I don't know anything about this site, or this person. This is not an endorsement or a slam. I just found the article very nicely thought-provoking as well as echoing some of my own thoughts lately. what are your thoughts?
(the article itself is linked at the bottom)
"Yet, with this pseudo-religious, cultural emphasis on housekeeping, you'd think "tending the flower garden" was a fruit of the spirit."
"It's a softer, more feminine legalism, but just as deadly as any other variety."
"Reject this unholy caricature--rebel against anything other than what the scriptures actually say."
"We need to speak out when we see cultural expressions forced on people as if they were biblical norms, even if it is dressed up as a self-improvement project. It is legalism. If a rose by any other name smells as sweet, then legalism by any other name still smells like the decomposing corpse it is."
and finally:
"Yet, I also feel a bit of sympathy for those who have been locked into the cultural religion trap. I hurt for those who are so convinced they are right and are compelled to make people conform to their own ways of believing, way less biblical than cultural. They have long lost the joy of their salvation."
http://www.edstetzer.com/2011/09/legalism-and-the-help.html ###
(the article itself is linked at the bottom)
"Yet, with this pseudo-religious, cultural emphasis on housekeeping, you'd think "tending the flower garden" was a fruit of the spirit."
"It's a softer, more feminine legalism, but just as deadly as any other variety."
"Reject this unholy caricature--rebel against anything other than what the scriptures actually say."
"We need to speak out when we see cultural expressions forced on people as if they were biblical norms, even if it is dressed up as a self-improvement project. It is legalism. If a rose by any other name smells as sweet, then legalism by any other name still smells like the decomposing corpse it is."
and finally:
"Yet, I also feel a bit of sympathy for those who have been locked into the cultural religion trap. I hurt for those who are so convinced they are right and are compelled to make people conform to their own ways of believing, way less biblical than cultural. They have long lost the joy of their salvation."
http://www.edstetzer.com/2011/09/legalism-and-the-help.html ###
from the comments there on the original article, and too good to risk you missing:
ReplyDeleteI would add that, in addition to constructing a womanhood that excludes certain women (ie standards that are unattainable for disenfranchised women or minority women), The Help also highlights a notion of womanhood that can only exist *by means of exploiting* other women. The vision of womanhood and Christian family life that Hilly Holbrook endorsed was only possible by means of cheap, Black, female labor.
Even today we need to be aware of this problem. For instance, if godly stewardship is equated with bargain shopping, women might be encouraged to shop at stores that have cheap, cute clothes, but exploit women workers in other countries. That is not to make a blanket statement about affordable clothing, but just because something is purchased cheaply does not by default mean a woman is stewarding her finances Christianly.
That is a topic for another day, but suffice it to say that Biblical womanhood should incorporate both personal holiness AND missional vision. If one constructs Christian womanhood in a way that does not include love of neighbor, then it is not Biblical.