Biblical Womanhood

A Christian Home-Educating mum told me a story about how she had taken her little daughter to the Doctor's. In the course of the examination, the female GP asked the little girl what she wanted to be when she grew up; the little girl thought for a moment and then said, "a mother!" In that instant, two very different worlds collided. 



Young Christian women today, suffer immensely from the pressures of our society, to conform to an ideal that God never intended them to endure. They are sexualised by the media and the fashion industry at an early age (and many Christian writers have spoken intelligently and with justified condemnation about this) and yet there is another danger that is perhaps not as explicit as the first. They are encouraged in the pursuit of a confusingly androgynous identity; a hybrid of masculine and feminine characteristics and the idea that to be truly independent and happy, they need to emulate men.

Today, young women are encouraged to be "empowered" into acting, thinking, working, drinking (or even dressing) like men. The government is doing all they can to get mothers "back to work." They are horrified by the idea that some mothers may actually want to stay at home and bring up their children themselves. What! Bring up young children without professional help and guidance! And who would want the terrible drudgery, nay slavery of being a Housewife!

A culture that sees children, not as a blessing, but as an economic inconvenience, is at odds with the word of God. 

These days, the aging spectre of feminism is still attempting to groom young women to feel dissatisfied with marriage and motherhood. What is surprising is that those attitudes have even started to make their way into the church, to the extent that some Christian women (and men) are identifying themselves today as "Christian (or Jesus) feminists," despite feminism representing the antithesis of everything the Bible teaches about the role of women; particularly married women and mothers.





The antithesis to Biblical womanhood.

 



Here are some extraordinary, and revealing, feminist quotes:

• “Since marriage constitutes slavery for women, it is clear that the women’s movement must concentrate on attacking this institution. Freedom for women cannot be won without the abolition of marriage." Sheila Cronam, feminist Leader.
 

 

• “The end of the institution of marriage is necessary for the liberation of women; therefore it is important for us to encourage women to leave their husbands and not live individually with men. All of history must be rewritten in terms of oppression of women. We must go back to ancient female religions like witchcraft." Declaration of feminism 1971

• “The most merciful thing a large family can do to one of its infant members is to kill it.” Article, "Women in the New Race", Margaret Sanger, feminist and founder of Planned Parenthood, USA's largest abortion clinic business.

If there was ever a time that Christian women needed to find their identity, it is now.

Proverbs 31: 10 says, "Who can find a virtuous woman? for her price is far above rubies."  A virtuous woman is truly a woman of strength, though not as the feminists define strength.

Matthew Henry comments, "the weaker vessel, made strong by wisdom and grace, and the fear of God...who has command of her own spirit...a woman of resolution, who, having espoused good principles, is firm and steady to them." This is strength indeed.

 

A Christian woman does not need to marry in order to have worth. There are remarkable women whom God called to serve as missionaries and to live celibate lives; women like Gladys Aylward and Amy Carmichael. They expressed their strength in inherently feminine ways; such as being effectively mothers to the children whom God had entrusted to their care and confounding violent and dangerous men, with "a meek and quiet spirit, which is in the sight of God of great price."

Amy Carmichael with some of he girls she saved from temple prostitution.

 Also, women like Hester Ann Rogers, of whom it was said,

"Though she devoted much of her time to religious duties in public and private, yet nothing seemed to be left undone which could make her children comfortable and happy. She even prevented all their wants; and was equally, nay, if it were possible, more attentive to Mr. Roger’s children by his former wife, than to her own." (The Character and Death of Mrs Hester Ann Rogers - Reverend Thomas Coke.)

 

The challenge for Christian women today, particularly young Christian women, is to find themselves in the Scriptures.

One thinks of the great women of the Old Testament: Esther, Ruth, Hannah and Sarah; the self-sacrificing lives they lived. They put their people, their families and yes; even their husbands, before themselves and were commended for doing so. They gave all for God.

It is absurd for Christian women to attempt to identify with politically and socially driven, non-Christian movements, like the Suffragettes. Today's politically correct history books often gloss over the fact that the Suffragettes, at times, behaved outrageously and unlawfully. Historian and Journalist Andrew Marr reminds us, that at the height of the Suffragette's protests, "The Prime Minister, Asquith was punched, had an axe flung at him and had slates thrown at his car. Winston Churchill was attacked at Bristol railway station by a riding-crop-wielding woman who hit him on the face." (The Making of Modern Britain.) Hardly the epitome of Christ-likeness!

It takes much boldness to be a Christian woman today. Particularly in a society that sees meekness as weakness, home-keeping as slavery and "modest apparel" as just plain weird! Once again, Christians have to choose between following the world, or following the love of Christ. As Amy Carmichael once observed:

“You can give without loving, but you cannot love without giving.”   

Paul Jennings.

Liberal Fascism

 

 So there I was, discussing the judgement of God with three teenage girls in the centre of Stockport. It was one of those moments that will stay with me forever. There was nothing overly dramatic, or unusual about the encounter; God’s judgement of the wicked is something that comes up again and again with those who seek to justify their sins. The girls were not excessively hostile, or anti-Christian, in fact their lack of conviction about anything, was perhaps one of the most disturbing elements of the whole scenario! It was simply the way in which their response to the matter was articulated. After I had explained the guilt of sin, the holiness of God and the righteous justice of the Judge of all mankind, one of the girls responded with, “but judging people is like not nice. It’s like not fair!”  

Peter Hitchens, brother of the late Christopher, once quipped, “Hell was abolished around the same time that abortion was legalized and the death penalty done away with!” The idea of eternal punishment was so beyond the mind-set of this teenage trio, who were the products of systematic secularization and Humanistic grooming, that all they could do was cry, “That’s not fair!"

We live in a largely secular society; a society that seems to worship the intellectual elite. Why then is it, that so many cannot express their thoughts intelligently, or apply any kind of robust argumentation, or engagement with the Christian faith, other than “it’s not fair!”

When it comes to fairness, it is significant how this society, and particularly the present government, have redefined that word.  Many of those who are calling for fairness and tolerance have actually become the least tolerant members of our society. They have in fact become the heralds of a new politically-correct dawn; one that author Jonah Goldberg rightly defined as “Liberal Fascism.”

Liberal Fascism

 

National Secular Society

In 2011 a legal challenge from the National Secular Society was brought against Bideford Town Council for saying prayers in meetings.

After conducting an investigation, the Mail on Sunday found that more than a fifth of councils still have a Bible reading or a prayer at the start of meetings. Communities Secretary Eric Pickles has also reaffirmed the freedom for town hall officials to say formal prayers.

The newspaper’s Freedom of Information Act request found that 59 out of 271 councils, 22 per cent, have a prayer or reading in their meetings.

Mr Pickles warned: “It’s clear that some politically correct town hall officials are still trying to marginalise faith and impose an illiberal and intolerant secularism.”

Scottish Secular Society

A secularist pressure group has targeted every school in Scotland demanding to know about their chaplaincy services.

The Scottish Secular Society (SSS) wrote a letter in September asking 24 questions, including whether material disagreeing with homosexuality had been distributed in the school.

But The Christian Institute urged schools not to be intimidated by the ‘hostile’ Freedom of Information (FOI) request, and reminded schools that it IS lawful for them to invite in religious groups.

Colin Hart, the charity’s director, said, “we want to reassure you that schools are fully within their rights to invite chaplains and representatives of faith groups or religious organisations to conduct activities on their premises."

Mr Hart also said: “The FOI request is wide in scope and shows the SSS’s hostility towards any lawful manifestation of religious and moral belief within Scottish schools.”

Girl Guides

In September 2013, Girl guiding UK officially introduced a new Humanist oath, replacing “to love my God” with “to be true to myself and develop my beliefs”. In Northern Ireland the new politically correct ousting of God has come in for some criticism.

The vast majority of Girl guide groups in Northern Ireland meet in Church buildings.

The Methodist, Presbyterian and Church of Ireland denominations have joined together to voice their “deep concern” about the move.

An online petition urging Girl guiding Ulster to reinstate the old promise, and make an atheist pledge optional, has already been signed by more than 1000 people.

Dr Alan Clifford

Homophobia

Dr Alan Clifford, the Pastor of a Reformed Christian church in Norwich, sent two gospel tracts by email, one entitled ‘Christ Can Cure – Good News for Gays’; and the other ‘Jesus Christ – the Saviour we all need’ to his local LGBT Project, Norwich Pride. Instead of responding via email, or simply deleting the tracts, they phoned the police.

The police arrived and graciously offered Pastor Clifford the option of an on-the-spot fine of £90, which he politely refused.

The officers asked if he was aware that he’d actually committed a homophobic offence as defined by the official police leaflet which the officer then produced. The leaflet defined such an offence as ‘any incident which is perceived to be homophobic by the victim or any other person’.

 As Adrian Hilton of the Daily Mail put it, “Dr Clifford patiently refuted the accusation, by explaining pedantically (as a doctor of theology might) that the meaning of ‘homophobia’ stems from the Greek ‘phobia’, meaning ‘fear’, and does not embrace hatred. Whilst acknowledging the changing vernacular usage, he explained: ‘I certainly fear the influence of homosexuality on society, but this should not be regarded as “hatred” unless criticism is taken to mean “hatred”.

The subtitle of the tract was ‘A Compassionate call to Christian Conversion.’ Dr Clifford asked: ‘Is that hatred? We don’t hate these people. We love them and want to help them. So, even though the gay-pride people are upset, we are guilty of no crime.’”

In a society that is as wide and diverse as the United Kingdom, one wonders, why there is no room for those who hold to traditional religious beliefs? Nick Clegg recently became embroiled in a row over a pro-gay marriage speech, after aides had to remove comments in the draft version calling opponents "bigots".  Why is tolerance extended only to those who hold secular, atheistic, humanistic, pro-Homosexual and irreligious worldviews? Why are convictions, which we might describe as “liberal,” NOT open to intelligent debate and critique? Christian beliefs are not only criticized, but openly lambasted, parodied and blasphemed; and that with very little fear of prosecution; is that “fair?”

The word of God delivers the following warning:

” Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!” Isaiah 5:20 (KJV)

We can rest in this, that whilst men often act biasedly, politically, manipulatively and indeed wickedly; at least  “God is no respecter of persons.” Now that’s fair!

For more information on the influence of hostile Secularism, please watch the following video.