I need scriptural help

This is SERIOUSLY out of context but I just got in from church and have our supper cooking. Hubby and son are playing catch while the chicken finishes on the grill.

1 Timothy 5:13 And besides they learn to be idle, wandering about from house to house, and not only idle but also gossips and busybodies, saying things which they ought not. 14 Therefore I desire that the younger widows marry, bear children, manage the house, give no opportunity to the adversary to speak reproachfully.

YOUR BABY SITTER needs to NOT discuss your devotion to the Lord with your child! I keep a lot of kids in my home and I do NOT put their parents down if they miss services! One family rarely attends.

Please note people... I see you replying saying her SISTER and this is the baby sitter!

 

AMEN!! Thank you!!!

 

Would it be possible for your husband to care for your daughter while you work?

This baby sitter is certainly out of line discussing your church attendance with your daughter. I think I would look for another sitter. How does she know when you go to church?

You do not need to give her or anyone else an explanation for your church attendance.

God is your first priority, but God expects you to take care of your family first.

I can relate to your situation because I have been there.

I had a discussion once with a pastor years ago that thought that I should put the church first. I did not believe him then and I do not believe him now. One must put God first. He and his wife were not very understanding when the doctor told me I had to stop all the work I was doing for the church to protect the health of my unborn child. They thought I should continue to work even though I might lose my baby.

Do not let anyone make you feel guilty for putting your family first. Do not let anyone make you feel guilty for working outside the home to provide for your family.

May God Bless You and your family!

 

This is now the second time you have said this. I am curious as to why you think these two things conflict. I never see this conflict in Scripture.

 

Sometimes it a little bit of fun to come around the other end. For example ask your daughter why her sitter said that. This may be a good time to discuss some things with your daughter about the choices you make in a way that a child can understand. Life is filled with choices nad we must live with the choices we make.

Children need to learn why we make the choices we do.

 

It is absoutley not allowed for a babysitter to discuss your private life in any way shape or form with your child. And most especially your private religeous life (and I use the word religion because I don't think it matters what religion a person is, it it off limits to a babysitter!). You are her employer! Whether it is right or wrong, or even ok not to go to every church service is not her business when it concerns you and not her. She has stepped far outside her bounds as a babysitter, you need a new sitter.

 

It is because someone else has made her choices seem like they are conflicting.

Newlady, either you need a new sitter or you need a new church.

My situation is similar to yours in a way.

My husband also doesn't go to church. It wasn't this way when we married. This has left me as spiritual leader in our home. (Don't have a cow, folks, anytime he wants the job back he can have it) Not only does he not go, there was a time when he actively discouraged me from attending with the kids.

I was caught between the rock of my husband's wishes and the hard place of my churches expectation of my participation. I'm a stay at home Mom, so they had even higher expectations of my ability to help.

I didn't have to deal with out and out gossip, thankfully, just the odd looks and the but why nots. Church folks often do not understand the extra burden a wife has when her husband doesn't attend. They are used to the Christian ideal of marriage and not the sinful worldly marriages some of us are caught up in. They just don't understand what objection a husband could possible have to church attendence. And mine was very good at saying one thing in public and another in private. He would tell people he didn't care, but then blow up and not talk to me when I took him up on it.

Not to mention that his work hours left him little or no time at home, so if one of the kids was sick, I was the only one who knew what/how to deal with them or was even there to deal with them.

So many, many different things conspired to keep me out of church and still do.

My solution ended up being to not sweat it and find a church that wasn't so needy. A move to a larger church, with a body of people from all different backgrounds (including mine!) that understood the difference between slacking and life circumstances was the best thing I could have done.

At this point, within the 6 years I have been at this church, attending when possible(sometimes not attneding for 3-4 months at a time), I have had 2 of my children saved and baptized, the third is asking questions and will be ready soon, my husband no longer discourages us from attending(he still doesn't) and this year I was able to start teaching a Sunday School class.

If changing churches isn't in the Lord's will for you, then a nice long discussion with the sitter about gossiping about you in front of your daughter is in order. If that doesn't solve the problem, perhaps you should speak to your pastor.

Hold firm, sister, life isn't always easy but tribulations such as this worketh patience. How you work through this problem will set an example for your daughter as to how such things should be worked out by Christians. It may also be an example your sitter needs to see.

May the Lord bless.....

 

The root of this problem, surely, is that you are doing the job that your husband should be doing, and your own job as well. It looks as if there is no way round that, but I think if it were me I'd be doing my Bible and prayer time during my lunch break at work, on the grounds that if I am not getting up at 4.30 I might be in more of a fit state to go to a church meeting.

But yes, the sitter was way off limits.

Liz

 

Regardless of what your Husband does, you still have a responability to be faithful to your local church. That is a NT principle. God will not lead you to do anything contrary to His Word. The best way to get your family in order is through the ministry of the local church.

There is today an emphasis on family above the local church. Usually this stems from bad interpretation of the OT.

In the NT we see that the church has the primacy, though it works harmoniously with the family.

Perhaps the sitter should not have answered so, but it sounds like she was right. When you miss the preaching of God's Word you are missing the opportunities for Him to speak to you and instruct you in the way you should live. Preaching is what God has ordained as the primary medium to convey His truth to others and if you neglect to hear it, you will miss the benefit it brings.

 

This is true and it seems to me that Newlady has said more than once that she feels led by God to take care of her family first.

God established the family before he established the church.

While the church, church fellowship, church Bible study, preaching are all important, God has given us the responsibility to take care of our families.

I would venture to guess that as soon as Newlady gets her family cared for and has her time organized that she will attend church more.

Her baby sitter was totally out of line trying to influence her child that her mother should attend church more.

Newlady goes to church on Sunday morning! Just how much preaching does a person need. She reads her Bible daily. Should she neglect her family to hear more preaching?

 

Dear Newlady,

You do have a hard situation, and I am sorry.
Here are some suggestions. None of them may apply.
Some of them are based on my mother's situation. She got up at 5 a.m. for decades to work all day, do housework at night, and raise three kids.
She went to church regularly, but no, not to every service.
And there was a lot expected in those days beyond 3 services a week.
January Bible Study which took two hours a night for a week or two, revivals two or 3 times a year, lasting two weeks for 2 plus hours a night.
Bible School which lasted two weeks for 3 hours a time. It was not just for little kids and was often held in the evenings. WMU (women's group) was often held on a separate weeknight, as was visitation. There were lots of other meetings, all considered important.

Anyway, I don't think anyone on this thread is arguing about whether or not church is important.
But you can't do it all. I go to church 3 times a week plus other special times, now. But I could go every night. However, my church and pastor expect people to appropriately deal with their own circumstances. When my kids were little, there were plenty of times I could not go to church for weeks at a time. Some kids just get sick a lot more than others. And they get it one after the other, not at the same time.

Anyway, back to the suggestions. See if any might work.
Don't get up so early. Read your Bible at lunch. Fix lunch the night before. Get a simpler hairstyle for your daughter.
Move closer to work. You are spending, it sounds like, a long time commuting.
Or get a job closer to home.
Pare down stuff. You don't have to clean what you don't have. Clean less. (For example, don't let DianeT know, , but I don't mop my whole floor every week. I sweep and dampmop parts that need it. Then periodically it gets mopped. Read a book on cleaning methods. Don Aslett has some good ones.
Make a chart of realistic things your husband and daughter can do. Don't expect them to do them exactly like you do.
On the weekend, make some soup and freeze it in batches for weeknights.

***Get a different sitter. Don't ask your husband the equivalent of "Honey, does this dress make me look fat?" and then be upset when he answers. Men can be relatively, well, clueless. They tend to think that when you ask a question, you are asking something different than you are.

Karen

 

"Someone, please show me, through scripture that I must attend every service that our church has. And if there are scriptures that show otherwise, please show that also.
I would love to stay, but have to eat. It is already 9:00 p.m. here and I have not eaten since lunch."
3203.......I think you just answered your own question.

 

Does anyone think that it is quite possible that the Lord could be speaking through the sitter?

 

Wow, nosey Parkers, tell them in a spirit of love 'mind ya own business'

All it says is that we must not stop meeting together. I would not worry too much, do not let church become legalistic.

I find these forum boards more help than church
I live in the Mountains and the church I want to attend is always closed
http://www.podsdad.net/cauterets_mp.html

I have attended a Evangelical church here but found out that they are AOG and I do not feel comfortable with Pentecostals, never have. So I am inbetween at the moment, my home church is Aenon Baptist in Tongwylias but thats a long way off in the UK, bit far to drive I have no problems with conscience.

David

[ May 04, 2005, 05:57 AM: Message edited by: David Michael Harris ]

 

Okay - this may sound .. out of line, and if so, I apologize for that in advance, but I think we're going off in the wrong direction with this.

Since your daughter brought it up to you, I would guess she is sort of wondering why Mom doesn't go, and what Mom's opinion on church and God is.

I see this as a fantastic opportunity to talk to your daughter about what you believe. If you feel God is leading you to spend more time with your family, let her know that you love the Lord, and that you pray and study your bible, but that you feel lead somewhere other than the church doors.

Use it as an opportunity to talk to her about God.