Which Came First?
The Liberated Woman or the Liberated Man?
I was at a “Christian Book Event” recently (whatever that is – use your imagination) and I noticed an interesting (to me anyway) phenomena. I talked to both men and women, but mostly to women – I think there are more female readers of Christian Fiction than there are men (though I haven’t checked any statistics – let’s just say that it’s true though for the sake of this article – as well as for the sake of this run-on sentence.)
Anyway, afterward I realized that I could easily group the women into two groups.
Group 1 were generally: open, friendly, gregarious, interested in engaging in both dialogue and debate about apologetics, doctrine, apostasy, the purpose of the Church, if the Church was effective, if my book, The Second Trumpet was doctrinally correct, if it was even a good read (btw - they said it was), if Christian fiction was important, if fiction in general held any value……the list could go on and it did.
Group 2 were generally: (how should I put it)….. wary. Wary it seemed of me, of conversation with me, of conversation about any seeming controversial topic, even of lively conversations with the other women.
At first I just chalked this up to personality. Hey, people are different right? – And well, maybe they just didn’t really like my book, my views, or me. That’s certainly OK, but then through my keen powers of human observation (yes, they’re different from other powers of observation) I began to notice things. The first thing I noticed was the husbands.
Almost every one of the husbands from the Group 1 wives, also shared certain characteristics. First I noticed they were open, friendly and easily engaged with me in conversation. Given the setting, the topics of conversation all either began, or eventually got around to the subject of religion, to include doctrine, and each person’s pet beliefs. (Yes everyone has them – even you.) What really distinguished these men from their Group 2 counterparts however, was the non-threatening way they were able to engage in discussions about doctrine, the purposes of the Church, and how it worked.
It occurred to me that what made these Group 1 husbands different was their confidence of belief. They weren’t at all threatened by discussing concepts foreign to their own experience or current beliefs; in fact they seemed to enjoy it. Similarly they seemed pleased when they learned that their wives had just engaged in similar discussions.
In contrast, the Group 2 husbands, much like their wives were, well, wary. Wary of me, as well as any topic or subject that offended their view of the world. (Upon realizing this I decided it would not be helpful to mention that their wives had recently stopped by and exhibited the same standoffish behavior. (Then again, maybe that would have made them feel better to know that their wives hadn’t been contaminated with another view of what the Church could do, or a different take on their pet doctrines.)
After the event I continued to think about my experiences with these two groups of people, who – I am certain – all loved Jesus equally. Was one group right and one wrong? Did I like one group better than the other? (Well that’s kind of obvious I guess.) Why were the two groups, both men and women so different?
To me the most defining characteristic of the Group 1 wives seemed to be freedom. They seemed free to talk, free to think, and free to engage. I kept being reminded of:
2 Cr 3:17 Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.
Perhaps the Group 2 women were free too, but it sure didn’t’ seem like it. So what made these Group 1 women so free – obviously the answer is two lines above, but could it have also been that the Spirit of freedom, manifested through their husbands, affected them this way? Or did the Spirit of freedom manifest through them and so affect their husbands?
It left me wondering, which came first the liberated woman or the liberated man? And in the end convinced me that what I’d truly witnessed was perhaps less about personality and more about letting the love of Jesus shine through to your spouse, and then to all others with whom you come into contact, regardless of whether you agree with them or not.
God Bless,
LM
I was at a “Christian Book Event” recently (whatever that is – use your imagination) and I noticed an interesting (to me anyway) phenomena. I talked to both men and women, but mostly to women – I think there are more female readers of Christian Fiction than there are men (though I haven’t checked any statistics – let’s just say that it’s true though for the sake of this article – as well as for the sake of this run-on sentence.)
Anyway, afterward I realized that I could easily group the women into two groups.
Group 1 were generally: open, friendly, gregarious, interested in engaging in both dialogue and debate about apologetics, doctrine, apostasy, the purpose of the Church, if the Church was effective, if my book, The Second Trumpet was doctrinally correct, if it was even a good read (btw - they said it was), if Christian fiction was important, if fiction in general held any value……the list could go on and it did.
Group 2 were generally: (how should I put it)….. wary. Wary it seemed of me, of conversation with me, of conversation about any seeming controversial topic, even of lively conversations with the other women.
At first I just chalked this up to personality. Hey, people are different right? – And well, maybe they just didn’t really like my book, my views, or me. That’s certainly OK, but then through my keen powers of human observation (yes, they’re different from other powers of observation) I began to notice things. The first thing I noticed was the husbands.
Almost every one of the husbands from the Group 1 wives, also shared certain characteristics. First I noticed they were open, friendly and easily engaged with me in conversation. Given the setting, the topics of conversation all either began, or eventually got around to the subject of religion, to include doctrine, and each person’s pet beliefs. (Yes everyone has them – even you.) What really distinguished these men from their Group 2 counterparts however, was the non-threatening way they were able to engage in discussions about doctrine, the purposes of the Church, and how it worked.
It occurred to me that what made these Group 1 husbands different was their confidence of belief. They weren’t at all threatened by discussing concepts foreign to their own experience or current beliefs; in fact they seemed to enjoy it. Similarly they seemed pleased when they learned that their wives had just engaged in similar discussions.
In contrast, the Group 2 husbands, much like their wives were, well, wary. Wary of me, as well as any topic or subject that offended their view of the world. (Upon realizing this I decided it would not be helpful to mention that their wives had recently stopped by and exhibited the same standoffish behavior. (Then again, maybe that would have made them feel better to know that their wives hadn’t been contaminated with another view of what the Church could do, or a different take on their pet doctrines.)
After the event I continued to think about my experiences with these two groups of people, who – I am certain – all loved Jesus equally. Was one group right and one wrong? Did I like one group better than the other? (Well that’s kind of obvious I guess.) Why were the two groups, both men and women so different?
To me the most defining characteristic of the Group 1 wives seemed to be freedom. They seemed free to talk, free to think, and free to engage. I kept being reminded of:
2 Cr 3:17 Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.
Perhaps the Group 2 women were free too, but it sure didn’t’ seem like it. So what made these Group 1 women so free – obviously the answer is two lines above, but could it have also been that the Spirit of freedom, manifested through their husbands, affected them this way? Or did the Spirit of freedom manifest through them and so affect their husbands?
It left me wondering, which came first the liberated woman or the liberated man? And in the end convinced me that what I’d truly witnessed was perhaps less about personality and more about letting the love of Jesus shine through to your spouse, and then to all others with whom you come into contact, regardless of whether you agree with them or not.
God Bless,
LM
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