What is Partnership in Family?

A study on working women showed that 70 percent of working women do 90 percent of work at home. For a working woman, the day’s work doesn’t end after her office hours. She has plenty of work at home. While writing about the working woman, Sudha Umasankar wrote in The Hindu (May 2, 1993), “The Indian women – a unique species battling against odds, juggling home and career with little or no help, trying to please everyone, always placing family first, racing against time doing a super woman’s job day after day”.

In our country some husbands do not understand the stress through which their working wives are passing through. They consider it below their dignity to give a helping hand to their wives, while their wives struggle with the children, and work at home and in the office. The husband may say that he loves his wife as himself. But if he does not voluntarily and wholeheartedly come forward to help her in her time of great need, then his love is not practical. A husband is expected to love his wife as Christ loved the Church. Will Christ stand idle when we suffer in our lives? A husband should show his love and kindness in action. Eph 5:25. 

Here are few case studies for partnership in family.

1. Partnership in home: There was a professor who worked in a college. His wife also worked in a college. They had two grown-up children. While sharing about his family, he said, “Our activities start very early in the morning with the usual devotions. We have divided the work between all of us. My wife cooks the food and I help her in all possible ways including cleaning the vessels. My son irons the dress and my daughter cleans the house. In the evening and holidays my primary duty is to wash all the clothes by using the washing machine. We have learnt to adjust without the help of servants. Our sharing of responsibility eases the stress on my wife and we enjoy our work and our time together as a family”.
2. Partnership in bringing up the children: One working woman shared with gratitude how her husband helped her to bring up her children. “When my first daughter was born, I didn’t know how to even hold her. I had no help from others because we were away from all our relatives. My husband came to rescue. He took turns to look after my baby in the night and helped me in bringing up my daughter. He helped me in bottle feeding, giving a bath and looking after her, while I worked. He was always available to help me in my cooking. When my daughter began to go to school, he took the responsibilities of helping her in studies. He also looked after my second son. He helped both of them to take bath and get them dressed up in the morning. It relieved me of most of the stress and strain in bringing up my small children. I praise and thank God for my good, understanding and loving husband”.
3. Partnership in the ministry: Once an evangelist visited our college to speak in a meeting. The principal  after seeing his itinerary and his ministry asked, “How are you able to travel widely and carry out your manifold tasks?” He replied, “It is due to three reasons”, and continued.

• • “I have a definite call from the Lord to the ministry and my family members also know my call.
  • My family members stand behind me and with me in the ministry. My wife sees that my family members ‘send me’ and not ‘I leave them to the ministry’. 
  • Prayer of Christians throughout the world including people from communist countries and my family members”.