Celebrating Women

Today is International Women’s Day.

We could rant about the dubious origins of this festival eventually adopted by the United Nations and imposed on the world. We could ask questions about what exactly we are celebrating or campaigning for on this day and whether it makes any difference to the world.

We could observe the irony in the fact that woman as a distinct gender is being celebrated at the same time as we are seeking to supress and remove gender distinctions.

But far better, I want to praise God for making the first woman and from her, women. I want us to celebrate God’s genius in making man and woman to reflect his character and rule his world. We can give thanks for mothers and wives and sisters and grandmothers and girl friends.

We should recognise and repent that we have not always treated women in general or the women in our lives with the honour they deserve.

We can rejoice in God’s great design for the world that women work to subdue and rule the world often with an efficiency and work-rate that us men can only dream of as mothers, engineers, home managers, teachers, Directors, electricians, wives, nurses, grandmothers, bloggers, farmers and even prime ministers.

Most of all we praise God for Christian women who have exemplified what the loving husband in the book or Proverbs says about his industrious wife

“There are many virtuous and capable women in the world,
but you surpass them all!”
Charm is deceptive, and beauty does not last;
but a woman who fears the Lord will be greatly praised.
Reward her for all she has done.
Let her deeds publicly declare her praise.

By Graham Nicholls