I preached on “A Good Woman” on Saturday night. While I heard from many women as to the content and not expecting me to talk on modesty of the heart (most women when they come to church and hear a sermon on womanhood are expecting to hear a sermon on submission). Since we’ve preached on that topic before, I felt like I wanted to go in a different direction. We will hit some more topics pertaining to biblical womanhood this fall when we preach through Titus and in March when we preach through 1 & 2 Peter. What was surprising was hearing from a couple of guys who felt I let women off the hook “after punching them in the throat” the week before.
Here are a few thoughts, in no particular order:
First, I find that if a man lives out what God calls him to, often his wife will live out what God calls her to. She responds in amazing ways. Often, her response of not wanting to follow a husband’s leadership, while it can come from a place of sin in her life, it most often comes from a lack of leadership on his part. The most alive, passionate, Christ centered women I know tend to be married to a man who gets biblical manhood.
Second, men and women are different. They respond differently and live out different roles. We tend to push really hard on men, throwing down so to speak and we try to be gentler with women. If the hammer is going to come down on someone in a sermon, I’d rather it be the men. Men also respond to that kind of straight forward talk.
Third, any man who thinks women got off easy Saturday night in terms of modesty, humility, restraint, self control and not pushing to be the center of attention, either did not listen or have no idea what women actually just got called to. One of the thing I heard from woman after woman is how hard it is to live a life that has a heart of not wanting to be first, the center of attention, seeking the approval of someone or the jealousy of another.
One woman actually summed up beautifully for me when she said, “If you can get this, submission and having the heart of a woman the way God designed you is easier. This is actually at the heart of everything that it means to be a woman of God.”
Fourth, I really wanted to do a sermon on womanhood that was larger than being a wife and responding to your husband. As our population of being who aren’t married continues to grow at Revolution, I want to make sure we are speaking to them as well. From a scheduling perspective, knowing we will speak more clearly to wives on several occasions over the next year, it was an easy switch in this series.
Fifth, I wanted to keep women guessing. Women come expecting to hear a certain message, when it doesn’t happen, my hope was that they would be interested to hear what I had to say.
Sixth, I had a submission message planned and God changed that late Friday night, early Saturday morning.
Our hope through this series has been to call men and women to a larger vision than what they have for themselves and for their marriages. I am loving the feedback I am getting from couples and individuals as they go through the 30 day intimacy challenge and how God is stretching them over this series. It is definitely hitting its mark.
