1991 March/April issue Part 2

Women: The Road Ahead

That was the theme of Time's special issue last fall. There were pictures of women with babies in prison, an inconsolable “crack” baby with a tangle of tubes connected to machines, crying his little heart out, a mother charged with a felony: delivery of drugs to her newborn child, women in politics “sharing real rather than cosmetic power,” a veiled Muslim woman, ten tough-minded women who “create individual rules for success,” e.g. a police chief, a bishop, a rock climber, a baseball club owner, a rap artist, a fashion tycoon, an Indian chief and others (not much femininity showed in their pictures). There were single mothers, lesbian mothers, divorced mothers, working (outside the home) mothers. There was a twelve-year-old who fixes supper for her sisters when Mom works late and there was a man who is a house husband. But there was not one picture of a father and mother and their children. Not one.

1991 January/February issue Part 1

The childless man or woman      

  
Children, God tells us, are a heritage from the Him. Is the man or woman to whom He gives no children therefore disinherited? Surely not. the Lord gave portions of land to each tribe of Israel except one. “The tribe of Levi... received no holding; the Lord God of Israel is their portion, as He promised them” (Joshua 3:14, REB). Withholding what He granted to the rest, He gave to Levi a higher privilege. May we not see childlessness in the same light? I believe there is a special gift for those to whom God does not give the gift of physical fatherhood or motherhood.

1990 November/December issue Part 3

Men, Women and Biblical Equality. Part 3

   Men have disobeyed by misusing their authority, and women have disobeyed by refusing it. We are not therefore at liberty to drain the word headship of its oblivious hierarchical meaning. Let’s be careful not to overlook the all-important word as: “Wives, be subject to your husbands as to the Lord, for the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church” (Eph 5:22, 23). In what sense is Christ the head of the church? It’s a physical metaphor Paul is using. Is it not the head of the human body the part from which all other parts take orders? Yes, iv’e read pages and pages of arguments about that Greek word Kephale. Some would insist that it means only source, and carries no thought of authority. But I insist that metaphors are metaphors and they mean more, not less, than the mere words could mean in another context. One wonders if these humourless, nearsighted, nit-picking, theological pendants have ever read a book in their lives!

1990 November/December issue Part 2

Men, Women, and Biblical Equality. Part 2

   Most of what the MWBE’s advertisements say I think most Christians would accept. It is what they have chosen not to say that disturbs me deeply. The section on Community deals with the Holy Spirit's coming on both men and women; both have spiritual gifts. True enough, but were there not certain restrictions (for both men and women) placed on the use of these gifts? Is there no such thing as church order which manifests a church hierarchy?

1990 November/December issue Part 1

Men, Women, and Biblical Equality. Part 1

   A few months ago a double-paged advertisement with the above heading appeared in Christian magazine, containing a statement drawn up by seven Christian leaders, and signed by (if I counted correctly) 164 others. It appeared to be a direct rebuttal to The Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood which was formed several years ago.

1990 July/August issue Part 4

A "Hard Time"

   Following a talk I gave on what older women are to teach younger, according to Titus 2:3-5, someone raised this objection during the question period:

“I have a hard time with that verse about staying home!”

   It’s an expression we often hear-“I have a hard time with that.” Usually the tone is one of argument, and the words are a euphemism for “I don’t like that,” or “surely that doesn’t apply to my case.” If the speaker were convinced that the verse did not apply to is case, he would not be having a hard time with it. He could dismiss it at once. But if the person really means he or she is having difficulty, what is the exact nature of the difficulty? I can think of four possibilities:

1. Does this apply to me?

2. I want to do it but I can’t.

3. I ought to do it but I don’t want to.

4. I wish God hadn’t said it.

   What shall we do with the difficulties? To the first I would say that if we come to God with an empty cup, asking Him to reveal His will and help us to do the right thing, no matter what it costs, He will certainly show us. For the second we have the promise, “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” God never gave a command for which He will not supply the power to obey. For the third we know we have been created with the will to choose. We may choose to do what we ought to do, and God will help us. If the last describes our “hard time” let’s be straightforward with God, confess the truth, and submit to His Word as an obedient servant. Obedience always finally leads to joy.

1990 March/April issue Part 3

Virginity part 3

“How can a Christian single woman enter into the mystery of Christ and the church if she never experiences marriage?” is the question of a very thoughtful young woman.

   The gift of virginity, given to everyone to offer back to God for His use, is a priceless and irreplaceable gift. It can be offered in the pure sacrifice of marriage, or it can be offered in the sacrifice of life’s celibacy. Does this sound just too, too high and holy? But think for a moment- because the virgin has never known a man, she is free to concern herself wholly with the Lord’s affairs, as Paul said in 1 Corinthians 7, “and her aim in life is to make herself holy, in body and spirit.” She keeps her heart as the Bride of Christ in a very special sense, and offers to the Heavenly Bridegroom alone all that she is and has. When she gives herself willingly to Him in love she has no need to justify herself to the world or to Christians who plague her with questions and suggestions. In a way not open to the married woman her daily “living sacrifices” is a powerful and humble witness, radiating love. I believe she may enter into the “mystery” more deeply than the rest of us.

1990 March/April issue Part 2

Virginity Part 2

But what shall I say to the women who write to me in such sorrow and perplexity? First of all, it is not our job to set about trying to coerce the men. They must answer to God, who made them the initiators. But a woman must answer to God about her acceptance of singleness, seeking to know Him in it and converting it into good by a peaceful YES, LORD! Rather than into real evil by a rebellious NO!
   At lunch today Lars said, “I’ll tell you what would change things fast- if all woman decided they would not ‘give out,’ I mean give men what they’re looking for but are unwilling to make a commitment for.”
   One young woman wrote in desperation, agreeing with what I believe is God’s order, “YEAH! That’s the way is should be!! Unfortunately, that’s not the way it is!”

1990 March/April issue Part 1

Virginity Part 1

My heart goes out to the countless women in their thirties and forties who write to me in real agony of soul because they are still single. There were two letters in this mornings mail. One said, “I am a Christian woman thirty years of age and I am facing the possibility of a life of singleness.” The other: “I am forty-one years old. I never dreamed I would not be married- I’ve been praying for a husband ever since I was sixteen. “
   This phenomenon, due in part, I suppose, to what demographers are calling “the postponed generaton” (the Baby Boomers, born between 1946 and 1964) has reached catastrophic proportions. Men postpone marriage ten or twenty years beyond what used to be considered the marrying age. When the mirror tells them they’re fast aging they decide it’s time to settle down.

1989 September/October issue Part 1

The Effectual Fervent Prayer of a Mother

"Thou sentest Thine hand from above, and drewest my soul out of that profound darkness- my mother, that faithful one, weeping to Thee for me, more than mothers weep the bodily deaths of their children. For she, by that faith and spirit which she had from Thee, discerned the death wherein i lay, and Thou heardest her, O Lord; Thou heardest her, and despisedst not her tears, when streaming down, they watered the ground under her eyes [he alludes here to that devout manner of the Eastern ancients, who used to lie flat on their faces in prayer] in every place where she prayed; yea Thou heardest her... Thine ears were towards her heart. O Thou God omnipotent, who so caredst for every one of us, as if Thou carest for him only; and so for all, as if they were but one!"

(Confessions of St.Augustine)

1989 September/October issue Part 2

A call to older women.

In 1948 when i had been in Prairie Bible Institute (a very stark set of wooden buildings on a very bleak prairie in Alberta) for only a few weeks, i was feeling a bit displaced and lonely one afternoon when there came a knock on my door. I opened it to find a beautiful rosy-cheeked face framed by white hair. She spoke with a Scottish burr:
"You don't know me, but i know you. Iv'e been prraying forr you, Betty dearr. I'm Miss Cunningham. If everr you'd like a cup of tea and a scottish scone, just pop down to my little aparrtment."

1989 July/August issue Part 3

But i have a graduate degree

A woman was asked to speak to the women students of a seminary about job opportunities for those with seminary degrees. She writes, "I talked to them first principally about being, doing and going as God wills (not who i am but whose am i). Then i listed both traditional and creative ways to fulfill needs in the Kingdom of God. Three feminists were offended especially that i should mention a nanny among the 70+ jobs. But Aristolte was a 'nanny' to Alexander the Great! These women had bought into the values of the world and were ready to figth for their ten years of executive computer programming. They said my talk had 'put the down more than any man's.'"

1989 July/August issue Part 2

What's a nice girl like you...

Young people have the crazy notion now days that the only way to really "get to know" somebody is to get intimate. That's what's important. No it isn't. What's important is what the person lives for and how much they'd be willing to risk for it. The following is reprinted from The Pilot, a Catholic weekly of the Aarchdiocese of Boston, March 31, 1989, with the premission of John Mallon:

1989 May/June issue Part 2

Humdudgeons or contentment

The word humdudgeon is a new word to me and I like the sound of it. It means “a loud complaint without a trifle.” Heard any of those lately around your house? One mother thought of an excellent antidote; all humdudgeons must be presented not orally but in writing, “of two hundred words or more.” There was a sudden marked reduction in whining and complaining.

   Parents, by example, teach their children to whine. No wonder it is so difficult to teach them not to! Listen to conversations in the elevator, at the hairdresser’s, at the next table in the restaurant. Everybody’s whining about everything- weather, health, the president, the IRS, the insurance mess, traffic, kids.

1989 January/February issue Part 6

When Your Children Grow Up

  In response to my question as to what readers would like, one asked “how to look at one’s purpose in life when your children are grown up and gone.”
  If ones supreme ai min life is to glorify God by doing what He wants, I would suggest a careful study of the characteristics of Godly women in the New Testament as set forth in 1 Timothy 5:5-10 and Titus 2:3-5. Nancy Krumreich of Anderson, Indiana, makes a practical suggestion that fits Paul’s advice; “You might write about what you think older women ought to be doing in our world (besides going to retreats!). it seems to me that there is a gaping need for women in this category to do things other than seek careers, things which teach us younger women how to love our husbands and children. And things which we younger ones should not be doing, like being Crisis Pregnancy Center directors, picketers of abortion clinics, spending hours of time volunteering which needs to be spent with our children and/or husbands. Perhaps even things like helping us younger ones with our heavy loads and giving practical guidance and encouragement... Are there churches out there bold enough to teach that older women have this responsibility? It seems to me that the attitude is strong both in church and out of it that once the youngest child is in school, women are freed up to pursue whatever they wish.
  “I’m a young woman in search of a mother-figure, mine having dies three years ago when my middle daughter was newborn.”
  I’m sure Nancy is all for the CPC’s, the protests against abortion, and volunteer work- for those who can be free to participate without neglecting the first God-given duties. But if the young women can’t do those jobs, and older women choose to pursue something called fulfilment, who is available?
  Are there some out there with ears to hear this plea?

1987 November/December issue Part 1

Splendor in the Ordinary

For the encouragement of those whose work seems humdrum, here is what St. Francis DeSales said: "The King of Glory rewards His servants not according to the dignity of their office, but according to the love and humility with which they carry it out."

  In the same spirit are these paragraphs from the book Splendor in the Ordinary (out of print, alas), by Thomas Howard (who has taught me many things, even though he is my brother): "[In households] the idea is that in our daily routines we are playing out the Drama of Charity, which eludes politics and its calculations. The commonplaces of household life are parts of the rite in which we celebrate the mystery of Charity-and it is indeed a mystery, full of outrageous absurdities like obedience being a form of liberty, and self-denial a form of self-discovery, and giving a form of receiving, and service a form of exaltation. Politics boggles at mysteries like this; but in Christian house-holds the hunch is that they are all clues to what the Real Drama is about.
  "For when the Drama of Charity was played out on the stage of our history, we saw these absurdities disclosed in their true colors. Here we saw Love incarnate in the form of a servant; here we heard the disquieting doctrine of exchanged life proclaimed all over the hills of Judaea; here we witnessed the humility of the virgin mother exalted high above the station of patriarchs and prophets, and the heroic silence of her spouse lauded for all time. Here we saw a gibbet transfigured into a throne, defeat into victory, death into life, and submission into sovereignty. And here we learned of the Holy Ghost himself whose service is to glorify, not himself, dread and mighty as he is, but this incarnate Love humbled below the meanest of men. A riot of self-giving and glory, humiliation and exaltation, service and majesty. Nonsense by any political calculating; but the mystery of Charity before our eyes.

  "It is this nonsense that we come upon in our kitchens. For the service in this room is either pointless thralldom, or it is as close to the center of the Real Drama as any rite in the whole household. For it is, precisely, service; and service, occurring as it does always for the sake of something else, is a form of humility and self-giving; and humility and self-giving have been disclosed in the Christian Drama as being at the heart of the matter."

1987 May/June issue Part 2

My Mother

She was Kath to her close frinds, Dearie to my father, and always Mother (never Mom) to her six children. She held us on her lap when we were small and rocked us, sang to us, and told us stories. We begged for the ones about "when you were a little girl." Katharine Gillingham was born June 21, 1899 in Philadelphia. We loved hearing about the butler who did tricks for her behind her parents' backs and about the alarmed postman who rushed to rescue the screaming child with her arm down a dog's throat until he heard what she was saying: "He's got my peanut!" In 1922 she married Philip E. Howard Jr., a man who, because he had lost an eye in an accident, felt sure no woman would have him. They worked for five years with the Belgian Gospel Mission, then returned to the States when he became associate editor (later editor) of The Sunday School Times. Mother's course was finished on February 7. She was up and dressed as usual in the morning at the Quarryville Presbyterian Home in Pennsylvania, made it to lunch with the help of her walker, lay down afterwards, having remarked rather matter-of-factly to someone that she knew she was dying, and wondered where her husband was. Later in the afternoon cardiac arrest took her, very quietly.

  Each of us (in chronological order) took a few minutes at the funeral to speak of some aspect of Mother's character. Phil spoke of her consistency and unfailing availability as a mother; of her love for Dad, ("He was always my lover," she said). I recalled how she used to mop her eyes at the table, laughing till she cried at some of my father's bizarre descriptions, or even at his oft-told jokes; how she was obedient to the New Testament pattern of godly womanhood, including hospitality. Dave talked about her unreserved surrender to the Lord, first of herself (at Stony Brook conference in New York), and then (painfully, years later at Prairie Bible Institute in Canada) of her children; of how, when we left home, she followed us not only with prayer but, for forty years with hardly a break, with a weekly letter. Ginny told how Mother's example taught her what it means to be a lady; how to discipline herself, her children, her home. Tom remembered the books she read to us (A.A. Milne, Beatrix Potter, Sir Knight of the Splendid Way, for example), and the songs she sang as she rocked each of us little children ("Safe in the Arms of Jesus," "Go Tell Aunt Nancy") shaping our vision of life. Jim pictured her sitting in her small cane rocker in the bay window of her bedroom after the breakfast dishes were done, sitting quietly before the Lord with the Bible, Daily Light, and notebook.

  The last three years were sorrowful ones for all of us. Arteriosclerosis had done its work in her mind and she was confused and lonely ("Why hasn't Dad been to see me?" "He's been with the Lord for 23 years, Mother." "Nobody told me!"). Still a lady, she tried to be neatly groomed, always offered a chair to those who came. She had not lost her humor, her almost unbeatable skill at Scrabble, her ability to play the piano, sing hymns, and remember her children. But she wanted us to pray that the Lord would let her go Home, so we did.

  The funeral ended with the six of us singing "The Strife is O'er," then all family members, including our beloved aunts Alice and Anne Howard, sang "To God be the Glory." The graveside service closed with the doxology (the one with Alleluias). We think of her now, loving us with an even greater love, her poor frail mortality left behind, her eyes beholding the King in His beauty. "If you knew what God knows about death," wrote George MacDonald, "you would clap your listless hands."

1987 May/June issue Part 1

Serious Play, Careless Work

When I was a kid we rushed home every afternoon from school, burst into the house to make sure Mother was there where we wanted her to be (she was), and then collected the kids on the block to play Kick the Can or to build playhouses out of wooden greenhouse boxes. Equipment didn't cost us a cent. Adults didn't have to supervise us or drive us anywhere or coach us. We just played. We were kids, and we knew that after-school time was playtime-until it was time to work (practice the piano, set the table, clear the table, do homework).

  Something has gone badly awry. Educators have gotten terribly serious about play and terribly casual

1987 March/April issue Part 3

The Government Is on His Shoulders

The Orthodox Morning Prayer includes this petition: Teach me to treat all that comes to me throughout the day with peace of soul and with firm conviction that Your will governs all.

  I had thought of "all that comes to me" as coming from outside, that is, from the action of others. Today what came to me was the sudden sickening realization that I had. forgotten a speaking engagement last night. It was on my calendar but not in my engagement book. I had looked only at the latter.

  I did not treat this with peace of soul. The pastor was very gracious when I called. "God is in control," was his word of comfort. 

  Yes. He is still there in spite of my in-excusable failures. What destroyed my peace was not only the thought of those I had sinned against-their inconvenience, disappointment, offense but the thought of my reputation for faithfulness. I had to confess that subtle form of pride.

  Nothing that comes to me is devoid of divine  purpose. In seeking to see the whole with God's eyes, we can find the peace which human events so often destroy. He is the God who is able even to "restore ... the years which the swarming locust has eaten," (Joel 2:25, RSV) and to turn "the Vale of Trouble into the Gate of Hope"  (Hosea 2:15, NEB).

A Working Mother

"A few years ago,' writes a friend, "when faced with some rather large debts, Elaine wanted to earn a little money to help get the family out of the hole. She didn't want to leave the children, so even though her past work experience had been as a high school math teacher and computer programmer for IBM and Sylvania, she opted instead for a paper route! That meant that she had to leave at 3:30 each morning, seven days a week, for a couple of years, to deliver her papers. She was home again before breakfast and before Ed had to leave for work." Bravissima, Elaine!

1987 March/April issue Part 1

My Life for Yours

Ten years ago a young Canadian woman sat in the assembly hall at the University of Illinois in Urbana, along with 17,000 other students attending Inter-Varsity's missionary convention. She thrilled to the singing of the great hymns, led by Bernie Smith. She heard the speakers, "and I remember the incredible excitement and desire to know and serve God that I experienced at that time. Now I have walked through some deep waters, and I feel compelled to write to you," her letter to me said. She had

read two of my books just before the convention, and I happened to be among the speakers. Another was Helen Roseveare, author of Give Me This Mountain and other books. Barbara was especially moved by the thought of the cost of declaring God's glory. Her letter told me this story:

Three years after Urbana she married Gerry Fuller, "a wonderful man who demonstrated zeal for Christ, a passion for souls, a beautiful compassion for hurting, broken people who needed to know the healing love of Jesus Christ." Following seminary and student pastorates, he became a prison chaplain and an inner-city missionary. Then he married Barbara and together they worked in Saint John, New Brunswick, with street kids, ex-convicts, and glue-sniffers.

  The time came when Barbara saw Gerry seeking the Lord with such great intensity it made her question her own commitment to Christ. Was she prepared to die to self as he was? What was it that drove him to pray as he did-at least once until four in the morning? Was her own love for the Lord as deep as his, or was it perhaps shadowed by her love for her husband?