July Bookbag - Part Two

Recently, I have been reading a fair amount re: the role of women from the Evangelical Christian perspective. I was not raised in a Christian home and while I hold some conservative political views – powered by a fervent belief in the free-enterprise system – I’ve never uttered the words “All I’ve ever wanted to be is a wife and mother.” I stopped dating when I realized that most men I dated were interested in a lifelong relationship.

Though I firmly believe in traditional marriage, family, and children, I’ve chosen to remain single.  I know that my background – both the family and the culture I come from – has influenced this decision. Some days, I am stunned that I adopted two helpless (but lovable) cats who demand not only regular meals but also a clean litter box.

Most of my friends are married, have children and work outside the home. I’ve generally viewed it as a ‘both-and’ proposition. As in – you get an education so you can have a career 'and' be a wife and mother.

Last year, a brilliant young woman who had been the TA for several of my seminary classes had a baby and decided to stay home. Obsessed with baby quilts as I am, I retrieved a really nice one from the hall closet and dispatched it to her. I also cried – not because she was having a baby – but because she wasn’t pursuing a PhD. One of the people with whom I regularly meet (in Boulder, naturally) maintains that I’m more liberal than say I am.

Back to the subject at hand – I just finished Nancy Leigh DeMoss and Mary Kassian’s Bible study, Divine Design: An Eight-Week Study on Biblical Womanhood. While I have read and listened to teaching on hot topics like submission and women in church leadership, this is the first time I have completed a Bible study on what the Bible says about men and women, the relationship between the sexes, and the role each party is called to fulfill.

Let’s just say that the stubborn nature which makes this type of teaching tough to swallow is the same stubborn nature that made it possible for me to finish it. Though I made it through all 213 pages of the workbook in less than eight weeks, I am still processing what I learned.

What else? I just finished Bernard Ruffin’s biography of Fanny Crosby. Crosby, who was visually impaired, wrote thousands of once-familiar hymns like Blessed Assurance. She’d store the lyrics in her head - dictating them to note takers who sat beside her. Often, she’d have one person sit on the right and another on the left, sharing the lyrics for two songs simultaneously, stanza by stanza.

On to Bonhoeffer and When Helping Hurts.