women of my people have ye cast out from their pleasant houses, from their children have ye taken away my glory forever?” Now that's the King James Translation.
Most translations say: “The women of my people you have cast out from their DELIGHTFUL HOMES or from the HOMES THEY LOVE.” We should have a LOVE for our home. Do you love home? Do you love to be at home? God has put that in every one of us. In each woman, there is inherently a love for home. Now, many mothers don't love home because they have been brainwashed to think that it's not the place they’re meant to be; it's a place where they're not really going to do great things, and they've been educated, and they've been influenced away from the home. If we come back to, and we take away and get rid of all that extra stuff that's been infiltrated into our brains, underneath, there is that love for home. God is concerned when women are cast out, taken out, or even go out of the homes they love.
The big reason He says this is because of the children in the home. In this Scripture He calls our children our “glory.” They are the glory of the nation. In fact, if we go back to Hosea again, Hosea, once again one of the minor prophets. In Hosea 9:11, it says here: “As for Ephraim, their glory shall fly away like a bird from birth, from the womb, and from conception.” Now, what is this talking about? It's talking about Israel, called Ephraim here. It's saying that their glory was taken away. Actually, this is a Scripture of God's judgment upon Ephraim because they've turned away from the Lord, and God is bringing His judgment upon them. He says: “I'm going to take away your glory.” What does He specifically say their glory is? He says, “There will be no more conception, no more birth, and no more babies coming from the womb.” In other words, children, babies being born, and children growing up in a family are the glory of the nation.
They're God's glory, they're our glory, and they're the glory of the nation.
Here again, in Micah, we see the same thing, and it talks about our children being the glory. Can I give you a few other translations of that Scripture?
The Holman translation says: “You take away {when the mothers are taken out of the home} My blessing from their children forever.” Dear precious ladies, it's the blessing of children to be in a home with their mother.
The New Living Translation says: “And for forever stripped their children of all that God would give them.”
What about the New English Translation? When mothers are cast from the home “You defraud their children of their prized inheritance.” Mothers, it is the children's inheritance to be raised in the home.
Let's get it. This is God's plan.
God woos women into the home, but the devil, who hates every plan of God, entices them out of the home.
What about the Amplified version? When women are cast out of the home, or they leave the home, it says: “You take away my splendor and blessing forever” because that is one of the meanings of glory. It means “splendor, blessing, honor, beauty, and excellence.” You take away my splendor and blessing forever by . . . Listen to this, when I read this, I could hardly believe what I was reading . . . “by putting them among pagans away from Me.” Did you get that, ladies? This is God speaking. “You take away my glory and blessing forever by putting them among pagans, away from me.”
You see, God wants us to raise our children in the home, in His presence, in the presence of God. That's what we seek to do, to make our home a sanctuary for God, filled with the atmosphere of heaven. When the mother goes out of the home, what's going to happen to the children? They go into daycare or they go to public school, and they are amongst pagans, taking them out of the home, taking them out of God's presence, to put them amongst pagans! What are we doing? Oh, let's just hear the heart of God who woos us to be in the home. Let's not be duped by the enemy, the devil, who entices women out of the home.
I have another little thought. I was actually writing about this on Facebook yesterday. I read in Job. Let me have a look at the reference, Job 7:2: “Like a hired man looking for his wages.” I read about the employed person, the hired person who waits for his or her wages. I was thinking about this in the light of motherhood and thinking of how everything that God planned, His original plan that was thought out in eternity. It was planned in the eons of eternity, and God's plans are for all generations, from the beginning of time until the Lord Jesus comes to take back His own. They are forever, but Satan hates every plan of God, so he has a counterfeit for every plan that God has.
Now, God's plan is for the mother to be in the home, raising her children in the home. That's God's original plan. Now, the devil hates it because it's God's plan. He hates it. He doesn't want women to be in the home for he knows the power of that. He knows the power of a godly mother in the home who is there protecting her children, who is raising her children in the atmosphere of the presence of God, who's training her children in the ways of God. Oh, this is such a powerful thing and the devil hates it because he cannot get his hands upon the children.
He has a counterfeit; he has daycare centers for little babies. Can you believe it? For little toddlers, can you believe it? For children, he has a place where someone else looks after these children, anyone but the mother because he knows the power of motherhood. You see, these people in daycare centers are doing it for money. They're not doing it out of that God anointed mothering intuition that is within them. They are doing it for pay. Let's be honest, if they weren't getting paid, they would not be doing the job.
Now, they can do the job very diligently, very conscientiously. I am sure there are many daycare workers and even some lovely Christian mothers who have daycares in their home who do it so conscientiously and diligently, and they care for these children in every way they can, but they are not the mother.
It is only the mother who intuitively really knows the inner needs of her baby and her little children. I think of my daughter, Serene, and she has her little baby. How old is Solly now? I think she's about four months. This most beautiful little baby and she is totally mothered. I hardly ever see little Solly out of Serene's arms or in her baby carrier, and even when she is out of her arms, she's just looking at her, and she's doting on her and smiling at her and squeezing her little fat thighs because she's so gorgeous and fat, and just loving her. She is totally mothered day and night, and then she has all her brothers and sisters who are also fighting to hold her and talk to her and be with her. This little baby is so totally mothered, and this is how a baby is meant to be mothered in the home. Now, a baby in a daycare can be cared for, but they are not mothered like that. They miss out on so much. It's a counterfeit. It's the devil's counterfeit.
Once again, Jesus even spoke about this in John 10 where He was talking about the Good Shepherd, and in the word of God, mothering is likened to shepherding. He says that the hireling, that's the hired worker, the paid worker, he just does it for money. He's doing a job, but the true shepherd will lay down his life for the sheep. That is the difference. A mother will lay down her life for her baby, her children. That's why she can't leave them with someone else to look after, a hired worker, because this baby is her life. These children are her life.
I'm sharing these Scriptures with you, so you can get God's heart and be encouraged as you mother your children in your home. We need a revival back to the home, back to God's ways. I've been thinking about revival because we are praying for a revival in our nation. I'm praying for a revival of mothers returning to the home.
Back in one of my podcasts, I talked about that incredible, powerful Scripture about the women who are a mighty army in the home. God talks about this mighty army, and it's in the home. God wants this mighty army in the home. Sadly, this army has been vacating its post and that's why this nation is weak regarding family, because the mighty army, the mothers, have left the home, their post where they are meant to be fighting the battle for their families. Listen to that post if you missed it (Podcasts 5, 6, and 7). I'm praying that God will turn the hearts of the fathers back to their children, and they will get a heart for children, and that families will come back to God's ways.
Of course, revival means to bring back to life, to come back to the original, to restore. That, of course, will take repentance and take a great turning back to God. I was reading some definitions of revival this morning. Duncan Campbell describes revival as “A community saturated with God.” Isn't that beautiful? Now Duncan Campbell was the man through whom God used to bring revival to the Hebrides Islands way out there, west of Scotland or east, can't remember, but the islands of Scotland. What a great revival that was where God came down in such a mighty way. It affected the homes and the communities. I believe that a revival is not a revival unless it affects the family and the children.
I think of that great revival in King Josiah's time (2 Kings 23). Do you ever remember reading about that? King Josiah was used by God to bring a mighty revival to the people of Judah. They got rid of evil in the land. They got rid of all the sodomites. They broke down all the groves of the idol worshipers. Man, they got rid of every bit of evil in the land. It was so powerful, and they vowed before God that they would serve Him only. My, if that happened in this land, we would really say that was revival. Yet, Josiah's children did not walk in the ways of God. They became future kings of Judah, yet they did not walk in the ways of God. That revival missed it. Unless a revival, a move of God, touches our children, it's not true revival.
Another couple of descriptions, let me see. Another one says: “The sovereign act of God in which He restores His own backsliding people to repentance, faith, and obedience.”
Robert Coleman says: “It's an awakening or quickening of God's people to their true nature and purpose.” I love that because I think that is the revival that we need in family today, for fathers and mothers to come back to their true nature and purpose for which God created them.
I think of a testimony that was given by a husband and father at one of our Above Rubies' family camps. It was a few years ago in Louisiana, and at our Above Rubies' retreats, we love to have a testimony time. We usually have that on Sunday morning, and we do it at our ladies' retreats and our family retreats.
This was a family one, and this guy got up, and he shared how when he and his wife got married, they were so passionate for God, and they were so passionate for revival, and they cried out to God every day to work in their lives and bring a revival to their lives, and a revival to their church, and a revival to the people around them. He said they continued praying that every day and continued doing this. They had two or three children or so, and then God began to speak to them. He began to convict them of living the status quo, normal life like everybody else in the church and limiting their family. God touched their hearts, to open their hearts to receive the children He wanted to give them. They realized that they were wanting God with all their hearts, but they were holding back from God this aspect of their lives, her womb, his loins. They were holding that to themselves, so they yielded that to God, and God began to bless them with more children.
But they never lost their heart for praying for revival. They kept praying, and then God began to talk to them about having a garden, and they thought, “Wow, this is a bit strange, but yes, we're feeling this urgency.” They began to put in a garden. They began to, instead of just eating sprayed vegetables from the supermarket and GMO vegetables, they grew their own vegetables. They really got into looking after their family with their own produce.
They kept praying for revival. Then, God began to talk to their hearts about having chickens. Oh goodness me! We were all laughing because here they are crying out for revival and then God is speaking to them about children. Then He's speaking to them about a garden. Now He's speaking to them about chickens. Well, they got chickens. They lived in the suburbs. They were in the city. They ended up using every little bit of their space they had with a garden and with chickens. The message he was getting across was that, as they prayed for revival, God was bringing them back to His heart and His plan.
Very practical, but it was what God wanted. Well, I do have to confess that we don't really have revival in our home about chickens because I've wanted chickens only for about 55 years because that's how long we've been married. But my husband, he just doesn't want chickens. Well, he grew up on a farm, and he grew up with chickens, and he grew up with them hanging around the doorstep and messing on the doorstep, and he just couldn't stand it. He said he never wanted chickens. Well, I'm still asking him to make a chicken coop where they can be confined, but he hasn't got to that yet. One day, we might have a revival there!
Anyway, let's keep coming back to God's ways and to the home, shall we?
Now we are getting to the end of this session, and I was going to continue talking a little more about prayer. Perhaps we can share a tiny little bit and share some more in our next session next week. Prayer is very much part of making a home where we live. It should be a house of prayer.
Do you have a prayer meeting in your home? Have you ever had a prayer meeting in your home? Now it's so good to be praying personally, praying as a family, but, you know, it's great to even have a prayer meeting in your home. Have you ever thought of that?
Colin and I have had a prayer meeting, apart from our own prayer and family prayer, for most of our lives. We've had different seasons. Sometimes we've had a prayer meeting where we've gathered people to pray and cry out to God for Israel. We've had prayer meetings for other certain situations. Currently, since we've actually lived out here on the hilltop in Primm Springs, we have had a prayer meeting every week. Actually, since 9/11. About that time, I think, we began to pray, and we've continued that prayer meeting every single week.
Tonight, it's a Wednesday night, we'll be having another prayer meeting here, and we will be crying out to God for the nation. In fact, I just emailed one of my grandsons, and this is what I wrote: “Valiant soldiers needed to help with battering ram payer against the gates of evil in the land. Ramming at 7:30 pm tonight.”
Did you know that that is what prayer is? The Bible talks about it, about the battering ram. Now, I guess you all know that back in early battle days, to get into a city, they always had the big gates of the city and the walls, they had to get in through those gates. They would have these big, long battering rams. On the end, there was a steel thing that could bang into the gates, and usually, it had a ram. It was made into the head of a ram (male sheep). That's why they called it a battering ram because a ram likes to butt. They would have a whole lot of soldiers all holding on, and they would run with it and bang and bash and ram into the gates until they broke through the gates. That's what we do in prayer when we come corporately to pray and to batter through and ram the gates of the city and the gates of the enemy. We have so much evil in the gates of our cities today and even up there in the swamp in Washington.
I wonder if you are praying. You might like to get a little prayer meeting going in your home. It's so wonderful. It blesses your home amazingly. We don't only have older people come to our prayer meeting. We have the children. We invite everybody on the hilltop and other families as well and other people. Some even drive an hour or more to come to the prayer meeting.
So, the children come. Dear mother, if you have a prayer meeting in your home, include your children. Don't think, oh wow, I better get all the children to bed before everybody comes to pray. Oh no. Don't deprive your children of prayer meetings. It is the most powerful and greatest thing that they can be involved in. It doesn't matter if they get tired and go to sleep. They can just fall asleep on the sofa or fall asleep on the floor. In fact, at our prayer meetings, when we start, we will often have to say, “Now children, all the children are going to fall asleep, you pray first.” So we get them to pray right at the beginning of the prayer meeting, so they don't miss out. Because often, they will go off to sleep as the prayer meeting goes on. In fact, we've always taken our children with us to church or had them with us at prayer meetings in the home.
When our children were younger, they used to sleep on sheep skins. Because we come from New Zealand, sheep skins were very readily available, and they are very healthy and wonderful for babies to sleep on. All my babies slept on a sheep skin. They all had their own sheepskin. In fact, even as they got older, I would have to get a new sheep skin for the new baby because they wanted to keep their own sheep skin. They would put it on their bed between their sheets, of course, we had sheets as well.
In fact, while I'm talking about sheets, I have to tell you how we have sheets. We always have two sheets. Now I have stayed with lots of people in different countries because wherever you go in different countries, it's different. Often we go to a home, and we'll go to the bed, and there is just one sheet, the bottom sheet. Then there is a cover, an eiderdown, for the top. I have to confess that I miss my top sheet. When it gets hot, what do you do? You've got to throw off that big eiderdown, and then you're left with nothing on you. I don't know what to do. I've got nothing to cuddle myself and nothing to have over me. It's sort of nice to have something over you. When you have two sheets, you've got your bottom and your top one, which you can have, and then eiderdown. If it's hot, you only need your sheet, and then if it's cold, you can have your eiderdown and even two or three if you want them.
Back in the older days, we didn't have fitted sheets, so we used to, this was the plan, nobody has to do this today, but you may be interested. We used to, every single week, take the bottom sheet off and put it in the laundry. We would put the top sheet on the bottom and then the new clean sheet on the top. This was faithfully done every week, but then fitted sheets came in so we no longer had to do that. Now of course, I'll just leave the sheets on for two weeks or perhaps three and then wash them both, but that's how we used to do it.
Anyway, talking about the sheep skins, the children loved to keep their sheep skins, and they would love to take them. They could bring them out and lay them on the floor to go to sleep in a prayer meeting or so on.
Time is going again. Be blessed precious ladies. Love your home, enjoy your home today. Oh, when you wake up each morning, don't think of it as a drudgery. Think of it as a joy because He makes the barren woman to dwell in a home and to be a joyful mother of children. Make your home a wonderful place for everyone to enjoy. Think of how you can make it more enjoyable. Make that your goal. Make that your purpose.
“Father, I pray that You will bless each precious mother listening today. Oh God, please fill her with such a love for her home because this is Your plan, Your idea, and Lord, we want to do things Your way. I pray that You'll fill each home with Your blessing and Your anointing and Your presence and Your glory. Help each dear mother to see that her children are her glory and Your glory and the glory of the nation. Lord, it is your plan for them to be raised in Your presence in the home. Pour out Your blessing on every husband, every mother, every child. Oh God, I pray for, Lord, any children today who are wayward, who, Lord, are going through a difficult time. I pray that You will give great wisdom to the parents, and You will pour out Your spirit upon these children and these teens and draw them back to You and to your fold. I ask it in the precious name of Jesus. Amen.”