{Listen to Part 1 here}

One summer my two youngest children set their minds on getting a fish, one for each of them.  My daughter’s birthday was approaching so she asked for, and received, a fish tank and whatever else was needed for her future pet fish.  My son, whose birthday was still a few months away, decided that he could not wait that long!  He asked his grandmother if she had a fish tank that she wasn’t using, knowing that she seldom threw anything away!  Low and behold, she had one!  She retrieved the tank from the attic, and my son cleared his dresser: he was ready for a fish of his own!  

After a couple of months had passed, we were finally ready to purchase a fish for him.  My husband looked over the tank to make sure it was still in good condition.  Imagine my surprise when he said, “This isn’t a fish tank!  It’s a lizard tank!”  Before I knew it, my son gleefully replied (of course!), “Great!  I would love to have a lizard!!”  For the next three weeks, they slowly prepared the tank to be a perfect home for his pet lizard.  

Throughout those weeks I kept thinking, “I’m going to have a lizard??  What if it escapes?  I will be so grossed out!”  Then I thought, “This is all because of a hand-me-down?!  I am getting a lizard because I was given the wrong tank?!  Are you kidding me?!”  I certainly did not expect to be here, in this situation!  

Sadly, there have been times in homeschooling that I have looked around and have had to say, “How did I get here?  I did not expect to be here, in this place.”  It has probably happened to all of us at some time or another, when we suddenly realize something along the lines of, “We’re getting a lizard!?”

I was reminded of Proverbs 31:27 which says, of the virtuous woman, “She watches over the ways of her household.”

This Proverb invokes a picture of one who would lean forward and peer into the distance: observing, waiting, and closely watching what was coming, like the job of a watchman.  In the Old Testament, the watchman’s job was to be on the lookout for any approaching danger, to be on guard against the enemy, and to protect his city.  

Imagine peering into the distance like a watchman, watching for what was coming.  

What a responsibility!  How sobering it is to be entrusted with the job of watching over the ways of our household like a watchman peering into the distance of his city.  What might we see?  What might we change?  What might we keep the same, despite seeing any fruit today?

What a privilege!  Homeschool moms, we have the privilege of being the first to hear of something that is happening in our child’s life, the first to realize there’s something deeper taking place within their heart and having the privilege of taking it to the Lord in prayer, and the first to be able to point our child back to the Lord and His ways and thoughts.

It is with this heart and within this context that we turn to the topic of bearing fruit in our homeschool.  Fruit is Christ-like actions or characteristics that are worked within us by His Spirit and eventually become visible to those around us.  We won’t bear the fruit we hope to if we approach our homeschool like I approached the lizard tank: caught off guard, not aware of what was taking place around me (or what was approaching in the distance), and not foreseeing the situation I would soon find myself in, all of a sudden realizing, “What?!  I’m getting a lizard!?” 

Let us ask the Lord to do a work in us, that we might be women who faithfully watch over the ways of our household: prepared, alert, and ready to serve Him and our families and thus by His grace, have a fruitful homeschool.   

If you’ve already begun your school year, perhaps you already see areas in need of adjusting or tweaking.  It is never too late to ask the Lord to help us be women who watch over the ways of our households, like a watchman, aware of what’s coming, not being taken by surprise that a lizard is moving in, so to speak, that we might bear fruit, to the glory of God.

Continue to Part 2

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