Dear friend,

 

Therefore, my beloved brothers, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain.
 

- 1 Cor. 15:58-

 

Homes and houses are not the same. You can have a beautiful mansion empty of true purpose and affection. You can have a tiny trailer full of love and safety. “Better a dry crust with peace and quiet than a house full of feasting, with strife.” (Proverbs 17:1). A home can be built with the sparest materials as long as the heart behind it is unified with God’s mission.

 

In her trailer my grandma loved us through a humble home and mundane tasks— primarily cooking and cleaning. If grandma showed up, you knew there would be an entire three- course meal and a perfectly cleaned kitchen by noontime! She attributed a greater value, a meaning or blessing, to humble things. And she taught, mostly by accident, that an eternal purpose is woven into the fabric of home and all its tasks.  

 

None of the homes I loved as a child were perfect. Some were small. Some were under construction. All of the families had pain, loss, and brokenness somewhere in their history. But the people in these homes had something in common: they saw home, and the mundane tasks within it, as something worthy of their best. They gave their best at home and invited others (me!) to participate in the blessing of their faithfulness. They saw the daily routines of making food, cleaning up, and opening their door as a way to love. And I was loved because of them. I mourn to think of the loss experienced if these people had waited for a bigger home or less to do before inviting me in.

 

Though I grew up in a home full of love, my parents worked hard to provide it for us. They allowed Christ to redeem their histories and tried to build something completely new. Chances are you, too, have been affected by the brokenness of home in a sinful world. Even the word “home” may be a trigger for you… not a word of comfort and peace but a reminder of anxiety, fear, and isolation. Maybe you didn’t grow up in a home that felt safe. In fact, home was the opposite of safe. You spent as much time away from it as you could. Maybe you grew up in a home that was distant, cold, and lonely. No one was invited in; sometimes you felt like you didn’t even belong. Maybe you had a parent who did not care well for the home, so you had no example, and now feel like you’re drowning. There is room for all our stories here because God does not leave us homeless in heart, wandering without communion, unseen in our pain. God is in the business of redemption, and the homes He builds cannot be undermined.

 

Home matters to God. It is the center of true discipleship. 

The fall of humanity broke what God created, but God wasn’'t done. In Genesis 3, He promised to send “the seed of the woman”to crush the Enemy for good. He promised a Messiah, a Savior, to reconcile all things to Himself and redeem the painful choice of mankind. In the meantime, God did not leave; He revealed Himself in Old Testament history, dwelling among His people in a tabernacle and a temple until Jesus Christ, the Messiah, arrived. God’s mission is to build a home for His people. He began the story with a home in a garden and He ends it with a home in a heavenly city. Hebrews 13:14 tells us, “For here we do not have an enduring city, but we are looking for the city that is to come.”. God’s heart is for His people to find the kind of belonging a home should provide—and to create that belonging for others. Home matters immensely to God. 

Everything changed for the American home during the Industrial Revolution. Machines made man-made items more inefficient and, eventually, obsolete. With inventions like the steam engine, cotton gin, and electricity, “better, faster, stronger” took priority. As factories took over the work landscape, a divide began to form between work and home. People left their farms and personal businesses to work in cities; they left the home to head to the factory, bank, or railroad. The work of the home, once done in an almost-egalitarian fashion by both men and women, was now mostly relegated to wives and daughters. With husbands and sons working long hours to provide, the bulk of home tasks fell to female members of the family. With the Industrial Revolution, it was possible to make more money than ever before. Perhaps because of the value placed on financial success, the work of the home —non-income producing—came to be seen as less valuable.

 

As World War One and World War Two crashed onto the national scene, more women left homes to work in factories. Poor women had always worked, but with the war effort there was a new note of admiration for working women—they were helping win the war! Perhaps this moved more women of wealthier classes to the workforce. American culture realized women were not just “stand-ins"for men; women were effective, efficient, and intelligent workers. When WWII ended and women returned to the home (now in the 1950’s), a rising discontent began to pervade the women of America. Their experience working in a place where their contribution was measurable, observable, and impactful, coupled with the invention of time-saving home management “machines” like the microwave, refrigerator, dishwasher, and vacuum, made home tasks both less time-consuming and less appealing. By the time of the sexual revolution in the 1960s, no one needed to tell American women that tending the home was boring, obsolete, and fake. They felt it. The Leave It to Beaver ideal proved hollow, and feminism promised something more: women could have it all. They could join the work force, work as well as men, and enjoy all the rights that men did. The work of the home came to be seen as oppressive and limiting.

 

Before the sexual revolution, habits of the home (how to clean, plan, make meals, grow your own food, mend what was broken) were handed down generation to generation. We were taught how to peel potatoes in the same way we were taught to walk. My own grandmother taught me how to scrub a baseboard, clean as I cooked, and fold fitted sheets. Her mother, a rural Michigan farmwife and mother of eight, taught her. And Great-Grandma Pearl’s mother was off the boat from the Netherlands, never spoke a “lick of English” (as my grandma put it), but probably knew how to scrub tile and get all the food out of the oven at the same time. My point is: before the sexual revolution, the shattering of the world wars and the Industrial Revolution, the family handed down an appreciation for the home. Though by no means idyllic or even moral, without even thinking about it, parents and grandparents (who not uncommonly lived all together) handed down the knowledge of home and its purpose…

 

…This brings us to today. Extended families are scattered across long distances, leaving young parents with little support. Home is something to show off on Instagram or HGTV, not something to share with people across a table. Our schedules are so jam-packed, our perfectionism so suffocating, we can’t open our doors to the family across the street. Domestic tasks are seen as unnecessary and yet when we abandon them, we feel claustrophobic, overwhelmed, cluttered, and sad.  

 

…This isn’t to say that life was better, or perfect, in the 1700s. I enjoy my conveniences as much as the next person! Even when Western culture had a stronger centralized family and an appreciation for home life and industry, many homes were just as broken as they are today. Without a Christian theology of home, the most purposeful home life can become abusive. The most intimate home life can become codependent and controlling. Observing history shows us how we got here, but it doesn’t mean that home life in the eighteenth, nineteenth, or twentieth centuries in America was innately better. There were different challenges in a different time. What we can do is identify what has changed across the last four centuries and ask ourselves: “Has our view of home really progressed as a society and church, or have we gone too far?” We don’t have to return to the nineteenth century, but we should critique and question a view of home that sees “real life” as everything outside the door. 

 

…We’ve been trained not to see the value of home; we’ve been taught that home is a burden and its care an impediment to real life. But God said all work matters (1 Corinthians. 10:31), and our homes, the place where we should be free and vulnerable, matter immensely to Him. 

 

A biblical theology of home is the answer to all home problems across all centuries. It frees us to not just enjoy the place we live, but to live with purpose and dignity. What if we can recapture what was lost to the rugged individualism of the American dream? What if we could worship God through dishes, laundry, mopping, cooking, mending, and hospitality; and what if there was truly a way to show up to our homes from a place of peace?

 

I say “what if,” but I can make you a promise: there is a way. And it’s God’s way home.  It’s grace-based, rest-filled, adaptable, and free. And it’s more than just physical—it’s a spiritual practice! The Christian home is an image of both a coming spiritual reality and the existing spiritual reality of our family, the church. We are part of something bigger than ourselves. Our homes should reflect the priorities of Christ, our foundation and cornerstone of the church.  

 

 

Do you struggle to love the home you have – the apartment, duplex, or imperfect little house where God has you?

Do you resent home tasks, feeling like they “get in the way” of real work and ministry?

Do you struggle to feel joy in your home because the housework constantly piles up?

Do you feel like your unseen tasks don't matter to God?

 

If you resonate with any of these struggles, Every Home a Foundation is for you. Both spiritual and intensely practical, my latest book will help you change your mindset and align your lifestyle to find JOY and PURPOSE in the work of the home. 

 

Every Home a Foundation is not a motherhood book, though it speaks to moms. It's not spiritual theory and it's not a homemaking manual. It's a little bit of everything: biblical teaching, theology, poetry, liturgy, and practical help. You'll be challenged to change how you view the home and the tasks within it, to see yourself as worthy of a home you love, to find contentment in the place God has you, to reject materialism and over-consumption, and to ultimately open your door to others so they can experience the joy you've found in home's foundation: Christ.

 

Every Home a Foundation includes my proven plans for cleaning, cooking, tending, mending, and hospitality from a place of peace. I have adapted these for different lifestyles: single and married, small families and large, all kinds of homes and experiences. You are encouraged to use them as inspiration, customized to your own lifestyle! 

 

What Publisher's Weekly said about it: “Masonheimer makes a creative, open-minded case that the domestic and the divine need not be mutually exclusive.”

 

Ordering during launch week helps an author get the word out to others! All orders count: Kindle, Audible, or hard copy!