strong women

Sometimes, when my child falls down, I pretend I don’t notice. Please don’t judge me. I’ve come to realize that, if they think I didn’t see, they often carry on with whatever they were doing prior to the fall. If I make eye contact, however, weeping and wailing may commence.

Sure, I’m watching out of the corner of my eye. But no eye contact – that’s the rule. This parenting tactic has served me well over the years. Here’s the thing, though:

This doesn’t apply to grownups.

You know what I’m talking about. You hear that someone is going through some stuff and you’re afraid of being uncomfortable, so you avoid her. You’re worried you may say the wrong thing, so you avoid her. You have enough of your own stuff to deal with, so you avoid her.

When we see another woman take a tumble, we don’t pretend like we didn’t notice! We don’t avoid eye contact hoping we can all just carry on like normal. Let’s just go ahead and face it: if your eyes connect, there may be some weeping and that’s okay.

If we love Jesus like we say we do: we will not look away. Jesus never looked away. Not from the leper or the lame. Not from the pharisee or the prostitute. Not from you or me.

But you, O Lord, know me; you see me… (Jeremiah 12:3)

Hurting women don’t need us to watch them out of the corner of our eyes. They need us to stare into their eyes, hug their necks, and shoulder their burdens with them.

It’s easy at first. We post a prayer request for them. We take up a donation for them. It happened to be a Saturday so, perhaps, we drop by and sit with them. <—These are all good things, by the way!

But it doesn’t stop there. They still need to be seen on Tuesday when the baby is crying and you’re trying to make tacos. They still need to be loved on as the weeks pass and everyone else’s life as returned to normal.

Don’t look away when it’s no longer convenient. Don’t look away when it’s uncomfortable. Don’t look away because you don’t know what to say.

It’s okay to say, “I don’t know what to say, but I see you and I won’t look away.

Don’t look away.

You are loved. <3

There are so many voices. So many opinions. So much noise. There are books and blogs. People and platforms. Conferences with catchy themes. It’s easy to get swept away by charismatic teachers and ear-tickling teaching.

We can google anything and fill our minds with useless trivia which may serve us well at a dinner party but will be of no use when we are blindsided by life. We can, quite possibly, gorge ourselves on information and our souls can still starve for lack of truth.

Always learning and never able to arrive at a knowledge of the truth. 2 Timothy 3:7 ESV

We have an enemy who lurks about. He walks up and down upon the earth (Job 1:7) and he’s just looking for anyone to devour (1 Peter 5:8.)

In 2 Timothy, Paul says that there are people who creep around outside households in the hopes of capturing weak women (2 Timothy 3:6.) He describes those women as those who are always learning but never arrive at the truth. They are weak!

Satan is creeping around outside our homes and he is not going to be scared away by some catchy quote from our latest favorite blogger or the lyrics to the latest hit song. He doesn’t care if that Bible teacher tells you you’re fabulous or if that preacher gives you all the warm fuzzies when he preaches.

Some time ago, my husband was home alone and noticed an empty truck at the end of the driveway. He couldn’t seem to locate the owner of the vehicle and could only assume that he was lurking around the outside of the house.

He called 9-1-1 and informed the operator that she may want to send someone to the house. Actually, what he said was, “Someone is creeping around my house and I’ve just loaded my shotgun.” Because that is how you respond when some fool is lurking around your home.

Don’t misunderstand me. I love Bible studies. I attend women’s conferences. Obviously, I’m not opposed to bloggers or authors. But none of it matters if we don’t know Truth. The truth is our only defense again the enemy waiting outside our households. We must, like the people of Berea, take what we hear and compare it to Scripture (Acts 17:11) so that we are not led astray or left defenseless.

The surest way to not be the weak women Paul references is to be women in the Word!

You are loved. <3