Balancing Home and Career Gracefully

Contemporary society assumes that we make a choice: one member of a household will be the “homemaker” and the other the “breadwinner” (i.e., in the marketplace generating income to sustain the home). The assumption is that a person cannot be ably engaged in the world, perhaps in a career, if he or she is managing a house or raising children. We have to choose: Will I raise a family or develop a career?

While there certainly are challenges and tensions that come in the interface of each dimension of our lives and work, the woman of Proverbs 31 is clearly engaged on both fronts. And by implication it is important to observe that there is no inherent tension between them. Indeed, perhaps the two are essential to each other, authenticating or legitimizing the other, each a counterpart to the other.