A wife of noble character who can find? ~Proverbs 31:10
In the midst of this sex-driven culture finding a woman of noble character can be hard and being a woman of noble character is even harder. It is true that what we wear on the outside reflects who we are on the inside; businessmen wear ties and the Amish men living down the road wear suspenders and bushy beards. Looking around at the grocery store I wonder about the woman in front of me with her sloppy clothes and harsh words. I'm sure you've seen others like her; women who live for the approval of others and personal enjoyment. What boggles my mind is that these women are not only at the grocery store but also sitting in our churches. Who are they? What's inside that makes them present themselves so?
I submit to you that is fear.
We fear we will be lusted after so we try to hide our femininity as much as possible via baggy clothes and lack of make-up. We fear we will be alone so we dress in the opposite extreme to get the attention of men. We fear we are judged so we say things to make ourselves look good without any thought to others. We fear we will not be liked so we post only "good" pictures on social media and invite others over only when our house is perfect. We fear loss. We fear instability. We fear our own unimportance.
While modesty and motherhood are two subjects that often get the lime light I wonder if perhaps we are missing the point.
Speaking of Sarah Peter says "And you are her children if you do good and do not fear anything that is frightening." (1 Peter 3:6) Earlier he talks about modesty and having a gentle and quiet spirit but maybe, just maybe, we would be modest and gentle and quiet in spirit if our focus became doing good and being unafraid.
Yes, it is frightening to think that you may be alone for the rest of your life and that others are judging you because of the state of your kitchen. Yes, it's frightening to be mediocre, to get to the end of your days having impressed no one and realizing that you probably won't be remembered a few years after your death.
For God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self control. ~1 Timothy 1:6
God's Spirit. To be a woman of noble character is to express the character of God, which is only possible if His Spirit lives within us. The outside of a woman has as much to do with dress as it has to do with attitude because self-control deals as much with what/how much we eat and holding our tongues as it does with covering our bodies.
Being a woman is hard. However, I submit to you that it is possible to be a woman after God's own heart as we work out our faith with fear and trembling because He who is in us is greater than he who is in the world (1 John 4:4) and the sex culture we live in. We have been bought with a price (1 Corinthians 6:20). We have no reason to fear. If God is for us who can be against us?
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