The Value of a Woman

This morning, we're going to start with the reading of the Scripture.

The Scripture is found in, there's two places, and it's lengthy.

One is from Proverbs 31, the story of the valuable woman.

And then we're going to read from Romans chapter 16.

Romans 16 · chapter mention

The reason for that one, and you will see highlighted and bold and underlined,

or italics bold and underlined, the names of women that Paul mentions in his greetings.

So we're going to read from verse 10 of Proverbs 31 and then verse 1 of Romans 16.

Proverbs 31, 10 through 31. A wife of noble character who can find.

She is worth far more than rubies. Her husband has full confidence in her and lacks nothing of value.

She brings him good, not harm, all the days of her life. She selects wool and

flax and works with eager hands.

She is like the merchant ships bringing her food from afar.

She gets up while it is still night. She provides food for her family and portions

for her female servants.

She considers a field and buys it. Out of her earnings, she plants a vineyard.

She sets about her work vigorously. Her arms are strong for her task.

She sees that her trading is profitable and her lamp does not go out at night.

In her hand she holds the distaff and grasps the spindle with her fingers.

She opens her arms to the poor and extends her hands to the needy.

When it snows she has no fear for her household, for all of them are clothed in scarlet.

She makes coverings for her bed. She is clothed in fine linen and purple.

Her husband is respected at the city gate, where he takes his seat among the

elders of the land. She makes linen garments and sells them,

and supplies the merchants with sashes.

She is clothed with strength and dignity. She can laugh all the days to come.

She speaks with wisdom, and faithful instruction is on her tongue.

She watches over the affairs of her household, and does not eat the bread of idleness.

Her children arise and call her blessed, her husband also, and he praises her.

Many women do noble things, but you surpass them all.

Charm is deceptive, and beauty is fleeting, but a woman who fears the Lord is to be praised.

Honor her for all that her hands have done, and let her works bring her praise at the city gate.

Romans 16, 1 through 16. I commend to you our sister Phoebe,

a deacon of the church in Sencreo.

I ask you to receive her in the Lord in a way worthy of his people,

and to give her any help she may need from you, for she has been the benefactor

of many people, including me.

Greet Priscilla and Aquila and my co-workers in Christ Jesus.

They risk their lives Not only I, but all the churches of the Gentiles are grateful to them.

For I was. Greet Ampliatus, my dear friend in the Lord.

Greet Urbanus, our co-worker in Christ, and my dear friend Stachys.

Greet Apellas, whose fidelity to Christ has stood the test. Greet those who

belong to the household of Aristobulus.

Greet Herodian, my fellow Jew. Greet those in the household of Narcissus, who are in the Lord.

Greet Tryphena and Tryphosa, those women who work hard in the Lord.

Greet my dear friend Persis, another woman who has worked very hard in the Lord.

Greet Rufus, chosen in the Lord and his mother, who has been a mother to me too.

Greet Asyncritus, Phlegon, Hermes, Petrobus, Hermas, and the other brothers and sisters with them.

Greet Philologus, Julia, Nereus.

This is the word of the Lord. When I was growing up, when we finally got a black

and white TV that someone donated to us, and my dad finally allowed us to watch TV,

we watched family sitcoms like Leave it to Beaver and Father Knows Best. Thank you.

Gender roles were pretty clear at that time, and parents were pretty much in

charge of the household.

They were portrayed as solid husband and wife working together to raise their children.

Now a genre of family sitcoms turns the family on its head with shows like The

Simpsons and Beavis and Butthead.

These shows are very degrading to family life and derogatory to the roles of

mother and father, and increasingly to the fathers.

The names of the shows today would be better if they were named things like

Fathers No Less and leave it to Butthead.

They have this kind of genre, this kind of epidemic of belittling family life,

belittling of mothers and fathers.

Brothers there was another show on television called

the osbournes there was a huge gap

between ozzy and harriet and the

ozzy osbourne and his family ozzy however has come a long way since his drug

crazed days of biting off the heads of bats he claims to have been clean and

sober for well over a decade now his show also star starring his wife and kids

kelly and jack is one of the

most successful shows in MTV's 21-year history.

In the past, Ozzy used LSD drug every day along with other drugs and lots of alcohol.

His fatalistic and angry albums like Diary of a Madman and Speak of the Devil

were accused of having subliminal messages encouraging suicide.

He himself attempted suicide several times, but now he has become a role model

for the new all-American family. Just think about it.

It's a confusing and difficult time for family. I can't tell you how glad I

am that my children are grown and out on their own.

I would not want to be a kid again for anything.

Even though I encountered a huge potential for evil when I was growing up,

I did not have to deal with half of what kids deal with today in this environment.

And I knew that I had a family at home that would circle around me.

My parents would, even though my dad took me outside of the church,

my parents would circle around me and provide that boundary for me that was safe.

Nor would I want to be a parent today with all of the pressures and cultural

baggage that families are facing.

I tremendously respect and appreciate those of you who are living out a Christian

life, and that's one of the reasons I love to be a substitute teacher out at school,

helping Helping those students find that boundary of knowing what a relationship

with healthy adults is like.

I especially would not want to face the pressure of being a woman in today's world.

I don't know why some are transitioning to be a woman because the role is super hard.

The supermodel would starve themselves in order to get into their clothes portraying

some image that is simply impossible for the normal person to achieve.

The movie stars, with their own professional makeup artists,

make you feel like you have no value unless your looks are perfect.

They act and live in make-believe worlds and want us to join them in their world of fantasy.

Yet most of them die very unhappy, having had multiple marriages and even more

escapades and decadence.

The professional businesswomen make you feel like you're a nobody if you decide to work at home.

Those who balance career and home and volunteer for everything make you feel like giving up.

And there are always those who remind you of where you fall short.

But the Bible is full of words and encouragement which show how God values women.

The world may put you down, but God lifts you up.

The world may expect the impossible, but God comes to you with grace and a heart

that accepts you for who you are.

You are important to God in many ways. And I want to talk specifically about three of those ways.

Today, a woman has a special place in the heart of God and his plan for the

world. The first is this.

A woman's place is in the home. That must emphasize that a lot.

A woman's place is in the home. Now, don't crucify me for being sexist.

I'm not talking about, I don't want to be light on this.

A woman's place is in the home. Now, Now, don't go crazy, though.

It's not what you think, because actually, a man's place is in the home as well.

Each of our places is in the home. I'm not being a chauvinist. I'm being a biblicist.

I believe that the Bible is the infallible written word of God,

and life operates best when it is lived under the authority of the teachings of God.

So long, for so long, we have grown with the idea that the women are the only

ones who who are spending time nurturing their kids and men are vacant from the home.

And we need to have a husband and wife, a man and a woman who are nurturing.

The home is where we are nurtured, loved, and encouraged.

That doesn't mean that a man's only place is in the home or a woman's only place

is in the home, but it's the best place.

Women are so much better at this nurturing than we men are.

Home should be where men and women find their meaning.

Meaning let me say that again home is

where men and women should find their meaning

because this is the place of our most important

and abiding relationships god speaks much

about the family and his word from the beginning in the creation of

male and female and the right to the writings of paul and his admonishments

for the truly godly family god is all about relationship having a relationship

with god is what it means to be a christian and having a relationship with others

is what it means to be fully human.

It's in the home where we learn to live with other people in important ways.

We learn to forgive other people when they're wrong, and thankfully my wife forgives me.

We learn to extend grace when others are being difficult, and thankfully my wife extends grace.

We learn not to set unrealistic expectations on others. Well,

maybe that's one thing that she, you know.

We learn that love is more than a feeling.

It is a deep and abiding commitment that overcomes feelings.

A woman's place is in the home because she is to be the recipient of these divine

gifts expressed through human agents, namely her family. She has shown appreciation.

As we looked at that Proverbs 33, a wife of noble character,

and we read those characteristics, that was written to Solomon's son,

or King Legniel's son, excuse me,

as an admonishment for somebody to look to and for as a wife.

I know that I can't imagine what I would be like if it were not for my wife

helping me to see the importance of responding in different ways.

She cautions me. She keeps me on the ground. She keeps me firmly grounded. She keeps me in reality.

I would be uncouth and unmannered. when we got met each other and started dating.

I was living as a bachelor in a trailer. I don't know if I've told you this

before, but my aunt had given me a set of meal-macked dishes. You know what those are?

I had enough meal-macked dishes I could eat for about a week,

maybe a week and a half without doing dishes.

So I would do my dishes in the bathtub. tub. I was a miserable bachelor.

I was a very bad bachelor. I needed my wife. I needed somebody to come alongside

me and teach me how to be couth.

I would be a most lonely and unfulfilled person. I would be filing for bankruptcy.

I was a most miserable bachelor. My wife is what makes my life work,

and she is what makes my life enjoyable.

She brings a quality into my life that I would not have otherwise.

I am a different person because of her.

When I met her in that Bible study in Minnesota, in Pipestone,

Minnesota, she was the only one in that whole room of college age kids,

male and female, that looked like she had it all together.

She was dressed in a white ruffled blouse with a blue plaid skirt I can still

remember it 42 years later and she was dressed in such a way that she looked

like she was most concerned about knowing Jesus and not about getting her MRS degree.

And as I watched her in that time, and we began to date, I realized that her

relationship was completely with Jesus.

And I knew that when we came together as husband and wife, that our relation

would be centered on Jesus Christ.

She taught me a lot through growing up, or through our time together,

and through our children, that she spent a lot of her time studying the Scripture.

That's awesome. them. So a woman's place is in the home, and we understand that,

but we also understand that home is where the ministry is.

We minister to each other. We minister to our children, and we brought them

up in the Christian faith and trained them by word and example.

Those who believe that only what happens outside the home is important have

missed out on God's greatest calling. calling, we, both men and women,

minister to the people in our homes.

That is our first place of ministry.

We bind emotional wounds. We lift sagging spirits.

We allow people to be themselves. We show kindness when they have been beaten up by the world.

We give smiles and hugs, and apparently Sarah's are pretty well remembered by Curtis.

We listen and try to understand. a woman's place is many places,

but her main place and that of a man is most importantly in the home.

The second point I would like to make.

And I would like to emphasize this. A woman's place is in the world.

If you remember reading that, Proverbs 31 describes and praises a woman who

is a truly worldly woman, not in the bad sense, but in the sense that this woman

had her own business and she took place in a marketplace.

She made deals in real estate. She helped those in need of feeding and clothing,

those who did not have, and she provided for those needs of her family through

her trading and her craftsmanship.

The Bible ends this section describing her activity by saying,

charm is deceptive and beauty is fleeting, but a woman who fears the Lord is to be praised.

Give her the reward she has earned and let her works bring her praise at the city gate.

You would have to have lived in the time that that was written to appreciate

how radical this elevated view of womanhood is.

In the time of that writing of Proverbs, the surrounding cultures did not give

a woman a place of dignity and honor as the Hebrews did.

In fact, the whole point of the story of Adam and Eve is that man by himself

was inadequate in this world.

A couple weeks ago, I had to have an ultrasound of my liver and stuff,

and I told the technician, I said, did you notice that I have one less rib in me?

She said, well, yeah, all men do. I said, yeah, that's where God created my wife.

Anyway, so the whole point of story of Adam and Eve is that we were created together.

We were inadequate by ourself.

Man should not be alone.

Now, that's not just Adam. That's not just God speaking. That's me.

Man should not be living alone.

Not just to do the work and meet his needs, but a full partner needs to come

alongside the man whom life would not be nearly as so rich without her.

Just imagine if you could a world where there were only men.

Well, obviously, we all know that none of us would be there if his world was only men.

You don't even want to go there, though, if you think of what it would be like if it was just us dudes.

The interesting thing about television sitcoms is that men get to be irresponsible slobs,

while women have to keep themselves attractive while being the brains of the

house because they have to take the responsibility of making sure the family functions.

The woman, the mother, the wife, has to make ends meet even when the man is

not doing what's necessary.

She makes excuses for him and takes up the slack when he's not doing his part.

When that happens, a man has not married a wife.

He's just changed mothers.

Men need women, but women are not able to live up to their full value when they

are merely servants instead of full partners.

Women are major players in keeping the world going, but they get less than their

fair share of the recognition.

Yet they keep going because they are not doing it for the sake of monetary reward,

but for the satisfaction of being responsible. responsible, even though they

may be doing more than their share, they still do it because they know that that's their role.

And most of them were trained by their mothers.

One bumper sticker read this, and I can't believe I'm saying this in public.

One bumper sticker I saw read this, real women don't have hot flashes, they have power surges.

I think that's true. It just amazes me sometimes with how much energy my wife

has when I don't. I like my afternoon nap.

Well, the third thing is this, and it's important for us to recognize that.

A woman's place is also in the church.

This church truly has an extraordinary percentage of men who are involved in

doing the work of ministry,

but we all know that most churches could not exist without the women who do

so much of the work at church.

And they do this in spite of the fact that they have often been kept out of

the positions of leadership.

In many churches, women are not permitted to preach. A few churches do not even

allow them to hold leadership positions of any kind.

A board of elders is all men in many churches.

And even in this most modern age, some churches simply do not allow women to

even speak in the presence of men.

Now, don't get me wrong. Paul talked about this. But I made note of Romans chapter

Romans 16 · chapter mention

16 of how many times he noted women in his greetings.

In fact, if you look at the listing of that, for instance, Aquila and Priscilla,

it started out with Paul talking about the church in Aquila and Priscilla's home,

and then two references later, he switches it to Priscilla and Aquila, puts the woman first.

Why was that? because the woman was taking the place of leadership because the

husband probably was not doing what he should have.

Just an editorial note. So some of this has come from about because of Paul's

statement in 1 Timothy, I do not permit a woman to teach or to have authority

over man, she must be silent.

But we have to remember that Paul was starting churches in the middle of a pagan

culture in many of these places where he was,

like Ephesus and Corinth and all of these, which looked at women as little more

than chattel or property.

A woman was the property of a man and could be discarded at will in those godless societies.

For a woman to be in a place of authority of preach would have killed any chance

for the church to reach out effectively in their culture.

Paul was also speaking to the issue of an undue recklessness by certain women in those cultures.

Scriptures men and women men and women when not led by the scriptures and the

spirit of god can be most frivolous with their tongues and in their damage to

others and i say this specifically because we in the free methodist church believe

that women are just as gifted as men to be pastors.

But we have to be very careful because it doesn't matter whether you're male

or female a person can use that position of pastor as dominion and domination over others.

There can be just as many poor male preachers as there are poor female preachers.

So we need to make sure that our ministers, male or female, are called specifically by God to do that.

It's true that there's been more done

by brothers and sisters in the church to damage the faith of others than there

is done by outside church dallas willard was one who wrote that how did he put

it the prospect of evangelism would be largely automatically if it wasn't for

the damage that's done by the people in the church.

We damage our own reputation in that of Jesus often by our hatred of others,

even by our political comments on Facebook and wherever.

We damage the reputation of Jesus by the way we act in our community,

the way we act in our schools.

That's some preaching on toes, mine too. We need to be careful that everything

that we do, say, and think would be pleasing to our master.

The Bible says that the Christians would and should be known by their love for

one another, and the modern church has unfortunately done much to destroy that witness.

But while the guidelines that Paul was preaching under were culturally appropriate,

it is clear that women gained an increasing role in the life of the church as

Christianity influenced the culture.

Some of Jesus' followers, some of his most supported followers were women.

But remember that it was women who faithfully stayed by Jesus in his darkest

hours after all the men had fled.

They were the last ones at the cross and the first ones at the tomb.

They were the first to tell the world about Jesus' resurrection.

It was a woman named Anna who first preached to the world about the infant Jesus becoming the Messiah.

A large group of women were in the upper room when the Holy Spirit fell on the believers.

It didn't just fall on the men, it fell on every of them and said that tongues

of fire could be seen on everybody's head in that upper room.

It was a woman named Lydia who was the first Gentile convert during Paul's missionary

journey to the European continent.

Women made up an important part of the leadership of the early church,

including the church's prophets, teachers, and ministers. In the Old Testament

Hebrew culture, Miriam served alongside her brother Moses in leading Israel.

Deborah became a judge or prime minister of the nation.

And the woman Huldah was a prophetess. In the New Testament era,

Philip had four daughters who were prophets.

They spoke the word of God. Priscilla was a co-laborer with her husband as they

preached and taught the early church.

The church met in the homes identified by the names of women,

indicating she was the leader or preacher of that church.

In Romans 16, verse 1, we saw it was interesting that Phoebe is described as

Romans 16:1

a deaconess or servant in many translations, including the one we read.

The word in the original Greek is diakoness.

When that word is used in context with a man, it is most often translated as minister.

But in this case, when it was used for a woman, it was translated as deaconess or servant.

But in order not to offend those who believe that women should not be ministers

and suffer the loss of sales, the publishing companies chose the word deaconess instead of minister.

Only one translation that I found put the word minister as a footnote,

but there is no reason to believe she was not exactly what the Word of God said

she was, a minister in the same sense as men were ministers.

Careful reading through the Old and New Testament, especially through the book

of Acts, will will reveal the most important place that women had in the ministry of the church.

As the disciples gathered in the upper room to pray, it says,

they all joined together constantly a prayer along with the women and Mary,

the mother of Jesus, and with his brothers.

People of Jerusalem had gathered around because the followers of Jesus,

both men and women, came out from that prayer meeting speaking in the native

tongues of the foreigners in Jerusalem, Jerusalem preaching the message of Christ

on that first Pentecost.

It did not say only the men spoke in tongues, spoke in other languages.

It says the people gathered there marveled that they heard the message of Christ

in their own languages, their own tongues.

Some thought they were drunk because they couldn't understand what they were

saying, but Peter explained that they were full of the Holy Spirit.

Listen again as he quotes from the Old Testament in Joel, where he says,

this is what was spoken by the prophet Joel, in the last days,

God says, I will pour up my spirit on only men.

Oh, wait a minute, no, on all people. Your sons and daughters will prophesy,

your young men will see vision, your old men will dream dreams,

even on my servants, both men and women,

I will pour out my Spirit in those days, and they will prophesy.

If Paul was such a chauvinist—.

Why did he go on to say in Galatians chapter 3, there's neither Jew nor Greek,

Galatians 3 · chapter mention

slave nor free, male nor female, for you all are one in Christ Jesus.

If you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham's seed and heirs according to the promise.

In the kingdom of God, there's no distinction between male and female,

black or white, poor or rich, educated or unschooled, beautiful or ordinary.

We are all the children of God, and we are all joint heirs with Jesus Christ.

It is our relationship with him that gives our life its value, and only that.

We all have a role to play and a script to live out.

Sometimes the roles God calls us to are directed by our gender,

and sometimes they're not.

One thing is for sure, whatever way in which we choose to serve,

it has eternal value in the eyes of God. Tony Campolo's wife is a brilliant woman. She has a PhD.

Actually, I think now she actually has two PhDs, but I'm not sure of that,

and is capable of pursuing a profitable and rewarding career.

But she chose to stay home with her children while they were young,

and that decision didn't bother her at all, although it seemed to bother other people.

People would ask her, what do you do? And she would reply, I'm a homemaker.

I stay home and take care of my children and my husband.

And when she did that, people would look embarrassed for her and cut the conversation

short as if that was something small.

So she decided to come up with a different response. The next time someone asked

her what she did, she said, I'm socializing two

homo sapiens in Judeo-Christian virtues so that they will appropriate the eschatological,

values of new utopia. What do you do?

That was even hard for me to say. So whether you're a woman who is teaching

the eschatological values of the kingdom to the occupants, the homo sapiens of your home,

or doing it in the church or in the world, the hand of God is on your life.

As the scripture says, and whatever you do, whether in word or deed,

do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.

Thank God for the women of God, the women of this world, who faithfully do God's will.

The last verse from Proverbs 31 is this.

Honor her for all that her hands have done and let her work bring her praise at the city gates.

As we close in prayer, we're going to, after we close in prayer,

we're going to invite the late women of God, those 18 and older to come forward

and the kids will hand out flowers to you. I think we have an opportunity to each.

We should be. so yeah so yeah so ladies over the age of 18 you're invited to

come after the service and,

receive a couple flowers from us as our appreciation to you i know it's not

big but we thank you very much let's pray heavenly father as we close the service

and we remember the women of god that are so important especially in the life

of the church and in life of the home but but even in the life of the world.

We thank you for those women that you have blessed with your spirit. In Jesus' name, amen.