The Woman of God: Honesty, Wisdom, and Life

It had everything to do with these suppressed insecurities of I don't think I'm enough for you. And what we had to learn and we we had to learn with community and with counseling is that it's okay to be honest about your insecurities. We we say it this way, God can't love the person you're pretending to be. Ladies, neither can your husband because that person does not exist. [00:49:11] (28 seconds)  #HonestAboutInsecurities

Hardest parts of my marriage early on, fools of insecurities never expressed our insecurities. We just suppressed them until so we'd be arguing about towels on the floor, and that would become a two hour shouting match. And it had nothing to do with the towels, but everything to do with, I don't feel like I'm enough for you. Intimacy comes from vulnerability. [00:03:31] (49 seconds)  #StopSuppressingInsecurity

Intimacy comes from vulnerability. God can't and your husband can't love the person you're pretending to be. Now you may need a counselor to get in counselor to help with that. Community. You need all that. Intimacy comes from vulnerability. Naked and unashamed Is it just about sex? [00:04:50] (60 seconds)  #VulnerabilityNeedsCommunity

Verse 13, myrrh was a costly fragrance worn close to her heart. She's telling the man, hey, you are precious to me. I cherish you above all else. I want you close to me. You're the best thing in my life outside of my relationship with Jesus. Verse 14, when she says, a cluster of henna blossoms in the vineyards of En Gedi. En Gedi was and is an oasis in the desert. She's telling him, hey, you are what fills my cup. [01:01:43] (30 seconds)  #CherishYourBeloved

Last thing, a woman of God is life giving. One of the things you see from the woman is she does not withhold affirmation or admiration. She expresses it openly. Look at chapter one verse 13. She says, my beloved is to me a sachet of myrrh that lies between my breasts. Verse 14, my beloved is to me a cluster of henna blossoms in the vineyards of Engedi. Now, I think cultural context is needed for both of those. Some of are like, what does that mean? [01:01:13] (30 seconds)  #LifeGivingAffirmation

A woman of God is like that with her word and with her deed. She can set the temperature of a room. She can change an atmosphere of a room. You can still be talking about what a woman said hours later, years later, a woman of God has that kind of influence. And we see in this text, she should be life giving, affirming in that process. [01:03:08] (28 seconds)  #WordsChangeAtmosphere

You need some women in your life where you bring a man into the room and they are protecting your heart. They are defending they are asking the questions of the guy. They are able to test them. And some of you women are dating guys who nobody's ever met, and a 100% of the time that goes bad. I hear it from teenagers, college students, and adults. Hey, what's going on with that guy? Nobody really knows him. Hey, so they ended up at the house in private, the parents weren't there, and some things went sideways. [00:54:30] (32 seconds)  #ProtectiveFriendCircles

Have some ladies around you. Have some godly friendships. Be wise enough to have some godly friendships around you. Godly friendships do not equal cynicism and gossip and complaining. If that's your accountability group, you need to find a new one. Well, Tim, should I not love all these lady? Like, you love them, they should not be texting you and be accountable to you as your primary godly friendships. [00:54:02] (28 seconds)  #HealthyAccountabilityGroups

God created marriage. God created sex, and God created attraction and desires. He knows that you have those. Stop pretending like you don't and that you're content as some, like, magic recipe to unlock the code to get a man. Be honest about your desires. This woman is being honest about her desires for a man. And she's honest, not just about her desires, she's honest about her insecurities. Look at verses five and six. She says, I'm very dark. Don't gaze at me because I'm dark. [00:47:15] (39 seconds)  #HonestAboutDesire

I love you and I can't wait to hang out later today. I can run through a brick wall and I could I could, like, stiff arm any critique from anybody else because my wife believes in me and loves me. Women, you have incredible influence in the marketplace, in your home, with your husband. Use your words to give life, not bring death as James says. [01:08:07] (28 seconds)  #UseWordsToGiveLife

User words as Proverbs talks about, not to be a dripping faucet, not to be quarrelsome. That makes him wanna live on the corner of a roof or go die in the desert. God said it, not me. Right? I've I've heard it said this way, I've seen a man nagged into transformation by the power of the Holy Spirit by a woman. Women, you cannot change your spouse, only the Holy Spirit can. But you can encourage him. You can't breathe life into him. You can do what Proverbs 31 says, she opens her mouth with wisdom and the teaching of kindness is on her tongue. [01:08:36] (42 seconds)  #WisdomAndKindness

Let me tell you women, we need you. We need your voice, we need your service, we need your teaching, we need you coming alongside, we need women in our kids ministry with our next gen ministries. We need women in this room. We need God God has called you in the mission of God. Who who is the first person at the empty tomb of Jesus? Who was the first missionary after Jesus rose from the grave? Women. [01:10:42] (33 seconds)  #WomenInMinistryMatter

And at all points throughout scripture, throughout this cultural context that scripture was written in, where it continually demeaned women and pushed women down, over and over scripture is gonna elevate women. Like I joked before, the woman of God talks more than the man of God in Song of Songs. She goes first. She started out this text. Women, you have a voice, use it to bring life. Don't dismiss your voice. Don't demean with your voice. Don't get caught up in gossip or slander with your voice. Speak life. [01:11:15] (36 seconds)  #UseYourVoiceForLife

Here's the first thing we're gonna see today is that the woman of God is honest. The woman of God is honest. Look at the text with me. She's honest about her desires. Starting out, this is the introduction to the book. She says this, let him kiss me. Verse four, she says, draw me after you to the man. Verse seven, she says to the man, tell me where you pastor your flock. Basically, hey, tell me where you hang out. Tell me what coffee shop you go to because I might just stumble in there accidentally. [00:45:44] (34 seconds)  #WomanOfGodIsHonest

And we might meet up. Right? She she's honest about her desires. Here's what you don't see, ladies. You don't see the woman of God trying to act like she doesn't need a man so that God will give her one. See, sometimes we do this weird thing in the church and maybe you grew up in purity culture and all those cut types of things. When we tell women either directly or somewhat unintentionally, we tell women, hey, just focus on God. Hey, don't worry about a spouse. Don't worry about a man. Jesus is your boyfriend. [00:46:19] (31 seconds)  #StopPretendingYouDontNeedLove

Like, says, you and Jesus, fix your eyes upon him as you're running this race, you run after Jesus. Don't look around, just look to Jesus. And then at some point, you might turn to your left or to your right, and you're gonna see this mature, godly man, and you're gonna get married to him, and it's just gonna happen. And let me just tell you, I'm sorry because that is the dumbest thing I've ever heard. And it's not true. Right? [00:46:49] (26 seconds)  #DontPassivelyWaitForSpouse

What who who is checking him? What church does he go to? Well, he doesn't go to church. We're evangelating. That that doesn't work. And the man who is not in community and the girl who is not community in community, things go sad sideways. And one of the things that break my breaks my heart all the time is when I see a godly, vibrant woman serving in the church amongst community until she started dating Tommy. [00:55:03] (31 seconds)  #IsolationLeadsToRisk

Here's what I I've learned. And by God's grace, my wife and I have a not a perfect marriage, but a very healthy one, and I want that for you. So if you're starting out in this thing, we have many couples who are engaged to be married. If you're dating and trying to figure out the chaos that is called dating apps. If you're married and thriving or married and struggling, we wanna invite you to lean into this series to experience God's promises and relationships not pain. [00:40:38] (28 seconds)  #InviteToHealthyMarriage

And those first couple years of marriage were very, very hard. We've said it before. We've been pretty honest. We found new ways to fight. I mean, we we stood up and fought. We yelled and fought. We threw things and fought. We sat down and whispered and fought. We went on walks and fought. Like, it was it was a hard first few years. And so what I'm sharing with you in this series is not only biblical wisdom, but life wisdom. [00:40:13] (24 seconds)  #MarriageIsLifeWisdom

No. My wife is gonna be up here. The beautiful J. A. Birdwell is gonna be up here in just a few moments, and she's really gonna bring the house down. So we're really glad to have her. But here here's why we're talking about all this stuff. I I'm not a glutton for punishment. I'm not trying to be edgy. I I'm talking about all this stuff is to save you from pain. To save you from pain. [00:39:28] (23 seconds)  #GuestSpeakerFeatured