Sarah D. Shearer

I am sitting down at last to write something I have been thinking about for many years. This will be an opportunity for me to gather my own thoughts and I hope it will challenge you as well. I tend to either make dear friends or vehement enemies with my writing, so we shall see where you land.

Ever since my brief foray into the world of college culture in the year 2011, I have been passionate about femininity. After attending a women’s college that literally sought to rewire women’s brains regarding gender and gender roles, I realized this was a hot topic and one on which I was extremely convicted. 

I remember it vividly. I was in a freshman seminar class, fall 2011. It would have more aptly been entitled Feminism 101, and I’ll explain why. It was right after thanksgiving and we were sharing our holiday experiences. Several young women, teenagers mind you, shared proudly that while home for the holiday, they refused to help in the kitchen because they were expected to as a woman. In a stupid act of of false bravado, they raved on and on about how they planted themselves on the couch in an attempt to educate their family members that they were NOT going to  cook or babysit because they were female—feminism, am I right?? Wooohooo go ladies. 

I was sickened as I heard this because it was in that moment I realized how absolutely toxic feminism was and how badly I needed to get away from this college, and quick. I left a month later and it set me on a long journey of figuring out what exactly it means to be a woman. Why did God make me? Why is my body the way it is? What is innate? What is learned?

And most importantly, what does God require of me as a human female?

Because I am a Christian, I chose the Bible as my supreme resource, and as is common, I went a little extreme to start out with. When exiting one sort of environment, it’s easy  to seesaw in the opposite direction and come off rather legalistic, which I totally did for a while. It is, I think, a natural part of the process. 

I was not married and had no children, but my desire for both was strong and I wanted those two things to be the focal point of my life. It quickly became apparent that even in Christian circles, we want more for women. Here is where I began to see all the “exceptions” we offer.

It’s great to want marriage, but not everyone gets married, some are given  the “gift of singleness.”  It is true that not all marry, but singleness should remain what it is, a rare exception. The normative state described all throughout scripture is marriage and children. Not always early in life, but for most people it will happen. 

It’s great to want kids, but you can do so much more for God than just be a baby machine. Ugh. Don’t even get me started. I have never walked closer with God than I have raising my babies and being pregnant.

It’s lovely that you want to be home with them, but that’s not for everyone. I think boobs + babies are the best living proof that babies need their moms. I shall not state more on this at the moment,

There were exceptions and caveats everywhere I looked. My black and white personality wanted hard and fast rules and I found only passionate discourse on both.

You either only have purpose as a wife and mother or the total opposite. You’re a baby maker whose sole purpose is baking bread for your husband and being a sexually available for him every night (doesn’t sound so bad if I’m being honest) and if you ever desire anything else you are rebellious. Stay home, clean house, lose yourself and wear skirts to your ankles because every aspect of your feminine nature is tempting to men. And people will swear up and down this is holy and better living and you are to look down on anyone else.  You see, there are some good principles in there, but they get all muddled up in legalism and trying to please God with our righteousness, when in reality our righteousness is as filthy rags. Step one is to realize that we are woefully unable to please God without being completely fulled with his Spirit.

Or…. If you don’t like skirts and pregnancy and bread and sex ad nauseam, here’s the other option —-you are free!! independent! Unconstrained ! Don’t need no man! Unless you want to of course, but only on your terms. You don’t need to submit,. That’s archaic. Gender roles are legalistic, we aren’t under the law but under grace. Patriarchy is part of the curse. Pursue a career, fit kids in there somewhere. You can do it all and in heels! Co parent! Co rule! Where would Rome be without the Popes! There is no hierarchy! The future is female!

 I grew exhausted. What was right??  Where was balance? What was I to do??

I have to say, getting married helped me clarify the truth so much. I one hundred percent recommend marrying an extremely godly man who knows who he is and whose he is. Not to prove my point even more, but he has truly shepherded me and helped me to understand the Bible so much. It’s almost like… that’s…his..role… as a man… 

Together,  as newlyweds, we began to explore our future family, which of course was between him and me and God. Not every couple will come to the same conclusion on every decision, but our prayers and reading of scripture has lead us to form convictions which are largely based on biblical principles. This is important because it cuts out a lot of extra biblical legalism that people use and stamp Jesus’ name on it. For example, you can have a conviction on contraceptives, skirts, tattoos, alcohol, etc that may be different than another spirit -filled couple, but abortion is always wrong across the board. principles and laws. different at times.

Let’s break it down further: here is a principle in the Bible: children are a blessing and it’s advantageous to have a lot of them. Many Christians miss the mark on this.  A large group of them have forgotten this principle and embraced the culture of this world entirely, subscribing to the typical two kids and going on their merry way, forgetting that so much more reward is available to us. They buy into the lie that children are a liability  rather than asset, and avoid pregnancy more than necessary because it’s not always easy or cheap or logical. They view family as something they control and something God has a minor say in, but more in a “please bless our plans” kind of way.

Then you have the  quiverfull people who take the principle and turn it into a law and say that having a large family is the way to please God, and you should have as many as possible even if you’re just populating hell because you’re doing a crappy job raising them. Women should wear only floor length skirts and no makeup and their job is to please men even if they are married to gross men who abuse them. True submission means following your alcoholic, unfaithful husband and never saying a word. 

Clearly these are extremes but I have a feeling you’ve seen both. I certainly have.

After  recently being lumped in with the latter because I’m having kids close together, like to wear skirts and (usually) submit to my husband, I knew it was time to really dig into this. 

 My heart is to please the Lord, and I think that is the crux of this entire matter.

I truly believe that if your heart is toward the Lord, he will lead you to live like he explains in his word. For me as a woman, it means rather unequivocally that my heart is toward my husband, my children and my home. It doesn’t tell me how long my skirt should be, but it does tell me to be modest. It also tells me to submit to my husband. I could work my away around all of those verses, coming up with some fancy modern day reason why I get an out. The bible doesn’t tell me expressly, be a housewife or you’re in sin. But  it does tell me to look to the ways of my home, care for my children and respect my husband, calling him lord. So I don’t know about you, but if my heart is totally to do that, it’s a full time job! I don’t have time for another job! This is all I have capacity to do. I believe God’s perfect will is for women to have the GREAT privilege of caring  for their families as their primary occupation. Will every woman marry? No. But most do, and the Bible assumes that. Will every woman bear children? No. But we have created a whole new standard based on exceptions, not rules. The bible offers a clear vision of a patriarchal father who lays down his very life for his wife and a wife who readily offers herself to him.

Again, this is assuming the man’s heart is toward God and the wife isn’t a psycho Jezebel. Everyone loves to talk about the what if’s but let’s talk about and hope that men will be godly and women will be pure. There are still good men and good women. Don’t marry the other kind. But what if you do and they change? It sucks, it’s awful and it’s hitting way too close to home these days but I want to reiterate that these sorry exceptions of men and women DO NOT nullify the standard. 

God created men to be the head of their homes and wives, and enacted properly with the holy spirit’s guidance it is GLORIOUS. It is soooo sweet to live in the safe and beautiful care of a man who loves God. If he is leading and listening, he will create a safe space and will act masculine. His heart is consumed with Jesus and it is clear. His wife joyfully follows him and out of the strength of their marriage they produce  hopefully a quiver full children and enjoy them.  So it gets tricky ay times because the “quiver full” people can look like this on the outside but it can be a whited tomb because their hearts aren’t toward the lord—they only seek outward validation. 

We live in a sin filled world. This  beautiful picture doesn’t always happen. Men sin and go astray. Women sin and go astray. Children sin and go astray. But this doesn’t mean we get to do away with the standard altogether.

Men are still the head of their wives and their homes. Their biblical mandate is to be strong patriarchs.

Wives are still the helpers who should seek to be devoted to home and family.  Their biblical mandate is to be feminine, gentle counterparts.

This plays out a million different ways all over the world in every culture.

Despite the prevalence of Christianity in many places, I still maintain that we are missing out big time. Because we are so hyper focused on being inclusive and having an exception to everything, we have all but tossed out strong masculinity and strong femininity. Because not everyone subscribes to those supposed traits, we just say, “be yourself” whatever that means.

No. Be a man if you’re a man. Don’t  avoid your aggression or your desire to rule and fight and win and provide. Pursue God in the midst of it.

Be a feminine woman. Lean into home and family and yes, wear lots of dresses, not because you’ll go to hell if you don’t but because you love being feminine and you see a need in our culture to be something besides a boxy androgenous she her who hates cooking and kids. Pursue God and he will literally make you more feminine than you ever imagined.

What I’m trying so desperately to say and that I’m sure many of you will miss, citing all the exceptions I forgot to list is that gender roles are of PARAMOUNT importance. Our society is desperate to see real men and real women, and Christians, imperfect as they are, are the only way they’ll see it. 

If you seek him, you will find him if you seek him with all of your heart. And if you seek him with all your heart, you’ll be required to die.

Die to your career dreams and girl boss hustles, perhaps.

Die to your video game habit so you can read your family the Bible.

Die to your two (or three) kid plan because the lord is urging you gently to consider more.

Die to your high paying job that keeps you from ever seeing your kids.

Die to your college experience, seeing its ultimate lack of fruit and pile of debt you’ll bring to your marriage. 

Die to your bikini.

Die to your foul mouth.

Die, and then live. Truly live.