True Woman 101 - Week 3: Sugar and Spice

Nancy: Okay girls. "Sugar and spice and everything nice." That’s not exactly the image of womanhood that our culture promotes is it.

Mary: Not at all the image. I think that culture has intentionally tried to change the image. I mean, the Mother Goose rhyme from way back when. I remember when I was a girl. “Sugar and spice and everything nice is what little girls are made of.” But you know what comes to mind on that is that cartoon, The Powerpuff Girls. You have girls. Are you familiar with that cartoon?

Dannah Gresh:  I am, unfortunately. 

Mary: It just strikes me how intentional culture is being about changing the idea of what womanhood is about. Because sugar, spice, everything nice, in that particular cartoon, the three little girls have an encounter with three boys who are called the Rowdy Rough Boys. These boys come in and they are larger than life—big, mean, tough boys. And then the girls figure out the way to subdue them is by giving them sugar, which is kisses. Then when that doesn’t work anymore, they see that every time they insult the boys and really insult them as boys—basically emasculate them and insult their manhood—these boys get smaller and smaller and smaller and smaller. And so our young girls who are watching these messages.

Nancy: And how true to life is that? When we act that way toward men, what are we doing to men, making them smaller and smaller and smaller in their own minds.

Mary: Exactly. It just seems that we have such an issue in our culture with this and girls that are sassy and in-your-face and not just towards men, but towards each other. Insolence and arrogance is really seen as girl power, and that is seen as something that is very, very positive.

Dannah: One of the things that really bothers me is just television commercials, because the guy is always the brunt of the joke. He is always the dummy. He is always the one who doesn’t know how to order pizza or use a tissue or open a can of something. Why does he always have to be the dummy? And why is she always so smart and the one that solves the problem? I mean, just something in my spirit goes, “This is just not fair! It's not right.”

Nancy: I think we underestimate the impact that these messages are having on women, teenagers, little girls.

Mary: And on men. I have a house full of boys. It was difficult raising them with countering the messages that they were hearing about their identity. Girls now are just really being poured into and lifted up and given all the prominence and given the funding. And certainly it is good that we are paying attention to the women, but it’s often at the expense of the men. The attitude of this superiority. It’s just so fascinating to me because really what the women’s movement was complaining against was that men were seeing themselves as superior to women, and they wanted to equalize the playing field.

Dannah: And that’s the double-mindedness of the feminist movement, isn’t it? They have achieved many of the things that were useful. I’m grateful I can vote. That’s good. But why does my son have to be treated like a second-class citizen so they can feel good about themselves? That infuriates me.

Mary: As the oppressed has become the oppressor in our culture.

Nancy: And yet there’s a sense, don’t you think, among women that nice doesn’t cut it? "Sugar and spice and everything nice." Thinking that if you’re going to have a gentle spirit, be kind, be gracious, be nice, that you’re going to get walked all over in the work place, you’re going to get taken advantage of. That’s a way of thinking that we see everywhere. It’s in the air we breathe that nice girls don’t get anywhere. You can’t advance; you won’t be respected. You have to stand up for yourself, be strong.

Mary: Nice is really seen as weak. Nice is wimpy. Women can’t be nice and can’t be gentle spirited because that’s seen as being doormatish.

Holly: What’s applauded for younger women, or for any age woman is to be aggressive, to be in charge, to be in control of the situation regardless of who is around you. And it’s pervasive. Not just in television shows or movies, but it’s invasive across our whole culture. I’m thinking of my daughter, Jessica, who in our youth group is surrounded by girls that are from all different avenues of life.

And what they desire is so different than what my older daughters would have encountered fifteen or twenty years ago. These gals have grown up watching the Disney channel. So their dress is mature. I mean at thirteen they are dressing like mature women that are twenty-five. And their goals in life are very, very drastically different from a thirteen-year-old’s goals twenty years ago.

Dannah: Right. Well, let me tell you what is heart-breaking to me because this is where my heart beats. Years ago I was saying, “Lord, let me grow up and minister to women,” because I was ministering to teens. He goes, “How about eight-year-olds?” And I was like, “Really, Lord?” And I was obedient to that, and my heart has become so impassioned. But those little girls, when they dress to look like they are seventeen when they are eight years old, when they are listening to these songs, “Don’t You Wish Your Boyfriend Was Hot Like Me?” which you can hear lots of little elementary school girls running around singing, when they are becoming so consumed with beauty image issues; they are most at risk of eating disorders, body image issues, depression, and an early physical debut, an early sexual debut as teenagers.

Which means by the time they are married women in their twenties or thirties, their bodies are so broken and they have so many scars on their hearts from sexual sin, and they have so many body image issues that they can’t enjoy the gift of marriage that God has gifted to them. And on top of that, they don’t want to enjoy the gift of marriage.

In the eighties, there was a survey was done about how many men and women in the church felt like they wanted to emphasize the role of motherhood for their daughters. And it was a majority of the church. In the last decade, the same survey, the vast minority wanted to emphasize the roles of motherhood and being a wife for their daughters. And you talk to the average teenager today, even my girls . . . I have to work so hard to be counter-cultural to plant in them the desire for motherhood and being a wife. We are just dismantling the passion to be in the marriage relationship which is a picture of Christ and the church.

Nancy: And as women have embraced these new models of womanhood, that’s had a strong impact in relationships, on men and in male-female relationship. Here at Revive Our Hearts we get a lot of letters from women, but we also occasionally hear from men talking about how this whole revolution in womanhood has impacted them.

I’m thinking of an email that a man sent to us here at Revive Our Hearts. It’s really tragic when you think about it. He said,

I haven’t been out with a real woman in many years. The reason is simple. I haven’t found a real woman in years. The so-called modern woman is aggressive, controlling, rude, loud, overbearing obnoxious, unfaithful, disrespectful [and this was what was sad to me,] even women at church. I miss the strong, but feminine woman of years gone by.

He misses that. I think our culture misses something. I think our relationships miss something by not having that courageous, strong, but feminine woman of years gone by. And so as we think about womanhood and what our culture says and its messages, the Bible has a whole different message about womanhood. And of course, that’s our authority. That’s what we are looking to if we are to be true women, we need to think biblically, think “Christianly.”

And in this week’s True Woman 101 lesson, we looked at several things that are at the core of what it means to be a woman from God’s point of view. Now, these are counter-cultural. They are radical. They are not messages that women are getting today, but they are messages we need to be taking in, embracing and communicating to our daughters and granddaughters and other young women.

The first of those core aspects of womanhood that we looked at this week is “softness.” Softness. Now talk about counter-cultural.

Mary: That is so counter-cultural, isn’t it? But when we go back into Genesis, we see that God created the sexes differently and at different times and in different ways. We can glean so much truth out of what Genesis says. We studied this verse also in this past week’s lesson where Adam is presented with his wife. The Lord brings her to him, and he goes into this amazing, spontaneous poem, this “Wow!” and “Amazing!” And he says, “This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh.” And here is the critical part. “She shall be called woman” which in Hebrew is isha, “because she was taken out of man,” which is ish (Gen. 2:23).

There’s just so much depth in there, even in what Adam recognized immediately to be true. And the word for “man” there, being based on the Hebrew root for “strength.” “I’m the strength. I have all this strength to give her and pour out into her. And her name being really based on, scholars believe, “softness.” Ao that isha means “soft” and ish means “strength.” And what an incredible picture here, right in Genesis, right in the very beginning of how God created women to be different than men.

Nancy: And yet, when you start talking about softness for women, that evokes some fears in a lot of women’s hearts. What are they thinking might be the downside of being the soft woman.

Dannah: This was a big thing this study for me this week as I looked at those two words and just the fear that there really is in our culture for a woman to be soft. I’ll tell you what my "eureka" moment was. It was in looking at those words and in looking at the Hebrew and saying this is fact. This is what God says. Men are created to be strong. Women are created to be soft. And I think that doesn’t mean we are wimpy. I think it means we are soft toward. We are soft toward God. We are soft toward our husbands. We are soft toward truth. This is fact. It says, “man” is strength; “woman” is soft.

I was at a conference on family that I spoke at and there was a national pastor that made kind of a passing joke for singles. He said, “Let me minister to the singles for just a moment. If God could find a spouse for Adam, He’s got a better chance for finding one for you.” And it was just kind of a moment of fun and humor, so I posted that on my Facebook page.

A lot of single women were saying, “Wow, that really did encourage me and minister to me. I’m going to pray again.” And then one woman said, with I think a feminist heart, “It offends me that you would post that. Why didn’t you take note of the fact that God equally created Adam for Eve?” And I thought, “No, He didn’t. No, He didn’t.” We’ve got to get back to the facts of the Scripture.

The fact is that God made her for him, and He made her to be soft for, soft towards, tender towards. I think in the Scriptures it also talks about when we delight in something, we are soft towards it. And we are supposed to delight ourselves in the Lord.

Mary: And our whole bodies. Even our physical bodies, you know the way the parts fit together, the way that women are . . . we’re softer. We’ve got curves. (laughter)

Nancy: Do we ever! (laughter)

Mary: Curvy, sometimes too much, but we’ve got that softness, that welcoming. We’ve got the womb. We’ve got the space. And in the lesson, I talked about the curve in our arms. It’s so amazing.

Dannah: You know, I got my husband and I said, “Stand next to me.”

Mary: Stand next to me. Right.

Dannah: Let’s compare it.

Mary: Right! And the woman has this carrying angle, which is why we can’t throw footballs.

Holly Elliff: And that is why men cannot carry children for long period of times in their arms.

Mary: That’s right.

Holly: It’s so much more uncomfortable for them, but women can.

Dannah: I always wondered what that was about. (laughter)

Holly: But women hang on to that baby and tote it all over town like this in their arm and on their hip. Men cannot do that. They are physically built in a different way.

Mary: Physically, they are different. But I think that is such an image. When I think of womanhood, I think that God created us to create this nurturing space, a welcoming space. And even when we hold our arms, there’s a space, our wombs are a space. And whether you’re single or whether you’re married, there is a softness about womanhood that God finds very, very precious. And He talks about that in 1 Peter chapter 3 that this is very precious to God.

Holly: But it is not applauded anywhere.

Nancy: So what are some of the blessings and benefits of embracing that mindset rather than resisting it?

Dannah: Is it all right if I confess something? This softness has been something that has been very hard for me and the Lord has really had to do a work in my heart. I can remember as a young married woman believing that I was submissive. I would never have called myself a feminist. If my husband asked me to do something big picture, I was on board, “Amen. Let’s do it.” He asked me once, can we move from my little home town across the nation fifteen hours, and I said, “Yes. Absolutely. Amen.” Submit, submit, submit. But God forbid should that man try to choose our parking space on Sunday morning.

Mary: Ugh. I’ve been there.

Holly: I think everybody can identify there. (laughter)

Dannah: It’s the little things. I wanted to micromanage every little decision. We were on vacation about ten years into our marriage, and God really just got a hold of me. I was seeing how I was breaking my husband’s spirit. I was breaking his heart. And I remember waking him in the middle of the night and just getting down on my knees and saying, “Can you forgive me for this?” And you know, I think he didn’t believe it. But the next day, I started to just . . . You know, it took a lot of strength to be soft, let me just say that!

Mary: I know. People just don’t understand it’s a sign of strength.

Dannah: But here’s the benefit that came out of it, because your question was, “What are the benefits?” As I submitted to the little things, as I was soft and just let him lead, suddenly he started rising up to do all the things. Little things like opening the door for me, putting his hand in the small of my back and leading me along. I think that is what we are forfeiting in our hardness. We are forfeiting that protectiveness in them that they will rise up to bring if we could just shut our “pie-holes” once in a while, and be soft, instead of saying what we think is the smart and fast thing to do.

Holly: But there is so much fear related to softness.

Nancy: Kim, I remember when we had that conversation a number of years ago, now, where I asked you, “Is it possible that you intimidate your husband?”

Kim Wagner: Yes.

Nancy: And you looked at me like, “Who, me?”

Kim: I am so thankful you asked me that question, Nancy, because when you first said that, I think my response was, “Whew! Right.” But that question kept going over and over in my mind. And sure enough, it took a while before my husband admitted it to me that I did intimidate him with my strong will, my determination, with “I have the right answer and this is the way we need to go.” And I, too, would say I was a submissive wife. But in the little decisions and in the recesses of my heart, I was not submissive. I did not have that openness, that receptivity.

I think the greatest benefit is, when we are living out our design, the way God has designed us, as you’ve shared, and as this chapter has opened out, then we are able to demonstrate to others God’s glory. When we have that relationship with our husband that people can look at and say, “That’s a transformation. Only God can do that.” That brings Him glory and that is what we are called to do.

Nancy: And we demonstrate the responsiveness that the church is supposed to have toward Christ, our heavenly husband.

Kim: Right.

Nancy: As the bride of Christ, we are picturing for the world, giving an earthly picture of that heavenly spiritual reality that the church is to be responsive, tender to Christ, and not weak, not run over. Christ doesn’t run over His people. He loves them. He nurtures them. But it makes it a lot easier, don’t you think, on the guys, if, as women we will be malleable, responsive.

Holly: It makes it impossible for a guy, for the shepherd to be strong, if the woman is insistent that she is in control. It makes it impossible for him to do what God has called him to do.

Mary: I feel so bad for the women today because really they are shooting themselves in the foot. More than anything they want to have good, healthy relationships that last and that are fulfilling. So in a sense, it is the same goal. I mean, all of us want to have those types of relationships. But the way to go about getting that type of relationship is by following God’s design.

And I just think that women are so relational that if we don’t have that softness that welcomes relationships, we are going to really cut off what we need the most—what we want the most. Because I believe that we were created for relationship and that women yearn for relationships in a way that is very unique to what it means to be a woman.

Nancy: You can see this. I mean, when was the last time you were out with couples for dinner or whatever. You never hear a guy stand up and say, “I’m going to the restroom. Would anyone like to go with me?” (laughter) But women are going to do things in groups. We are just wired for relationships, which doesn’t mean men can’t be relational, and some of them are very good at it. But it means in our DNA is that connectivity—that bent toward relationships.

Dannah: I was doing some research recently for teenage girls. One of the things that is undeniable across the board is that when sex, the gift of sexuality is misused, a woman is hurt. It’s not so for a man. He might feel some shame. He might feel some conviction. He might feel some regrets, but there is not an overwhelming sense of woundedness that permeates him for years to come sometimes.

I’ve worked with women in their eighties that are still wounded from something that happened when they were sixteen. And one of the facts is— this is just biology—the part of the brain that stores relationships, that stores particularly the romantic emotional relationship of man and woman, but all relationships, my friendship with you, my friendship with Nancy, is the deep limbic system.

Though the male brain is typically larger than the female brain—which don’t let them know that, we don’t want that out. (laughter) But the part of the brain, the deep limbic system which stores memory and emotions and relationship is two to three times larger in the female. There’s simply more geography for her to store all of that relationship. There’s more potential for deep healthy union. And there’s more potential for hurt if we don’t do things the way God designed it.

Mary: She’s the softer one. There’s more potential for connection, and there’s more potential for hurt.

Nancy Leigh DeMoss: The desire to create a space to nurture relationships. We see that in Scripture, the challenge for women to have a heart for home. Domesticity is the old-fashioned word . . . “domestic.” You hardly hear that word anymore, but that is part of what’s at the core of womanhood—that nesting instinct.

Holly Elliff: We have spent so long now denying that, telling our girls, telling women that being domestic, being in your home is not important, that it doesn’t matter.

Nancy: We've really devalued that calling.

Holly: We've devalued that calling as though it were not something critical to our life as women.

Mary: And yet the Bible lists having a heart for your home as one of the top ten things that women need to learn and need to be mentored in, in Titus chapter 2.

Nancy: A great True Woman passage.

Mary: Exactly . . . having that heart for the home. I think often we think this is just for married women who have children. But I think that it is about womanhood overall. It doesn’t matter what age or stage of life a woman is in, it is about creating that space that’s welcoming and that nurtures life. It doesn’t matter if you’re married, doesn’t matter if you have children. It’s high time that we start valuing the home and start telling women that their homes are important.

Nancy: And I want to emphasize that all of these core values at the heart of womanhood are not just for married women—and I’ll be the advocate for single women here—and say that it really is a joy and a privilege to create in my home a space that is welcoming. In fact, Mary, you’ve been camped out at my house for the last couple of weeks. It’s to welcome somebody into my home, to create an environment  that’s conducive to growth and nurture and caring. That’s part of what fulfills who God made me to be.

Kim Wagner: I think that a heart of hospitality really comes from the heart of God. He prepared the garden; He prepared a beautiful place.

Nancy: Isn’t that what the gospel is all about? It’s Christ on the cross extending His arms, saying, “Come to my home. I’m going to prepare a place for you, and I want to receive you there.”

So when we show hospitality, we show the open arms of the gospel. We show the welcoming heart of God. As women, that’s a way we model and make the gospel attractive.

Mary: And we model really what the church does here on earth, in terms of creating a place where life can happen, where community can happen, where connectedness can happen, where you see life and growth.

Really, that’s what the church does for Christ, and that’s what women model in terms of who we are as women, to create those spaces for our girlfriends, for our families if we happen to be married, or just to have that life-giving space. You don’t need to be a married woman to be able to do that.

Dannah Gresh: I saw a really neat blog just this week. A single woman was talking about how she had this hope chest and this beautiful, fine china that one day she would eat on with her husband.

God spoke to her and said, “Take the china out. You’re a nurturer now; you’re a homemaker now.” So when her girlfriends come over they eat on the most beautiful china with the most beautiful crystal. She said, “This is just my obedience to the Lord, that I’m a nurturer now.”

Holly: I love, in the study, that that is the attitude in these first few lessons we’ve looked at. It’s not about putting on a certain outfit, or conforming to any set of rules. It’s about the heart that says, “I understand who God created me to be,” and giving ourselves permission to step back a little bit, get God’s perspective on our lives, and understand that being soft, that creating those environments is part of what God has built into me if I will tap into it.

I love in the study that we’re looking at stepping back, getting big-picture concepts of what our womanhood is about, and that it’s okay.

Kim: Let me ask you this, though, because the rubber meets the road . . . “God, help me with the laundry.” This is the real deal. Packing lunches has been something the Lord’s had to transform my heart with. How do you make this attitude of softness and nurturing roll over into, “Alright, in the next fifteen minutes I have to pack some lunches and get the laundry out.”

Holly: For me, it has been a process of surrender to God’s will for my life rather than my own agenda, and seeing even those things that God has called me to as part of His big-picture calling on my life.

Nancy: And now you’re not only doing it with children and grandchildren, you’re doing it with an elderly mother with Alzheimer’s.

Holly: I’m pretty much doing every season of life right now, which, knowing who I was at twenty is pretty amazing. It’s a good thing God did not give me a road map at twenty because I would have been running the other direction. But what God did was grow me up into those things.

I think it’s about realizing that even those mundane things that I’m not a fan of, are part of the big picture of raising sons and daughters who will have that concept when they leave my home.

Nancy: And they matter, they matter to those family members, they really do matter. It makes a difference.

Mary: I think we need to be careful, though, to explain that we’re not talking about a stereotype, about who does what. It’s really just cultivating that heart, that womanly disposition, that propensity to nurture and to line our nest with feathers and to create that environment that is conducive to life.

It’s keeping in mind those big-picture things.

Kim: That’s the deal for me, big-picture. If I’m folding laundry it’s real easy for me to grumble, ‘cause I just did it yesterday, and I’ll do it again tomorrow. So, big-picture for me is praying over my children while I fold their laundry.

Mary: That’s what I used to do, actually. Every time I matched a pair of socks, I would pray for the person whose feet were going to be in those socks the next day.

Kim: Right, otherwise it’s overwhelmingly monotonous for me, those kinds of tasks.

Holly: And I think even as we are talking about single women, what I’ve seen God do in you, Nancy, in the last couple of decades is change your heart toward the things that God has called us to as women. So it’s okay if you want to decorate your home or cook a meal.

There’s an understanding that it’s not either/or. That softness in any environment is part of living out God’s message, whether you’re teaching a Bible study, or you’re having guests in your home and wanting them to be comfortable.

Nancy: Again, it comes back to the attitude of the heart, so when we think back over those five core aspects of womanhood that we’ve looked at in this week’s lesson . . . Let me just tick, them off here: softness; forming deep relational bonds; having a welcoming, responsive spirit; creating a place to beget and nurture life; and then one we didn’t get to in this discussion, but we did in the study this week, being a helper and realizing this is not an inferior role, this is a vital role to men.

As you think about those aspects of womanhood, is there any particular one that you have found most difficult or challenging?

Dannah: To be a helper without being a controller. I’ve shared with you how I looked at the helper role, “Oh good, this is where I get to fix my husband. I’m helping him improve.”  

To step back from that and see that the helper role is actually encouraging him and empowering him to be the man that God has called him to be. That can be done in many different ways.

Mary: It’s not really about helping him, he’s not the end point of that. As soon as you lose sight of the big picture, you start taking missteps, I think, in terms of attitude or heart, or in terms of just deciding what it should look like.

I think if we have the big picture in mind, that really gives us guidance. I know that for me, sometimes forming those deep relational bonds is challenging because I have a limited capacity in terms of how many people I can relate deeply to.

Nancy: We all do. With social media and technology there’s a demand put on us. With Facebook you have about six gazillion friends but they are pseudo relationships.

Mary: But I look at my girlfriends who seem to have so much bigger capacity in that area. They’re very good at remembering birthdays and anniversaries and relating very well. Well, it’s not that I don’t want to, I just . . . I forgot my anniversary one year. My sweet husband shows up with a gift, and I say, “Oh, I forgot.” That’s a challenge for me.

I’ve made it up to him, but there’s so much joy and so much fulfillment. It’s almost like when I’m intentional about that part, it pours life into me. I become more of who God created me to be. So I think it is important to be intentional about realizing, instead of just saying, “Oh well, that’s not me,” saying “Well, God created woman with this capacity, and maybe I ought to go there and try it out a little bit.”

Holly: I think for me, having a responsive spirit was probably the biggest challenge and still is, because my tendency is to want to focus on myself. I have to get my eyes off myself, and look big picture. Like you said, Dannah, the softness thing didn’t come naturally to me. Knowing that it is something God desires to do through me. It’s not something I have to create; it’s something I have to rest in, and allow God to do through me as He grows me up. For sure, that was a struggle for me, that responsiveness.

Kim: My struggle would be nurturing. And you wouldn’t look at me and say, “What an awful mom, what an awful wife.” As long as it was creative and outside the box . . .

I was writing Bible study curriculum for my mom and dad when I was seven years old. “TBFF,” The Barker Family Fellowship meets here every Tuesday. So if I was being creative with my kids, crafting things, writing Bible studies, reading the Bible with them, taking them for hikes, great.

But, laundry, grocery store (I love cooking, but don’t like the grocery store), packing lunches. And here’s where the Lord really got me years ago with the verse, “Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with your might.”

“I am not packing lunches with my might Lord. I am barely getting that done.” My kids even grumbled and complained about the soggy sandwiches. “Did you make these peanut butter sandwiches at the beginning of the week?!”

I got creative with that. Since I’m not good with routine, I get creative with routine. I say, “Lord, how can I get creative with lunches?” And so my kids don’t get the standard lunch—sandwich, chips, apple—they’re getting leftovers.

Mary: Are you trying to convict the rest of us? (laughter)

Kim: No, and they’re not getting the organic shaved carrot sandwiches that some of my girlfriends send to school, because I’m not a morning person. So, I plan my meals out with lunches in mind so that I can put them in little containers and they can just microwave them at school.

They have phenomenal beef stew one day, chili with toppings the next day, and for me it’s easier and it’s creative. So I’ve found that I can submit, I just have to find how God created my personality to work so that I can nurture.

Holly: And like you said, it doesn’t have to look like the other mom who’s shaving carrots into her sandwich.

Kim: Right, too crazy!

Holly: Be who God has called you to be.

Nancy: Let’s talk a minute about how this nurturing, responsive, welcoming heart attitude can play out outside the home, in our relationships with men in general. Just think about what that looks like: married, single. How does the gospel play out in our womanhood as we, in the workplace (a number of us travel), what does that look like?

Mary: I have a travel story. One time, when I got on the plane, and I’m schlepping—that’s the good German word, schlepping—a little suitcase down the aisle, my little, heavy suitcase. A gentleman stands up and offers to put it in the overhead for me. I say, “No thanks, that’s alright, I can manage it myself.” And I sat down, and God’s Spirit convicted me. I thought, “I just missed an opportunity to allow him to bring his strength into my life to minister to me as a woman.”

Nancy: To let him be a gentleman.

Mary: Yes, to let him be a gentleman, and me to be a soft and responsive as a woman. And certainly, women are not be responsive to sin, and we’re not talking about violating boundaries or going the wrong way. But just this attitude of receptivity and blessing who our brothers are as men, even if they’re not believers, and  interacting with them out of the focus of being a woman, interacting with them in a womanly way.

There was another gentleman on a plane that I sat next to once who basically said to me, and this was not a believer, “Women have no idea of the power of their femininity. When I encounter a womanly woman, a feminine woman, it makes me want to rise up and serve her.” It’s just an amazing thing.

Holly: It can be as simple as a smile on your face, greeting the person next to you, so you find out all about Deloris’ life, or whoever it is . . . just a warm receptive spirit that opens the door to be able to share the life of Christ.

Dannah: Giving out a lot of “thank yous,” demonstrating gratitude in your home to the family members, doing that often. Just to say, “Thank you. I appreciate you.” Communicating to them often what you think in your mind (and you think they know that). “They know they did a good job; they know I think highly of them.”  But if we don’t verbalize that, they really don’t.

Nancy: And to the gentleman who opens the door so that you can go through, to have a grateful spirit. I’ve read the articles of some of these guys feeling they’re going to get their hand cut off if they treat us in a womanly way. I think we’ve created some terror there. But to be another kind of woman who says, “Thank you so much, I appreciate that.”

Kim: I’ve found one of the cool things that God has allowed me to do is to speak words of affirmation to people like my brother, my dad, my husband, and there are some other men in leadership in my ministry.

It means a lot when I take time to say, “I saw your strength in that decision that you made,” or “I appreciated the leadership that you exemplified in that really difficult conversation.” Just writing an email or a handwritten note can go such a long way in giving them the courage to continue to lead.

Dannah: And affirming them in front of others, to speak that in front of other people.

Nancy: Okay, I’ve got to tell you one of my pet peeves, and it fits in here with this whole thing of women being responsive. Take it out of marriage and out of the home. I’ve seen so many times when there’s a gathering, we’re having prayer time (or a testimony time), and there are men and women (I saw this last week). The women just dove into the pile to pray, and because we do tend to be more naturally verbal, the guys they’re being gentlemen, they’re letting you through the door, and just waiting.

I hear so many women say, “I wish men would be more expressive, more responsive, take more spiritual leadership,” but sometimes you think, just practically, do we even give them a chance to step in?

One of the things I try to do—I’m in a lot of meetings with mostly men—and it’s to give the guys a chance to verbalize. They will. They’ve got deep hearts, so many of them do. I thank the Lord for so many of the men I work with. They really do, and they love the Lord, and they love His Word. But if we’re going to fill all the holes, all the silence with our words, we’re not going to give them a chance.

I say to women sometimes, “Just back off a little bit.” Let him have a chance to say what’s on his heart. That’s being responsive. It’s in a quiet sort of way, giving them the chance to be men, to take the initiative and to provide leadership.

Mary: I wholeheartedly agree. Womanhood is such a critical topic, because it ties into our identity and who God created us to be. I think that it’s not an easy topic to talk about in this culture, it hasn’t been easy for me.

Holly: I don’t think it is for any of us, necessarily.

Mary: I think the fear sometimes is that God’s going to change our personalities, or violate our personalities. If I’m a strong-minded, opinionated, outgoing, extrovert, that I have to change. That’s simply not true.

I think that God can take these characteristics that we’ve talked about and pour them into any woman, any personality type, and she’s going to end up looking like “her.” You’re going to become more “you.” Your personality will shine out more as it’s redeemed by the gospel, and as God teaches you who it means to be a woman. A true woman, a godly woman.

Holly: You become the woman that God had in his mind when He created us, when Jeremiah talks about God creating us in the womb, that we fully become the woman that God had in his mind when He created us—instead of part of that, or a misshapen representation of that. We are able to more and more look like Christ throughout our life in a feminine way.