career women

Career Women Are Failures in the Sight of God

/ biblicalgenderroles / 38 Comments

When I make the bold claim, which I will support with the Bible, that career women are a failures in the sight of God I am not talking about women who are forced to work to feed their families. I am not talking about the women who tried for years without success to find a husband and simply needed to support themselves. I am not talking about women whose husband’s became disabled, died or abandoned them. In other words, I am not talking about women who did not choose to have to have a career outside the home.

I am talking about women who planned on it from the time they were teenagers.

For these women their dream was their career. And they may or may not have wanted a husband and some kids to go on the side with that career. These are the women that are utter and colossal failures in the sight of their creator whether they realize it now or not. And one day they will stand before God ashamed of the fact that they did not fulfill the purpose for which he created them.

In Galatians 1:10 the Bible says “For do I now persuade men, or God? or do I seek to please men? for if I yet pleased men, I should not be the servant of Christ”. This Biblical principle should be at the forefront of our minds as Christians each and every day in the decisions we make.

Recently a young woman calling herself Shary wrote me about her concerns about being seen as a failure in the eyes of her family:

“Can’t God use certain women through their careers for His will. For example I’m going to be a freshman college student starting this fall (with the intention of becoming a doctor) after taking a gap year to work. I feel conflicted because over the past several months I have been reading your blog and you write a lot that women should strive to be keepers at home. I would like to get married and have children, but at the same time I feel like I need to go to school or else I’ll just be a huge disappointment to my family. I don’t know if this is because I’ve been conditioned to think this way all my life or for some other reason, I just feel that if I don’t go to school and become a doctor I’d be a failure.”

My Response to Shary And Other Women Facing this Conflict

Shary, you asked if God can use women through their careers for “his will”? The last part of that question is the key to finding the answer to your question. So how do we know God’s will for women? For that we need to look to the Bible.

The Bible tells us for what purpose he created women in Genesis 2:18 when it states “And the Lord God said, It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him an help meet for him”. So, we learn from Genesis 2 that God created woman as companion and helper suitable for man. The only way she could be suitable to be man’s life companion and helper was for her to have a human nature as he had. That is why God took the woman from the man.

But what kind of companion and helper did God intend for woman to be for man? Was she intended to be his equal partner and for both of them to do the same things and go and pursue their own missions?

The answer is found in Titus 2:4-5 where the Bible states “That they may teach the young women to be sober, to love their husbands, to love their children, to be discreet, chaste, keepers at home, good, obedient to their own husbands, that the word of God be not blasphemed”.

God created woman not as an equal partner with man to have equal rights and to pursue a career outside the home as he does. But rather, the Scriptures are explicit on this that God intended for a woman’s life focus to be on serving the needs of her husband, her children and her home.

What About the Proverbs 31 Wife?

Some Christians who want to try and get around God’s explicit command for women to be keepers at home will attempt to skirt it by pointing to passages like Proverbs 31:16 which states “She considereth a field, and buyeth it: with the fruit of her hands she planteth a vineyard”. They say “See – there is a career woman in the Bible! She is a land developer”.

As Bible believing Christians, we know that the Scriptures never contradict. So, we know that there is no conflict between the Bible saying in Titus 2:5 that women are to be keepers at home and Proverbs 31:16 showing a woman buying a piece of land and farming it for food. Those who say Proverbs 31 shows a career woman are reading something into the text that is not there and also ignoring the overall theme in the passage that the focus of her life is serving her husband and his home. Does it say she spends 50 or 60 hours a week buying and farming fields? No, it does not. It says she buys “a field”. Does it say she does not bring her children to help farm the field with her? No, it does not. Does it say she leaves her children with her maidens to watch them while she pursues her career in farming? Again, no it does not.

Those who read a career woman into Proverbs 31, a woman who spends upwards of 50 hours a week pouring her energy into things outside her home, are in error. They are ignoring not only the clear command of Titus 2:5 for women to be keepers at home, but also other parts of the same passage in Proverbs 31, like verse 27 which states “She looketh well to the ways of her household…”.

It is Impossible to be a Keeper at Home and a Keeper at a Career

It is impossible, utterly impossible, for a woman to be a keeper at home and at the same time spend 50 hours a week or more giving her energy to things outside her home.

Feminism sells women this lie. And sadly, even most of our modern churches today have bought this lie. They tell women they can spend 50 hours a week outside their home “following their dreams” while having a husband and kids on the side at home. What they don’t tell them is what really happens.

They don’t tell them about the anguish many of these women feel when they have to leave their young infants with others when they know an infant needs its mother. They don’t tell them about the anguish they will feel when their home is in utter disarray because they have such little energy to keep up with it. They don’t tell them about the fights they will have with their husband over who does what. They don’t tell them about when her career moves conflict with his career. And then after handling the job, the house and the kids many career women have little energy left for their husbands. And then marriages die.

Of course, there are the women who are “without natural affection” as 2 Timothy 3:3 alludes to. These women actually care more about themselves than their children or husbands. These are the women that murder their children by aborting them for the sake of their career ambitions. If these women do have children, they have absolutely no problem dropping off their crying infants with others to pursue their selfish ambitions. They have no problem donating the vast majority of their waking hours to endeavors outside their home and giving only the scraps left of their time to their children and their husbands.

And these women are a “success” in the view of our modern humanist and feminist culture.

Conclusion

So, we just described two types of women. The first group are women who after believing the lies of feminism later come to feel remorse for the decisions that they made. But now they are trapped because they have made their economic situation dependent on their income. Then we have the second group of more sinister women who lack natural affection and have absolutely no remorse for the impact that there career takes on their husbands, their children or their homes.

Are you one of these women that lacks natural affection? Could you drop your two-month-old infant off without it bothering you a bit? Could you see the stress your career places on your home, your children and your husband and be happy with giving them only the scraps left of your time and energy each day?

But there is something even more important to consider than just the impacts of a career on your future husband, children and home.

The Scriptures tell us in 1 Corinthians 11:9 “Neither was the man created for the woman; but the woman for the man”.

The following statement I make to women who are not keepers at home by their own choice and design, and not because of circumstances outside of their control.

If you as a woman are not a keeper at home (and you have no desire to be so), if the majority of your time and energy are not spent supporting your husband in his career, meeting his needs sexual and otherwise, bearing his children, caring for his children and caring for the needs of his home then your life will be a failure in the sight of the one who created you.

So, are you as a woman more concerned with being seen as a failure in the eyes of our humanist culture, your parents and friends or are you more concerned with being a failure in the eyes of God?

The last subject I want to briefly touch on is celibacy.

God’s rule for men and women is marriage and having children. His exception his celibacy. And God only calls us to celibacy “that ye may attend upon the Lord without distraction” (I Corinthians 7:35). Celibacy is to be used for service to the kingdom of God, not for selfish ambitions or to avoid the risks or responsibilities of marriage and having children.

So, could a woman decide to dedicate her life to God by helping on mission fields or by being a doctor, a nurse, a school teacher or other such profession? Yes. But she needs to make sure that she is doing this for the right reasons.

See these two articles I previously wrote for more these subjects:

For what reasons does God allow celibacy?

Why does God make some women with a genius level IQ if he wants all women to be homemakers?

Can a Christian Woman Have Children Without a Husband?

/ biblicalgenderroles / 7 Comments

Is it wrong for a Christian woman to desire to have children without having to marry first?  In other words, can a Christian woman simply adopt children and form a family without a husband? What if a Christian woman wants a husband and children but she wants them much later in life so she can pursue educational and career interests?

The questions above are a summary of questions I recently received from a young woman named Jill who is a college student.  Jill, like many young women in recent decades, would like to put off having children longer and even when she does she wonders if she needs to have a husband to have children.  But before I get to Jill’s email we need to talk about the unsettling fact that there are more and more women like Jill who are choosing to wait much longer to have children and if they have children at all they have fewer children than women of previous generations.

Women Are Marrying and Having Children Much Later In Life

Ellie Kincaid wrote an article for BusinessInsider.com entitled “Why having kids later is a really big deal“.  In this article she made the following conclusions based on CDC study that showed women having children much later in life:

“The average age of first-time mothers is increasing because more women are waiting until their 30s and 40s to start having kids and fewer women are having their first kids in their teens and 20s, the CDC report says.

The majority of all births are still to women under 35 (about 85% of the total), but rates for all births, not just of a first child, to women over 35 have been rising over the past 20 years, while birth rates for younger women are stable or declining…

Data from the World Bank show the seven countries where the average age of women giving birth to their first child is above 30 (Greece, Australia, South Korea, Japan, Italy, Switzerland, and Luxembourg, according to the CIA World Factbook) all have general fertility rates below what’s called the replacement rate. That means the generation currently having kids isn’t having enough to replace itself. Countries with low fertility rates have populations that are aging and set to shrink, meaning fewer people of working age have to support more older dependents.”

Let me summarize what this article above just said.  If the world continues down the path of westernization with women becoming more focused on their education and careers than on having children it won’t just be a few countries where the population is shrinking.  Instead it will be the world population that begins to shrink.

Each generation will be smaller than the one that preceded it.   To say this will cause problems for governments and economies is a vast understatement.  And the world population will continue to decline unless this trend of women being more education and career oriented is stopped.

A United Nations Report entitled “World Population in 2300”  states that if the rest of the world follows western countries in having less children than the replacement level needed the world population will drop to 2.3 billion by the year 2300.  To put that in perspective, today the world has 7.6 billion people so that means the world population will drop by 70 percent over the next three centuries.

So as we can see Jill is not in the minority of western women with her thoughts about having a career and having children later in life.  She is in the majority of women who are choosing to put off having children to a much later age than women of the past and there are very real consequences for this decision by the women of this generation.

With all that said as introduction we will now dive into Jill’s email to me.

Jill’s Questions

“I am a Christian female university student in my mid-20s.  I am currently in a Bible college. I want to pursue a Master’s, and I want to be in charge of a library. I have a question. Is this considered “authority?” If I am in charge of a library used by men and women, and in charge of hiring men and women, is this wrong?

I am unmarried. I do not want to get married. I just am not interested in it. 1 Corinthians 7 says that it is okay, and even good, to stay unmarried. I often have asexual feelings and I just do not care for marriage.

I want to have children, much later in life. I know a godly woman who never married, though she wanted to. She adopted a girl who had little chance of ever being adopted by a two-parent family. The result has been beautiful. I have prayed about this, and I still am praying. I desire something similar in my life, if it is God’s plan.

If I ever have children, I will work in a school or other similar setting so that I am home when my child/children is home, and away when they are away during school hours. I will even work from home if I have to. I want to have a child or two, I want a dog, I want to direct a library and if I do not do that then I would like to teach at a Christian school or work in ministry. I want to be a kind boss. I want to show God’s love everywhere I go. I want to help people

If I ever get married, I feel led for it to be an equal-but-different partnership. I pray about these things. I feel led by God in this direction, at least for now.

I would like to hear your thoughts. Please comment on each of these paragraphs and tell me what you think. “

Now as Jill requested I will answer each of her statements.

Should Women Be in Jobs Which Place Them Over Men?

Jill ‘s Statement:

“I am a Christian female university student in my mid-20s.  I am currently in a Bible college. I want to pursue a Master’s, and I want to be in charge of a library. I have a question. Is this considered “authority?” If I am in charge of a library used by men and women, and in charge of hiring men and women, is this wrong?”

Yes someone who hires people is an authority.  If you are hiring men, then you are any authority over men.

The Scriptures tell us that man is to be the head of woman and this is not restricted to just the Church and the Home and would also extend to society in general:

“But I would have you know, that the head of every man is Christ; and the head of the woman is the man; and the head of Christ is God.“

1 Corinthians 11:3 (KJV)

In our modern culture we don’t want to admit it but we know it is unnatural for a woman to be in authority over a man.  Think male secretary to a female a boss. This is because God designed for man to be over woman in all things.

In the Old Testament we are told that women ruling over men is just as shameful as it would be for children to oppress men:

“As for my people, children are their oppressors, and women rule over them. O my people, they which lead thee cause thee to err, and destroy the way of thy paths.“

Isaiah 3:12 (KJV)

Even the heroine of modern day Christian feminists, Deborah, said this when the cowardly men of Israel insisted that she go into battle with them:

“8 And Barak said unto her, If thou wilt go with me, then I will go: but if thou wilt not go with me, then I will not go.

9 And she said, I will surely go with thee: notwithstanding the journey that thou takest shall not be for thine honour; for the Lord shall sell Sisera into the hand of a woman. And Deborah arose, and went with Barak to Kedesh.”

Judges 4:8-9 (KJV)

We know that Deborah was refering to Jael, the wife of Heber, who eventually killed Sisera.  But Deborah talked about the honor being removed from Barak and these other cowardly men for insisting a woman go into battle with them. There was no praise  for these men in what they did.

So the second part of the answer to your question is – you as a woman should not seek authority over men.   Now sometimes because of this sinful world we live in women are sometimes placed over men – but Christian women should not seek this out.

Is Celibacy Right Before God?

Jill’s Statement:

“I am unmarried. I do not want to get married. I just am not interested in it. 1 Corinthians 7 says that it is okay, and even good, to stay unmarried. I often have asexual feelings and I just do not care for marriage.”

It is true that Paul calls celibacy “good” in I Corinthians 7 and he honors celibacy in service to God:

“26  I suppose therefore that this is good for the present distress, I say, that it is good for a man so to be…

32 But I would have you without carefulness. He that is unmarried careth for the things that belong to the Lord, how he may please the Lord: 33 But he that is married careth for the things that are of the world, how he may please his wife.

34 There is difference also between a wife and a virgin. The unmarried woman careth for the things of the Lord, that she may be holy both in body and in spirit: but she that is married careth for the things of the world, how she may please her husband.

35And this I speak for your own profit; not that I may cast a snare upon you, but for that which is comely, and that ye may attend upon the Lord without distraction.”

I Corinthians 7:26 & 32-35 (KJV)

Celibacy is an exception that God makes to his first command to mankind in Genesis 1:28 to “be fruitful and multiply”(to marry, have sex and have children).  God’s normative design was for man to image him by being a husband to a wife and father to children and going out in the world about his work.  He created woman to help man to fulfill his mission to image God by her dependence upon her husband for his leadership, provision and protection and by her serving him and submitting to him. In this way the husband and wife relationship pictures the relation of God to his people with man modeling God and woman modeling the people of God.

Celibacy should only be sought after either because a person has NO desire for a spouse and NO desire for children or their zeal and dedication to serve God is so strong that it makes any thought they would have of having a family seem like nothing. This kind of person wants to dedicate their life in a undivided way in service to God.  Now that does not mean celibate women have to be nuns.  They could be missionary nurses or doctors, they could be school teachers or a host other occupations in undivided service to God.

So yes, celibacy is a good thing and it is even called a gift in the Bible.  But it is only a good thing if it is pursued for the right reasons and not in order for someone to fulfill their own selfish ambitions or for someone to escape gender roles that God has assigned to marriage.

Can a Christian Woman Have Children Without a Husband?

Jill’s Statement:

“I want to have children, much later in life. I know a godly woman who never married, though she wanted to. She adopted a girl who had little chance of ever being adopted by a two-parent family. The result has been beautiful. I have prayed about this, and I still am praying. I desire something similar in my life, if it is God’s plan.”

Many Christian women have had children without a husband over the centuries.  But it is important to understand how they came to be the mother of children without a husband.

Some women were raped and then gave birth to their rapist’s child and they had to raise this child on their own.  Some women did have a husband, but perhaps they became pregnant and then he died.   Other single women have faced situations where they had no choice but to take orphaned or needy children in who had not place to go.   God honors all these situations where these women courageously raised these children on their own.

But these women did not purposefully seek to have children without first being married to a husband.  These situations were thrust upon them by God.

But for you to purposefully seek out having children (even through adoption) without first having a husband is a violation of God’s design for how we are to go about having children. 

The Bible tells us God’s design for when women should have children:

14 I will therefore that the younger women marry, bear children, guide the house, give none occasion to the adversary to speak reproachfully.

1 Timothy 5:14 (KJV)

God’s design for women having children is simple and straight forward.  First a woman marries a man.  Then she joins with her husband to fulfill God’s command to be fruitful and multiply by freely and regularly giving her body to her husband in the marriage bed.  Then she has children as a result of her obedience to give herself to her husband. She cares for the needs of her husband and children.  She also takes care of the affairs of the home after marriage.  This is God’s order, this is God’s design.

Jill, you are making up your own design for the family by even entertaining the thought of trying to have children without first being married.   And yes God will sometimes still bless us in spite of the fact that we went about something the wrong way, but that does not make it right for us to do.

Can A Woman Work While the Kids Are School?

Jill’s Statement:

“If I ever have children, I will work in a school or other similar setting so that I am home when my child/children is home, and away when they are away during school hours. I will even work from home if I have to. I want to have a child or two, I want a dog, I want to direct a library and if I do not do that then I would like to teach at a Christian school or work in ministry. I want to be a kind boss. I want to show God’s love everywhere I go. I want to help people”

It is admirable that if you had children you would want to make sure you were home when they are home.  But being a wife and mother is about so much more than just being home when your children or husband are home.  It is about caring for the home while they are gone, taking care of their clothing needs, the house needs and preparing food so that when your husband and children come home everything is done and in order.  If you try and work while they are out and get home just before they do then you will have to do all these things in the evening and you will have little time or energy for your family.

A lot of women who aspire to have careers do not consider these things.  The greatest lie of feminism is “you can have it all”.  No you can’t.  You must make a choice. Will you fully dedicate your life and time to your family and the help-meet position God made you for or will you try and dedicate half your time to your own desires and give your family what is left?

You desire to help people is wonderful.  And I think working in a Christian school or other Christian ministry in a full time capacity would be a wonderful thing for you to do.  But you have to make a choice.  You can help people by dedicating your life in celibacy in service to God in a Christian school or other Christian ministry giving up having children and a husband OR you can choose to help your husband and your children by caring for their needs and the needs of your home.  You must be 100 percent dedicated to one or the other – if you try and do half and half you fail at one.

Is Marriage an “equal-but-different partnership”?

Jill’s Statement:

“If I ever get married, I feel led for it to be an equal-but-different partnership. I pray about these things. I feel led by God in this direction, at least for now.”

The Bible tells us we cannot live by how we feel, but by instead by what the Word of God says despite our feelings.  The Bible tells us this about trusting our feelings:

“26 He that trusteth in his own heart is a fool: but whoso walketh wisely, he shall be delivered.“

Proverbs 28:26 (KJV)

It is foolish for us to follow our feelings, but rather we must trust in the Lord with all our heart and allow his Word, and not our feelings, to direct our path.

“5 Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding. 6 In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths.”

Proverbs 3:5-6 (KJV)

Also in regard to feelings – we can with the Lord’s help over time change our feelings and direct them as he would have us to.  That means that we can as we surrender to  God’s will for our lives come to love what he loves and hate what he hates.  We can feel good about what he wants us to feel good about even if we did not feel good about it before.

So this brings us to the next question. Does the Bible teach marriage as a “equal-but-different partnership”?

“23 For the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church: and he is the saviour of the body.  24 Therefore as the church is subject unto Christ, so let the wives be to their own husbands in every thing.”

Ephesians 5:23-24 (KJV)

The passage above from Ephesians tell you as a young woman why God created you.  He created you to play a part in painting the beautiful picture of the relationship of God to his people.  In this model, you play the part of the Church who submits to Christ in everything.  Your service to your husband, who represents Christ in this model, is your service to God.  The only exception to this design is celibacy in service to God – but only if you are truly called to it for unselfish reasons.

“1 Likewise, ye wives, be in subjection to your own husbands; that, if any obey not the word, they also may without the word be won by the conversation of the wives; 2 While they behold your chaste conversation coupled with fear…

6 Even as Sara obeyed Abraham, calling him lord: whose daughters ye are, as long as ye do well, and are not afraid with any amazement.

7 Likewise, ye husbands, dwell with them according to knowledge, giving honour unto the wife, as unto the weaker vessel, and as being heirs together of the grace of life; that your prayers be not hindered.”

I Peter 3:1-2 & 5-7 (KJV)

While women and wives are joint heirs with their husbands of the grace of life, the Bible never calls husbands and wives equal partners – it fact it never calls them partners (despite the NIV changing the translations to “partner”).

Women are called to submit to their husbands as the church submits to Christ.  Are the Christ and Church equal partners or is one the subordinate to the other?

And God did not just flip a coin and put man in charge of woman.   He made woman for man as the Scriptures tell us in I Corinthians 11:9 “Neither was the man created for the woman; but the woman for the man.”   Woman submitting to and serving man is a beautiful picture of mankind submitting to and serving God.  And the man lovingly leading, providing for, teaching and protecting his wife is a beautiful picture of God doing all these things for his people.

Conclusion

As I close let me just point out something based on this statement you made “I want to have children, much later in life.”  Let’s be honest – why would you want to have children much later in life? The honest answer is because your love for education and your career ambitions to be a librarian are more important to you than having children, yet you desire children.  But you desire children outside of God’s designed path which is marriage.   This is by definition a selfish ambition.  Anytime we desire things that outside God’s design for us that is a selfish desire.

When a woman desires to have children without a husband that is just as selfish as a man who desires to have sex with a woman without having to marrying her.  Both the desire for children and the desire for sex are God given desires, but when we seek to go about to fulfill those desires in a way which violates God’s design we sin against God in doing so.

So Jill– you have a choice to make.  If you feel you cannot fulfill the role God designed women in general to fulfill – to be subordinate helpers to men to help them paint the picture of God and his people – then you can exercise the celibacy option in service to him.  But you cannot take half measures and actively seek to have children and make a family the way you want it, instead of the way God designed family to be.

Even if you decide you will follow God’s design for having children and marry a husband first if you do as you have stated and “have children, much later in life” this could still be selfish ambition on your part.

It is one thing if you are vigorously as young woman pursing a husband and family and during that time you are working to support yourself.  There is no sin in this.  But God knows your heart.  If in your heart you know that you are purposefully delaying finding a husband and having a family so that you can pursue educational and career interests and then later you will do the “family thing” that is utter selfishness before God.  That is NOT why God created you.  He created you for man, he created you marriage and the only exception to that is true dedicated celibacy in service to him.

 

Real men DO provide and Real women DO appreciate it

/ biblicalgenderroles / 20 Comments

“Real men provide Real women appreciate it” was a simple message posted on a billboard in Forysth County, North Carolina.  60 years ago such a sign would have been lauded by our communities.  But now in our post-feminist culture this message is considered “a sexist comment”.

Molly Grace, a woman who organized opposition to the sign, made this statement:

“The very notion that there should be a man to provide and that no matter what a woman should just plain accept it and appreciate it, is a sexist comment,” said Grace, who is an outspoken critic against the billboard.”

http://myfox8.com/2017/02/28/crowdfunding-to-change-controversial-billboard-in-winston-salem/

She wants the anonymous person who paid for it to be posted to come to a local panel and “explain why they think the way that they do and try to shed some light on it for us”.

Some people thought the anonymous person who posted the sign was targeting men, not women.

“Donald Amos says he likes the sign and said he believes it’s directed toward men who are not fulfilling their promises.

“A lot of times, women have to go on their own and do this and take the role of a man and a women and it’s not right, but it happens and I think men ought to step their game up. Really they ought to and become men again instead of shoulda, coulda, wannabes,” Amos said.”

http://myfox8.com/2017/02/22/real-men-provide-billboard-in-forsyth-county-sparks-controversy/

Perhaps it would have been considered less “sexist” to feminists if the sign had simply read “Real men provide”.  But because the sign implied that real women appreciate men that can provide for them – that cannot be allowed to stand.

Why do some people think that real men should provide and real women should appreciate it?

If you are a person that thinks like Molly let me “shed some light” on this issue for you from the source that some Americans still hold dear and that is the Bible.

The man’s providing role is referenced in multiple passages of the Scriptures.

In Genesis after Adam and Eve sinned God said he would make both Adam and Eve’s primary roles more difficult:

“16 Unto the woman he said, I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception; in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children; and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee.

17 And unto Adam he said, Because thou hast hearkened unto the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten of the tree, of which I commanded thee, saying, Thou shalt not eat of it: cursed is the ground for thy sake; in sorrow shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life;

18 Thorns also and thistles shall it bring forth to thee; and thou shalt eat the herb of the field;

19 In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground; for out of it wast thou taken: for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return.”

Genesis 3:16-19 (KJV)

Woman would experience great pain now in child birth – one of her most important duties in her help meet role to man. It would not so easy for man to provide for his family, but instead he would have to work hard to get what he needed from the earth.

In addition because of woman’s new sinful nature she would make his other very important role, that of leading the home, much more difficult as she would seek to control him and the home instead of submitting to him as God had designed her to do.

But even though God made the man’s duty of providing and the woman’s duty to give birth more difficult he also provide them both with the gift of joy from the pain they had to endure in their labor:

“A woman when she is in travail hath sorrow, because her hour is come: but as soon as she is delivered of the child, she remembereth no more the anguish, for joy that a man is born into the world.”

John 16:21 (KJV)

“There is nothing better for a man, than that he should eat and drink, and that he should make his soul enjoy good in his labour. This also I saw, that it was from the hand of God.”

Ecclesiastes 2:24 (KJV)

In the Law of Moses a man’s provision for his wife was deemed of such critical importance that if he failed to do so his wife could seek a divorce:

“10 If he take him another wife; her food, her raiment, and her duty of marriage, shall he not diminish. 11 And if he do not these three unto her, then shall she go out free without money.”

Exodus 21:10-11 (KJV)

The New Testament reaffirms and strengthens the distinct roles of man and woman

The New Testament tells us that a woman’s primary role is to be the bearer of children and the keeper of the home:

 “4 That they may teach the young women to be sober, to love their husbands, to love their children, 5 To be discreet, chaste, keepers at home, good, obedient to their own husbands, that the word of God be not blasphemed.”

Titus 2:4-5 (KJV)

God reiterates his call for men to be providers and protectors to their wives in the Epistle to the Ephesians:

“28 So ought men to love their wives as their own bodies. He that loveth his wife loveth himself. 29 For no man ever yet hated his own flesh; but nourisheth and cherisheth it, even as the Lord the church:”

Ephesians 5:28-19 (KJV)

Husbands are called by God to provide for the physical needs of their wife as they would the needs of their own body.  They are also called to protect their wife as they would their own body.

Was the Proverbs 31 woman a career woman?

Many Christians have tried to point to Proverbs 31 to show a defense of women having careers outside the home.  There is no doubt that Proverbs 31 shows the woman going out to plant a field or sell in the market.  But here is what people miss.

The Proverbs 31 wife did not leave anything undone in her home so as to go outside the home and provide.  It tells us of her husband “The heart of her husband doth safely trust in her…” (vs 11) and that she “She looketh well to the ways of her household…”(vs 27).

Proverbs 31 in no way paints the modern career women we see today.  With the schedules that modern career women keep being gone from their home anywhere from 40 to sometimes 50 hours a week there is little to no chance they are also doing 100% of what they should be doing at home.  Their duties to their home will slide or be neglected.

But can’t a woman and her husband just split the roles of provider and the duties of the home?

Well if we want to throw out the duties God has assigned to man and woman as well as then entire picture of marriage with man symbolizing God as the leader, PROVIDER and protector of the woman and woman submitting to her husband and serving him by bearing his children, caring for them and caring for the home then sure – it does not matter and husband and wives can split these roles.

But what if the man can’t work?

Because we live in sin cursed world husbands get sick, get disabled or lose their jobs. Sometimes because we live in sin cursed world unforeseen financial events occur where a man must ask his wife to work to provide additional income for their family to survive.  These are not the kinds of situations we are talking about in this article.  God understands this type of situation.

But what we are talking about here are young couples that marry and PLAN to have the wife be a career woman. We are talking about a man and woman literally agreeing to the fact that she will purposefully not devote herself entirely to her duties to bear children, care for them and care for the home.

These couples actually PLAN to split the duties of husbands and wives between themselves in direct contradiction to God’s design and his commands. There is no excuse for such plans of men and women which go against the very commands of God.

Real men provide

If you are a young man reading this I hope that it will help to show you that our culture has sinned against God in abandoning the gender roles he designed. I hope that you will purpose in your heart that you will not seek marriage to any woman until you can provide for her so that she can dedicate herself fully to the role God has given her as the bearer and nurturer of your future children and the keeper of your future home.

I am not saying you have to be rich when you get married.  Please don’t misunderstand me.  But you should be able to provide a modest life – with food and shelter. You don’t have to provide brand new cars and a big fancy house.  If you can provide for her the basics of life so she can be the homemaker God wants her to be then you are doing what is right before God.

As a young man you should have a plan to further yourself anticipating that as your family grows so too the expenses will grow.  This means that while you may be able to marry based on a certain wage you make – you need to plan on how you will provide more in the future as your family needs it.

And in the future should you ever lose your job – asking your wife to work outside the home should be your last resort. If you have to work two jobs to provide –then you should do so.

Real women appreciate a man who will provide for them

If you are one of these young women that were raised by your parents to be independent and not have to depend on a man you need to throw that thinking out in the trash. Your parents may have felt they were doing right by you and just looking out for you in case you don’t find a husband or in case your husband were to divorce you or die.

Yes because of sin in this world we are not always able to live up to God’s design for men, women and marriage. But we should not plan for the failure of God’s plan in marriage due to sin on our part or that of our spouse or the sinful circumstances of this world.

Instead we should plan for success.

As a young lady your goal should be this very goal given to you directly by God through the Apostle Paul:

“I will therefore that the younger women marry, bear children, guide the house, give none occasion to the adversary to speak reproachfully.”

1 Timothy 5:14 (KJV)

Will you follow the world’s pattern or God’s pattern?

To young men and women.  You must decide before you seek out marriage.  Will you follow the world’s pattern of partnership marriage and gender neutrality when it comes to the roles in your family or will you follow the pattern God has established for men and women?

The Bible tells us not to follow our culture when it conflicts with God’s design:

 “And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.”

Romans 12:2 (KJV)

Will you ask God to renew your mind today? To make you the man or woman he has called you to be? To play the role he has called you to? I hope that you will.

And let me tell you something – it will bring peace to your marriage if you follow God’s pattern especially in this area of the man being the provider for the home.

You see God has placed a desire in every man to provide for his woman and his family.  For some men it is buried far beneath years of conditioning by our culture, but make no mistake it is there.  That is why many men cannot marry a woman who makes more than them.  It is not a pride issue, it is a God given man issue.

Its time to blunt about this

Sinful pride and ambition blinds us. When we are ambitious for what God has called us to do as men and women that is a great thing and blessed of God.  So when a young man has career ambitions and ambitions of not only having a family and providing for them but also making his mark on the world that is from God himself and it is good.  When a young woman has ambitions of marrying a godly man that can fully provide for her and her future children and she has ambitions for caring for those children and her home this again is from God and it pleases him.

But what about men that have ambitions to marry a woman who can provide for them as a man so they can care for the home and children? This ambition is a sinful one because it violates God’s design. What about a young man who has ambitions to marry a career woman knowing he will not be able to fully provide and knowing she will not be able to fully dedicate herself to their home as God wills? Again such an ambition is a sinful and selfish ambition.

Let me conclude with this warning to young couples who want to follow the path God has set forth in the Bible.

You have two choices in this life.  You are either called by God to a life of celibacy in his service or you are called to seek out marriage.  There are is no choice in between.  Now notice I said “seek out marriage” because not everyone will find someone to marry. But if we are not given the gift of celibacy, we are called to seek marriage.

To young men:

If you have not been given the call of God to celibacy in his service and you have a desire to seek out marriage then you cannot seek out a career path that will never be able to fully provide for your future family. If your future plans for marriage involve your future wife having to work to help provide then your future plans are WRONG. Perhaps the career path you are thinking about will eventually be able to provide for a family but at first it will not be able to.  Many men pursue apprenticeship jobs in fields that do not make enough to provide for a family but eventually they will. That is ok.  But then you must wait for marriage until your career plans come to fruition and you are able to provide for your wife and future children.

And finally to young men – not only should you be able to provide but you should seek out a Christian woman that wants a man that believes he should be able to provide for her. You want a woman that appreciates this conviction and your desire for yourself and your future wife to follow God’s design for men and women.

In other words – don’t marry a career woman. And you know how to NOT fall in love with and marry a career woman? Don’t date one.

To young women:

If you have not been given the call of God to celibacy in his service and you have a desire to seek out marriage then you must not seek out a career.  It is one thing to work and save money while you are seeking your future husband. In fact this could be a blessing to your future husband. But you must be able to drop whatever work it is you are doing the moment you find the man God has for you so that you can fully dedicate yourself to serving him in the role God has given you as his helper.

There is no sin in you as a young woman going to college while seeking that man that God has for you. But make sure that this will not saddle your husband with great debt.  So that might mean going to a community college where it is more affordable and you can work a part time job and pay off the schooling as you take it. If your parents can pay for a better school while you look than that is fine as well as long as you will not be passing this debt to your future husband.

Your goal whether you go to college or just work a job while looking for him is to come into the marriage with little or no debt or perhaps a small savings from your work that you can bless your husband with as you enter the marriage together.

Seek out a godly man that can also provide for you as God wants every man to do for his wife and children. This is not a matter of “either or” as if you must choose between finding a godly man or a man that can provide for you.  If the man you seek to marry truly understands God’s word and wants to live that out he will not want to marry you until he can provide.

I thank God for whomever anonymously paid for that message board. We will need more of those around our country to stir up this conversation and to help bring people back to the design that God has for men and women.

 

Why does God make some women with a genius level IQ if he wants all women to be homemakers?

/ biblicalgenderroles / 45 Comments

“I am a neurosurgeon with three kids. With my first child, I thought that I would give staying home a chance. I hated it. For five years, I was miserable. I am not a homemaker or a cooker or a nurturer. Our child was not happy, and my partner and I were not happy. I went back to work and took only six weeks off after the birth of my other two children, and our life has been amazing. I have an IQ of 158. I need to use my brain. In addition, I have firsthand experience about what it is like to be a child and mother on both sides of the fence.” This was part of a story I received from a woman who calls herself Jess.

At the end of her comments she asked me a simple question in light of the Bible passages I have presented showing that God made women to be helpmeets to men, bearers and caregivers to the children and the keeper of the home.  Her question was “How do you explain me?”

Before I give my response to Jess and to the larger question of the existence of female geniuses in light of the role that God has given women in being wives, mothers and homemakers I want to share Jess’s complete story (as much as she shared that is).

Jess’s Story

“When I was a child, my mother did everything mentioned in this article, yet I hated my childhood. Kids need to be away from their parents. I asked my parents if they could back off. They agreed. After school, I went to a free child-care provider. I did not get any help with my homework. I spent at most 2 hours with my family a day. Guess what happened? I became emotionally stable. I became happy. My grades improved. I loved my life. That went on until I left home at 18.

Today, I am a neurosurgeon with three kids. With my first child, I thought that I would give staying home a chance. I hated it. For five years, I was miserable. I am not a homemaker or a cooker or a nurturer. Our child was not happy, and my partner and I were not happy. I went back to work and took only six weeks off after the birth of my other two children, and our life has been amazing.

I have an IQ of 158. I need to use my brain. In addition, I have firsthand experience about what it is like to be a child and mother on both sides of the fence.

I am a women and I:

Have no emotional intelligence. My husband says that I am about as emotional as a brick wall.

Don’t have soft hands, they are really very rough and scratchy.

I take risks all the time. I am a rock climber and I love paragliding and bungee jumping.

I have a body fat percentage lower than the average male, and I have basically no curves. I have barely any fat in my breasts, it’s mostly pecs.

I have a very hard time dealing with children.

How do you explain me?”

My Response to Jess and other highly intelligent or genius level women

You sound like a very intelligent woman and with an IQ of 158 that puts you just a couple points shy of Stephen Hawking. I do not deny the existence of high IQ women like you and I have talked about it on my site in several posts.

These are the facts about genius level IQ distribution by gender:

“For instance, at the near-genius level (an IQ of 145), brilliant men outnumber brilliant women by 8 to one. That’s statistics, not sexism…

Of course, in normal daily life, there’s not much real difference between a man with an IQ of 105 and a woman with an IQ of 100. The real difference only emerges as we rise up the IQ scale to the sort of level that the really top jobs require and as we drop lower down the scale – because men, as it turns out, have a much wider range of intelligence than women.

As a result, there are not only far more men with high IQs than there are women, but there are also, as I’m sure any woman would tell you, far more stupid men around than there are stupid women.”

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-1274952/Men-ARE-brainy-women-says-scientist-Professor-Richard-Lynn.html#ixzz46QZ2qDGm

So the fact is that that men have a much broader range of IQs than women meaning there are more stupid men that stupid women – a fact that most feminists love to shout.  But on the other end of the spectrum there are more highly intelligent men than highly intelligent women and this is a fact that feminists fight to hide.  Often it is explained away as nothing more than cultural influences rather than a biological fact.

This also explains why men occupy roughly 75 percent of STEM jobs.

So how should we as Bible believing Christians respond to women that occupy that 1 out of 9 genius level spot?

If the Bible is a made up book of fables then you can just live your life as you please and when you die you will just fade away.

But if the Bible is the Word of God then that means each and every one of us has a soul that will live on after our body has died. It also means that one day each of us will stand and give an account for how we have lived our lives. If God’s Word is true then we must measure our daily and long term life decisions and actions by the Bible.

I don’t know if you are a Christian or not but if a young Christian woman came to me with your story and she wanted to live her life by the Bible believing she would one day stand before God and give an account of her life I would give her the following admonitions.

The Bible says that the presence of sin in the world has corrupted everything including our bodies even as we are formed in our mother’s womb.

 “Behold, I was shapen in iniquity; and in sin did my mother conceive me.” – Psalm 51:5 (KJV)

“So also is the resurrection of the dead. It is sown in corruption; it is raised in incorruption:” – I Corinthians 15:42 (KJV)

So anything in us whether it be our physical characteristics, our mental characteristics, our attitudes, our likes, our dislikes or our desires that do not measure up to God’s standards and expectations for our lives are to be regarded as defects caused by the corruption of sin in this world. These are things that we must overcome to bring our life into compliance with God’s will for our lives.

Now am I saying being smart is a defect because you are woman? No.

But an intelligent woman can use her intelligence in many ways.  An intelligent woman can write books from her home, write a blog, teach women’s Bible classes, teach and home school her children and when her children are grown and gone perhaps help other women in teaching their children. In some cases a woman may be able to run some type of small business out of her home if she has the intelligence, energy and will to do so.

The Bible does not say that women are only allowed to cook, clean the house, do laundry and care for children and the needs of the husband.  But what it does say is that these things are the primary mission of a woman and if she fails at these things a woman fails at her most important mission in this life.

The purpose for which God made women and the mission he has given to them

The Scriptures show us in these passages the reason for which he made women and their primary mission in life by which a woman will be considered a success or a failure in God’s eyes:

“And the Lord God said, It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him an help meet for him.” – Genesis 2:18 (KJV)

“Neither was the man created for the woman; but the woman for the man.” – I Corinthians 11:9 (KJV)

“The heart of her husband doth safely trust in her, so that he shall have no need of spoil.” – Proverbs 31:11 (KJV)

“I will therefore that the younger women marry, bear children, guide the house, give none occasion to the adversary to speak reproachfully.” – I Timothy 5:14 (KJV)

“That they may teach the young women to be sober, to love their husbands, to love their children, To be discreet, chaste, keepers at home, good, obedient to their own husbands, that the word of God be not blasphemed.” – Titus 2:4-5 (KJV)

“She looketh well to the ways of her household, and eateth not the bread of idleness.” – Proverbs 31:27 (KJV)

God’s mission for woman is to serve the needs of her husband, bear and care for his children and care for the domestic needs of his home. 

The women who get an exemption from this mission are those who are called to a life of celibacy in service to God or are in some way providentially hindered from either finding a husband or having children.

Questions and observations I have based on your story

I would also say to a Christian woman who had your childhood experiences – “what caused you to hate your childhood so much and being around your parents so much?“ This is not normal social behavior for a child.

I realize you tried the homemaker role (which I commend you for) but I can guess why your child and your husband were not happy.  It was because you were not happy.  If you find things like cooking, nurturing and caring for your home and children on a daily basis to be a drudgery and waste of your abilities then of course it will show and then cause others in your home to be unhappy because you are constantly displaying unhappiness.

You say your life has been “amazing” but I doubt your children especially when they were younger thought it was so “amazing” not to have their mom around as much as they needed her.   No six week old baby goes “yeah my mom is leaving me and giving me some alone time”.  Children at this age desperately need their mothers 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

Yes children will adjust as they get older to not having their mother around but that does not make it good for them.  Some children in the most horrible of situations still turn out good sometimes in spite of their mothers or fathers not being as involved in their lives as they should have been.

What about your emotional and physical features?

If a Christian woman told me she had no emotional intelligence and had a hard time dealing with children I would tell her the same thing I tell women who say they simply don’t have a desire for sex with their husbands.  You need to cultivate a desire for these things and ask God to put these things in your heart and remove any desires in your heart that are contrary to his design for your life.

“Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts: And see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.” – Psalm 139:23-24 (KJV)

“A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you an heart of flesh.” – Ezekiel 36:26 (KJV)

On the issue of you having a manlier shaped and muscular body and rough hands – this is because of how you have chosen to live your life. It is good for a woman to be healthy and in shape and I am not saying anything against that.  But women are designed to have more fat then men and fat is what actually helps to give women some curves and softness to their body.  I am sure if you were to work out less and allow your body to have some of that natural fat that women are meant to have you would have a much more feminine appearance.

Now are there some women that don’t work out at all that still have muscular bodies? Sure. And if that is the case than this is the body God has given you and you will need to work with it. But in the vast majority of the cases where women have pectoral muscles as opposed to breasts it is because they are working out and exercising too much.

Conclusion

In the Bible there is something mentioned called “strife” or in newer translations it is called “selfish ambition”.

“For where you have envy and selfish ambition, there you find disorder and every evil practice.” – James 3:16 (NIV)

God is not against women being ambitious. The Proverbs 31 wife was certainly an ambitious woman.  What God is against is selfish ambition. Selfish ambition is when a man or a woman are ambitious for something that God did not intend them to have.

God intended for you to marry a man and then serve him with all your heart to the very best of your ability. God intended for you to have children (if you are not barren) and to care for those children.  God intended for you to care for your home and make it a haven for your husband and your children.  This is not meant to be a life of drudgery but a life of honor and service.

The reason we have such disorder in our society today is because over the last century men have abandoned their authority over women and as a result women were allowed to abandon the role for which God made them in his creation. Women became envious of men and followed their selfish ambitions and this is why in the last century we have seen the highest divorce rates in the history of mankind and even the concept of marriage itself is being rejected in favor of people just living with another.

One of the many casualties of this selfish culture is our young infants and smaller children who cry in terror as they watch their mothers go off to live their “amazing” lives as they pursue their career interests outside the home.

Why women don’t belong in politics

/ biblicalgenderroles / 18 Comments

Do women belong in the political arena? Should we encourage our daughters to emulate the lives of women like Hillary Clinton or Sarah Palin? Some Christians believe examples of women like the prophetess Deborah in the Bible answers this question with a resounding “Yes!” This was the position taken by a young Christian woman named Justice Forte who recently wrote a comment on my post “How to Help Women Learn Their Place”.

But does the example of Deborah and other prophetesses and prominent women in the Bible show us that God wants women involved in the political arena?

Before we seek to answer this question let me share Justice’s story.

Justice Forte’s Story

Larry Solomon,

While scrolling through my Facebook feed, I came across your intriguing post. Though I usually do not take the time to read articles shared by my friends, as I am a pre-law college student with hundreds of pages of reading assigned to me each night, the striking words “How to Help Women Learn Their Place” piqued my interest. I visited your blog and read the biographical information you provided and several of your comment threads. As a Catholic, made in the image of God, I share many of your beliefs and I have read most of the passages that you listed in your article during my years attending Catholic institutions. I have been fortunate in that I have had numerous mentors that have guided me in my faith, including my father, mother, and several teachers. I have had the opportunity to analyze philosophical and theological works, including those of St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas with the great educators I encountered in my time at Pope John XXIII High School in Sparta, New Jersey. I have studied these topics with fervor, and I have strengthened my faith through constant inquiry, as my religion is not something that I take for granted.

However, I believe that your article reflects not only the loving messages given to us by God, but also several sexist attitudes embedded in our society. While it is clear that God created men and women with differing characteristics, strengths, and weaknesses, I do not think that it necessarily follows that the two genders must adhere strictly to narrow roles. While the Bible includes passages that guide women to be reverent and respectful to men, it also offers direction to men to love women and to treat them with kindness and understanding, and to acknowledge them as companions and partners in life.

As an 18 year old woman, I have struggled throughout my lifetime to discover exactly what your article claims to offer an answer to. I have struggled to learn my place in this world with this life that I have been given. The wave of feminism that you readily criticize has afforded me the ability to explore the vast possibilities of who I could be. It has allowed me to receive an education, and to read the works of insightful minds who have contemplated and established their places in life.

Through this education, I have found role models such as Deborah the fifth judge of the Old Testament referenced in Judges 4 and 5 and Hebrews 11:32-34. A thoughtful and effective leader, Deborah lifted the spirits of the downtrodden Israelites as she prophesied the word of the Lord under her famous palm tree. A courageous warrior, she led her army of 10,000 against the 100,000 Canaanites and proved victorious. The mother of Israel, the wife of Lapidoth, and the prophetess of God, Deborah serves as the ultimate example of a woman using her specific gifts to lead and to change the world in which she lived.

My education has also allowed me to ascertain and to ruminate on various attitudes and viewpoints regarding sexuality and gender roles that exist in the present day and to solidify my position on these crucial topics. Before beginning my studies at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, I had always referred to myself as a “traditionalist feminist.” I viewed myself as equal to my male classmates, as I had continually been able to interact and compete with them academically. However, I did not feel that I could properly call myself a feminist and all that this term has come to mean, as I agree with many of the roles set out for men and women. This internal conflict continued until I came across a page in my international relations textbook during my first semester at college which separated feminism into two distinct categories.

The definition of liberal feminism was familiar to me; it was an idea that I had heard recurrently, an idea that I could never bring myself to agree with. The theory of liberal feminism claims that there are no fundamental differences between men and women and that any perceived distinctions are merely the result of societal stereotyping.

To me, this theory seems entirely unrealistic, as I have experienced the inherent differences between the genders in countless situations, specifically during my time playing for the men’s ice hockey team at my high school. It is indisputable that I was not physically equal to the men on the ice, as I was mentally equal in the classroom. But, Authors Joshua Goldstein and Jon Pevehouse offer the definition of another strand of feminism, difference feminism, which focuses on “valorizing the feminine…valuing the unique contributions of women as women.” Difference feminism provides a way for a woman like me to both accept many gender roles and to work to compete academically and intellectually to shape their societies and to learn their places within them.

In your article, you stressed the need for parents, teachers, and pastors to teach young women how to behave as daughters of God and you argued that feminism has resulted in disrespectful behavior by women to their fathers and their husbands. Throughout my life, I have looked to my mother and father for guidance and they have been the measure against which I have evaluated myself. My mother is a devoted wife and homemaker, and she has worked tirelessly to instill in my brother and me values of compassion, kindness, and honesty. However, my mother has also served as my greatest advocate, and she has consistently demanded that I be afforded the same opportunities as my brother. She has taught me to be ambitious, and to embrace every task with passion and diligence.

My father, for whom I have immeasurable respect, has provided me with every possible chance to both better and challenge myself. He supported me throughout my eight year long career as a hockey player, understanding that this activity, though male-dominated, was important to me and would present many occasions for self-growth. It was my father who pushed me far beyond my own perceived limitations and encouraged me to apply to the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, a school 1,250 miles from my home, and it was him who all but forced me to accept my full tuition scholarship to attend this institution of higher education. While my mother and father have taught me what it means to be a daughter of God, bringing me to mass, showing me how to present myself in word, deed, and dress, and providing examples through their own lives, they have never allowed my gender to inhibit my desire to learn and participate in my society.

In concluding your article, you offered a list of Bible verses to be used by women to guide their behavior. While I disagree with the connotations of several of your brief summary headings, as I feel you have misinterpreted some of the text due to the gender biases that our society poses, I have tried to model my life based off of teachings and verses such as these. I work hard to be trustworthy, to show discretion when it is necessary, to speak with wisdom kindness, and love, to dress modestly, and to look to my parents and grandparents for guidance when I have needed it.

Though I have copious aspirations, including earning a college degree, attending and graduating from law school, and using all I will have learned to pursue a career in politics, I also hope one day to be a wife and mother.

Like your daughter, I look forward to fulfilling my role in God’s design and I intend to embark on that endeavor with the same ambition that I have put into my education, the same ambition that has been fostered for 18 years by my parents and teachers. I will treat my husband with respect and I will gladly support him in all that he does, and I will expect that he show me the love and kindness that God commands.

However, right now, I am an 18 year old woman, and I am subject and accountable to no one but my parents, educators, and myself. Right now I am a student and I intend to learn all that I can so that I may one day change my world, because my ambitions stretch far past the nuclear family unit and home. I urge you to contemplate my viewpoint, because I have combated attitudes similar to the one you expressed throughout my life. I have had boyfriends who claimed I showed them disrespect by simply having conversations with other males. I have had young men on opposing hockey teams cast disparaging remarks at me such as “make me a sandwich, bitch,” in an effort to help me learn what they think should be my place. I urge you to reflect on the possibility that there is more than one way for a young woman like myself, and like your daughter, to fulfill her role as a daughter of God and to learn their true place. I ask you to cogitate on my position because I feel it is imperative for today’s young women to understand that their faith does not have to stand in contrast with their aspirations, and you and I both have the power to spread this message. I respectfully ask you to take the time to read and respond to my post, as I would be interested to hear more about your perspective.”

My Response to Justice Forte

First and foremost Justice – I want to commend you for what I believe is a genuine faith in Jesus Christ and your belief in his Word.  I also want to commend you for your respect and admiration for your parents as this is something highly lacking in many young people today. I also commend you for listening to wise teachers and being curious about and studying schools of theological and philosophical thought. Being a critical thinker is never a bad thing but unfortunately in most generations there have been few of us that are critical thinkers.

What I want to do next is to zoom in on a few statements that you made and respond to them from the perspective of Christians who believe in a patriarchal view of society and marriage as well as more “strict” Biblical gender roles.

Prominent women in the Bible

First let’s take a look at some female characters that are often used by feminist Christians to assert that God encourages women to take active leadership in political and church arenas and see if any of these women resemble a modern feminist.

Miriam – prophet. – It never specifically says she exercised authority over men.

Deborah – prophet; judge; led the army of Israel into battle with Barak, their commander. She was a spiritual and moral leader. She did not seek to lead with Barak, he begged her to. She shamed him by telling him God would hand their enemies into the hands of a “woman”. It is interesting the Bible says she sat under a tree, and not at the city Gates as leaders typically did.

Hulda – prophet during the reign of Josiah. She served at a time when Israel had forsaken God, one of their darkest hours. Josiah sought to restore worship and the Word of God and sent messengers to her to seek the will of God.

Anna – a widow who became a prophet and pronounced Jesus to be the redeemer of Israel

Lydia – business woman in the Philippian Church, but the Bible never refers to her as a leader or a Pastor.

Priscilla – helped Paul while he was establishing churches at Corinth and Ephesus; with her husband Aquila, corrected Apollo’s preaching and helped him to learn of the new way in Christ.

Junias – contrary to feminist teachings, she was not an Apostle, but she was honored by the Apostles for her work in the Lord.

Phoebe – a servant in the Church at Cenchrea, She was not a deacon as feminists assert.

There is absolutely no Biblical evidence that any of these women sought to raise the social status of women or to challenge the role of a woman in the home and in her relationship with her husband.

Is Deborah a feminist role model for women?

Your Statement:

“Through this education, I have found role models such as Deborah the fifth judge of the Old Testament referenced in Judges 4 and 5 and Hebrews 11:32-34.”

I challenge you to present any Biblical evidence that Deborah was a “warrior”. She was nothing more than moral support and reluctant moral support at that.  If you look at the passage from Judges 5 Deborah only went with Barak because he asked her to and he refused to go if she would not go with him.  She was not the proud feminist that she is portrayed as.   In fact she said God would hand their enemy into the hands of a “woman” and this was not said in a proud way, but to shame Barak for refusing to go without her.  God did eventually give the honor of killing Sisera to a woman (Jael) to shame the men for their cowardly behavior.

The truth is this.  We have no evidence that Deborah neglected her duties to her home in her role as prophetess.  In fact we have no idea how old she was when God called her to this position. She may have been barren or raised her children and taken on this role much later in life after her children were grown and gone.

Women in leadership positions were the exception to God’s design not the norm

In no way does the Bible EVER paint women in leadership roles as a positive thing, but it is something God uses to shame the men into action.

“As for my people, children are their oppressors, and women rule over them. O my people, they which lead thee cause thee to err, and destroy the way of thy paths.” -Isaiah 3:12 (KJV)

God is allowed to make exceptions to his own rules

God made these exceptions to his own design at limited and specific times:

God allowed a donkey to speak to a Balaam in Numbers chapter 22.

God tells the prophet Isaiah to go and prophesy naked for 3 years in Isaiah chapter 20.

God tells the prophet Hosea to go marry a prostitute (something clearly forbidden for priests) in Hosea chapter 1.

God took Enoch (in Genesis 5) and Elijah (2 Kings 2) directly to heaven without them first experiencing physical death.

In the same way that God made these exceptions to his rules God has sometimes allowed women to occupy positions of spiritual authority in an effort to shame the men of their society into action and obedience to God.

Are “sexist” beliefs always wrong?

Your Statement:

“However, I believe that your article reflects not only the loving messages given to us by God, but also several sexist attitudes embedded in our society. While it is clear that God created men and women with differing characteristics, strengths, and weaknesses, I do not think that it necessarily follows that the two genders must adhere strictly to narrow roles. While the Bible includes passages that guide women to be reverent and respectful to men, it also offers direction to men to love women and to treat them with kindness and understanding, and to acknowledge them as companions and partners in life.”

Let me first address the term “sexist”.  This term is often used synonymously with “misogynist” but the two words really mean two different things.

The truth is that while all misogynists (haters of women) are sexists not all sexist people are misogynists.

If by “sexist” you mean a person who believes that one gender may typically excel in certain tasks over the other gender than I and those others who believe that men and women excel over one another in different areas could be labeled as sexists. For example, men generally speaking are better at most physical sports than women and women generally are better at tasks that require nurturing and empathy than men.

This is why if you take the typical woman and throw her in a sports game with men she will get beat.  It is also why if you put a man in a room with toddlers and infants he will not do as well caring for their needs as the typical woman.  Are there exceptions to these norms? Of course there are.  But exceptions do not negate norms.

But based on your belief in “Difference Feminism” I would guess that this is not something you are including in what you think are “sexist attitudes embedded in our society”. You accept these types of differences between genders.  However, you do seem to believe though that it is “sexist” for a person to believe that a woman’s place is in the home.  If that is what you mean by “sexist” then I plead guilty.

To be fair to your position – I recognize that you are not condemning women who choose to be homemakers as your mother was.

But you seem to feel that it is “sexist” for a person to believe God did not give women a choice but instead directly commanded that a woman should spend the majority of her time, talents and energy in direct service to her husband, her children and her home.

Coed Sports force men to violate their natural God given instincts toward women

You reference the fact that you played hockey – a sport you readily admit is dominated by men. The reason that hockey is dominated by men is because it is not only physically demanding but it also a very aggressive sport not unlike football although football is even more aggressive.

I have allowed and even encouraged my daughter to play basketball on a church league in our area – but it was not coed.  They have a separate league for girls and a separate league for boys. I would not encourage my daughter to do what your father encouraged you to do and play hockey with men.  There are two reasons I would not have done what your father did.

The first reason is that men will often instinctively hold back and do not play as aggressively when women are involved.  The second reason is that coed sports can also bring out frustration in men as they realize at a conscious or unconscious level that God meant for men to protect women and not to physically compete with women.  This is why I am firmly against any type of coed sports leagues because I believe anything that causes men and women to go against their God given gender specific design, nature or instincts is not something we should encourage.

This is also one of the reasons women do not belong in the military as men will instinctively afford more protection to female unit members which affects unit cohesion and effectiveness.

The Bible does not call a man’s wife his partner

You talked about a wife being her husband’s “companion and partner”.  While the Bible does refer to man’s wife as his companion it never refers to her as his partner – despite the NIV Bible translation which tries to use “partner” in some verses with no textual support for doing so. I dive into these passages in great detail in these posts.

https://biblicalgenderroles.com/2014/05/20/is-marriage-a-partnership-or-patriarchy/

https://biblicalgenderroles.com/2015/03/03/is-christian-marriage-a-master-servant-relationship/

7 Questions for young women with political ambitions

Question 1

How do you explain Biblical characters like Deborah as any more than an exception to God’s design and purpose for woman in light of the fact that God calls it a shame for women to rule over men (Isaiah 3:12), he calls it a shame for women to speak in the church (I Corinthians 14:34-35) and he says the head of the woman is the man (I Corinthians 11:3)?

Question 2

How can a woman occupy a position of political authority which would most like make her an authority over her husband when God calls women to be in subjection to their husbands in “everything” as the Church is subject to Christ in everything? (Ephesians 5:23-24, I Peter 3:1-6)

Question 3

How can a woman be the “keeper of her home”(Titus 2:5) and serve the needs of her husband, her children and her home while being gone 40 to 70 hours a week as most political jobs require?

Question 4

Do you think God is ok with other people raising your children and experiencing all the special firsts those children will have(like walking and talking) while you are gone pursing you political career 40 to 70 hours a week?

Question 5

If a woman pursues a career and her husband must dutifully stand behind her and support her in this career is this not a reversal of the creation order that woman was made for man, not man for woman (I Corinthians 11:9)?

Question 6

Could you honestly say if you pursue this course of action that you would be dedicating the majority of your time, talents and energy to serving your husband, your children and your home if you pursue this course of action?

Question 7

Are you willing to sacrifice seeing your child walk for the first time, talk for the first time and all those other special firsts as you most likely will if you are gone so much from your home?

I would invite you to read a recent post I did “Don’t fall for the feminist lie that women can “have it all”. In that post I show a comment I received from a woman who used to think as you do.  She believed she could have it all and found out years later that she was sacrificing her family and her marriage as well as not fulfilling the role God gave her by following her selfish ambitions. I encourage you to read her story.

Conclusion

Justice – there is nothing wrong with you having a love for studying the Bible and also other great writers in history. You could use your love of reading and desire to impact the world by teaching other women in your local church as Paul exhorts women to do (Titus 2:3-5). You might even consider having a Christian woman’s blog.

Neither of these uses of your talents would contradict with the primary mission God has given you.

For a man PART of his mission from God in this life is to lead, protect and provide for his home.  If he fails to model the love, leadership, provision, protection, teaching and discipline that God does for his people he will fail his mission.  But for a man the other part of his mission is to do what you are presuming to do and make an impact his world through his career.

For you as a woman your husband, your children and your home are not just a part of your mission as they are for a man. Your future husband, your future children and your future home ARE your mission.  Anything that takes away from your service to your husband, your children and you home must be put aside or you will fail your mission.

I encourage you to read my post “Young ladies – If you pursue a career you may fail the Christian race”.

Also see Does the Bible allow for a woman to be President of the United States?

Photo Sources:

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Don’t fall for the feminist lie that women can “have it all”

/ biblicalgenderroles / 39 Comments

The feminist lie that women can “have it all” has destroyed countless marriages over the last half century. Infants that are no more than a couple months old are left by the one person who God meant at this early stage of life to be the center of that little person’s universe. Sometimes they are left with strangers in daycare centers.  Other mothers who want to console themselves as they pursue their dream of “having it all” leave their young infants with their grandparents or their fathers. But no one, not even a loving grandparent or a loving father can take that special place that God designed only a mother to have in these early days of a person’s life.

Not only does a woman pursuing and believing the lie that she can have it all affect her children but it also affects the central role in this life that God designed her for – to be a help meet to her husband. There is absolutely no way a woman can go out and endure the stresses of a career and be involved all manner of activities outside the home and it not affect her moods and energy toward serving the needs of her husband and her home.

Dinners will be left unmade. The house will be in disarray. She will often be too tired and worn out to have sex with her husband as a direct result of her endeavors outside the home. There are going to be days when a woman is stressed and tired from fulfilling her duties to her children and her home – no question.  But God did not design a woman to shoulder the stresses of a career and her home and duties to her husband simultaneously.

Are some women forced to work outside the home by no fault of their own due to their husband being disabled or some financial crisis? Yes. Are some women abandoned by their husbands and have to provide for their children? Yes. We are not talking about those women.  These are women that had no choice but to go out and provide for their children. These women because of the sinful world we live in have had to step into the role of provider in addition to be homemakers and mothers. This is something that God did not intend in his perfect design of the roles of husbands and wives.

Today I received a letter from a woman who calls herself Jamie and she shared in her letter how she believed the feminist lie and tried to “have it all” only to realize how many years she wasted in that futile pursuit and how it affected her service to her husband, her children and her home.

I hope if you are a young woman reading this story that you will heed the advice of this Christian wife.  Don’t believe the feminist lie that you can do what God designed you to do and what the world tells you to do.

Jamie’s Story

“Dear BGR,

My husband printed off your article “How to help women learn their place” and encouraged me to read it. I read it, with a lot of pain, over the years that I wasted in trying to be all things that the World expected. Early in our marriage, I tried to be a successful working woman and a mom, and a wife, and a friend to all of my church friends, and the school volunteer of the year.

God eventually broke my heart and my husband’s heart about our family and that the family of 3 girls and 1 boy God have us was the most important. We began our journey by homeschooling through Advanced Training Institute International last Summer, and God definitely dealt with me in many of the areas you mentioned:

I stopped my work as a professional assistant in a real estate firm and had to learn to depend on my husband as the sole bread winner and decision maker. You see, when I earned money, I thought that it was ok for me to make the decisions because it was “MY” money…not Gods. I had to learn to budget and be frugal, something I had never really done before because of my second income.

Your article touched on our husbands desire to see us acting innocent and having childlike joy. Well, when I was working and being a “leader” volunteering in so many areas. I had little joy or spontaneity with my husband. God has changed my heart where I now relish in making him happy and surprising him with little things (cooking his favorite foods, detailing his car, or doing “diy” projects to beautify our home. His joy gives me joy.

In my appearance, I dressed very career like (slacks, some suits, and flat dress shoes to be comfortable at the office. When I started our mission at home, I had never considered what I needed to wear to please him and God and not wearing things “that pertainth to a man” My husband had asked for years for me to dress more feminine, and I would accommodate him for a special occasion. So, I told my husband that I wanted to dress more feminine, in a way that I would bring honor to him and God. And he delighted in this!! He splurged and bought me a new wardrobe of dresses and skirts…some casual and some dressy. We threw out my pants and flat shoes, and he purchased me several new pairs of heels, some casual and some dressy. (I realize that God doesn’t require a woman to wear high heels, but I do have the desire to please my husband and I know he desires me in them, so I love to do it for him. We discussed that while heels may limit some of my activities, that is where he must become involved with the children and take over the more boisterous or outdoor activities, while I watch and encourage all of them!)

My struggle is far from over. I do not get a lot of encouragement from friends and family. They do not understand the choices we have made, but I know I am honoring my husband and my God, and that is all that matters.”

Jamie – thank for your courage to share your story with us. If you ever need encouragement in being the help meet to your husband God designed you to be you will always find it here.

Young ladies – If you pursue a career you may fail the Christian race

/ biblicalgenderroles / 53 Comments

The Bible often compares the Christian life to an Olympic race. In fact many of the Greek terms that Paul uses in talking about our Christian life as a race refer to the Greek Olympics (words like stadium, athlete and gym all are used by Paul).

Just like we separate our Olympic events by gender, God also has separate races for each gender to run and different rules depending on gender. The Bible also says we must compete (live our lives) according to God’s rules. If we compete but cheat or deviate from the rules we will not receive the rewards for running the race:

“Also if anyone competes as an athlete, he does not win the prize unless he competes according to the rules.” – II Timothy 2:5 (NASB)

A Tale of Two Runners

So now imagine this if you will. There are two races with different obstacles to overcome, but they use the same course. On that course you would see male and female signs on different obstacles.   This is a timed event it is run by one person at a time.

So a man runs the course and as he comes to each obstacle if it is marked “male” he overcomes the obstacle, if it is marked “female” he goes around it and continues with the race till he finally finishes the race where the judge awards him with his prize.

Now a woman comes to the same course. She has decided before she ran this race that she will run the male obstacles instead of the female obstacles. She has decided she does not like the female obstacles and prefers the male obstacles.

So she runs the race just as good as that man who ran just before her. Every time she comes to a male obstacle she overcomes it but then she skips the female obstacles as the man did.   In fact she matches his time as she runs toward the finish line. She crosses over feeling triumphant and she turns to the judge to receive her prize as the man before her did but he tells her she has failed the race.

“But I did everything the man who ran before me did and I even did it in the same time!” the woman says.

The judge replies “But you are not a man, you are a woman. You did not meet the challenges that were assigned to you as a woman, but instead chose to do the male obstacles that were not assigned to you. All your hard work was a waste because you did not overcome the obstacles that were assigned to you”

Over the last century feminism has taught women “you can have it all”. You can have a career, a husband and kids. You can balance your career and your obligations to your family in the same way men do. In fact you and your husband can just split the responsibilities of caring for the kids and your home.

But this is lie.

God never meant for women to have to balance a career and family obligations as men are meant to do. A woman’s complete focus was meant to be on serving the needs of her husband, her children and her home. She would only go outside her home to the extent that it did not affect her performing her duties to her home.

But because we live in a sin cursed world sometimes a woman has no choice but to work to support herself and her family and do what God did not intend for her to have to do and balance work and family obligations. If her husband becomes disabled, abandons her or dies a woman may have no choice but to work. Some women have husbands who in their sinful greed force their wives to work when they should not be.

Another reason a woman may have to pursue a career is because by no fault of her own she has not been able to find a husband and she eventually has to work to support herself.

The push to get women out of the home and into careers

Sadly today many women are actually encouraged and taught from a young age in their schools, homes and even churches that planning to be a stay at home mom is a “waste of their full potential”. My 13 year old daughter recently experienced this in the junior high she is attending.

They had a project to do for class which had them writing out their life goals and a big part of that was what they wanted to do for a career. It was simply assumed that everyone in that class, both the young men and young women should have career ambitions.

The young teens were all comparing what they wanted to be when they grew up and some of the girls said they wanted to be a doctor, or a nurse and one said a scientist. Then it came around to my daughter and she said “stay at home mom”. She told me after she said that you could have heard a pin drop. Then one of her girlfriends asked her “don’t you want more than that?” I was so proud of her response. She said “this is what I believe God wants me to do”.

She told me they were actually offended by that and by her choice to dedicate her life fully to her future husband, her future children and her future home.

But make no mistake – the distain for the Biblical role of a wife (which is what my daughter was espousing) did not happen overnight. It took decades to accomplish.

“In the 1950s, only 19 percent of mothers with small children worked outside the home, said Stephanie Coontz, a historian at The Evergreen State College in Washington and author of “A Strange Stirring: The Feminine Mystique and American Women at the Dawn of the 1960s” (Basic Books, 2011). As of 2008, more than 60 percent of moms with kids under age 6 were in the work force, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Working moms of older kids are even more common. As of 2008, close to 80 percent of mothers with children between ages 6 and 17 worked outside the home. That is a rise of about 10 percent since 1984.

Attitudes haven’t kept up with reality, however: According to the Pew Research Center, only 16 percent of Americans think a mom who works full time is ideal for young kids. A third favor moms staying at home full time, and 42 percent think part-time work would be ideal.”

http://www.livescience.com/29521-5-ways-motherhood-has-changed.html

The two sources of the cultural shift from stay at home moms to career women

What brought about this change from only 19% of moms with young children working outside the home to it now skyrocketing to 60%? The answer is two words – Feminism and Materialism.

Feminism encouraged women to be selfishly ambitious and some men became greedy and materialistic when they realized by allowing their wives to work they could double their household income. Some women today would much rather stay home and care for their home and children but their greedy husbands force them to work outside the home.

Speaking of husbands – while this post is primarily written toward women – let me just say Biblically speaking a man has no business getting married if he is not ready to provide for his wife. I realize a lot of men today do that, but this breaks the model of marriage God has designed.

“Prepare your work outside and make it ready for yourself in the field; Afterwards, then, build your house.” – Proverbs 24:27 (NASB)

This verse from Proverbs has been widely interpreted to be referring to a young man working and preparing to have a family. Preparation and provision come before having your own household.

Now we will return to women and selfish ambition.

The selfish ambition fueled by feminist propaganda also caused divorce to become common place where it peeked at around 50% in the 1980’s before having a slight decline.   But the dirty little secret about why divorce has leveled off is because marriage itself is down. Single parenting and cohabitation rates have sharply risen since the 1980s.

There is nothing wrong with a man or woman being ambitious. But we are selfishly ambitious when we are ambitious for things God never meant us to have. The Proverbs 31 wife is a very ambitious wife, but her entire life’s focus was her husband, her children and her home. Even when she temporarily went outside the home her focus was always turned back toward her home so her husband had no worries in his home. She had everything under control.

Rush Limbaugh is certainly not a very religious man and I don’t endorse everything he says when compared with the Scriptures. But back in 2012 when he was commenting on our cultural shifts and the negative views toward stay home moms he had this to say:

“Instead of having the government, stay-at-home moms have a husband to support them — and you don’t think that irritates some of these leftist women? Remember the early days of feminism…

A relationship, a man were shackles.

That was holding you back. It was denying you your full potential. Being a mother, staying at home? You’re letting the sisterhood down, but you’re letting yourself down, too. It was a full-court press to throw away as many traditions in male-female relationships, both at home and at work, as possible…

See, the women are not supposed to depend on that. It was okay if the government ended up providing for you — that was cool — but not a husband, not a man. You’re supposed to do that yourself. And if you couldn’t do it yourself, then you turn to government programs.”

http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/daily/2012/04/16/why_stay_at_home_moms_threaten_the_left

Many Christian women today have drank the feminist Kool-Aid. Even some good conservative Bible preaching churches have drank the feminist Kool-Aid. I can’t tell you how many Christians I have spoken to that have said our young women must have college degrees and careers and you know what the most common reason was? In case they ever have to support themselves.

We have taught now over decades and are continuing to teach women to be independent of men – to not need a man. My own mother-in-law told me this several years back that she taught her daughters to “never be dependent on a man”. This feminism was ingrained in her daughters and the Lord has had to bring a lot of things into my wife’s life and her sister’s life to get some of this thinking out (sometimes it comes back and rears its ugly head though).

God shows in his Word that the husband/wife relationship is to be a model of the relationship of Christ to his Church. In the same way that the Church looks to Christ for their provision and protection a woman was designed to look to her husband for her provision and protection.

Instead our wicked culture has replaced the husband as the provider with the government as the provider. Truly the only way feminism thrives is in a socialistic system that makes women less dependent on men by having the government provide for their needs or pushing them to provide for their own.

Feminism can only survive in an artificial environment.

Nature opposes feminism. In the absence of a social welfare state feminism would rapidly collapse as women came to see their natural dependence on men for their provision and protection.

How women fail the race God has set before them

The Bible says:

“Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us” – Hebrews 12:1 (KJV)

Young Christian ladies please hear what the Word of God says about the race God has set before you. There are two courses God sets before you and ONLY two courses and you must choose one or the other. The course of marriage or the course of celibacy. If you run the course of celibacy then rules for the female marriage course do not apply.

These are the obstacles or goals you are to meet to win this race.

The 7 Rules of God’s race for married women

Rule #1 Submit to and obey your husband. (Ephesians 5:22 & 24, Colossians 3:18, Titus 2:5, I Peter 3:1 & 5-6)

Rule #2 Reverence your husband. (Ephesians 5:33 & I Peter 3:5-6)

Rule #3 Love your husband. (Titus 2:4)

Rule #4 Ravish your husband with your body. (Proverbs 5:19, I Corinthians 7:3-5)

Rule #5 Always speak to your husband with a kind, gentle and quiet spirit. (Proverbs 31:26, I Peter 3:4)

Rule #6 Bear and care for your children if God opens your womb to do so. (Genesis 1:28, I Timothy 5:14)

Rule #7 Manage all the domestic affairs of your home (cooking, cleaning, laundry, shopping) so your husband has no worries about his home while he is away working. (Titus 2:5, Proverbs 31:10-31)

There is a different race that God has set before you as a woman, then the one he has set before men. You must run the race according to the rules God has set for YOU, not those that he has set for men.

Someone might say “What about loving God and obeying God?” My answer to that is the very foundation for these 7 rules is love for God and obedience to God.

“By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God, and keep his commandments. For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments: and his commandments are not grievous.” – I John 5:2-3 (KJV)

You can’t enter the race unless you register as a runner

This is the Christian woman’s race. You can’t run in the Christian woman’s race unless you first become a Christian. Then your race performance will be judged by how you followed the course rules.

“For other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ. Now if any man build upon this foundation gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, stubble;

Every man’s work shall be made manifest: for the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire; and the fire shall try every man’s work of what sort it is.

If any man’s work abide which he hath built thereupon, he shall receive a reward. If any man’s work shall be burned, he shall suffer loss: but he himself shall be saved; yet so as by fire.” – I Corinthians 3:11-15 (KJV)

At the Bema seat of Christ every Christian will stand and his or her life’s work will be judged.

“For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ; that every one may receive the things done in his body, according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad.” – II Corinthians 5:10 (KJV)

The Bema seat (which is what this in the Greek) was a place of reward after a competition. Our salvation is not a reward for how we run the Christian race, but it is the gift of God.

“For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God” – Ephesians 2:8 (KJV)

However our rewards from God are indeed earned by how we ran the race while we lived her in these bodies. Did we accept the rules of his race or did we make up our own rules as we ran?

But I can follow all those 7 rules and have a career!

Christian women listen to me. You cannot run the race God has set before you as a woman and have the same kind of career a man can. You might be able to work part time and you may be able to work while your kids are in school.

But if you try to have a career in the same way that your husband does you will drop something else.

You cannot be in be in two places at once.

Either you will be gone from home 50 hours a week or more chasing a career or you will be home.

When you have those young infants and small children – either you will be caring for them or someone else will be while you are gone 50 hours a week.

If you are working and gone 50 hours a week pursuing your career you will not have the same energy to give or focus that is needed toward you husband, your children and your home. Something will slip and what will slip is what is supposed to be the primary focus of your life.

Don’t believe the lie

Don’t be like Eve who was deceived by the serpents lie.

“Now the serpent was more subtil than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made. And he said unto the woman, Yea, hath God said, Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden?” – Genesis 3:1 (KJV)

The Devil told Eve she should could have it all and she fell for the lie.

Don’t believe the lies of feminism. Believe what God says in his Word.

Run the race that he set before you as a woman, not the race that he set before your husband as a man.

But you can’t survive on one income these days!

While it is true that some women have to work because of economic necessity (no husband or husband is disabled) often times it is because of wants that they work, not needs.

Just look back at the average homes that were built in the 1950’s and earlier and look at the homes that are built now. The home back then were smaller and simpler – kids used bunk beds and crammed into rooms. Now every child has to have their own room.

Families often survived on one car. Now every family must have two cars, and not just two cars but two NEW cars.

We have to go on expensive vacations each year and we have to eat the best foods.

We have forgotten as a society how to live simpler. Feminism and Materialism have grown up together in our country.

But you can choose to live simpler, you can choose to live God’s way. You can choose to sacrifice the vacations or drive two used cars instead of new ones. You can choose to do what is right and run the race that God has set before you.

Ladies – don’t let having a career cost you your reward

Let me be blunt ladies. When God judges what you did with your life – yes your career will matter. But not in the way you think. Your career will matter in how much it detracted from your ability to serve your husband, your children and your home.

When God reviews the tapes on your life and sees that you purposefully planned from the time you were young to have children and ship them off to a day care center six weeks after they were born so you could return to your more “fulfilling” career you will be held to account for this. You will lose the reward for being a wife and mother that you could have had. You will be ashamed.

“Watch yourselves, that you do not lose what we have accomplished, but that you may receive a full reward.” II John 1:8 (NASB)

The Black Hole of Babydom

/ biblicalgenderroles / 7 Comments

“It makes me sad to lose my friends and watch them throw away their promising careers and lives to enter the black hole of babydom” – my wife found this quote from a woman who wrote into an advice column that is featured in our local newspaper.

This advice column is written by a nationally syndicated columnist named Judith Martin a.k.a. “Miss Manners”.  Each week people write in asking her what is the correct way to handle different social situations.

This week a woman whom Miss Manners titled as a “Hater of baby showers” wrote  this to her about why she hated that her friends were having so many babies and baby showers:

“I am also alarmed at the shocking number of otherwise intelligent people who, despite this being the First World with various forms of birth control widely available, still have unplanned pregnancies and make no secret of this fact...

For these reasons and others, I am generally not thrilled when my friends become pregnant. I love my friends, but once they have kids, they fall off the face of the earth. It makes me sad to lose my friends and watch them throw away their promising careers and lives to enter the black hole of babydom (which, despite common arguments to the contrary, almost all do).…”

You can read the full letter from this woman and Miss Manner’s advice to her here.

This letter is a pure and unabashed display of just how ugly modern feminism has become.

It is a direct contradiction to what God says about children.

“Lo, children are an heritage of the Lord: and the fruit of the womb is his reward.” – Psalm 127:3 (KJV)

“He maketh the barren woman to keep house, and to be a joyful mother of children. Praise ye the Lord.” – Psalm 113:9 (KJV)

While there has always been all kinds of wickedness in the world, never have we seen on such a wide scale the complete visceral hatred of motherhood as we do today.

God never intended for women to find their greatest fulfillment in a career, but rather he designed them to desire and be fulfilled in making and molding human lives.

Photo Source: Jason Ippolito  https://www.flickr.com/photos/jasonippolito/3686987657
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/

Why do older men go out with younger women?

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Bodycrimes made this comment in reply on a post she wrote about Older men and Younger women:

“Except that women aren’t making that sacrifice at all. Women who are university educated are now the most likely to get married and have families. Professional and educated men do not marry uneducated women. The worst thing a woman who aspires to a middle class or above life could do is to fail to get an education and career.”

Are there studies that on the surface would seem to support what she said? Yes.

This study sited at the HuffingtonPost would be one that seems to confirm her opinion:

“According to a new study by NYU sociologists Paula England and Jonathan Bearak, prepared for the Council on Contemporary Families, college-educated women are now as likely to get married as their less-educated peers — even if the weddings happen in a somewhat older age range. These findings contradict the previously prevailing idea that women who pursued higher education were more likely to delay finding a mate past some stereotypical “marriageable age” while studying and building demanding careers.”

However as you dig deeper into the study, you note the disparity between races on this issue.

“In terms of race, the delayed marriage boost that college education produces is far more pronounced for black women than for white women. While “black women have lower odds of ever marrying than white women … getting a college education raises ultimate marriage rates by the 30s and 40s much more substantially for blacks than whites.” Black women who don’t complete high school are far less likely to get married than any other group.”

Because there is a complete breakdown of the nuclear family in the black community of the United States, where almost 70% of black children are born out of wedlock Black women need that extra education to give them that leg up. But in other racial groups, especially with whites, where the out of wedlock birth rate is more around 30%, a woman having a college education does not have as high an impact on her marriageability or getting into the middle class.

This study cited by the Huffington Post also shows that these same college educated women, while having a better chance of getting married (and as I pointed out this is more in the black community than in other racial communities) also marry much later.

What they don’t report is that these women who marry later in life often have a lot more fertility issues and this is one of the contributing factors to declining birth rates in most western nations (including the US).

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/04/12/college-educated-women-and-marriage_n_1421792.html

But is a higher education all positive for women? Not really according to this study cited at Bloomberg.com:

“Women who have come out on top in the job market may not find similar success in the marriage market… Aversion to wives earning more than husbands could be leading to fewer weddings and more divorces, according to a National Bureau of Economic Research working paper… couples where a wife earns more are less satisfied with their marriage and are more likely to divorce”

http://go.bloomberg.com/political-capital/2013-05-15/higher-paid-women-less-married-more-divorced/

The higher educated a woman is, and the more she makes directly lessens her chances of getting married and even if she does get married her chances of divorce are much higher.

The study cited in the HuffingtonPost and the one at Bloomberg.com are not contradictory when you look at the racial factor. There is truly a marriage crisis in the Black community, to deny so would be to deny what every government and private study shows us. Does poverty have some affect? Yes. But even in other racial communities where poverty exists marriage rates are much higher than in lower income black areas.

If you remove the racial factor, for whites especially, a woman having a higher education makes her LESS likely to get married, and when she does get married she will have a much higher chance of divorce.

That may not sit well with my feminist and egalitarian friends, but it is the truth.

Call it Complementarianism all you want, but this is what it looks like.

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Anarch[Egalitarian]ism: a political theory holding all forms of governmental authority to be unnecessary and undesirable and advocating a society based on voluntary cooperation and free association of individuals and groups

“Neither was the man created for the woman; but the woman for the man.”
I Corinthians 11:9(KJV)

“…teach the young women to be sober, to love their husbands, to love their children, To be discreet, chaste, keepers at home, good, obedient to their own husbands, that the word of God be not blasphemed.”
Titus 2:4-6(KJV)

“I will therefore that the younger women marry, bear children, guide the house, give none occasion to the adversary to speak reproachfully.”
I Timothy 5:14(KJV)

“ Let your women keep silence in the churches: for it is not permitted unto them to speak; but they are commanded to be under obedience as also saith the law.
And if they will learn any thing, let them ask their husbands at home: for it is a shame for women to speak in the church.”
I Corinthians 14:24-25(KJV)

What has Egalitarianism given us? In a word anarchy. Since Egalitarianism abandon’s God’s order and design in creation they embrace what Israel saw when “there was no king in Israel, but every man did that which was right in his own eyes.”(Judges 17:6).

What is the result? A complete confusion in our society when it comes to gender roles. Men lead, guide and protect as God designed them to do, and women don’t submit to their husbands or care for their children and their homes as God designed them to.

While divorce peaked around 50% in the 1980’s and has decreased slightly since, marriage rates have dropped and cohabitation rates have skyrocketed. While less and less children are born each year, more and more of these children our born out of wedlock.

Government dependency has skyrocketed and poverty increased due to the decline of the nuclear family. All of this lies at the feet of Egalitarianism and its evil sibling, Feminism.