On a recent trip to Asheville, my friends and I stopped in for a visit to the Barnes & Noble. I love that some of my friends enjoy bookstores, have a need for a new journal on a consistent basis, and consider sitting around over a cup of coffee or sweet treat the best kind of quality time.
Anyway, I bought a book while I was there! "Let Me Be A Woman" by Elisabeth Elliott. It's a short, non-fiction consisting of various letters E.E. wrote to her daughter Valarie as she (Valarie) was waiting to be married. The topic of each letter is somewhat different but all get at the same thing..."The fact that I am a woman does not make me a different kind of Christian, but the fact that I am a Christian does make me a different kind of woman. For I have accepted God's idea of me, and my whole life is an offering back to Him..." (pg 43)
She was writing to Valarie in 1976 during the peak of the feminist movement. What a counter-cultural book for that time, and even for our time, now. There is so much going on now about gender and sexuality that some of it is kind of ridiculous.
I'm thankful for E.E.'s love for her daughter, and for her wisdom as she wrote words to her daughter that are true, even today about who I am, and am to be as a woman (more of a lady for me right now =)) of God.
Here is the specific quote for this Thoughtful Thursday:
Talking on how the heartbeat of the Women's Liberation Movement is actually enslaving.
Placing these words into the context of the time they were written blows my mind. What radical statements! But how true, are they not? Is it not true that real, life-giving freedom is found in knowing Christ and therefore who He has made us to be? We are the created are we not? Therefore, we have a purpose, we're not arbitrarily placed here, though at times it may seem as such. I mean think about it this way, you don't make a pillow to hang it on the wall or paint something beautiful to use a door mat, right? No, you make the pillow to rest your head on, or to accent a room. And you paint something beautiful to decorate your home or showcase your talent.
So, (going with the analogies) if the painting had feelings (and autonomy), and wanted to rebel against the artist it would usurp the artist's attempts to hang it and place itself on the front porch floor just in front of the door...but it wouldn't really be happy! It would trampled on, scuffed, broken. But if the autonomous, emotionally aware painting, submitted to the artist's attempts to hang it on the wall the painting would be delighted in, enjoyed, praised, appreciated...but only when, and after, the painting submitted.
There is a distinct difference between man and woman, even down to our very soul, the very fiber and nature of our being, we are different and thus created to fulfill different roles. And E.E. is saying that in fulfilling our own, purposed roles, we find life because we are submitting to the will of our Father, the Creator! We find who we are and who we were intended to be, by God's design.
I love this book...I'm eating it up. EE is causing me to want to be a better "God-woman" more accepting and welcoming of my feminine "responsibilities", mindset, heart-set, and character... - and I could dialogue for days!
In some of my circles, this idea is not that new or seemingly radical, but outside of them...radical indeed, and so desperately needing to be said!
- p.carrick -
Anyway, I bought a book while I was there! "Let Me Be A Woman" by Elisabeth Elliott. It's a short, non-fiction consisting of various letters E.E. wrote to her daughter Valarie as she (Valarie) was waiting to be married. The topic of each letter is somewhat different but all get at the same thing..."The fact that I am a woman does not make me a different kind of Christian, but the fact that I am a Christian does make me a different kind of woman. For I have accepted God's idea of me, and my whole life is an offering back to Him..." (pg 43)
She was writing to Valarie in 1976 during the peak of the feminist movement. What a counter-cultural book for that time, and even for our time, now. There is so much going on now about gender and sexuality that some of it is kind of ridiculous.
I'm thankful for E.E.'s love for her daughter, and for her wisdom as she wrote words to her daughter that are true, even today about who I am, and am to be as a woman (more of a lady for me right now =)) of God.
Here is the specific quote for this Thoughtful Thursday:
Talking on how the heartbeat of the Women's Liberation Movement is actually enslaving.
"But God has set no traps for us. Quite the contrary, He has summoned us to the only true and full freedom. The woman who defines her liberation as doing what she wants, or not doing what she doesn't want, is, in first place evading responsibility, [and the] evasion of responsibility is the mark of immaturity. While telling themselves that they've come a long way, that they are actually coming of age, they have retreated to a partial humanity, one which refuses to acknowledge the vast significance of the sexual differentiation...And the woman who ignores that fundamental truth ironically misses the very thing she has set out to find. By refusing to fulfill the whole vocation of womanhood she settles for a caricature, a pseudo-personhood." (pg 45)
Placing these words into the context of the time they were written blows my mind. What radical statements! But how true, are they not? Is it not true that real, life-giving freedom is found in knowing Christ and therefore who He has made us to be? We are the created are we not? Therefore, we have a purpose, we're not arbitrarily placed here, though at times it may seem as such. I mean think about it this way, you don't make a pillow to hang it on the wall or paint something beautiful to use a door mat, right? No, you make the pillow to rest your head on, or to accent a room. And you paint something beautiful to decorate your home or showcase your talent.
So, (going with the analogies) if the painting had feelings (and autonomy), and wanted to rebel against the artist it would usurp the artist's attempts to hang it and place itself on the front porch floor just in front of the door...but it wouldn't really be happy! It would trampled on, scuffed, broken. But if the autonomous, emotionally aware painting, submitted to the artist's attempts to hang it on the wall the painting would be delighted in, enjoyed, praised, appreciated...but only when, and after, the painting submitted.
There is a distinct difference between man and woman, even down to our very soul, the very fiber and nature of our being, we are different and thus created to fulfill different roles. And E.E. is saying that in fulfilling our own, purposed roles, we find life because we are submitting to the will of our Father, the Creator! We find who we are and who we were intended to be, by God's design.
I love this book...I'm eating it up. EE is causing me to want to be a better "God-woman" more accepting and welcoming of my feminine "responsibilities", mindset, heart-set, and character... - and I could dialogue for days!
In some of my circles, this idea is not that new or seemingly radical, but outside of them...radical indeed, and so desperately needing to be said!
- p.carrick -
LOVE LOVE LOVE!!!
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