The set-apart women I admire most all had one very important thing in common; they were passionately, ardently, fervently in love with Jesus Christ.  They put Jesus Christ above pleasure, riches, comforts, family, friends, and worldly applause.  And they put Jesus Christ far above their own agenda.

Amy Carmichael sacrificed her right to be married and chose instead to spend her life rescuing 1,000 children from being sold into temple prostitution in India.  Her romance with Jesus Christ far exceeded the most beautiful fairy tale ever written.

Sabina Wurmbrandt sacrificed her right to live “happily ever after” with the love of her life, Richard, when it came down to a choice between saving her husband and standing up for her first Love, Jesus Christ.  She inspired her husband to stand against those who were blaspheming Christ’s name, and as a result she and Richard were separated for ten long years.

Gladys Alyward spent all of her youth and beauty in a war-torn Chinese village – rather than pining after men – choosing service for the Kingdom of God over marriage, family and the comforts of this world.  And as a result, a hundred violent prisoners were subdued into quiet obedience, two hundred orphan’s lives were saved and thousands were pulled out of darkness into God’s marvelous light.

Catherine Booth laid down her right to a comfortable marriage and family life – not only allowing her husband to pour out his life for the destitute and dying, but serving right by his side as he did so.  She chose all-night prayer gatherings, long days trudging through slums, and attack from the modern church over a stable existence in a cute home with a white picket fence.

When I study these women’s lives, I am astounded and inspired by their level of commitment to Jesus Christ.  They didn’t just say He was their first love; they lived it.  Whether they gave up their right to be married in order to serve Christ, or gave up the “happily ever after” lifestyle they’d always dreamed of, nothing was more important than protecting the honor of their Lord and King.

So it must be with us.

The more I study the lives of great Christian women, the more I recognize that our American culture (even the Christian culture) so often convinces us that this life is all about us rather than being all about Jesus Christ.  It is my desire, by God’s grace, to make all of my decisions, choices and attitudes based on the question, “How can I honor and glorify my King in this moment?” It’s a deliberate choosing to ignore what my flesh (and this culture) constantly encourages me to do, which is to ask, “What is best for me right now?” or “What do I feel like doing?”

Being a mother of three has offered boundless opportunities to lay down my own agenda and serve others for the glory of God.  Tending to a crying newborn several times a night, and spending my best energies during the changing diapers, pouring juice, and kissing “owies” (instead of taking a nap or relaxing on the couch with a books) are a few small ways I am learning to die to self’s agenda and live a poured-out life for the glory of God.  However, I am convinced that these small victories are preparing for much greater opportunities to take up my cross and follow Him.  After all Christ said, “He who is faithful in little will also be faithful in much.”

I would encourage you to look at the challenging areas of your life.  Are there areas, even small areas, in which God wants to teach you how to lay down your own agenda, die to self, take up your cross and follow Him?  It may not seem like an exciting path at first, but it is the doorway into the fullness of all He has for you.  The heroic women of history past all had to begin living a poured-out life the small areas of their daily existence.  And because they were faithful in little, God entrusted with much.  Are we willing to follow in their footsteps?

© Leslie Ludy
www.setapartgirl.com

“Then,”replied Simpson, “You see more than some of the doctors of divinity.”

Girls, we have a coming King. The story of Jesus Christ is an incomplete picture if we stop at the manger. We must move beyond his first visit to earth, to his second coming. His Kingship can only be understood in light of his second coming. This month, we will celebrate his coming as a tender Lamb of God. But one day, he will come as the Lion of the tribe of Judah – Our King! And in this character of God, we find much of our motive. Our motive for what, you might ask. It is our motive to share the gospel and our motive to live pure lives.

Titus 2:11-14 says:

“For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men. It teaches us to say ‘no’ ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age, while we wait for the blessed hope – the glorious appearing of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ.”

Our belief in his second return should, in part, shape our lifestyle. It makes this world less attractive because we are looking forward to the New Earth that will be ruled by our King. It makes us want to talk about him and prepare others because he can’t come until everyone has heard the gospel.

I was at the last crusade that Billy Graham ever preached. Flushing Meadows, New York City. He said, “For years every time I came to New York through LaGuardia Airport, I would pass a graveyard on the way down to Times Square. I don’t know what the name of it is, but there are graveyards all over New York and those graves are going to be opened if they are people who knew Christ as their Lord and Savior. And those who are left here that are still living are going to join them. Where? In the air on our way to heaven.”

Are you ready for Christ our coming King?

© Dannah Gresh

For example, this is how my day has gone so far. I checked the news, and saw stories about a 15-year-old girl who was brutally gang-raped by by anywhere between 7 to 10 men outside of a high school while at least a dozen others stood by and watched it without interfering, and a sadist who allegedly raped, murdered, and stowed the bodies of at least 10 women in his home. Those are just the stories in CNN’s headlines–the tip of the iceberg nationally. At the same time, there are numerous local stories about child sex abuse and murder that didn’t even make the national news.
Next, I checked my Twitter feed, which carried news of many non-profit organizations (Christian and mainstream) that are working to improve the conditions of women and girls around the world. High on their list of concerns is sex trafficking and enslaved prostitutes.

I then started work by listening to a media panel about “transmedia” efforts–telling a single story across a variety of media platforms. One of the panelists spoke without shame of working with a clothing company that sponsored an interactive game about a stripper. The gamer controls the stripper’s actions, which this media expert cheerfully said allowed the player to either make the stripper engage “in the most depraved actions” or “save her.” It’s an odd sponsorship, given the fact that the sponsor’s clothes aren’t seen very often. (The clothing company wasn’t mentioned in this panel, but I wish it had been so that I would not patronize their stores or product.)
 

Listening to this panel, I wanted to scream: Why can’t we connect the dots here? Why is it that as a culture in the developing world, we put our heads in the sand and voiciferously protest there is no connection between the media we consume and our actions? Yet, other studies show that when television is introduced to new areas of developing nations, there is a measurable change in behavior. Do we think we are somehow immune to the effect of media in our own nation? Do we think we can allow people the fantasy of degrading and brutalizing others (especially women) and argue that this thought life will not eventually affect behavior?!

What can we do to change this thinking? I want to encourage each of you to become media activists. Please protest media that undermines the safety and dignity of women and girls, in particular, through social media and your wallets. Teach your children to understand that what they feast their eyes upon will become normalized to them. Let retail vendors know of your displeasure. And please support media that challenges these denigrating, dehumanizing trends by producing edifying content. I’m not arguing for cheesy, unsophisticated content in the name of being positive, but well-produced content that elevates human dignity. If we speak out, we can make a difference in the lives of the next generation of women. Media is a powerful tool to shape and change behavior. Let’s make sure it shapes and changes it in the right way. Pay attention and do your part, because media matters.

© Carolyn McCulley

Now you may not think that there’s anything particularly unusual about a yarn aisle in a department store. But I was stunned. The reason I was stunned was that the womanly art of knitting and crocheting fell by the wayside a long time ago – along with the idea that the best place for a young wife and mom was in the home.

When I was a little girl, my Oma (granny) had taken me to the yarn aisle to pick out beautiful skeins for my next crochetting project.  And although it was still possible to find yarn in craft stores, I hadn’t seen a shelf  - let alone a whole aisle full – in a department store for  what seemed like eons.

The feminist women-centered analysis (err… brainwashing) of the seventies and eighties had convinced women like me that womanly crafts like knitting and crochetting were trivial, if not borderline demeaning. We were taught that women should stop doing menial things for the home and devote our attention to things of serious importance – like developing a career and earning a lot of money.  I hadn’t picked up a crochet hook in decades.

I was so overwhelmed by my thoughts that that I stayed there in the yarn aisle for a while, pondering the cultural significance of it all. I ran my fingers over the skeins, feeling the thickness and texture of the strings.  I studied the sizes and types of hooks and needles. I thought back to sitting at Oma’s feet, having her guide my clumsy young hands in basic crochet stitches. I thought of the pretty doilies she taught me to crochet and the sense of pride and accomplishment when my mom displayed my work on the living room coffee table.

I thought about the relaxed womanly commraderie… a grandmother sitting for hours mentoring and training her young granddaughter in womanly arts. Things that she had learned from her grandmother. And she, from her grandmother before her. I thought about the whole concept of an older woman training a younger woman how to be a woman and how to pour herself into making a house a home. I thought about the admonition of Titus 2:3 for older women to teach younger women good and beautiful things.  The sense of nostalgia that swept over me at that moment was profound. We women have lost so much.

I think that many women are beginning to feel the vacuum. They’re yearning for womanly things. That’s why a whole aisle of yarn has, after a 25 year absence, suddenly re-appeared at my local department store.

Inspired, I bought a ball of crochet thread and some hooks. I pulled out some old patterns I had kept stored in a box in my basement, and sat on the couch refreshing my memory on how to crochet. The next time I stayed with my sister-in-law and brother-in-law in Houston, I bought some bright pink, blue, and green skeins and large plastic hooks to teach my young niece how to crochet. We sat on the floor for a couple of hours as I guided her inexperienced hands in how to hook chains and do single crochets. We laughed together and worked together. When she was finished, she decorated her bed frame with bright, pretty crochetted flowers. I don’t know who was more proud.

What took place that day was a whole lot more valuable than a day at the office. It makes me think that our foremothers were a lot wiser than we gave them credit for. It is us – and not them – that have been deceived by an elaborate yarn.

© Mary A. Kassian

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But all too often, we don’t use our advantage for that cause.  Instead we sit around complaining about petty concerns and evaluating our own emotions.  We attend retreats that are all about how we can feel better about ourselves and live more fulfilled lives.  We read books about how we can somehow find the right guy.  We spend hours online frittering our time away in endless social networks.  We waste countless hours at the mall, snatching up the latest trends and trying to become more appealing to the opposite sex.  We live a life completely focused on self.  Meanwhile, children are starving, women are being prostituted, and countless families around the world are ripped apart by disease and poverty.

Remember the evil city of Sodom in the Old Testament?  The one that was destroyed by God’s fury with fire and brimstone?  Few of us are aware that God’s anger toward Sodom was for something beyond immorality.  As it says in Ezekiel:

This was the iniquity of your sister Sodom: She and her daughter had pride, fullness of food, and abundance of idleness; neither did she strengthen the hand of the poor and needy.  (Ezekiel 16:49)

I don’t know about you, but to me that description couldn’t fit American Christianity any better.  We are proud, focused on self, consumed with our wealth and comforts, we live in an abundance of idleness and shallow pleasure, and we are indifferent to the plight of the needy around the world.  And once you see the end of Sodom, it makes you a bit uncomfortable to realize that America is on the very same path.

In the past few years, God has challenged me at a whole new level about what it means to be a living sacrifice for Him.  He has asked me to get uncomfortable by going to the least and lost around the world.  He’s awakened me to the 143 million orphans, the 27 million human slaves, and the 25,000 people who die each day from hunger.  He has led my husband and I to adopt a little girl from Korea with no fingers, and a baby boy from down the street in need of a loving home.  He’s asked us to give sacrificially of our time, energy, and resources for the destitute and dying.

I encourage you to take some time to prayerfully consider the direction and focus of your life.  What is God calling you to?  How can you practically become His hands and feet to those in need?  American mentalities train us that this life is all about our dreams, our goals, and our ambitions.  But that’s not true Christianity.  How might God be asking you to forsake all, take up your cross and follow Him?

You don’t have to be amazingly gifted or highly educated to pour your life out for Jesus Christ.  You don’t have to have been seminary educated or groomed at Bible college.  You just need a heart fully surrendered to Him.  Just this week, I talked with a twenty-eight year old single woman who has chosen to joyfully pour out her life for needy children in the foster-care system.

Gladys Aylward was an uneducated parlor maid when she set off, against the advice of the Christian system, to give her life to the people of China.  Amy Carmichael was merely one simple girl in feeble health and with very few supporters when she left it all to rescue endangered children in India.  Throughout history, simple women like these have changed the world for the Gospel.  And it was not because of them.  They were merely vessels willing to lay down everything for the Kingdom of God.  Are we willing to follow their triumphant example?

© Leslie Ludy