I’ve heard it too many times: “A man likes a quiet woman.”
“Guys don’t respond well to smart girls.” “Educated women are too intimidating
to attract good men.”
I understand why we believe these things. It’s a nice story.
It makes sense of the success of some women to find husbands, and the failure
of others. As Christians (and as humans), we feel very clever when we get to
diagnose the cause and cure of singleness. “You’re too opinionated.” “You’re
too boisterous.” “A woman should be small, quiet, and delicate.”
Yet, it’s easy to forget in the midst of all our diagnosing:
whether a woman is “intimidating” is a factor of male perception, not female
personality. Do we want women to be less intimidating? That’s a question to be
put to men who experience them as such, and we can only wait for such men to
grow. The real question we need to ask is: Do we want women to be weak? And the
answer must forever be, on the basis of Scripture, “May it never be.”
Strong women are as vital as strong men to God’s purpose in
the church. Why?
1. Strong women expose evil men.
I can’t speak for Christian men everywhere, but I can speak
for myself, and for many of the men in the Bible: Godliness is attractive to
both men and women (Proverbs 31:30). And often, godly femininity requires being
strong, even intimidating. Consider Jael in Judges 4. Jael’s husband Heber “had
separated from the Kenites,” and “had pitched his tent as far away as the oak
in Zaanannim, which is near Kedesh” (Judges 4:11).
“Strong women are as vital as strong men to God’s purpose in
the church.” Tweet Share on Facebook
So, when Sisera, a Canaanite military general under Jabin
the King of Hazor — the enemy of the people of God — tried to seek refuge, he
went to Heber’s tent, “for there was peace between Jabin the King of Hazor and
the house of Heber the Kenite” (Judges 4:17). But Sisera found Jael at the tent
and started barking orders at her: “Give me a little water.” “Stand at the
opening of the tent.” In response, “she went softly to him and drove the peg
into his temple until it went down into the ground” (Judges 4:21). Deborah
later sang of Jael, “Most blessed of women be Jael . . . She sent her hand to
the tent peg and her right hand to the workmen’s mallet” (Judges 5:24, 26).
Thank God Jael wasn’t meek and submissive and respectful
toward this friend of her wayward husband. She wasn’t one to be trampled on.
Strong women reject the requests of evil men.
2. Strong women rebuke good men.
When David set out to kill Nabal — the brash and brute man
who embodied pure masculine folly — Nabal’s wife Abigail offered hundreds of
fig cakes and loaves of bread and wine skins to David. Yet, she used the
opportunity to warn David that he should “have no cause of grief or pangs of
conscience for having shed blood without cause or for my lord working salvation
for himself” (1 Samuel 25:31). In other words, Abigail warned: “Be careful.
Don’t use your power in a way that will make you guilty.”
David responded, “Blessed be your discretion, and blessed be
you, who have kept me this day from bloodguilt and from working salvation with
my own hand!” (1 Samuel 25:33). Nabal soon after died of a heart attack. “Then
David sent and spoke to Abigail, to take her as his wife” (1 Samuel 25:39).
David was attracted to this strong woman for her strength,
for her rebuke, and for her character. Abigail made life harder for David. And
David, in a moment of grace, was able to see that Abigail’s standing in David’s
way was a gift of purity to him. That day, David was seeking salvation for
himself, but it was gifted to him by God in Abigail, who, even while she was at
his mercy as his subject, told him what he needed to hear.
Strong women rebuke good men, who need help in their
weaknesses, who need someone to help them see how to be strong.
3. Strong women raise believing men.
There is no stronger, more consistent reminder of the gospel
in my life than my mom. Paul says something very similar of Timothy: “I am
reminded of your sincere faith, a faith that dwelt first in your grandmother
Lois and your mother Eunice and now, I am sure, dwells in you as well” (2
Timothy 1:5).
“Men have two choices: find female strength captivatingly
attractive, or be insecure and intimidated.” Tweet Share on Facebook
In an ideal world, men and women would partner together in
their strength. But we live in a world where we need strong women to make men
strong, because sometimes there simply are no men there to do it. My mom’s dad
died when she was nine, and my own dad wasn’t present in my life enough to be a
father. So she did the work of two parents — the work of two disciplers — for
both my sister and me. With Timothy and Paul, I’m so glad that God gave us
these gifts of strong women to survive the inconsistent presence and
consequences of “strong” men.
Of course, some of the godliest mothers have had some of the
ungodliest children, and vice versa. But in an age when fathers often fail to
bestow the gift of faith to their children, the future often hangs on the
strength of women to do that gospel work.
Whether as children or their disciples, strong women raise believing
men.
The Beauty and Strength of Faith
We live in a time when women are outperforming men in many
areas of professional and personal competency. And men have two choices: to
find female strength captivatingly attractive, or to be insecure and
intimidated. Real men love strong women, because God’s glory is beautiful, and
“woman is the glory of man” (1 Corinthians 11:7).
Jesus, give men the grace to see the beauty of glorious
female strength. Give women the resilience to remain strong long enough for the
right men to find them beautiful for the right reasons. And help men and women
to fall in love with proven, genuine faith, which is “more precious than gold
that perishes though it is tested by fire” (1 Peter 1:7).
Written by Paul Maxwell
Paul Maxwell(@paulcmaxwell) is a Ph.D. student at Trinity
Evangelical Divinity School, and philosophy professor at Moody Bible Institute.
He writes more at his blog, and pretends to like coffee..
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