Jim Miller
Gray, Maine
From time to time I hear women/wives/mothers say I am so limited in what I can do for the Lord. When I hear this I am always surprised that women can think this way. The role a women plays in the family and in the church and in everyday life is amazing. Yes, it is far different than the mans role but it is certainly NO LESS important.
Ladies I ask you to think about this. You are the emotional hub of the home for one thing. Your care of the children and your husband you make up the very fabric of life in your home. Today it seems that the importance of being a good mother and wife have fallen by the wayside for jobs and other stuff outside the family. This is not to say some women do not have to work today, but if you really consider the Christian home it can't be pleasing to God if the woman in that home is not taking her duty to God and her family seriously.
A Christian wife is to love her husband and help him improve himself in all good aspects of life, even inspire him to a more fruitful life, that they may encourage the young women to love their husbands . . ." (Titus 2:4). Wives are to love their husbands. This is a commandment from the Lord that should not be received lightly. This love should motivate a wife to seek the improvement of her husband's well being before the Lord. "In the same way, you wives, be submissive to your own husbands so that even if any of them are disobedient to the word, they may be won without a word by the behavior of their wives, as they observe your chaste and respectful behavior" (1 Peter 3:1-2).
Another very important, godly duty is that of the woman's bearing children. A godly woman should never think like some I have seen and heard these days saying thins such as, "Having children will limit my freedom," or something to the extent of "If I had children I could not raise properly" Some women have even been heard saying I don't even want children they are a bother. Believe it or not God does make child bearing a choice from Eve right up till today we are to go forth and multiply. The Bible tells us women shall be preserved through the bearing of children if they continue in faith and love and sanctity with self-restraint" (1 Timothy 2:14-15). If a woman is capable of bearing children, then she has that duty to her husband but above all to God in order to be pleasing to Him.
Now you might be saying that is all well and good but what role can I play in the church? I would be hard pressed to say the contribution that women make to the local congregation is of no effect since they are especially suit for important work. I would say a woman is not merely useful to the Lord's work, they are absolutely critical.
Look at Paul's remarks about Phoebe. When he wrote to the church in Rome he said "I commend to you Phoebe our sister, who is a servant of the church in Cenchrea, that you may receive her in the Lord in a manner worthy of the saints, and assist her in whatever business she has need of you; for indeed she has been a helper of many and of myself also" (Rom. 16:1,2). Paul doesn't specify what kind of service Phoebe was rendering, but his language clearly shows that she was doing things in the Lord's work that amounted to far more than a token contribution.
What about (Benevolence). Seeing to the needs of those who are sick, those who are impoverished, etc. No it is not just the work for women. Both men and women, need to do more than we do to help meet physical needs among the saints (Jas. 2:14-16; 1 Jn. 3:17,18). Yet, there can be no question, that sisters in the Lord are capable of bringing to this important work a grace and a beauty that men are normally not capable of. Just look at the the women who waited upon the physical needs of the Lord himself (Matt. 27:55; Lk. 8:3) look at the added a touch of grace that his male disciples were hardly able to supply and the unique at-tributes of femininity make the work of benevolence far more heartening than it would be without them.
Ladies these are but very few of the wonderful attributes you have been given and blessed with. It would never be too much to say, considering the high gifts granted by God to women, that the gospel is never adorned any more beautifully than when women of the Lord love and work and serve faithfully in his work.
