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“It is better to dwell in a corner of a housetop, than in a house shared with a contentious woman.”   Proverbs 25:24

For some reason, King Solomon brings this “contentious woman” thing up quite a bit in his writings. (It makes one wonder if it had something to do with his 700 wives and 300 concubines. But I digress.)
“Contentious” isn’t commonly used these days, so let me define it in one word: argumentative. So, a contentious woman is given to quarreling, griping, and complaining. In fact, this wise ol’ king (who sadly lost his godly judgement as the years progressed) also compared this woman to continual dripping on a rainy day. And he said that it’s basically impossible to restrain her (Proverbs 27:15-16).

I think about being part of Solomon’s harem of women (yuck), and I’m confident it would be easy to point my finger at a few gals at whom this complaint was probably directed. Certainly, it wouldn’t have been me! Ah, but we must consider the marriages and relationships in our culture today, which are mostly of the one-to-one ratio. Could it be that, with no one else to blame, the nitpicky, naggy, complaining woman is the one who’s staring back at us in the mirror?

Ouch.

I don’t know about you, but I’m not doing a lot of mirror-gazing these days—I barely put real pants on anymore, because no one sees me from the waist down. If I have several video meetings, I may add some mascara to my face and make sure my hair isn’t sticking out weirdly. Full-on get-ready-to-face-the-day mode, however, is a thing of the past.

But reading these Proverbs has convicted me to do some self-reflection—not of my face or body, but of my spirit. It’s so easy to use this crisis and its fallout as an excuse for crankiness and grouchiness. Times are challenging. And hard. But how am I treating the people in my home? Do I take out my fear, exhaustion, and frustration on them? Do I “drip” with discord such that they want to go hide on the roof?

My 17-year-old confirmed the “Proverbial” message the other day, when he asked, teary-eyed, that my husband and I stop griping about the virus stuff (and all the ramifications). “I know it’s bad,” he said, “but there’s nothing we can do about it. Please stop constantly complaining about it.”

Again, ouch.

Sisters, let’s take some time to consider our attitudes and our words. It’s not necessarily about being all sunshine and rainbows. But let’s definitely watch our contentiousness and make an effort to be kind and pleasant to those around us.

“Lord, thank You for the people in my life who love me. Help me recognize when my attitude and words are causing strife for others—and let me drip no more.”

For His Glory

Julianne Winkler Smith
TRBC Women’s Life