If you’re a woman, you may have just read that backwards – homemaking. It’s a big subject in the world of women. And if you’re a Christian woman, you may have been bombarded with what exactly ‘homemaking’ means. But I want to look at this idea of ‘making home’ and maybe get a different perspective at what this whole idea means.

Homemaking has maybe painted a picture of a barefoot and pregnant woman, making sure that her house is in tiptop shape – no matter how many (or few) children are running around, that dinner is on the table when her husband (the bread winner) arrives home from work. She is ready for sex with her manly (and maybe overbearing) husband after she so effortlessly puts her kids to bed at 8:30. There’s been countless books and studies on Proverbs 31 and Titus 2. Most of them painting an unachievable picture of what it is to be a Godly woman and homemaker.

But making home is different.

It is about making our home a safe place – a haven – for our family and, even beyond that, for others. Making home is less about the dust on the shelves and more about the heart that hears when others speak. It is about cultivating an atmosphere of peace – not about putting out a perfect dinner that is on the table at 5pm. It is for women, but also for men. It is for those married folks, but also for single ones. It’s less about the house and more about ‘home.’  

Here are some dictionary thoughts on the word home: the place in which one’s domestic affections are centered; any place of residence of refuge; principal or main; deep; to the heart. These words and phrases evoke something more than a concrete slab, some walls and a roof filled with things needing to be maintained.

Homemaking is about maintaining. Making home is about building. Building not just a physical place, but a feeling, if you will, of security, of love, of warmth. We all want to build something. To make our mark on the world. To want to know that what we did with our lives mattered. Whether you are a woman or a man. Whether you work a 9-5 or don’t. Whether you have your life purpose mapped out or you can’t stand the thought of setting goals you believe you’ll never achieve, making home is something that will mark you and those around you for eternity. Because at the heart of making home is relationship. And I don’t know one mamma, daddy, grandpa or grandma, single person or young adult that doesn’t want meaningful relationships. Creating a “refuge of the heart” (taken from the above definition) is exactly what making home is about. You doing your part in making home within you and your house but also your workplace, your church… wherever you go, you can be a safe place – and be ‘home’ to someone.