Gate Keeper of the Home

This weekend has been an emotionally charged one. I grew up in what I believed was an extremely close extended family. We gathered nearly every week after church on Sabbath, or on Friday night for the start of the Sabbath and sit and talk and relax and just enjoy each other. Then about 7 years ago it all fell apart. It is a really long story, complete recovery is no longer possible at least from a human standpoint.

However over the past couple of years a tentative truce had been called and we were at least able to be cordial and spend time together at holidays and birthdays. Last year we all got together at my parent’s house for Christmas, a first since the trouble began.

Then last Thursday it all erupted again. Since then I have been dealing with all sorts of negative emotions–feelings of betrayal and abandonment, regret, frustration, helplessness, fury, loss, deep sadness, confusion, and even hate. It has been exhausting and draining. In addition I have been raising 3 young children, nursing a husband back to health and growing a baby. At times it has felt impossible to move, or get around, or get over the deep pain I feel over what has happened to my family, and it scares me for what it means for my children and immediate family.

Then the Lord gently reminded me, that I do not have to feel these emotions, I do not have to be stuck in them, I can give them to the Lord and move. This is extremely important because I, as mother, am the “Gate Keeper of the Home” to protect my children and family it is my job to keep the negative and evil out and when I let these emotions in my own mind I am not fulfilling my calling.

Above Rubies has a great study guide called, Gate-Keepers of the Home: How to Guard your Home it is a “study manual on the twelve gates of Jerusalem that Nehemiah and the Israelites repaired and relating them to building and guarding the gates of our homes.” The study asserts that in traditional societies while men had their place of leadership outside of the home, women guarded the home, the children and in essense the welfare of the men and the whole culture.

“Just as it was a honor to be chosen to be an elder and sit in the gates of the city, so it is an honorable position to guard the gates of your home. It may not be admirable in the eyes of society, but it is very important in the eyes of God. It is a God-ordained mandate.”

So now I must move on, reclaim my duty and and probably review the study. I don’t know what this means for my extended family, but I know with a certainty that I must focus on my children, raise them for the Lord and trust that the Lord if He so chooses can even redeem this dire situation.