Before I was married, I spent a good bit of time preparing for wifehood and motherhood. Between researching, studying, brainstorming with other young ladies, writing articles, publishing articles, thinking about it a lot … I attempted to be as prepared as I could be. And it has been interesting to me to learn in what areas I was not adequately prepared, and what aspects of married life and motherhood have surprised me.

Here's one that I didn't think much about: ruling my home.

Now before anyone gets the wrong impression, I'm not talking about the feministic mentality that results in the woman wearing the pants in the family and the man following her lead.

We believe in traditional roles over here! 😉

What I'm talking about is the Biblical perspective that a woman is the ruler of her home. There are numerous passages that allude to a good woman being a good manager or overseer of her home, but there's a specific one that uses the Greek word "oikodespoteo". The two root words are "oikos" (house) and "despotes" - from which the English word despot is derived. Literally, the despot of the house.

Of course, there are those who might say, "look, there it is! A woman is supposed to wear the pants in the family and rule over her husband!" But if our goal is to honestly and contextually interpret the word of God, then we recognize that a woman rules her home under the authority of her husband.

In his book, How To Exasperate Your Wife, Doug Wilson explains it this way:

"But wise leadership never micro-manages and never insists upon the prerogative of making all decisions that have to be made. To take an example from elsewhere, the business world is filled with failures who were undone because they were highly competent control freaks. In contrast to this, a good leader in business is one who finds or cultivates competent men to whom he can delegate responsibility. Something similar happens in marriage. A man should marry a woman whom he can trust: "The heart of her husband doth safely trust in her … (Prov. 31:11). But trust defined in the context of marriage is not simply believing that she will do well if any problem ever comes up, and it involves far more than thinking she will not go out honky-tonkin'. Trust here means entrusted, and something has to be there to be entrusted. In a godly home, that which is entrusted is the management of the home and all the inhabitants thereof."

In my life before hubby and babies, I thought a lot about how to be a homemaker, but I never really thought about how to be a home-ruler. I have realized that when I start getting overwhelmed and frustrated, it's because I feel like I'm being pushed around by circumstances outside of my control, rather than being in charge of what happens in my home. It's like being in a boat tossed around in choppy water, and instead of taking the rudder and managing the situation, I'm just sitting in the bottom of the boat getting tossed around.

The reality is, nearly everything that happens within my home is actually within my control.

I've found this so interesting because ever since I was a little girl, I had no hesitation about taking charge of situations and being in control. I went overboard at times, for sure, earning myself the reputation of being bossy. So why is it that now, when I actually have a domain to rule, I struggle to fulfill that position?

I still don't know the answer to that. But I know one thing. My goal for this year is to learn and practice being a better ruler of my home, a more competent manager of the space and people within my little kingdom.