Back in Action

My goodness it's been a while since I've written a new post on Mark of Beauty! Chasing my toddler and tending to other responsibilities has kept me away, but within the past few weeks I have been revisiting some new stuff on biblical womanhood and would enjoy sharing them with you. I can't say that I'm going to be able to spend as much time on here as I have in the past, especially with a new baby on the way in January :), but I'd love to continue passing along helpful resources that I find and encourage you to dive into them with me.

One neat resource that I've found recently is from Mars Hill Church in Seattle, WA. They've been hosting a series on their blog dedicated to biblical womanhood and it's quite good. Here are some of the posts that I have enjoyed so far:

• This Isn’t ‘Separate but Equal." They’re One.: Discusses male and female equality and how that equality is determined by our Maker and who He has created us to be, not by the approval of others or our desire to prove something to others.

• Really Negative Women in Proverbs: Summarizes the negative women of proverbs in a modern day context. The foolish woman. The promiscuous woman. The quarrelsome woman. The embarrassing woman. The moody woman. The flirtatious woman.
  
  
• The Wife of Noble Character: Puts Proverbs 31 into a modern day context and contrasts the post ‘Really Negative Women in Proverbs’.
  
  
• 4 Inadvertent Examples of a Woman in Film: Highlights four recent films that depict women as they learn, inhabit, and demonstrate a more biblical vision of why God made woman than the typical woman we see on the big screen.
  
  
• What I Would Do Differently If I Were a New Bride Today: Jen Smidt, a deacon at Mars Hill Church, lists and works through 11 things that she would do differently now (with age & increased wisdom) that she wishes she would have done as a new bride. (Helpful for women at any life stage.)
  
  
• Awesome Women of Reformation: Summarizes the lives and accomplishments of 14 ‘awesome’ women of the reformation.
  
  
• Talk Like a Lady: Warns us against speaking negatively about ourselves and others. God has created us uniquely and with purpose, and our entire being, including our tongue, should be transformed (Romans 12:2) to reflect His glory.
  
  
• How Not to Change Your Man: Reminds us that God does NOT call us to change our husbands, or ourselves for that matter. Rather, we need to put full confidence in the One who will change us both, and lead each other to the feet of Jesus.
  
  
• Women on the Job: Highlights experiences from 3 different women and shows how the Lord has worked in their lives to make them stand out for Him in their careers. The post also provides 5 helpful tips to strike a balance between working hard, having a life, and loving Christ.

Enjoy your time exploring these posts, and I hope to rejoin you on Mark of Beauty soon!

Missionality Revisited

I've been revisiting my past posts on missionality this week in order to re-evaluate the way that my family, and also our community group, is pursuing practical missionality (love like Jesus and make His gospel known) among the people that the Lord has placed in our sphere of influence, and as I've been doing this, my husband introduced a talk from Pastor David Platt to me that was given at the Advance the Church conference this April. The underlying thesis of this talk, The Gospel Advanced: Radical Service, is that the gospel compels radical concern for the needs of the world around us. We can't believe the gospel and not pursue urgent missiology.

Here's the talk below. I would encourage you to take the time to listen to Pastor Platt and be prepared to have God change you through his words. These words that Pastor Platt speaks and the gospel message in itself is changing me.

Following Jesus' Example First

I write a lot on this blog about how I desire to become more and more like Jesus, and that's truly what I want for my life.

I just read an interesting blog post from Practical Theology for Women, titled Equipping Women for Gospel-Centered Lives, and I came across something that I've never thought about before. As we pursue godly womanhood and desire to become more and more like Jesus, we have to ALWAYS put Jesus before us and nothing else. We can study about how other women have pursued Jesus and have walked down the road toward godly womanhood, but we have to remember that our end-goal is not to become those women, but to become like Jesus. Here's a quote from the blog that I was reading:

Day in and day out, I hear from woman after woman who doesn’t fit the mold, perhaps by her choice but more often by circumstances completely out of her control, who feels lost in our evangelical construct of what the godly woman looks like. The problem is that she was not taught clearly that the image in which she was created is God’s and the image to which she is now being conformed is Christ’s. She feels pressure to be like Ruth or the Proverbs 31 woman but not so much to be like Christ. But Scripture doesn’t give us that leeway. She was created in God's image and is being conformed back to Christ's. Period.

Obviously, if learning about the practices of those women and how their struggles and successes helped them become more like Jesus, than studying their lives is only healthy. But it's when we set our sights on becoming those women that we're going to get ourselves in trouble. The Proverbs 31 woman was a godly woman, but still sinful! Her works and disciplines are to be admired and something that we can strive to achieve, with Jesus' help. But we must ALWAYS remember that it's about Jesus. And whether or not our lives resembles attributes of the Proverbs 31 woman or Sarah or Esther at the end of our lives (seeking godliness should produce fruit similar to that in these women), as long as we pursue Jesus -- it will be His character and His grace that will shine through us to transform us into the women after God's own heart. If following the example of the Proverbs 31 woman helps us get there ... great. That's why her story was included in scripture. But that should be secondary to how we pursue a life like Jesus.

Overwhelmed by the need for missionality ...

Now more than ever before I feel a deep need to be missional for the sake of Jesus Christ within my neighborhood. I've never quite felt this strongly about it before. I'm not sure if it's just because of where we live -- a transitional neighborhood that still exudes many signs of poverty and physical brokenness -- or just the sheer fact that the Lord is reconditioning my heart to long for Him and for other people to receive His gospel. I hope it's both!

Just within the last few weeks, my husband and I have branched out more than ever before. We've attended a few neighborhood association meetings and we've tried to be intentional about meeting our new neighbors -- stopping by, inviting them to join us to do different things, etc. And my mind just races with ideas of what I'd love to do to get to know our neighbors better and to begin fostering community.

As a stay-at-home mom with an 18-month-old, I have struggled for a while to figure out how to be missional. My priorities, aside from the Lord, are my husband, then my son, then my church. I don't have time in my day to volunteer at a soup kitchen or an afterschool program for kids, maybe some of the more obvious choices. But when I try to identify ways to be missional, I need to remember that missionality isn't defined by just a specific demographic or need that I can help. It's a mindset and an action that is realized to take the gospel to the people in my sphere of influence in a relevant context. It's the Great Commission lived out (Matthew 28:19-20), and it will look different for every body. But the questions that we need to ask are: 1) Who are the people in our sphere of influence? 2) How can God use us to reach out to them and paint the story of the gospel in a way that's relevant to them? (When I say relevant, I mean to communicate the gospel in a way that the people that I'm communicating to will understand, NOT to just tell the part of the gospel that I think they'll be comfortable hearing OR to shape the gospel in a way so that it becomes a product of what a person's wants, not about who God really is ... kind of like a "designer God".) 3) How will God reorient my life to make missionality a lifestyle instead of just a one-time or occasional event or activity?

So, where does this leave me?

• As a stay-at-home mom, I need to identify the people that are or could be in my sphere of influence.
• What kind of activities or events do I or can I participate in during the week that I can do WITH my son that will help us build relationships with people who don't know Jesus?
  
• How can I not only be effective for the gospel while I'm with him, but also teach him the gospel and the great commission as we interact and intentionally love our neighborhood and the people in it?
  
• Are there things I can do missionally that fall in line with my responsibilities as my husband's helper and my responsibilities around my home?
  
• Who are the people that my family can influence for the gospel?
• What kind of activities or events can we host or be a part of, or places can we go to intentionally love people for the sake of the gospel?
  

When I ask these questions, I need to be honest with myself and my family and determine if these are commitments that we can make over time ... not just a one-time do-good event. I'm sure there's a time and a place for one-time activities, but as I'm contemplating what it means to live a missional life, I need to reorient myself to be missional on a daily basis ... make these activities/events/etc. a regular part of my schedule so that the people I meet and care for and love on, will regularly see Jesus in me and hopefully come to know His greatness! And once it begins in my own life, how wonderful will it be to invite friends and community to be a part of it with me! We see in Acts that this is what we were created for!

If you're a single woman, or you're a recently married woman without children, or a woman that works full-time, or you're retired, or whatever life stage you're in, your missional lifestyle will probably look very different than mine. But the questions you need to ask yourself are still the same: 1) Who are the people in your sphere of influence? 2) How can God use you to reach out to them and paint the story of the gospel in a way that's relevant to them? 3) How will God reorient your life to make missionality a lifestyle instead of just a one-time or occasional event or activity?

This is HUGE ladies! I think it's very easy for us to dodge this call in our lives and say we'll do it later or on the side, but we can't tell ourselves this lie any longer! We must dig in deep right now. Just like the Israelites during their exile to Babylon, God is calling us to "Build homes, and plan to stay. Plant gardens, and eat the food you produce. Marry, and have children. Then find spouses for them, and have many grandchildren. Multiply! Do not dwindle away! And work for the peace and prosperity of Babylon. Pray to the Lord for the city where you are held captive, for if Babylon has peace, so will you" (Jeremiah 29:4-7).

Looking for a good book ...

I just stumbled across a great site, Discerning Reader. It looks like quite a gem! From what I can tell, it appears to be biblically based and offers reviews on a wealth of books from Apologetics to Children's Books to Family, Theology and Women. I obviously don't want to vouch for their reviews and say that their opinions are completely in line with what I believe, but from what I've read so far, this Discerning Reader seems to be a great place to locate books with sound theology and read a sound review from a source outside Amazon or some place similar.

So, if you're looking for a good book or a review of a book that you're thinking about reading, consider stopping by Discerning Reader and see what you think. I already found three books that I want to explore: Building Her House (Nancy Wilson), Most of All, Jesus Loves You (Noel Piper), and Gospel-Powered Parenting (William Farley).

Digging Deeper to the Heart

It's interesting how the Lord sharpens and prunes us .... We begin to pray for transformation in different areas of our lives -- change may be immediate or over time -- but it seems that God usually begins to work on and in us when we least expect it. That's how God has been working in me lately.

I've been struggling with what I thought was self-control or the ability to tame my tongue for who knows how long. I would like to think that on most occasions I do control my tongue, but it's during those moments of frustration, many times unwarranted, with those that I love or during casual conversation with folks that I don't even know very well (strange, I know), that the ugliest parts of me are revealed. The most recent bout of this issue seemed to surface sometime in early November '09 (at least that's when I started journaling about it). I've been deep in scripture, looking for 'remedies' to the problem and praying like crazy, and I thought that I was getting somewhere. But these "instances" continued to surface.

It wasn't until a dear friend of mine called me out and asked me if my issue was really self-control or if it was more deeply rooted than just my tongue; that it was a heart issue. I was kinda caught off guard by her comment and became a bit upset. She began to explain that it sounded like a gospel issue -- that my heart was not reflecting the truth of the gospel. "What do you mean?" I thought. "How could that be, of course I know the gospel. Why wouldn't my heart communicate that?" But when I really thought about it, she was dead on. The root of all my insincere remarks and thoughts, unrighteous anger (as if my anger is ever righteous), and slanderous comments and/or thoughts about others is rooted in my lack of understanding of the gospel.

I call myself a Christian. I believe that I am a sinner and that no matter how hard I try I cannot save myself from my sin (Ephesians 2:8-9). Jesus, God's own Son, who is fully God, is the only perfect sacrifice that can save me and he did, that day on Calvary. He died for me and on the third day when He rose and ascended into heaven, I too was redeemed the day I believed. He made me a new creation and justified me. But scripture is very clear that the change in me cannot stop there. (Colossians 1:9-14; Ephesians 2:10) It's a way of life. Jesus' work on the cross was not just for justification purposes, it was for sanctification purposes too. And if I do not pursue the good works and righteousness that He has set out for me, I am neglecting His gift of sanctification and the chance to become more and more like Jesus during my life here on earth.

Therefore, when I say that I do not truly understand the gospel, it's not a misunderstanding of my salvation, but a lack of understanding of who Jesus is and the ways in which He calls me to be like Himself -- progressive sanctification. Obviously it will take me until heaven to truly understand the gospel -- the time when Jesus will open my eyes and allow me to see His full glory -- but it does mean that I must pursue righteousness that only comes from God and not my own foolishness today and for the rest of my time here on earth (Romans 6:18-19).

As I revisit my struggle in light of the gospel, all I can really say is that whatever comes out of my mouth or the thoughts that I stop from coming out of my mouth; if they're not pleasing to Jesus, I know that my heart needs some work. Self-control is an important discipline, but when the out pour of my heart is evil, it's my heart that needs to be fixed first and then I can visit self-control. If I'm not careful, self-control can just be a pretty mask that hides the evil within my heart.

Since I've come to this realization, the Lord has been faithful to heal and change my heart. I am so thankful that He has opened my eyes to this truth.

I deeply desire to be a godly woman of righteousness and one who possesses discretion and a heart that fully knows the gospel and allows it to permeate in all areas of my life. As women who desire to pursue godliness, I pray too that you would make this a prayer for your life as well. Your situation may look a little different than mine, but I believe that as we point each other to these truths, God will transform us into women that are more and more like Jesus every day, and who could ask for anything better? Philippians 1:9-11 speaks this prayer perfectly:

And this is my prayer: that your love may abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight, so that you may be able to discern what is best and may be pure and blameless until the day of Christ, filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ - to the glory and praise of God.

Gone for a while, but not forever ...

Oh my ... it's been awhile since I've been on Mark of Beauty. With the busyness of Christmas, a move, the new year, and settling into a new house, blogging has not been a priority. (Lack of Internet connectivity can do it too!) But even in the midst of all that's been going on, God continues to be gracious to me and has continued to teach me about Himself and how this broken woman can pursue godliness through the gift of grace that He allowed His son to bestow on me. So needless to say, I still have much to share on Mark of Beauty and plan to bring you up to speed on the latest books I'm reading, scripture I'm studying and phenomenal truths I'm learning.

Believe it or not, I did have time to finally finish Womanly Dominion by Mark Chanski ... I finished the last 5 pages yesterday, and I'm beginning a pretty long, but profound read God, Marriage and Family right now.

I teetered back and forth on Womanly Dominion, trying to figure out if I liked it or not, but now that I've read the entire book, I do think that the book as a whole is great. Chanski's entire premise was to live out God's call for us to "rule and subdue the earth" as women and do so within the perimeters of God's design with a "win it attitude" and not in the way that the world has designed for us. In doing this, he showcases several great women of the Bible and other women throughout history, such as Jonathan Edward's mother, the Wesley's mother and so on, to demonstrate that it can be done. (There's a lot of other good 'meat' but that's the basic premise.)

Another point that Chanski makes that was really profound was that even when we feel like wifehood and motherhood is not glamorous and not the life that is portrayed in the movies, it's a life that God has ordained for us to call us to Himself and to transform us into His own image:

Meet Diana. By age 24, this slender, bright, and beautiful young woman was a newlywed with a BA in Speech Communication and a BS in Education. She loved her husband and the prospects of wifehood and motherhood. At the age of 25, Diana gave birth to a son. About two years later, she birthed a second son. At first the novelties of motherhood and homemaking were quite exhiliterating. She felt blessed by the Lord to be living her fondest dreams.

But soon the exhilaration wore off. Every morning, she faced dirty diapers, runny noses, food messes, temper tantrums, discipline problems, clothing piles, and kitchen clutter. Another son was born. Claustrophobic with cabin fever and boredom doldrums, she sighed, 'Any twelve-year-old could wash these dishes, wipe these fannies, mop that floor, and pour these Cheerios onto this high chair tray.'

Her mind often drifted back to her high school and college years. 'Back then, I was the center of my world. I decided what I wanted to do for myself. My decisions were based on what would please and broaden me. People applauded me on the stage, commended me for my well-delivered speeches, and discussed with me my future goals and aspirations in life. I enjoyed expressing my creativity in the classroom, discussing profound literary themes with my students, and checking off my responsibilities on each day's challenging to-do list.

But it's not about me anymore.

Her years in the feminism-infested current had given her glamorous dreams of personal glory.

Years later, Diana, who now has five children, admits, 'I was in mild rebellion against God. And I stayed there for a while, until I saw those wants for what they really are -- the display of my idolatrous, selfish, sinful pride. It was only when I took those deep personal longings and put them on the alter of consecration to God that I began to make spiritual headway.'

Meditations on her Savior burned away her rebellion and brought peace to her soul. In the garden of Gethsemane, the Lord Jesus looked into the appalling cup of self-sacrifice that His Father had poured for Him. He staggered at the thought of drinking it down to its last painful dregs. Instead of resentfully protesting, 'What am I, chopped liver?' He submitted saying, 'Father, if Thou art willing, remove this cup from Me; yet not My will, but Thine be done' (Luke 22:42).

It's my understanding that every biblically committed wife and mother must pass through a personal Gethsemane of sorts, needing to come to grips with the cup her Father has poured for her.

Think dear sister, how the Lord Jesus selflessly served you. He laid down His life to make you look good. He laid it down on crucifixion day, so that you'd look good on judgment day. He was spat upon, beaten, scourged, mocked, stripped, spiked, hung, and forsaken. Then He breathed His last so that you wouldn't have to forever weep, wail, and gnash your teeth in hell. He was born, lived, and died with the sole object that you would look good forever. Could it be that this wifehood and motherhood thing is calling you to higher ground, conforming you more to His glorious image?

Wow! Thank you Mark Chanski for that kick in the butt back to reality. Life is not about me. It never was meant to be about me, and I need to live each day for Jesus, regardless of life's season, in a way that brings honor, glory and thanksgiving to Jesus.

If you're looking for a good, but challenging read (meaning that it may challenge a lot of what you believe, but always bring the arguments and challenges back to scripture), pick up Womanly Dominion.