Something I’ve learned about brokenness.

Audrey Hepburn once said “I believe that happy girls are the prettiest girls”. And you know how everyone loves a nice quote from a good Classic. In fact many of us seem to have the habit of taking those nice classic quotes to heart simply because of the timeless mouths they came out of. But when I really think about this quote, which I’m sure Mrs. Hepburn meant only to inspire, I’m left wondering: what about the beauty in the unhappy girls? What about the ones who have been wounded, the ones who feel as if they are living in the midst of a mess? What about the beauty within the broken ones? 

I’ve had the privilege, as some might call it, of experiencing brokenness in this past season of my life. While I will not compare my state of brokenness with anyone elses’ as I know that mine hardly casts a shadow compared to the real tragedy that others experience on a daily basis, I have experienced a season, which to me, has seemed quite dark at times and left me feeling as if my life was simply strewn in many pieces across my floor, without having any knowledge of how to go about picking them up and putting them back together. 

For me, this was not okay. This was not how Christians were supposed to feel in my mind. Women of God are supposed to be so full of great joy within the hardships, and have that cheerful disposition even when their heart is completely downtrodden and then all will be okay, amen? But months later, after failing many times to superficially hold myself together and fix things on my own, I have learned something about the truth of brokenness.

“Then Mary took a twelve-ounce jar of expensive perfume made from essence of nard, and she anointed Jesus’ feet with it, wiping his feet with her hair. The house was filled with the fragrance.” John 12:3.

The perfume that Mary annointed Jesus’ feet with on this lovely evening was a very costly perfume said to have been held within an alabaster jar. In this time period, this perfume was given to a daughter by her Jewish parents before she was married. On the night of her wedding, she was to pour the perfume out onto her husband's feet as a statement of absolute love and devotion. And what a beautiful picture of those two things that is. However, the only way to pour this beautiful and priceless fragrance was to break open the bottle. It could only be used once, thus signifying it’s preciousness. 

The only way to pour this beautiful and priceless fragrance was to break open the bottle. Brokenness was required for this beautiful offering to be given. It was amongst the broken and shattered pieces of this fragile and priceless alabaster jar that Jesus found a most beautiful offering that pleased His heart so much. I have found in this season of brokenness that it isn’t a glued together jar that Jesus is looking for. He sees through the failed attempts at self-reached wholeness. I’ve found that sometimes the most beautiful thing you can offer your Lord is all that you have. And sometimes that looks like every piece of yourself broken and shattered on the floor; a completely empty and broken vessel, but one who’s last drops have been placed upon Christ’s feet as a beautiful offering. It is in this revelation that I must disagree with the ever-classic Mrs. Hepburn. While happy girls indeed are very beautiful, I have personally found that the most beautiful you could ever be is sometimes in fact when you are quite broken. But at the feet of Jesus, pouring out all that you have left. 

(Insert name), Warrior Princess.

          We’ve heard that we’re supposed to be warriors as women. We recognize that there’s something fierce lying dormant deep within us, waiting to emerge at the first sign of need. We see it in the way a mother fights with everything she has to protect her children. We see it in the way a seasoned wife fights against all odds to save her marriage. We even see it in the way a young girl stands in righteous anger against the injustices she sees around her- whether in the form of standing up for a bullied friend or protesting passionately against sex trafficking. There is something within us that almost seems to be bigger than us. Something that when it emerges, we stop and ask ourselves, “Woah, where did that come from?” That thing called a warrior spirit.

          Now I have to stop for a moment and be honest here. Bringing myself to use the word “warrior” to describe something within me kind of makes me shudder just a bit. Because when I think of warrior women, I think of "Xena, Warrior Princess". You remember her- tough, fierce, kind of weird outfit. And frankly, I do not see her in myself one bit. And I’m not sure I want to. See, there’s something about the word “warrior” that puts me off. Simply because for most of my life, that word has only held the connotation of a man in my mind. And if not a man, then a fiercely intimidating woman who used mens’ weapons and played mens’ battle games. And while I’m sure there are some women who get excited at the thought of that- shooting bows and using shields- this girly girl (not ashamed to admit it) would much rather entertain the idea of wearing a dress and painting her nails.  

          And for a while, I believed there was something very wrong with me for preferring that. I mean, if God made us to house a warrior spirit within us (which, looking at the examples of strong and courageous women in the Bible, I’d say He sure did), then maybe I was simply superficial if I preferred the idea of wearing makeup or cuddling over wearing warpaint or running into battle with guns. So I began to ask myself if a woman could really hold a warrior spirit and still maintain her girliness. Could I call myself a strong fighter of God and still be dainty and gentle? Is it even possible to be both?

          But this morning (while I was putting on my makeup, ironically enough), God opened my eyes to something new. The revelation that maybe, just maybe, we’ve gotten confused about what a “warrior princess” is supposed to look like. We’ve taken all that we’ve gathered from movies and books and used that to define the term “warrior” within our minds. We’ve chosen terms like “brave” or “manly” and we’ve written them on “hello my name is...” name tags and stuck them on mens’ breasts while as women we’ve only accepted beautiful, but nameless brooches on our own, leaving us questioning just what our role exactly is in the battle. Or we’ve stolen mens’ name tags and tried to live them out in the same ways they as men would, pulling a Joan of Arc or a Mulan if you will, loosing our femininity and burying our beauty because we don’t want to be dainty and “weak”, and we don’t know how else we can be warriors without abandoning those very things that declare us women. We show up to battle looking like a poser William Wallace from Braveheart, when God never intended us to play his role.

          Now let me just clear something up before I continue: I do not think that just because I enjoy dresses and makeup that every woman should do the same and deny the different passions that lie within them that maybe look a little more adventurous than mine. Let’s just take a moment to recognize that physical appearance and one’s enjoyment of the color pink or glittery things does not define whether or not they are a woman. There is a beauty that is deeper, that lies in every single woman no matter their shape or stature, that was placed in every woman’s heart by God. One that comes from a root of femininity (which again, is not defined by girly things, but rather by the feminine heart God has created within you- the gentleness and the capability to love in the way that only a woman can love) And likewise, let’s also recognize that just as women who enjoy hiking and hunting are not less womanly because of those things, neither are women who take delight in flowy dresses and strappy shoes any less warriors, for the simple delights of ones heart is not what defines the warrior spirit.

          Now that we’ve cleared that up, let me end by proposing a simple theory: the idea that maybe we as women are indeed warriors. But maybe God intended us to fight differently than men. I listened to a podcast once that said something along the lines of “You know, we’re supposed to crush the enemy's head under our foot. And it’s a lot more painful when women do it because we’re wearing heels.” God never asked us to drop the things that make us women in order to fight whatever battle is in front of us. Rather, when we walk out in the things that make us women, when we embrace our femininity, that is when we are most effective in battle. As women, God has equipped us and endowed us with traits that only we as women can bring to the front lines. He has placed a gentleness within us that is not to be confused with weakness, and a quietness that is not to be confused with silence. He’s given us strength that we were intended to lend to others, beauty that was intended to allure others to Him, and bravery that comes from a confidence that we are indeed princesses. Daughters of a King who loves us and fights for us as we step into whatever battle lies before us. We step into battle with beauty and grace as the weapons at our sides. We draw the fear of the Lord from our belts and we slay whatever evil sets foot before us as we place our confidence in God. 

          As women, I do believe we were intended to be fought for. Not to mean that we cannot take care of ourselves, but that we don’t need to. We were not created for independence, but for dependence on God. And in that dependence on God, we do find the confidence of William Wallace as he charges into battle. Only, we find it in a much more beautiful way. We find it in the way of strength, of dignity, and of laughter without fear of the future. We find our strength, our confidence, and our warrior spirit when we allow God to fight for us. We find our warrior spirit in our feminine hearts that so much resemble our Maker’s and that He is more than willing to fight for.

Shine Bright Like a Diamond

“A good woman is hard to find, and worth far more than diamonds.” Proverbs 31:10

Since I began my real walk with God, I’ve had a goal in mind of becoming a true “Proverbs 31 woman”. I want to be a woman with a gentle and quiet spirit. I want to be like Esther, like Deborah, like all the awesome and ridiculously confident in God women that fill the Bible. And while this journey of pursuing this godly character began with a longing for that gentle and quiet spirit, for taking on the special compassion and empathy that begins in a woman’s heart and for those softer but still such beautiful traits, in the most recent months of this never-ending journey, I’ve begun to hunt after some bolder traits of a Godly woman: the traits of strength, courage, and bravery. And for some reason, in my mind I thought these would come easily and without any trial. After all, if we as sweet and quaint godly women just sit in prayer for long enough, we will easily become an Esther, a Ruth, or a Miriam… or so I, and many other women I know, thought.

Misconceptions have flooded my mind and as God has filtered through them, He has unveiled a beautiful picture of what a godly woman should look like to me. And He has also been faithful to uncover the rocky pathway to becoming this woman….

We read in Proverbs 31:10 that “A good woman is hard to find, and worth far more than diamonds.” And I don’t know a Christian woman who doesn’t read this and think to herself, “Yeah, I want to be that kind of a good woman, I want to be considered worth far more than diamonds!” The longing to be this kind of woman is buried deep within our hearts. And as beautiful of a metaphor as this is- being compared to the beautiful stone all of us want to wear on our left hand ring finger someday (and that a lot of us envy when we see it on others’)- there is something that we forget to consider behind it: how diamonds are made.

Diamonds are formed deep within the mantle of the Earth- about 100 miles or so down. And they are not formed in a gentle and beautiful manner at all. They are formed through a process involving intense heat and crushing pressure. The diamonds that come to the surface of the earth have been brought there not on a cloud of glitter, but by a special kind of eruption that is quite violent. Upon this eruption, diamonds are carried from the upper mantle to the surface of earth where they wait to be collected and praised by men and women alike.

Intense heat and crushing pressure. That’s quite the process. Yet somehow through all of that intense and not so pleasant process, we get these beautiful gems that are worth thousands of dollars, and as we look at them resting on engaged womens’ fingers, we forget/don’t bother to acknowledge what had to happen in order for that stone to appear to us the way it does, in its full beauty and splendor.

But it’s not so different when we look at some Christian women in our lives, is it? We see these women who are awesome speakers, powerful worship leaders, really well-written authors, and we think to ourselves, “Wow. If only I could be the kind of woman she is.” But we fail to examine what those women had to go through to get to that point. And I can almost guarantee you that 99.9% of the time, it wasn’t through a hunky-dory process that they came to possess their great wisdom and strength.

We want to be women of God. And we don’t just want to be the silent and sweet women, we want to be bold and courageous and brave and strong. We want to be a good woman who is worth far more than diamonds. And yet when trial and risk comes our way, we resign. We cower in fear and think ourselves uncapable of what God has placed before us. We forget that beautiful diamonds are not formed through a beautiful process. They are formed through intsense pressure and uncomfortable heat, down in the dark where they are seemingly very alone. Not much unlike how character becomes embedded in our own lives. If a diamond didn’t go through the entirety of that laboring process, it would just be a rock. But because it sticks through the process, it comes to the surface as a beautiful gem.

          Courage, bravery, and strength are choices. And while I’m sure there are some exceptions, from what I’ve experienced of pursuing these traits, they do not feel so nice. Someone shared a quote with me the other day by a Christian leader who said, “If you’re looking for that warm, fuzzy feeling when it comes to walking out in faith, then pee your pants.” The process to obtaining these character traits is hard. Proverbs 31:10 doesn’t say “A good woman is really not too difficult to find, they're runnin' around everywhere”. It says, “A good woman is hard to find”. A good woman is hard to find, because being the kind of good woman Proverbs 31:10 talks about is hard. If it were easy, we'd all be Kim Walkers and Joyce Meyers by now! Yet, many women come to the diamond forming processes in their lives, and instead of stepping out and choosing courage and strength and bravery, they let their feelings and fears tell them it’s not worth the risk and in turn, they miss out on the chance to become true diamonds.

Nothing worth having in life comes without trials worth withstanding. Not trials worth running from or avoiding, worth withstanding. In Joshua 1:9, God commands us to be strong and courageous. He doesn’t ask us to pray really hard for courage and wait for the feeling of boldness to fall upon us. He tells us straight: “BE STRONG AND COURAGEOUS!” If you have found yourself at the mouth of a diamond forming process or even in the very midst of one, be strong and courageous. Take courage. Don’t wait for the feeling of it to come, take it. If you want to be one of those powerful women of God, know that it won’t come easily. If you want to be a beautiful diamond, be prepared for intense heat and crushing circumstances. But take hope in the fact that God is in every circumstance, including the ones below the earth’s surface, and there’s a beautiful worth waiting for you just upon the surface. Strength and bravery and courage as a woman will not come through prayer and hoping alone. Know that you have every capability in the world to be a good woman who is worth far more than diamonds, and God is sitting up on His throne rooting for you to become that woman. But the choice is ultimately yours.

Let me just encourage you to choose to become diamonds. Face the scary steps and challenges in your life with a courageous spirit and let them make you into a sturdy and beautiful diamond. Don't simply settle for being a rock.

In the words of Rihanna, "shine bright like a diamond".

Paige