Private Spaces: A Word About the Bedroom

MOPS’ theme this year is “The Home Factor,” and as you’ve undoubtedly figured out, our group is going through the spaces in a home room by room. Are you surprised that when it came to offering to write about the bedroom, all arms went down? In saying I’d do it, I’m either brave or really stupid. I’m not sure which one is accurate.

The bedroom is a very private space. The very word “bedroom” raises all kinds of ‘naughty’ possibilities and a few giggles. The bedroom speaks to vulnerability: the place where we are physically and emotionally bare to ourselves and oftentimes to at least one other person. That is, until we can cover up that vulnerability with clothes or sheets.
The rest of the house is pretty much public domain. We’re not surprised to have people wandering through our living, dining, family, kitchen or other spaces (even if they haven’t seen a dust cloth recently and are a maze of toys).

However, our bedrooms are our domain, a set aside space to share with those closest to us. They can reveal a lot about us, and that transparency — that vulnerability — can be frightening indeed.

Being vulnerable with others is a frightening prospect: will others respect our nakedness (physical or emotional) or will they find it abhorrent? This fear began all the way back with Adam and Eve. Until they ate the forbidden fruit, they didn’t know that they were naked and had no concept of shame, or of being naked, or of being anything less than whole. With the fruit came the sudden realization that they had fallen short in many ways. We all carry this burden today. It’s the legacy of Original Sin. This is the aspect of ‘the bedroom’ that brings giggles of embarrassment, timidity, and even shame; especially if we have things we want to hide about what has happened in that space. These are the kind of tales we don’t want to tell our children someday (childhood abuse, sexual promiscuity, bulimia/ anorexia and so on).

Here’s the good news: the Bible is full of such stories and how God redeems such circumstances. He exposes and cleanses; He forgives; He encourages us to be transparent with one another and to live in authentic community. He transforms. Ahhhh, here is that other dimension of the bedroom: the place that transforms the chaos of our lives to peace, to relaxation and rest, to sanctuary.

I don’t know about you, but when I’ve been ‘needed’ by everyone and everything all day, I love to crawl into my bed and pull up the covers and just be. I may read; I may listen to music; I may stare into space and ponder whatever thoughts flit through my mind; I may pray; but whatever I do, I have this sense of comfort and calm. I have intentionally set about trying to arrange the room to provide this sense of peace for Tim and me because we both need it to retreat from the ‘out there’ spaces that everyone else can see and demand to be a part. In this space, called ‘the bedroom,’ we can have solitude even when we’re together (e.g. one reading and the other watching TV) or we can be vulnerable in a space that is set apart from the rest of our world.

I think that our bedrooms communicate safety even to our children. How many of us can say that our children have never tried to come and sleep with us? (If you can say yes to this, I would be proud to kiss your hand.) They want to be with us in this space because they know that it is a place of safety, comfort, rest, and peace.

In the end, our bedrooms point to the kind of space we can enjoy with God all the time: a place where we can be vulnerable without fear; a place where we can rest and be refreshed; a place that has a magnetic appeal to others; a place without shame; a place where forgiveness happens. That’s a place I’d like to go to right now. It doesn’t have to stay in that room we call ‘bedroom’, it can be a mental space that we share with others—most especially our kids.

How they need to hear us be honest with them about our weaknesses as well as our strengths. They need to hear us ask for forgiveness of them and of God when we’ve fallen short. They need to be OK with their own nakedness—both physical and emotional. They need to know that they can fall short and still receive our love, mercy, and forgiveness. Most importantly, they need to know that they can have this from God, too, if they just ask Him.