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It might seem like an odd trait to cultivate, but I’ve been thinking lately about how “softness” is missing in a lot of today’s women, why it’s a powerful trait, and why I’m purposing to become a softer woman.

The pursuit of equality has robbed us of more than it gave. With all the hear me roaring going on, and the clawing our way up the corporate ladder, proving that “anything you can do I can do better” to all the men who want to “hold us down”, we’ve become hard, tough, independent women, and in our own delusion, we applaud ourselves for these qualities instead of mourning the death of our naturally-powerful attributes.

Equal doesn’t have to be the same. That’s where we got sorely misguided. To become more like men doesn’t make us equal any more than wearing a wig makes them more able to bear children.

We are already equal. Just different. That difference is (was?) incredible! Femininity is a unique gift that only we were given. Our softness and all that encapsulates is a powerful force and it is a strength we already possess and don’t have to fight for.

I have found that even those of us who would never think of ourselves as trying to act like men, have still been subtly influenced and tempted to throw off our feminine traits in favor of tougher, more manly ones.

Realistically, and ironically, true femininity is strong. A woman can be soft and strong, tender and tough, deferring and dignified, all at the same time.

She can “laugh at the time to come”, live fearlessly, be in shape, be a sharp business woman, manage her home with wisdom and be her husband’s most trusted companion, all while seeking to be soft, feminine and lovely.

I think a woman’s countenance reflects her heart’s attention. That is, what she studies, reads, thinks about and seeks after is an innate part of her and will manifest itself even in her physical demeanor. In the way we dress, carry ourselves, the words we use and even in the volume of our voices.

Now for a bit of confession. I am writing this post to myself more than for anyone else, I’m just hoping it may resonate with you too. I struggle, and always have, with a reactionary personality, raising my voice and answering harshly. I overreact to things more than I should and do not choose gentleness when I should.

It is deeply rooted and I know each day when I get up I am fighting a battle against myself. One in which I will likely lose a couple of wars.

But just like weeding a garden, I will not stop pulling the weeds and cultivating the soil of my heart.

My aim is gentleness and softness. I want to be known as a woman who had “the law of kindness on her tongue.”

I want to be known as a woman who spoke well of others, honored others even if they weren’t present, found the beauty even when it was hidden, and inspired those around me to live more intentionally.

I want to be a steady mom, expecting much, forgiving much, leading my children into adulthood with firmness and resolve, love and laughter, determination and perseverance.

I want a constitution as strong as steel, and a demeanor as soft as a dove.

I’m thankful God didn’t make me the same as my husband. I can assure you, our husbands are thankful too.

Equal but vastly different. Praise Him.

A friend shared a post on Facebook recently and when I read it, it irritated me. But I sort of didn’t know why at first, because honestly, it was hard to even articulate what the article was about when I tried to tell my husband. Do you feel the same? Here’s a snippet:

“It was the raspberry ices that broke me….the women’s Bible study I was attending was going through A Woman After God’s Own Heart by Elizabeth George, one of those guides to “biblical womanhood” that offered a few good insights, but mostly just made me feel guilty and inadequate about my fledgling homemaking skills. Something about the theology seemed off, but as a young mom, I took the older, more experienced women’s words to heart. Or at least I did until George described how she served her daughters raspberry ices when they came home from school, and a case of spiritual brain freeze spurred me to righteous rebellion.

See, I had spent much of my childhood in Liberia, a country that was in the midst of a horrific civil war. The women I had grown up with—strong women who loved Jesus and were certainly “women after God’s own heart”—had been forced to flee their concrete block houses and zinc shacks to take refuge in the jungle, or make the long, dangerous trek to Ghana seeking refuge and asylum….They sure weren’t serving up raspberry ices in sparkling goblets….

The dichotomy between what I was being taught about “biblical womanhood” in church and the reality of what my loved ones in Liberia were facing was grotesque, and the insinuation that the measure of a woman’s heart could be in any way related to the privileged frivolities of Western homemaking infuriated me….“If it doesn’t work for African market women, it doesn’t work for me.” The gospel has to be good news for everyone willing to accept it, no matter their circumstances, or it isn’t good news at all….

…when we absolutize our gender expectations, insisting that everyone meet our cultural standards of masculinity and femininity, we run into trouble. Not only do we misrepresent what the Bible has to say about men and women, boiling people down to caricatures, we also crush people under the weight of our human-made traditions, which we have erroneously equated with virtue and godliness. In Matthew 23, Jesus had strong words for the scribes and Pharisees who did just that, accusing them of tying heavy burdens on people’s backs, slamming the door of heaven in people’s faces, and of being white-washed tombs…”

Much of what I find problematic about the article is the way the author, Jenny, (studying to get her Master of Divinity in Theology) uses a sort of guilt-tactic I believe is grossly misplaced, even though the article is supposed to illuminate her anger at being made to feel guilty. Blaring red flag.

From the beginning, the reader is coaxed to agree with the article because no one wants to be associated with “the wrong gospel.”  Likewise, we don’t want to be grouped with the “uppity Western woman” when there are deeply suffering women in Africa. And we sure don’t want to be a burdening Pharisee! 

But the way she uses these tactics is dishonest.

She references a Bible Study about how to practically live out being a wife and mother. Something women are commanded to teach. You’ve seen them, and probably have attended them or read a book about them. I talk about practicalities here. (How to be resourceful, cook more nutritionally, be efficient, find shortcuts to cleaning tile–the never-ending suggestions to help us love our husbands and children better. Good teaching.)

But she villainizes them and uses extreme examples to do so. She jumps to the conclusion that merely teaching about the practicalities of homemaking is “not good news for everyone” since there are suffering women in Africa. Quite a leap.

I think that’s unfair for several reasons:

Firstly, we are Western women and thankfully not in the middle of a war-torn country. Life does look radically different for us, practically speaking, especially as it relates to our homes. But if the African women had that privilege, I’m sure they would appreciate some practical instruction on keeping laundry under control too. They might even enjoy the idea of serving raspberry ices to their children as a little token of love.

Now I would agree wholeheartedly with Jenny that holding up the perfect pearl-clad housewife is not helpful to women, no matter where they live. Because the truth is, we are in our own battles, even if we aren’t fighting starvation. Life is messy, even here. You may battle for your marriage, your children, your health. We fight cultural battles that seek to destroy our homes and families. And these are real. And I submit that we are strong, fighting women too, and that those African women would fight beside us here just like we would if we were there.

None of that changes our admonition to “teach the younger women what is good…” and doing so, as Mrs. George was, most certainly doesn’t imply we are depending on our homemaking skills as a measure of godliness. The stretch is absurd.

This is the blaring error, as I see it:

The article uses the “dichotomy” to undermine (and villainize) Titus 2 teaching. “If it doesn’t work for African market women, it doesn’t work for me.” See, that’s a lovely thought, but it’s not realistic. Because what works for African women also doesn’t work for us.

It’s true, we don’t have to serve raspberry ices in dainty goblets to be more godly. But neither does the act of it (or the suggestion of it in a Bible study) make a woman a hypocrite. That was strongly implied.

I am against “shaming” women into anything. But we can’t use that word anytime we’re confronted with something we simply don’t like or don’t want to do.

Confession time:

I don’t love keeping house. I love home, I love the idea of having a tidy, organized house, but I don’t like doing the hard part of it. I’m not good at it. If I sit in on a Bible Study that emphasizes how we can be better house-keepers, I can respond either with anger, feeling “shame” for my inadequacies (i.e. my natural disdain for housework), or I can respond with a renewed effort to improve in an area that needs improvement.

I’m sure Jenny is a lovely woman, and I’m sure we would be friends in real life. My intention isn’t to attack her, personally. But I think when we are given a public platform, we have to be very careful about the message we’re delivering.

Excerpts from On Being a Woman After God’s Own Heart

I’d LOVE to hear your thoughts. Did the article bother you?