The Power of a Transformed Wife, Lori Alexander, Keeper of Home, Stay-at-home-Mothers, Working Mothers

-by Kathi

This is a book review series of The Power of a Transformed Wife by Lori Alexander. If you are just joining us, you may click on previous chapter reviews if you’d like to catch up.

Introduction & Chapter 1   Chapter 2   Chapter 3   Chapter 4   Chapter 5   Chapter 6  Chapter 7   Chapter 8 – Part 1   Chapter 8 – Part 2    Chapter 9  Chapter 10   Chapter 11

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Chapter 12 – Keepers at Home

Do you find that women who write books or blogs about how God designed the weaker sex to stay at home are surprised to find that people may not agree with them? Is that surprise only in my imagination?

Encouraging women to be keepers at home is the most controversial topic on my blog, bar none. It seems like a lot of women want to work outside the home, which surprises me, so they give me an earful whenever I write about the positive side of being a stay-at-home-mom.

Nope, I’m not dreaming it. Why is it so “surprising” to Lori that women want to work outside the home? I think writers such as Lori feign surprise because for some reason they have a difficult time understanding that some people want to, or need to, live their life differently.

Staying home full time is difficult, I admit, but working outside the home on top of raising children, keeping a home clean and tidy, being a help meet to your husband, and fixing nourishing food is usually too much for anyone. Something will get neglected, and it’s usually the husband, who should be our first priority.

According to Lori, life is difficult no matter what decision you make, so why does it matter if a woman stays home or works outside of the home? I have run through all of these scenarios in my life so far: worked full-time and gone to school part-time with no kids at home, worked full-time with kids at home, worked part-time with kids at home, and stayed home to raise kids.

There was always something difficult that had to be tackled whether I was working or at home. There has always been untidiness because I have kids, and we live in a house. I find time to cook no matter what – and, sometimes we order pizza, too, because it’s good on a busy day (or when dinner doesn’t turn out as planned). And, there’s still time to spend with my husband, even if we are snoozing on the couch at 9 p.m. This is called being human, and life that happens when you have multiple people under one roof.

I could go on and on about this chapter. Instead I’ll highlight some of Lori’s teachings:

• “Studies have proven that children need their mothers.” – Well, yes, Lori, of course children need their mothers. Which studies? Oh, the one she states is from the Journal of Clinical Child and Adolescent Psychology. Lori never gives us the title of the study, so I guess we are left to believe that this journal article is very clear that women must stay home to raise children.
• When children get older, mothers need to make sure they are watching appropriate TV shows and don’t go online to look at pornography. Again, every potential sinful act leads to children watching porn. Know what your children are doing at all times. Do your kids ever get a break from mom? Sounds suffocating.
• Lori worked full-time for the first two years of her oldest child’s life and then stayed home. She states she will always regret those years. If Lori regretted working full-time while having children, then you will too. Forget all those mothers who enjoy their jobs and have good relationships with their children. They don’t exist!
• Lori doesn’t think working part-time is a reasonable option either. Why? Because she didn’t work part-time when she had children. There are no options for women who need to work in order to financially survive.
• Use your time wisely when you’re home with your children. No soap operas, letting your home get untidy, or children running like wild banshees. God is order, so your home must be too. Sounds like some idyllic fairyland to me.
• Proverbs 31 teaches you what it means to be a keeper at home. Proverbs 31 is not a “to do” list!
• Lori wants you to “spend more time at home than you do anywhere else.” Women are advised to keep the home clean and organized, live within the husband’s financial means, cook from scratch, don’t put the kids in too many activities, and don’t go to a lot of Bible studies or church events. Do whatever it takes to not neglect the home. I can see staying home with a tiny kiddo, but once they reach school age everything changes. If all I had done was spent every waking hour in my house, I would have gone nuts. My kids would have, too! One of the things I loved about homeschooling was taking my kids out of the house into our community.
• Lori does encourage women to open their homes to guests. I’m okay with that. Although, it would take away time from cleaning out the closet.
• Once a woman becomes middle-aged, she is encouraged to mentor younger women. The need is real and middle-aged women fail because “most of them don’t know what submission to a husband looks like or what a keeper at home means. Most of them don’t have good marriages and haven’t taught their daughters how to cook or be housekeepers.” Lori loves to generalize the female population.

At the end of this chapter, Lori laments that the church has dropped the ball in teaching older women to mentor younger women. Churches are not teaching the ways of John MacArthur, Michael Pearl, Voddie Baucham, or James Dobson, and this is why she must blog.

I say thank goodness many churches don’t follow the teachings of these men. Thank goodness that Christians have freedom in Christ. As far as Lori’s blog goes, she has every right to put her words out there. The world, and motherhood, wouldn’t end if she had to stop writing for some reason.

Of course, Lori ends the chapter with a comment (blog post) from one of her “many readers.” It’s three and a half pages on my Kindle – a very easy way to add pages to a book. And….next chapter is all about how women are to dress. I’m assuming we’ll be talking about yoga pants!

Image courtesy of Pixabay