Showing posts with label homemaker's prayer. Show all posts
Showing posts with label homemaker's prayer. Show all posts

Wednesday, January 10, 2024

Homemaker's Prayer



Last night I started reading this book.
 (lent to me by a friend who knew I would love it, and I do!)
I fell in love with it from the first paragraph (pictured below)! 
reflections on the value of home, 
timeless good advice for homemakers,
 prayers, stories and recipes
connected to the stories!


In the first chapter, (written in the '60's) she is contemplating the 
increasing breakdown of homes,  the foundation of strong nations!
Even more relevant now! 



Lord, help me to make home a haven of kindness and grace
For nothing else in all the world can take home-sweet-home’s place
Then fit me with Thy joy and strength, fill every task I do
With thankfulness and love, so above all, I honour You

Lord, help me guard the heart of home with fierce, yet tender care
Lest some ruinous habit leaves it in sad disrepair
Keep me aware of what may harm or wreck its shielding wing
For the heart of the home is like a living, breathing Thing

… And never let the barb of discontentment tear a hole
Into the fabric that ought to protect, cheer and console
Lord, when my home begins to feel like a fragile, chipped cup
Still, let no failure foster the temptation to give up

Lord, teach me with humility to tend with mother’s pride
To details that kindle a glow that reaches far and wide
So that, no matter how far from its happy hearth we roam
The flicker of love’s Candlelight instills a sense of home

…and always draws us gladly back to where we long to be
To nourish us with home-sweet-home’s familiarity
Where welcomes are never worn thin, where love attends life’s woes
In, pray what grants a glimpse of Home beyond time’s curtain-close

© Janet Martin


I love how the beginning of the second chapter
 is in sync with the season I am in;
slowly tucking Christmas away, bit by bit


Books like this kindle in me 
a sweet contentment for the domestic 'mundane'  bliss
For things like 
mending...

ironing...

folding laundry...


tidying clutter...



making cabbage rolls...


(enough to freeze some for convenient suppers-for-one))


Cabbage Rolls...



Psalm 51:10
Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me.



Tuesday, March 4, 2014

What I Should Like...a Little While





 It's been a 'toy morning':)...

I should like my home to be
Not a showplace of pride and pomp
But a solace where children romp
And shape their childhood memory

Home; oh dearest, happy word
Let these four-letters symbolize
A sort of heaven-paradise
Where prayers are prayed and cares are heard

…and I should like my home to wear
Love’s mended woes, life’s spills and such
And not withhold from it the touch
Of childish fingers free of care

…and may its rod and rule be kind
The Word of God read and revered
Lest vainly innocence is reared
To thirst for truth, yet to it…blind

...and I should like my home to smile
With humble, thankful happiness
A tiny nook that God will bless
And dwell in for earth’s little while

© Janet Martin

‘Oh Mom, just leave it there’ said my daughter as I was about to polish away a handprint from the window, ‘that hand print reminds us *Nathan was here!’ (* little guy I babysit)

...jotted this while having lunch. One of the little guys I baby-sit is slurping applesauce and chatting about the 'nice, nice day' and I looked out at its gray offering and back at his innocence and laughed, yes! it is a nice, nice day!'



Time to do dishes and pick up toys!




Friday, December 28, 2012

Home Sweet Home





Beyond those doors and windows
Within those humble walls
Are childhood’s precious shadows
And memory-tender halls

Life’s brick and mortar dwelling
If shared in unity
Is Love’s soft-glimpsed fore-telling
Of what Heaven will be

Lord, in this little journey
Wherever we may roam
May our hearts forever be
Love’s gracious home sweet home

Janet Martin~ 

We all travel this time of year, don't we?
even if simply in thought,
back to what once was...

Above is a picture of my childhood home

Monday, December 3, 2012

Homemaker's Hope





It is just an empty box
This shell of mortar, bricks, wood; stone
But it is what we put inside
That turns a house into a home

Lord, teach us how to fill our homes
Only with things that You approve
A haven from life’s troubled storms
Of joy and peace; of hope and love

And may the house that we call home
Dear Lord, by You be richly blessed
A place where each of us may come
And know that we are loved the best

© Janet Martin



Wednesday, July 18, 2012

A Homemaker's Prayer




Lord, teach me how to build my house
In tender, purpose prove
Compassion and humility
Shaping a home of love

Let my submission be fulfilled
As your wisdom ordains
That peace may brim from floor to roof
In pure, joyous refrains

May others needs preceed my own
May kindness never cease
Lord, mold these walls of brick and stone
Into Your masterpiece

Lord, let me serve in thankfulness
And gladness be my crown
Lest by sad, stubborn selfishness
I tear earth’s haven down

Lord, teach me how to build my house
Not of my own design
May it be heav’n’s foreshadowing
Through your blueprint divine

Lord, teach me how to build my house
A simple dwelling place
In wood and mortar skin on earth
Of heaven’s kind embrace

© Janet Martin 

 The wise woman builds her house, But the foolish tears it down with her own hands. Prov. 14:1