Ya know, some of you get up in the morning and the devil shows you what he calls REALITY. Then you start to confess it and live it out, and you will go nowhere in God doin’ that junk.

You gotta get up early in the mornng and seek God and His visons for you. His promises are powerful.

You gotta speak life to that broken down house and say, “Thank you, Lord, for remodeling my house.” And then clean the house as if it is the most wonderful house you ever saw. Praise the Lord for what you need and leave the burden at His feet.

Your burden should be to make a comfortable home for the family. Leave the worry with Jesus and go on.

And don’t walk this out for a day or two. Walk it out until you see His glory. Yield youself to His miracles. Quit takin’ the same walk in the woods to the same defeat. Walk in faith. Walk out your life as though the miracle came already. Sing a new song and ring a new bell. This is a new day to praise the Lord.

This is how I lived when my life was a total disaster. I mean, I fell, of course, and made a lot of mistakes. But I learned how to walk in faith, and I live daily like this now. You won’t hear much negative from me. Not because all is perfect in my life? But because I know better? I have Satan in my face but most of the time, I laugh at him. I don’t worry what folks think. I worry what God thinks and the devil knows that when I laugh at him, his pride is shattered. He ain’t nobody.

The Lord God is powerful and His word is alive. Apply it to your situation and walk out your faith.

Back in the late 70s and early 1980s, Country Living magazine came out. It was really of the Lord when it first was published. It promoted the traditional family and helped me so much to really get my family settled after Jim was healed. Well, now when I go to garage sales, I look for the early Country Living magazines and now I am starting a collection.

I want to get more back into the styles that were popular then, as this seems to be where my creativity lays. The jars … the old canning jars were so popular to use for storing dried goods in open shelves. I have a good collection of them now, as I have collected them over the years. I have the blue jars with the bale handles. The old kerosene lamps and the big crock bowls. I also collect the enamel ware when I see it at sales. Also, the big enamel ware speckled spoons. Some are the big stirring spoons and then they go smaller and smaller.

I am a dishes freak and I especially collect tea sets. Baby Girl and I will have many tea parties together as she gets a bit older. But I get this stuff for nickles and dimes. Jim would never take me to sales if I spent a lot of money. We just don’t have the money to waste on a lot of stuff. But if I see a little plate I like then I buy it for 25

Papa just went to work and I am left here to my own devices. We have had so much rain… much more than we have needed. Anyway, all the rain makes the flowers bloom and the grass to grow like crazy.

My Seven Sister Roses are lovely. They have a fragrance like they have never had. I went out and cut long brances of them. I have hung them above the doors in my dining room. They are tiny tea roses on long branches and they are just lovely. But they will dry on the branches. I also hung them around my chandelier light on the ceiling. It’s an old fashioned country light fixture made of wood. See, then the roses will just dry there.

Also, I made baskets of them; they will dry in the baskets. I added, also, my rose hips to the baskets. They will dry there, also. Just use the weaved baskets and set your flowers in there lightly, so they will dry, and then you will have a basket of potpourri. As the summer goes on, I will add other flowers to the baskets, and they will dry there, and are fun to have for the fall and winter. I will put in a few pine cones, too. But you can dry any of the flowers this way. Just stick them lightly in baskets and make sure they have the air circulation that they need.

A few yrs ago, I sent Christian Joy a postcard with red tulip petals taped on the card with the clear contact paper covering it. She loved it and, I think, still has it. But you can use about any of the petals of flowers.

I don’t keep my flower arrangements for more than a year. Yesterday, I cleaned my baskets out and put the old herbs and flowers in the dog house.

My cat loves hiding in there and loves all the dried herbs. He has taken many a lazy summer afternoon nap in those old dried herbs and flowers. My other cat used to hide dead rabbits in there. Wow, did that stink!!! I had to clean it out a lot. But this cat — we call him “Mister” — doesn’t put his dead things in this dog house.

But anyway, yesterday, I made rose water. I had bought an old 1950s crock bean pot at a sale yesterday. It has a little silver like thing that you plug in and it heats up. Then you set the bean pot on the top … it’s smaller than a crock pot. But, anyway, I thought this would be perfect to make the rose water. You could make this in a crock pot, too, but I wanted something separate that I would just use to make potpourri in.

You just fill the pot with roses and pour water over this. Then you simmer it until the water goes down to about half. This should take about all day? I turned it off last night and let it set. Then, this morning, I strained it and put the rose water in a jar.

I will use it for a hair rinse. Or you could use it to cook with. I put cinnamon sticks in mine and made it too dark. This is why I will use it for a rinse. But if you get a light clear rose water you could use it to make cakes or cookies or a rose jam, or drink it like a rose tea.

Don’t use roses that have been sprayed, of course. I don’t use the weed killers in my yard because I have a lot of wild herbs, and I don’t like tea with arsenic in it. Sometimes, if I have the ladies for tea, I will drop a few rose buds in the tea cups … it looks pretty … they are just tiny roses.

After making the baskets of roses and the rose water, my hands smelled so fragrant.

Last night, it rained again. Jim was up in the night checking the ceiling in the kitchen for leaks. As I lay in my bed, I could smell the roses from my rose pot. Later, Papa stood out on the porch and watched the rain. I could smell the tobacco from his cigarette. This smell, mixed with the scent of roses, is the smell of home to me.

We walk by faith and do our homemaking by faith. We believe God for the healing of our bodies, and where are we going with this? We are going to the conclusion which is the Proverbs 31 woman.

You ask me, “What am I to be like?” You are to imitate the Proverbs 31 woman … she is your goal. Everything I write about is to lead you to one conclusion … “the virtuous woman is the powerful woman.”

See, we read Proverbs 31 as if it is a choice. We can either be the virtuous woman, or we can be a factory worker. Or we can be a stay at home mom or we can go out to work. And you think all of this is well and good because the ladies at church do all these things and they are Christians. Well, yeah, they do, and going to work at the factory won’t make you lose your salvation. But we are not to be another man’s helper, to help him build his kingdom so that he can have a nice house and send his kids to college.

We are to have our own kingdoms. We are to be queens in our own castles. We are Esthers and Ruths … we are women of dignity and strength.

God has made us helpers, to fit in with our men. And the devil likes to take our gifts of helps, and hoodwink us into using our gifts to help the boss at work or the preacher at church.

We are private wives, not concubines to be used to build up some man’s dream factory or his kingdom. We have our own homes and kingdoms to put our strength into. If I am gonna break my back in work, it’s gonna go into my own husband and children. If I am gonna stay up all night and pray, it’s going to be for the head of my own house, or for my King’s children … my children. I don’t belong on the street where other men can look me over like a piece of meat or a sex object. No.

We should proclaim:

I am my husband’s private comfort … and my womb is private and my breasts are blessed.

I am a private secret garden.

I am a garden of healing herbs.

I am a garden of flowers scented by the Holy Spirit. My flowers produce holy oils and scents that this world don’t know about.

I am the virtuous woman and my price is far above rubies.

This is to be our confession and our thoughts about ourselves. We are not to go out and help the world to build their kingdoms.

We are not slaves; we are virtuous women. We have our own homes, and our children are our own, and not bastards.

We are not to take our baby priests and prophets and handmaidens, called of God, to daycare. No, only our hands can raise them as they have a special calling from God. Our seeds are blessed; this is why the Lord tells the Christian Mother to be fruitful and multiply and to replenish the earth. This command in Genesis is not to the unbeliever, but to the believer.

See, only a woman with a slave mentality would buy the lie about “Make something of yourself and put the kids in daycare.” No. A woman of dignity and strength knows her value as queen in her home. No one is gonna raise her children for her.

She feels that her heart is full of power and she feels that only she can teach her children the things of God. Jesus is her King and Lord. He is her anointing. Her husband is her king on earth, but the Lord God is her true King in heaven. And she is His wife and she takes seriously her place. And she doesn’t take her love to town. She plants and nurtures and harvests her crop of children who will turn around and honor her and her husband.

And when she gets it mostly figured out, then as she gets old, she teaches what she has learned to the younger mothers and wives. As she has passed the test and she graduates, she goes on to build up the body of believers. She builds up the body of Christ, as He is her true husband and Lord. But she was faithful in the little things. She was faithful when the world hated her and scorned her. But her light wouldn’t go out.

Abraham believed God and it was counted for righteousness. God called Abram “Father of many nations” when he and his wife were old and had no children.

We make a home to please God, and to show Him that we are faithful and that we believe that, no matter how bad things look, we know that our families are healed, saved, and walking with God. Faith pleases God, and faith is the walk we walk before God in hope, when we see nothing but defeat around us.

But the Bible teaches that we are to always believe first, and then the Lord will work. God ain’t gonna work because He feels sorry for us or because He has run out of things in heaven to do. He is moved by our faith. We attract the Holy Spirit as we keep our hearts and minds on the good things of God and on His word. He won’t invade our fears with a miracle.

A happy mother who is trusting in God and is in submission to her husband is very beautiful to God. 1 Peter 3 says that the women of old wore their submission to their husbands as adornment of beauty. It is the inside glow of the inner woman … the meek and quiet spirit. Yet, no woman could have this inner meek and quiet spirit unless she is trusting in God.

In this world, there is plenty to worry about. Wisdom is the stability of the times, and this is where homemaking comes in. Wisdom is the building of the house … it is the joy in baking a daily bread and making good meals for the family.

In a sense, we actually answer our own prayers by our walk of faith.

Let’s get wild and crazy concerning our homemaking.

Some of you would love to have been pioneer woman and do all that they did. I think this desire in you is the Lord calling you to do this. We, who know Jesus as personal Savior, all have this inner voice of the Holy Spirit, but how many of us have the nerve to follow it? I mean, what is to keep you from turning out all the lights and pretending to not have electricity?

I have read about women who prefer to do their wash by hand in the bathtub. Well, why not? There isn’t a law against it. The women of the world do a lot more idiotic things than that. At least while you are washing the clothes in the bathtub, you are home with the children. And certainly you are saving water.

When Jim was first healed, I was so happy when my washer and dryer went out, so I could use my wringer washer and hang my clothes on the line. I would tell Jim with this big smile, “My washer went out.” He would look at me like, this woman has toys in her attic. He would get so mad at me for being glad about the dumbest things. But ya know, my automatic did go out a lot with doing so much wash. And it was a good thing I thought it was fun to use my wringer.

And, ya know, sometimes, when I have been discouraged about my kitchen, I would pretend I was a woman during the Depression that just moved into an old house. And I would think about what the virtuous woman would do in my shoes. Because my kitchen only has one large cupboard and a hoosier cabinet. And the shelf on the hoosier is only the size of an ironing board. That is all the counter space I have. I mean, my kitchen is really cute, but it isn’t even big enough to put a table in it. And with all the cooking I do, it’s hard to be organized.

We have a lot of company for supper. Last evening, Dan and his sweetheart came over … also my cousin. So I have an easy five at my table many evenings. And many times, I have Mary and her little babysitting girl for lunch. And it’s hard to be organized. The girls want to help me do the dishes and clean up, but they really can’t, as I don’t have room for them to work with me. But if I think about what the mothers of old did, I gain courage and insight.

And we can let our imaginations go wild in the area of the word of God. We can think on things that are pure and holy and of a good report.

Some of you are called to make soap and cottage cheese. And to make a daily bread without the bread machine. You are called to wear long dresses and a covering. But how many have this calling to wear a head covering but won’t, because of, “What will the neighbors think?” Well, the heck with the neighbors!! But, ya know, what’s to keep ya from just staying inside all day after husband goes to work and put on the head covering and dress and apron and have yourself a ball? Some of you are called to do this.

As you obey the Lord on this, He will move you on to other things. But some of you are stuck in a spot where your homemaking is not fun anymore. But then you have not obeyed the voice of the Holy Spirit within you either, huh?

And maybe your husband doesn’t want you to wear the head covering, but the Lord has asked you to. Well, just wear it when your husband is at work. I mean, your husband just doesn’t want to see you with it on, right? And he won’t care if you wear it when he is at work.

Do what the Holy Spirit leads you to do. Listen for His voice concerning your household duties. And be prepared to be wild and crazy. Have fun!!!

I am telling you one thing, if you get anything at all out of my writings, I think the most important of all is the homemaking spirit. That is a powerful spirit to have. It’s a place of anointing when done out of the Lord. I don’t mean getting up and worrying if your house looks like a picture in a magazine. I am meaning to minister to the family and make a nest like Proverbs speaks of.

We are to call wisdom our sister and understanding our kinswoman. But the enemies of wisdom are strife and worry and discord.

Last night and this morning, Jim and I worried over Mary that she had such sharp words to us. Also, our weather has been so odd … such dreary days and cold … and here it is June. It’s kind of depressing because of the cold gray days. I think last night the temperature got into the 40s. Jim has been sick, anyway, with a cold but kept on working yesterday

And the worry over Jim and over Mary would love to pull me down. Makes me wanna sit and look out the window and cry. But I ain’t gonna do it. I must make my own light and walk in it. I must rally my own self and be my own cheerleader. Like David, I must encourage myself because it ain’t all about me. It’s all about maintaining joy and harmony in my home, and being an example to the older children, and making a home for Baby Rose.

I have to say to myself, “Now, Mary is young and just married, and she thinks she knows more than she does. And I shouldn’t take her seriously. And Jim, whenever he gets sick, gets upset. And he worked like a dog yesterday. But today, he can rest. He doesn’t have to work. And so things will mellow out.”

But we mothers and wives must be more then band-aids and salves to fix emotional and physical wounds of the family. As Nancy Campbell trys to tell us, we have a place in our homes and we have authority. We have an agenda, too. We must have a plan. We must let God lead us along as a Keeper at Home. We are responders and followers and nurturers, but somewhere in us is a woman who leads, too.

We are to blend with our husbands. The mother bird is a more dull shade, as to blend in with the trees and her nest. And yet, in that place of hiding, she has a job and must take authority. She has to have a plan. Father bird can’t teach her how to care for the baby birds. She knows things that the male bird does not know. And if she just waits upon her mate to give her all the answers, then she is ultimately cheating the whole family.

Mother has a part to play. When the spirit of wisdom comes upon the wife of the home, she begins her ministry. She plays a part in the scheme of things — she creates answers for the family through her good works. She is zealous of good works. As she works in silence, she creates a home. She builds a place for her family.

If you are like me, I somehow bounce from being really spiritual to being just keeper at home. But this is not to go like that. Our place of authority in the home is in the hidden place. And, in this hidden place, we are mighty for God. But, now me, I get all this mixed up. And I get out there sometimes and begin taking more spiritual authority than I should be.

Like now? Man, I am ready to rebuke every demon out there and on anyone! But I am out here too far. I can feel it. I am teetering and tottering in my spirit. I am not made to do all of this, and I must humbly bow and return to my place. You can have a ball without me — I am running back to the kitchen sink.

The Bible says that a woman should keep a covering on her head because of the angels. Well, I think this means a spiritual covering of her husband’s authority, and the angels spoken of here means demon angels. We can get out here too far.

But the main thing, and what it’s all about if you are a wife and mother, is the ministry of keeper at home. And you can certainly do your homemaking in the flesh, and this can get into some real slavery.

The homemaking Spirit is the Holy Spirit … it is the Spirit of God. It is making a home on earth as it is in heaven. Solomon built the temple for God with wisdom and we can, too. And the gifts of healing and power can come out of our homes, as long as wisdom dwells with us. Wisdom is more precious than Gold and Silver and we should chase after it as it is our life on earth.

Wisdom has to do with instinct and order in the home. It is wisdom that causes a bear to hibernate and the birds to fly south for the winter. It’s a knowin’ deep inside of woman. A hard heart can never hear the voice of wisdom, as a strange woman will hate her husband and shut off the wisdom of God in her. The wise woman builds her house and the foolish woman tears it down with her hands.

I have seen the spirit of wisdom once many years ago. I was standing in the kitchen doing dishes and I could see her come up behind me like a shadow. She said, “Connie, this world you are living in is like Sodom and Gomorah. Remember that.” And we do have to know that and not make excuses for the sin around us. We must have discerning hearts and see the sin and deal with it.

I am seeing things in the Spirit around me that look very dangerous for our Country. The laws being passed for parital birth abortion are so scary. But the Bible says that Wisdom is the stability of the times. And we must hear her voice. She is saying, “Tend to the home duties.” She is the voice of instinct.

Our world is just full of confusion. But we mothers don’t need to be confused.

Wisdom is our stability, our soundness and our direction. We have a knowin’ … like the birds know to fly south and the bears to hibernate. We have a knowin’ in our hearts about making a home and keepin’ the home fires burning. I don’t actually know how to tell you to pick up on your “knowin’” except to tell you to read the book of Proverbs. You will find her voice there. Proverbs says embrace her and she will exalt you. Actually, Proverbs 31 is the climax of Proverbs and not a separate part.

The virtuous woman loved God and she showed that she did as she worked out of her instincts or her conscience.

It’s common sense and the feeling of a mother’s love and longing to care for the baby.

It’s the joy ya feel when you are sitting with your husband in the evening after a day of work and confusion.

It’s a happiness … a joy.

It’s the work of your hands.

It’s that happy feelin’ you feel with you have made a nice loaf of bread for the family.

It’s like a voice in you that wants to tell about how you made the bread.

Sometimes we feel a barren spirit, a harsh spirit of slavery, concerning our homemaking. And this is not of God. When we do our work, we should feel happy and content and full of joy. This is how God made us to be.

Our ministry is homemaking, our calling is at home, as every mother bird or rabbit or cat is. A mother cat is always so content as she nurses her babies and she protect and loves them. She is the most happy when she is doing what God has assigned for her to do. And, even though confusion is around her, she does what she knows to do.

And, ya know, the world is in such confusion right now. We as mothers need to study wisdom, and the Bible says to seek peace and ensue it. We must learn to keep our minds on the wisdom of God. Because the wisdom is our stability in this confusion and madness. We must hear the voice of God and the voice of wisdom.

I really think the Titus 2 mother lives inside all of us. Her voice instructs us … all of us, to a point. I am an older mother and this is why God uses me to tell you of my experiences — it’s to pull you along and to teach and train the wisdom inside of you.

But wisdom will not dwell in a house of strife and discord. You can not do your homemaking with hell all around you except through slavery and pure bull dog tenaciousness. Or with a worldy spirit. But the Joy of the Lord is our Strength. And it is the strength of the home. A naggy wife will make a husband sick, and the whole family. Worry and strife will be a block to the natural instincts that God has given you.

And, ya know, some women have diferent instincts and gifts of homemaking than others. I know my gift is cooking and baking.

In the old days, a household would have differnt gifts. You don’t see this now. But, like one sister in the house would have a gift of sewing, and the home knew this, and she was the one to do the family sewing. Another sister would have a gift for organization and she would help the family with her gift. And, ya know, if you listen to the older women, you can pick up on this. Like, one will say, “I made all the pies in our family growing up, as I was good at it. My sister made all the cakes … she made delicious cakes.” Well, these were gifts in the spirit for the comfort of the family.

And my gift is cooking. And when I want to get the spirit of wisdom on me, I start baking. As I get my things out to bake, I may throw in a load of wash or decide I have to do the dishes in the sink first. But my gift calls to me and gives me joy and direction in God.