At the beginning of each month in 2022 this blog will focus on what God says about womanhood. We have named the series “Feminology,” a made-up word which means “the study of being a woman.” This is the fourth post in the series, so if you missed the first three you may want to take a look back at those (click here to read them!) as they laid the foundation for the rest of the series. The focus for those first three months was on woman being made in the image of our Creator and how we therefore reflect His image.
Beginning in April we will spend three months looking at one particular characteristic of godly, biblical women – strength.
As we continue in this Feminology series I hope that each one of us will grow in our understanding of how God views women. I pray that we will have soft hearts and humility as we examine His Word for the truth.
What does it mean to be a strong woman?
Does God even want women to be strong?
Are women as strong as men?
Many of us probably have deeply-held feelings and beliefs about questions like these ones, but to find the answers we need to turn to the Bible. The Bible is our textbook in this study of what it means to be a woman, because it is in the Bible that we find God’s words about His purpose and design for women.
Have you ever looked at a piece of abstract art and wondered what the purpose could possibly be? I know I have. What does that big blue blotch mean? Why are these scribbly lines important? Sometimes I look at the title of the piece for a hint, but titles like “Composition X” and “Abstract 345” don’t convey much when it comes to the artist’s intentions.
God gave us more than vague clues when it comes to His intention and desire for women. Proverbs 31:17 says that the godly woman “girds herself with strength and makes her arms strong.” Then in verse 25 we are told that, “strength and dignity are her clothing.” Pretty straightforward, right? God has made women to be strong.
Not only does the Bible speak about strong women, it also speaks about weak women. 2 Timothy 3 begins by describing what men are going to be like in the last days. Lovers of self, haters of good, the list goes on. We are told to avoid people like these, and then it says, “among them [those evil men] are those who enter into households and captivate weak women weighed down with sins, led on by various impulses, always learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth.” That is a really helpful list describing the opposite of a strong woman. Weak women are able to be captivated by lies and flattery, they are weighed down with sins, led by impulses, always learning but never coming to the knowledge of the truth. Weak women can’t bear difficult things.
This is not what God wants from us as women. Strong women are not taken captive by lying or flattery, they are victorious over sin, they have the ability to resist impulse, and they have a firm grasp of the truth. They can bear these difficult things. This is the kind of strength that God values. This is the strength that He intends women to have.
I think it is fair to say that most of us women want to be strong. The encouraging thing for the Christian is that not only should we be strong, but we can be strong. We don’t have to be weak like the women spoken of in 2 Timothy 3. Why? Because God is strong and He has said that He will give strength to His children. In Colossians 1:11 the Apostle Paul prays that the people in Colossae would be “strengthened with all power, according to His [God’s] glorious might.”
God is gloriously mighty. His strength surpasses anything that we can comprehend, and He will give us the strength that He wants us to have. What an encouragement! Let’s pray like Paul that God will strengthen us as women according to His glorious might, and then let’s look to him with faith to believe that He will answer that prayer.
Love,
Aleaha Bayly
