Yeah, I said it!
All of God’s creation is amazing and He claims several times in the first few verses of the book of Genesis that His creation is good…He loves His creation!
As a woman: mother of three daughters, mentor to young women in college, friend, sister, and wife…I want to celebrate how amazingly incredible a woman’s body is! Not because my body is perfect, but because I know I’m perfectly made!
A woman’s body is capable of so much!
We are created with the capacity to grow and nurture, to rise up and protect, and to create and teach.
There are several phenomenal women in my life who have given birth recently or who will be soon. And the Mom’s bible study that I’m a part of, it seems like every week someone is announcing a new pregnancy. I’m completely fascinated by baby belly’s ~ my own three and all the rest of them out there! I mean, just the fact that God created our skin to stretch like it does to hold that burgeoning belly!! Dang!!
A woman’s body is made to be a place of shelter as she literally grows a baby in her womb. God created her to have all the parts she needs. I want to be sensitive here and say that although I have not personally gone through the loss of a child, I have personal experience in losing a brother due to SIDS when he was only 3.5 months old, and I have several friends and family members who have gone through miscarriages and the realities of not being able to become pregnant. It is a very tender subject and my heart goes out to all who have suffered in this way.
What I do believe is that because God made our bodies to create, our God is not limited to use those qualities in only one way.
You may have cradled your a swollen belly and felt your baby kick, you may have been handed a newly born answer to prayer as you adopted a sweet baby the day they were born, or you may have held countless hands as you prayed for the young women in your life who have become your spiritual children. All of these paths to motherhood are significant and all of them carry the beauty and privilege that God has ordained us as women to carry!
We have a unique privilege in that our heart just keeps growing as God places people in our life to minister to ~ more full of His love that can be poured out!!
Our bodies are incredible for so many more reasons other than carrying a child too.
A woman has been fashioned by God with His Mother Heart.
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Judges 5:7 says, “The villagers ceased to be; they ceased in Israel Until I, Deborah, arose, Until I arose, a mother in Israel.”
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~ If you have not read the story yet of Deborah, one of the Judges of Israel, you’ve got to do that asap! God gave her the ability to listen and discern the issues of the people of Israel and bring down judgement on them befitting the requests. God’s heart leans toward us when we come to Him with our life issues and He discerns what is best for us. In this same way, Deborah was able to rise up and lead the people to a place of victory and healing…as a mother. She saw God’s people in pain and her heart could no longer take the inaction. God created women to be caretakers.
A woman has been ordained to carry spiritual truths to the next generations.
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2 Timothy 1:5 says, “I remember your sincere and unqualified faith [the surrendering of your entire self to God in Christ with confident trust in His power, wisdom and goodness, a faith] which first lived in [the heart of] your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice, and I am confident that it is in you as well.”
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~ Not only to our own children, but to all of those in our sphere of influence, are we to share the truths of scripture with. You are probably a mentor without even knowing it! Whether it is your daughters, the young mom at church who asks you questions about motherhood, your friends that you meet for coffee, or the college student you hang out with, your grandchildren or the little ones in children’s church on Sunday mornings…you are mentoring them by sharing your life and letting them see what it means to allow God to work in your life.
A woman has been given the power to protect.
- Exodus 2 shares the story of a mother who has what I like to call the “Mama Bear” protocol, absolutely sewn into her very being. {And we all have it by the way!} These verses (1-4) say, “Now a man of the house of Levi [the priestly tribe] went and took as his wife a daughter of Levi. The woman conceived and gave birth to a son; and when she saw that he was [especially] beautiful and healthy, she hid him for three months [to protect him from the Egyptians]. When she could no longer hide him, she got him a basket (chest) made of papyrus reeds and covered it with tar and pitch [making it waterproof]. Then she put the child in it and set it among the reeds by the bank of the Nile. And his sister [Miriam] stood some distance away to find out what would happen to him.”
~ We do not know the name of Moses’ mother in these verses, but find out later in Exodus 6 that her name is Jochebed. This woman knew that there was something special in her son Moses and she was going to do whatever it took to protect him. ~ I can only imagine what she went through in those months of keeping him safe from execution. But how beautiful that God provided a way for her to care for him and nurse him, even after he was found and adopted into the Pharoah’s house. This is one of God’s amazing kindnesses we see in scripture.
A woman has been given the grace to carry life.
- Psalm 139:13 says, “For You formed my innermost parts; You knit me [together] in my mother’s womb.”
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John 16:21 gives this insight, “A woman, when she is in labor, has pain because her time [to give birth] has come; but when she has given birth to the child, she no longer remembers the anguish because of her joy that a child has come into the world.”
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~ There is pain in growth. Pregnancy can be precarious and there are no guarantees. I almost lost our third daughter at 16 weeks when I had an extreme gall bladder attack. Our doctor told us that even though carrying a child is a normal function for a woman, any time our body goes into distress (like a gall bladder attack) the body will seek out “foreign entities and get rid of them.” My brain could hardly comprehend what the doctor was saying…have the surgery to remove my gall bladder so I wouldn’t have another attack but possibly lose the baby, or wait till after birth to have the surgery but if I had another attack at another point in the pregnancy, I ran the high risk of miscarriage. What? The caring hearts of all the doctors and nurses involved in my emergency surgery were beyond amazing. My husband and I are so grateful to them and to the Lord who saw fit to keep our little one safe during surgery. But in the pain of that surgery, the pain of childbirth, it really does all go away almost quicker than it came.
A woman’s body is incredible!
Our hearts break when we walk a hard road with a friend simply because their heart is broken.
Our hearts swell with pride at our child’s accomplishments or when we see the growth of one whom we’ve been mentoring as they reach their dreams.
We cry at every single “Soldier coming home” story, even if it’s for a coffee commercial.
We rise up and fight for those who do not have a voice, or the strength, to fight for themselves.
We encourage our people to grow and change, to mature and become world changers because we know how capable they are in their gifting’s to make a difference in this world!
We serve an incredible God, who has created us to be incredible!
Women ~ our bodies, our hearts, our minds, our emotions, our feelings ~ they are all important and they are all that encompasses the reality that we are incredible!!
Blessings,
René
Broken & Blessed~Adventures in Gratutide! 