Motivation Monday - Why It’s Time to Take Your Place in The Story
“Just because others have written you out of the story, it doesn’t mean you should write yourself out as well.
You cannot write yourself out of a story that Jesus has already written you into.
”
I continue to have more and more conversations, one on one, in groups, and on platforms, to do with the question of whether women can lead in the church. My most troubling questions are related to why we are still needing to have this conversation, and why this conversation cannot be dealt with, once and for all, on a main stage, with Canadian male and female church leaders in the room. At some point a decision needs to be made to get over this immobilizing issue. There is too much important work to do in the shaping of the church for future generations, with the whole church engaged, for us to keep rehearsing the same questions with little movement on the dial in terms of equity for women in the church. The consequence is that some incredibly gifted and anointed women simply give up and take their offerings elsewhere.
I wish it was not true, but I find that even the bravest and strongest women have silenced their voice and carried burdens by themselves, because to speak was too risky.
This phenomenon is not just a safe response to situations of power imbalance, but a result of the own devaluing of our place as females in the God narrative.
We self-silence for many reasons.
We believe that we were born to submit – either to men, to institutions, or those with more power, male or female.
We believe that because we are women, our lives inherently have diminished value.
We believe in a functional identity: that our value is directly tied to our ability to please or perform solely for the acceptance of others and to meet others’ needs.
We believe that the declaration found in Psalm 139 of being uniquely knit in our mother’s womb is a fairy tale rendered false once we have grown up into the under-valuing we experience from living in inequitable environments.
We have chosen to believe, like the world, the diminished narrative that being fearful and wonderless is the human norm, rather than embracing that we are fearfully and wonderfully made.
We believe that since others have used their power to silence our voices, we have no recourse but to acquiesce.
A history of experiencing inequity as women
has caused many of us to write ourselves out of
the main plot of God’s story.
As a result,
We step back, instead of forward.
We downplay, rather than own, our birthright gifts.
We give our power away.
We feel others’ voices are more important than our own.
We fail to develop what God has seeded in us to carry, because we compare our gifts and position to others and come up lacking.
Just because others have written you out of the story,
it doesn’t mean you should write yourself out as well.
You cannot write yourself out of a story
that Jesus has already written you into.
You cannot write yourself out of story
in which you were meant to be counted.
You cannot write yourself out of a story
for which you were given an invitation to participate fully.
The truth is that from the first book of creation, women were written into the story as ezer kenegdo, man’s equal match.
Following the biblical narrative that included women in the hinge moments of God’s story, we can’t help but notice that Tamar, Rahab, Ruth, Bathsheba, and Mary were all instrumental in moving the story of God and His people forward. They were not chosen because they were the most likely. In fact, they were always the least likely. They were chosen simply because they said yes to the invitation to step into the story, all at great risk in their cultural moments. The significance of their participation in the story fact is undeniable. Jesus’ lineage can be directly traced back to each one of these women’s bloodlines.
Hagar was not the first woman in the Bible to be seen by God when she was cast out into the desert. Every woman has been seen by God from Genesis to Matthew until now and into the future.
Don’t render yourself invisible when you have already
been seen.
You have been seen by God.
You have been known by God.
You have been loved by God.
That is the truth you must believe.
That is the truth that will encourage you to stand up, step out, speak up, and serve the world in only the way you can.
That is the truth that will encourage you to speak truth to power, in the right way, in the right time, in the right place.
It’s time to take your place in the story. It’s time to become visible and fulfill your storyline, which has been bought for, paid for, and redeemed by Jesus on the cross.
Jesus saw women and loved them, not in spite of who they were but because they were daughters of Abraham. Jesus commissioned women to fulfill their ordination as part of the God story.
Now is not the time to believe that your voice does not matter,
that you do not matter.
You do matter.
Future generations are counting on you to believe that.
May God grant you, through the breath of His Spirit and His resurrection power in you, to rise in your womanhood and reflect the image of God on your life. To come out of hiding. To find healing. To use your voice. To tell your story. To take your place in God’s story, and for His glory.
I believe in you.
Cathie