The Sword in My House

Wisdom builds her house, but folly with her own hands tears it down.

—Proverbs 14:1

I was clueless as a young wife mother and– on top of my naivety…I was alone a lot raising the boys while my husband traveled extensively with the corporation that owned us but paid our bills. We had moved far from any family or friends, had no church yet and nights were very difficult for me because I was still in the throws of PTSD and those dreadful nightmares. It was a really difficult time in our marriage and I had a choice to make;

Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding..

—Proverbs 3:5

Or, become a noisy, contentious, irritating wife that would make her husband prefer to live on the corner of a roof, rather than in the house with her.

—Prov 21:9

Contentiousness doesn’t occur in a vacuum, but there was only one heart I could do something about. God will have nothing by halves….all my heart meant,

All.

This is when Scripture became practical for me. Proverbs and Psalms were my daily bread .. I would lay my Bible on top of the kitchen counter and in between diaper changes, frazzled nerves from functioning on no sleep, and languishing loneliness– I found a friend in Jesus. No background in Hebrew or Greek, no masters degree in theology, no study on the historical roots of a passage, just a woman’s heart that feared God and believed He was the beginning of wisdom, crying out for Him to teach me His ways. He met me in my kitchen and taught me lessons I still look back on today.

I was reflecting on this this past weekend because the book of Proverbs was our assignment for our Oblate meeting with the Abbott.

By wisdom a house is built,

and by understanding it is established,

by knowledge the rooms are filled

with precious and pleasant riches.

—Proverbs 24:3

It didn’t always look or sound like that was what was happening, but by grace I kept on trusting Him and taking Him at His word.

I fell more than seven times, but I kept getting up strengthened by His promises ( Prov. 24:16)

You know what I took away from the study this weekend? I may have more knowledge and life experience now, but I have lost some of that childlike trust I knew in those early days. Sad to say, many of the homilies I hear don’t treat the Scriptures as,

living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and spirit, of joints and marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart.

—Hebrews 4:12

But I’m fired back up, because I know…no, I mean I really know, that were it not for the blade of that two edged sword in my life,

I’d have torn my house down with my own hands.

+PAX

from my blogpost at bellofthewanderer