Not an Add-On

A house is built by wisdom, and it is established by understanding. —Proverbs 24:3

Today it’s common for homes to be little more than physical structures where people sleep at night, take their showers in the morning, and then disperse in a hundred different directions. There’s little shared life.

And that’s the best-case scenario. At worst, our homes are in utter disarray, characterized by active hostility and oblivious neglect. They may be decorated to the nines, yet the relationships within the walls are seriously fractured—or at least emotionally distant and dishonest.

But home isn’t an add-on to our “spiritual” life. It is part and parcel of our discipleship and our calling as children of God. We can’t separate our home life from our Christian life without missing something that’s critical to our fellowship with God and our usefulness to His mission in the world. When we minimize the importance of establishing and maintaining Christ-centered homes that put the gospel on display, we short- change the enormous kingdom impact our life at home is supposed to have.