Thanks for visiting! If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed using the feedburner link to the right.
I don’t remember and can’t find where I recently read about volunteering. [If you ran across a post please let me know.] The idea was that a mother should not be volunteering outside of the home if she will not work outside of the home. It seemed to be making the two equal.
My opinion is that a full schedule of volunteering would be wrong. I believe that a volunteer job is different than a paying job. It is also different than a club or group.
What is the difference? The difference is who is in charge. Obviously with a job the employer is in charge. In a club or group that you pay dues to join there is someone in charge who tells you when to be where. As a volunteer you pick what you want to do, when you want to do it, and how long you will commit to doing it. In other words, you call the shots.
I do agree with Crystal that there is no greater work than raising children. I believe that raising my children and taking care of my home is my first priority.
(Can you feel a “but” coming?)
I, like her, cut back on 99% of commitments and ministries outside my home. It was a relief and I needed to do it. However, there came a time when I felt disconnected, dejected, and discouraged. Getting involved in some commitments outside my home greatly helped me.
Bear in mind that this is my experience. Everyone is different and at different stages in the raising of their children. Obviously, a mother of older children could do more with or without the children.
There was a comment left on Crystal’s post that I especially agree with. Here is part of it. It was left by Anonymous with no link included. [If you wrote this I would be glad to give you credit - just contact me.]
It is important that it not be viewed as ALL or NOTHING. There is a middle ground. We are instructed to see to the needs of our families first but this does not obliterate our responsibility to love our neighbors. The best part? These two can go hand in hand!
I just think it is easy for we mothers to feel so overwhelmed that we can be wanting to grab onto any reason we can to avoid doing outside acts of service.
Are you stressed from too many demands and not able to be a comforting spirit in the home; or are you hiding behind your mother duties?
My conclusion is that having a balance is key. There were many suggestions left in the above mentioned comments how you can involve your children in your ministries.
On the other hand, some time used to help others while the children are being babysat can be a boost much needed by a frazzled mother. It can also let the children know that the world does not revolve around them.
Related Posts: Worth of a Stay at Home Wife and Mother , Worth of a Stay at Home Wife
Possibly Related posts:
- God’s Protection
- The Worth of a Stay at Home Wife
- A Perfect Mother. . . Not!
- All in a Morning’s Work
- Ready or Not for Homeschool, Here I Go!
Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.
Sense & Sensibility has ePatterns now!
on Nov 28th, 2007 at 1:33 pm
I guess I’m kind of in the middle on the issue of volunteering. First off - is whether or not your family’s needs are being met. If the volunteer work gets too stringent (ie. you feel like you cannot miss a time or two) it’s time to cut back.
Also - what does it mean by “volunteer work”? Helping out a new mom making a meal? Helping an elderly neighbor lady with her shopping? or are we talking an “organized” volunteer job? Doing accounting for a non-profit organization 3x a week in the evening?
I don’t advocate women sitting around doing nothing (I know house-wife-ing has more to it than that - you know what I mean) if there kids are in school full-time or the children are grown…but let’s be around for our neighbors or family (extended and otherwise) and church family. Is grandma too busy volunteering at the hospital that she cannot watch her grandchildren while mom is at her doctor’s appointment?
Who can drive the elderly woman at church to her chemo treatments (easier for a wife at home with no children than a mom with 3 preschoolers).
I have 2 sisters that live about an hr from my parents - closer than the rest of us live. Yet when both my parents were seriously ill neither sister was regularly available (or perhaps willing) to help out. One sister w/no children worked full-time, one sister w/children full-time in school was going to college herself so she could work outside the home. Both were granted very busy.
But it was impossible for me (living in another country from my family - with 2 small children) to do anything except try to encourage my sisters to help out ma/pa when they had a chance…I think I even offered to pay my sister to help out (being that I could not be there I figured it was one way I could help).
I don’t want any job that I ever have outside the home (volunteer or otherwise) to interfere with my family and my ability to “get up and go” should my husband get a day or week or whatever off from work.