Undeniable #3-Womanhood & Motherhood

I’d like to proclaim freedom for women who have no children. Freedom from judgment. Freedom from guilt. Freedom from feelings of inferiority and feelings of being “less than” simply because one is not a mother.

Freedom from sadness is one I’d like to proclaim too, but in truth I know how deeply this issue touches women at their very core. One of the most painful things for many women has been the unfortunate and insensitive conflating of womanhood with motherhood. We’ll cover motherhood later as a social good, but it’s important that we do not reduce a woman’s role in this world to simply any baby’s incubator.

That’s how I arrived at #3 in the Ten Undeniable Truths of Womanhood:

The Bible clearly outlines what womanhood is…and it isn’t always synonymous with motherhood.

For women whose life experiences include death of the unborn, infertility, or being unmarried and without children, the whole ticking biological clock idea in order for one to be a good Christian woman is among the most hurtful concepts out there. It’s time we dispensed with that ill-gotten notion, one that is actually a very negative by-product of a very good idea: that women and men are not alike and we have complementary roles. Men cannot birth children. And that’s a fact of biology.

That said, God created women to be fully complete individuals before He ever gave the first pregnancy. Interestingly and importantly, the order is Creation, Blessing, Fall, Punishment, and then conception.

In the Bible, conception never occurred in the perfect world before sin (which poses really interesting theological hypotheticals, what ifs, and propositions all by itself). Pregnancy happened for the first time after being banished from Eden.

Genesis 4:1 Adam lay with his wife Eve, and she became pregnant and gave birth to Cain. She said, “With the help of the LORD I have brought forth a man.”

Frankly, Cain didn’t turn out so well.

Genesis 4:25 Adam lay with his wife again, and she gave birth to a son and named him Seth, saying, “God has granted me another child in place of Abel, since Cain killed him.” 26 Seth also had a son, and he named him Enosh. At that time men began to call on the name of the LORD. Genesis 5:1 This is the written account of Adam’s line. When God created man, he made him in the likeness of God. 2 He created them male and female and blessed them. And when they were created, he called them “man.” 3 When Adam had lived 130 years, he had a son in his own likeness, in his own image; and he named him Seth. (italics added)

It took 130 years for Adam to have a son in his own likeness, not in perfection’s likeness.

So what did Eve do during the 130 years of time between creation and Seth?

I don’t think it’s a stretch or unbiblical to suggest that as Adam’s suitable helper, she was likely doing the same things Adam was doing, things that were in the blessing God gave to His equal image bearers: Genesis 1: 26 Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, in our likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the livestock, over all the earth, and over all the creatures that move along the ground.” 27 So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. 28 God blessed them and said to them, “Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and over every living creature that moves on the ground.”

Eve was a complete woman long before she was a mom. She was ruling and subduing alongside Adam before she was increasing in number and filling the earth. Complete womanhood involves filling the earth with God’s image by her increasing display of God’s image over time and by spreading God’s wisdom over His creation by virtue of time spent serving God as well! This is something women can do whether they are married or unmarried, and mothers or not.

This is an image of completeness and filling. Complete womanhood! It could not be clearer that fertility produces a different level of increase and more potential for completeness, not the only way. Yes, fertile motherhood fills the earth numerically but here’s the key:

for mankind to fill the earth with God’s image still requires men and women to operate in the other areas of blessing, those of leadership and stewardship…because fertility only changes numbers, not hearts.

Research:

Genesis 1: 26 Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, in our likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the livestock, over all the earth, and over all the creatures that move along the ground.” 27 So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. 28 God blessed them and said to them, “Be fruitful [plural] and increase [plural] in number; fill [plural] the earth and subdue [plural] it. Rule [plural] over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and over every living creature that moves on the ground.” (Italics and [plural] notations added)

Genesis 2:18 The LORD God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him.” 19 Now the LORD God had formed out of the ground all the beasts of the field and all the birds of the air. He brought them to the man to see what he would name them; and whatever the man called each living creature, that was its name. 20 So the man gave names to all the livestock, the birds of the air and all the beasts of the field. But for Adam no suitable helper was found. 21 So the LORD God caused the man to fall into a deep sleep; and while he was sleeping, he took one of the man’s ribs and closed up the place with flesh. 22 Then the LORD God made a woman from the rib he had taken out of the man, and he brought her to the man. 23 The man said, “This is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called ‘woman, ‘for she was taken out of man.” 24 For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh. 25 The man and his wife were both naked, and they felt no shame.

Genesis 3: 7 Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves. 8 Then the man and his wife heard the sound of the LORD God as he was walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and they hid from the LORD God among the trees of the garden. 9 But the LORD God called to the man, “Where are you [masculine singular] ?” 10 He answered, “I heard you in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; so I hid.” 11 And he said, “Who told you [masculine singular] that you [masculine singular] were naked? Have you [masculine singular] eaten from the tree that I commanded you [masculine singular] not to eat from?” 12 The man said, “The woman you put here with me– she gave me some fruit from the tree, and I ate it.” 13 Then the LORD God said to the woman, “What is this you have done?” The woman said, “The serpent deceived me, and I ate.” 14 So the LORD God said to the serpent, “Because you have done this, “Cursed are you above all the livestock and all the wild animals! You will crawl on your belly and you will eat dust all the days of your life. 15 And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel.” 16 To the woman he said, “I will greatly increase your pains in childbearing; with pain you will give birth to children. Your desire will be for your husband, and he will rule over you.” 17 To Adam he said, “Because you listened to your wife and ate from the tree about which I commanded you, ‘You must not eat of it,’ “Cursed is the ground because of you; through painful toil you will eat of it all the days of your life.”

Reflect:

What difference does it make that the ruling and subduing involved in the blessing of Genesis 1:26-28 was both together (them) and individual (male and female)?
Prior to the fall of man, one flesh-togetherness characterized man and woman in Creation. Eve was created as a suitable helper, not as a wife or mother. In heaven, women will not be wives or mothers. We will be sisters working together with our brothers as a team. How does the idea of male and female as children of God form a more accurate pattern for eternity?
As Eve could not be 2 women at once, God gave her the role of wife and mother in order to fulfill the blessing of fertility and increase. Scripture says, Genesis 2:24 “For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh. 25 The man and his wife were both naked, and they felt no shame.” Which father and mother were Adam leaving? Or is this an explanation for later marriages offered by the narrator?
In the plan and scope of Creation, why was it necessary that some female of each species experience fertility? How does this relate to the blessing of increase?
After the fall, how did God punish both Adam and Eve? Infertility is a consequence of the fall experienced by both men and women. If fertility was the blessing for perfect image bearers, how is infertility a reality of brokenness? Why does our culture put so much the sadness of infertility on women? No one knows exactly what “I will greatly increase your pains in childbearing; with pain you will give birth to children” means. Emotional pain? Physical pain? Probably yes, both. But infertility, too, because the blessing was subjected to brokenness, it was never withdrawn. We grieve the loss of the perfect blessing.
In what ways does the Church’s insistence on–and elevation of–marriage and motherhood as the only suitable roles for women heap sadness upon women who have already experienced their share when single manhood and infertile men still have value to the Church apart from children? How does this communicate that women are not equal image bearers?
In the flow of redemption, why was it necessary that Eve did not birth children before the fall of man? What would have happened to a child (born or unborn) in terms of punishment if only Adam and Eve ate?

Respond:

If you’re a man, take another prayerful look at your theology and ask yourself if you hold married/mothers and unmarried or infertile women to a totally different yardstick than married/fathers and unmarried/infertile men. Is a man just as much of a man to you if he’s single without children? Is he a threat in your ministry? If you’re using different yardsticks, prayerfully consider what the “Kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven” would look like among brothers and sisters. If there is no marriage in heaven, ask yourself whether marriage is the model or if siblings in the family of our heavenly Father would provide a better pattern.
If you’re a woman, be encouraged that you can be a fellow worker in the Lord, like the ones Paul commended in Romans 16:1-16 –women who contended for the Gospel along with Paul. Importantly with women like Phoebe whom Paul sends with the masterpiece of Paul’s clearest theology of salvation. She was a sister, a servant, a missionary, and a leader doing her role in filling the earth with God’s image. There is no word or indication of her marital or reproductive status.
And if you’re a pastor, find ways to encourage women to be Phoebes in your ministry without sending them to the Women’s Ministry book club, Women’s Bible study, Beth Moore conference, or the nursery. Some of us aren’t made that way and we bring glory to Christ in the same ruling and subduing function Eve had long before motherhood. God never removed the blessing from women, or changed His view of complete womanhood, even if He did establish a undeniable structure for marital harmony. God didn’t remove His blessing from men and He didn’t remove it from women.

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Ten Undeniable Truths of Womanhood:

A Christian woman is still a complete woman, even without marriage.
No man can teach a woman what is the truth of womanhood, even Christian womanhood.
The Bible clearly outlines what womanhood is…and it isn’t always synonymous with motherhood.
Once a mother, always a mother.
Superwomen don’t exist except in the comics.
All women make choices of no return.
Biology affirms what the Bible teaches.
The Christian woman must learn to artfully balance following Christ while honoring the men in her life.
Submission and sacrifice aren’t bad words for women.
The Lord’s maidservants bring glory to Christ by their obedience.