The Original Indispensable Helper

OriginalPhoto by Ben White on Unsplash

Back in the beginning, before snakes were speaking and apples were ripe, what was God's original design for woman? What role and function did he create uniquely for her? Sisters, are we living that out?

To search out some answers to those questions, I dove into Genesis 2 in a word study of ezer k’negdo. It’s very easy to get lost in the weeds of headship and servant leadership and what each church tradition “allows” women to do, what offices they are permitted to hold. Let’s try and set aside those divisive discussions for now, and let’s just focus on a word study. What was God’s original design? Join me.

The “C”Church’s Best Advice

When I got married at twenty-one, having not grown up in the Church, I devoured every book I could get my hands on about how to be a good “Christian” wife. What I found was a whole lot of do more, want less, lose weight, dress better, be attractive, have dinner ready, keep the house clean, bring in extra income, remain silent, have perfectly mannered children, let him make the final decisions (even if they’re not very wise decisions), expect/demand nothing of his time, have sex whenever he wants (whether it’s enjoyable or not, whether you want to or not) — and then he won’t cheat on you.

Seriously — so he won’t cheat on you was the best I could hope for. Was that really all God wanted for me? For women? Was I really created just to use my giftings and skills in my house? Where does the Scripture say that?

I knew God created woman to be a helper to man, but honestly it felt more like a… like a mix between a child you didn’t fully trust and a servant.

Original photo by Anika Huizinga on Unsplash

The Trauma Lens

What I didn’t understand was that, because of my painful past, there was this lens – a filter, I unconsciously applied to life. I had learned to survive by squashing emotions and intellectualizing everything, predicting what others wanted me to say, and overachieving. Sadly, there was a lot of overlap between my experiences growing up and what I had read it meant to be a “good Christian wife” (or interpreted it to mean).

I was too damaged by the past (by emotionally abusive relationships) to discern what I was internalizing, or that the message was harmful.

**personal rant**

These authors can’t help that I was reading their words through a lens of damaged trust, and flight and fawn trauma responses. However, caveats built into the text could demonstrate what a trauma lens is, identify harmful patterns in abusive relationships, or ways in which this ideology could create a toxic environment if taken too far, would’ve been very helpful. personal rant over

Thankfully, a small part of me insistently whispered that I needed to ask God, ask Scripture, what the original plan for woman was. That part of me clawed her way out of the hole I’d buried her in, bloody stumps where fingernails had been. She was fighting for my life, and her rallying battle cry was to seek out the whole truth of what God had called a woman to be and do.

So, I set aside my presumptions, stopped asking the text questions it wasn’t answering directly, and sought answers from a wide variety of scholarly and pastoral sources – not only answers from one tradition or denomination or culture.

Going Deeper: Asking Better Questions Of Scripture

Questions are a very good thing. They are necessary and should be encouraged. God can handle our questions (our doubts, insecurities, struggles, pain & anger), the Psalms are full of questions. Take a few minutes to compare how many questions Jesus asked vs how many he answered (around 3).

We need to hold in balance our information-age-based-need for all the answers right now with the nuance and complexity present in Scripture where not all questions are meant to be answered.

Anyone learning to study any type of literature, first learns that it’s absolutely critical to understand the conversation the author was having with their original audience. That’s a first principle. Each biblical author (yes, they’re divinely inspired) has a point they’re trying to make and they include all the necessary details their original audience needed to understand their point. Yes, the Word of God is living and has much to say to us now, but we cannot skip that first principle.

Narratives (stories) are rarely prescriptive (making rules or giving instructions). When we ask questions of particular passages of Scripture the author wasn’t trying to answer for their original audience, we veer off course. To ask questions the author doesn’t answer requires us to read between the lines, infer meaning, or apply an additional filter of culture or tradition the author did not intend.

Focus on the point the author made to the original audience. What were they to learn or understand? Take that lesson and ask questions of that. That’s how good hermeneutics works.**

Man And Woman Created As Image Bearers

“God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them” Genesis 1:27 (NASB95).

In the account of Creation in Genesis 1, man and woman are created in the image of God. Every living creature, including mankind, had a space and their place in that space served the good of the whole.

Scholarship (on all sides of the debate about the role of women) seems to agree that both man and woman are created as spiritual equals.

Take Me To The Next Post In This Series

Questions

Do you have a similar story? Did you absorb (or were blatantly instructed) to make yourself smaller, to stay silent? Have you been told that your inconvenient giftings mix are to be used in your house and for your family only – because “we don’t believe God allows women to….” What was your gut reaction to that response? Is this a perspective you agree with?