"Continuing in our series on Biblical Womanhood concerning the topic:
IT IS IN THE COVENANT COMMUNITY
WHERE WE ARE EQUIPPED TO LIVE OUT OUR DESIGN
As you know, being in the family is not just about your nuclear family, but also about being in the family of God. When children are confirmed into the faith they are identifying with the Lord as well as with the Lord’s family, the church. As well, all God’s children need to live covenantally before God and with His people.
The Biblical account of Ruth and Naomi gives a dramatic presentation of what it’s like to live covenantally. “Where you go I will go, and where you lodge I will lodge. Your people shall be my people, and your God my God. Where you die I will die, and there will I be buried. May the Lord do so to me and more also if anything but death parts me from you. (Ruth 1:16-17) As Ruth committed her life to Jehovah as her God, she understood that this meant changing her citizenship to the covenant community.
The last half of the meaning of the 3rd Article of the Apostles’ Creed, “…but the Holy Spirit has called me through the Gospel, enlightened me with His gifts, and sanctified and preserved me in the true faith; in like manner as He calls, gathers, enlightens, and sanctifies the whole Christian Church on earth…” This is the covenantal concept – that He calls not only me, but also others into relationship within the context of the Christian church.
Women of Christ are crushed when we emulate the pursuit of self-fulfillment and self-actualization in the culture. Countless mothers have told their daughters, “Learn to be independent. Self-sufficiency is power” – these misbeliefs make the helper design seems senseless! But in the covenant community, the church of our Lord Jesus Christ, the helper design is essential.
Redeemed women join together as corporate helpers in God’s church and care for the body of Christ, much like Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of James, and Salome did when they bought spices so they might go and anoint the body of Christ. They made plans, decisions, and carried them out. They functioned well together. And even though they knew the stone was too big for them to roll, they still carried on. This is the essence of community and compassion in the church. It is the helper design in action.
Someone is teaching the women of our churches and our daughters what it means to be a woman. Is it the current culture or the church? How can we help our women? The life-giving culture of caring is not learned from books. They learn how to carry out this helper ministry as, by God’s grace, they watch us speak and live it!
It is in the church that believers are equipped “for the work of ministry, for the building up of the body of Christ, until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God” (Ephesians 4:12-13).
