On my Friday Round-Ups I like to focus on things that have happened around the web on social media, because that’s where so much conversation takes place.
And you can miss it if you only watch the blog!
There are two big things from my own social media I want to share with you today, but the main thing I’d like to do is introduce you to Rebecca’s Instagram. She doesn’t post that often, because she’s so busy with the two babies and it’s all she can do to get the chapters for our mother-daughter book drafted.
But every now and then she does (It’s a video so hit play if you can):
I think people sometimes forget that we wrote The Great Sex Rescue without an office, without real funding, without much of anything. Rebecca and Joanna were raising babies and birthing babies (literally) and even losing babies (which was heartbreaking). I was sitting in my yellow chair.
We are not powerful. But we are changing the conversation because what we’re saying is resonating. People know it’s right. And so you all are amplifying, and we’re becoming one big voice.
But when people paint us as bullies, I have to laugh, because they have huge organizations and media outlets behind them, and we have….this.
For those of you who can’t read Rebecca’s caption, I’ll print it out here too:
THIS is what I spend most of my time doing.
Cleaning my kitchen.
Breastfeeding my daughter.
Reading to my son.
Folding laundry.
Taking care of my home.
There are some big-name authors who talk about me as if I’m some big evil mastermind, like there’s some huge conspiracy against them, like they’re somehow the victims when they’re the ones who are propped up by the largest organizations in Evangelicalism today. The ones who have made their living off the backs of women who have been bruised and beaten by their false teachings.
I hate to break it to them, but it’s not true—I’m not anyone special. I’m just a mom who wants better for her kids.
I’m just a mom who refuses to allow her son to grow up in a church who sees him as a lustful animal who needs women to keep him honest.
I’m just a mom who refuses to subject her daughter to soul-destroying teachings that her body is a problem, and her role is to be second to a man.
I’m just a mom who sees the poison you are pouring into her children’s milk, and is finally standing up.
I think they have to see us as some big mastermind threat. Like some huge, powerful enemy.
Because the alternative is way scarier.
The alternative is that we are just normal women. And we aren’t taking your crap anymore.
She did not learn about our sin nature in having babies.
Here’s another of her posts that really resonated when I shared it in my own Instagram stories:
Again, if you can’t read the caption (it doesn’t always come through on all the RSS feeds), here it is:
My kids are good.
Yes the baby cries. Yes she bites me every now and then.
Yes Alex spills his milk when he doesn’t pay attention. Yes he has big emotions when he gets overwhelmed.
But these are not “badness.” These are necessary parts of learning. My kids aren’t just “good kids”—my kids are an example of goodness.
They remind me every day that although I’m still learning, I was born with the same goodness my kids have.
The goodness that drives them towards connection.
The goodness of the look of joy when they learn something new.
The goodness in satisfaction and contentment found in everyday needs being met.
I love getting to see that goodness flourish. I don’t have to break their spirits, “beat the devil out of them,” or see them as dirty rotten sinners.
My job is to foster that goodness. To rejoice when they run towards love, towards Christ, and not get in their way.
“Let the little children come to me and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.” Matt 19:14
Now for me–A Man’s Sex Drive is Not Like a Bedridden Woman Needing Someone to Get Her Water
On Facebook this week I shared a post by Ed Young, a megachurch pastor from Fellowship Church, who last week talked about sex in his sermon. He recorded a one minute video about how to understand a man’s sex drive–how it’s like a bedridden woman wanting her husband to give her water, and he keeps refusing.
It was absolutely awful.
Here’s what I said about it:
No, Ed Young, a woman saying no to sex is not equivalent to a husband not giving a bedridden wife the water she needs to stay alive.
People often tell me that I’m making too big a deal out of the problems with how the evangelical church teaches sex, and it’s not as bad as I say it is.
Well, this is what Ed Young, a megachurch pastor of Fellowship Church, posted JUST TWO DAYS AGO.
Let’s go through the big things that are totally wrong with this message:
- A person will die without water after 3 days. Nobody dies from lack of sex.
- He frames this as talking about a “man’s sex drive.” But in 19% of marriages SHE has the higher sex drive, and in 23% it’s shared. We need to stop making this gendered.
- He totally neglects to point out that the spouse the most likely to be deprived, if we simply count orgasms, is actually the woman. We should not be pressuring women to have sex without first saying that sex needs to be MUTUAL, INTIMATE, and PLEASURABLE FOR BOTH. We have a 47 point orgasm gap. Deal with that first.
- There is NEVER a reason to deprive a sick, bedridden person of water. There are plenty of times in a marriage where sex should be off the table, such as the postpartum period; recovery from pornography; recovery from betrayal trauma; a period of grief; when dealing with depression or anxiety; when dealing with abuse; even when trying to develop a healthy view of sex and needing some space to examine what you were taught.
- He elevates his sex drive over anything she may be feeling. 22% of evangelical women have experienced primary sexual pain (vaginismus being the most common) and 27% have experienced pain with sex after childbirth. To say that his need for sex is the equivalent of denying a sick person water without mentioning that she has needs too is negligent, to put it mildly.
- This reinforces the OBLIGATION SEX MESSAGE. When she believes the obligation sex message, her chance of experiencing vaginismus increases by the same rate as if she had been abused; she is 4 times less likely to frequently orgasm; she is 4 times less likely to say her husband makes her sexual pleasure a priority (among many other problems). When HE believes it? He is twice as likely to admit he doesn’t make his wife’s pleasure a priority (and other bad stuff, including a lower chance of his wife reaching orgasm).
- This makes it sound like women just say no to sex for no reason. But on the contrary: When there is high marital satisfaction; when she feels emotionally close to her husband during sex; when there is no porn use; when there is no sexual dysfunction; and when she frequently orgasms? Frequency takes care of itself. Pressuring women to have more sex WITHOUT talking about these underlying issues completely ignores her experience and centers sex around the man–which is ALSO one reason why women have low libidos.
And it’s not like it’s hard to talk about this in a healthy way! We showed how to reframe these messages in The Great Sex Rescue, and in the upcoming books The Good Girl’s Guide to Great Sex (totally revised!) and The Good Guy’s Guide to Great Sex, we build from the ground up a healthy marital sexual ethic.
Simply say, “Sex is a beautiful thing that God gave us, and it’s an important part of a healthy marriage. It’s meant to be MUTUAL, INTIMATE, and PLEASURABLE for both. But sometimes one of us has a higher felt need for sex than the other. Love and cherish each other outside the bedroom, and learn to be giving inside the bedroom, but remember that sex is the culmination of a wonderful relationship; it cannot, and it should not, build that relationship all on its own.”
The comment section was great too! Plus you have to see the original video (and go comment on his page as well. Let’s call him out for this!).
The Great Sex Rescue
Changing the conversation about sex & marriage in the evangelical church.
What if you’re NOT the problem with your sex life?
What if the things that you’ve been taught have messed things up–and what if there’s a way to escape these messages?
Welcome to the Great Sex Rescue.
I Fixed Owen Strachan for You!
Owen Strachan was prominent with the Council for Biblical Manhood and Womanhood, and in his manifesto last week, Keith talked about how Owen’s response to hearing that Ravi Zacharias was a serial sexual predator was to say, “that could have been me.” And Keith agrees. It could have been, because the things Owen believe naturally lead to this kind of behaviour. They are the root. So we believe Owen.
Here’s the Fixed It For You where I talked about Keith’s post:
Here’s what I said about it:
Dear Owen: WE BELIEVE YOU when you say that you identify with abusers.
When you hear about the Ravi Zacharias scandal, and how he sexually abused many women and even sex trafficked many internationally, and how he viewed these women as “rewards” for his years of service to God–
–and your first thought is, “That could easily have been me…”
We totally believe you.
Recently on the blog my husband Keith wrote his “manifesto”, asking Christian men to realize how dangerous so much evangelical rhetoric has become for women, and asking men to jump out of the boiling water.
He says:
If even after all I have said, you still can’t let go of the idea of male preeminence, then please know this:
To those of us who have jumped out of the boiling water, when you shout about women needing to submit while failing to work on your own moral failings, we do not see a protector of Biblical truth. We see a scared little boy trying to feel strong by making others feel weak.
Similarly, when you shame and chastise women for immodest dress and “being a stumbling block”, we do not see those women as the harlots you try to paint them. Instead, we see you as a man who is not safe to be around.
And, most of all, when you push patriarchy and male privilege and then say you could EASILY become an abuser, know this: WE BELIEVE YOU.
(Read Keith’s whole Manifesto)
Interestingly, Owen actually jumped into the comments on Instagram (you have to root around, it’s buried in threads) to accuse us of slander. I think that’s kind of funny.
Owen says: I could have been an abuser.
We say: We agree with everything you say. We think you could have been an abuser too.
Owen says: That’s slander.
It would be funny if it weren’t so sad and serious!
So that’s it for my Friday roundup!
On Monday our Launch Team for The Good Guy’s Guide to Great Sex and the ALL NEW TOTALLY REVAMPED Good Girl’s Guide to Great Sex launches! We’ve got an amazing preorder bonus with results from our men’s survey that aren’t even in the book. We’ve got an evangelical sex report card! Plus on the launch team you get an exclusive Facebook group with lots of Facebook lives and chances to interact with me and Rebecca and Keith, and a chance to get the books RIGHT NOW.
Want to reserve your spot on the launch team? Just email me your receipt for your preorder and you’ll get everything you need!
Anything stand out to you today? What do you think about what Rebecca said about babies? What about what Ed Young said about water? Let’s talk in the comments!
Sheila Wray Gregoire
Founder of To Love, Honor and Vacuum
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On quick comment about the bedridden woman needing water analogy.
Even in a stereotypical situation where the wife deprives her husband and “doesn’t understand his need”, the husband can still quietly take care of things by himself if the urge builds up too much.
A bedridden woman can’t create water out of thin air.
I see a lot of beautiful, good things in my children when I look at them. And when I see the bad? I see myself. More is caught than taught, and I have definitely seen them pick up my own bad behavior, so that’s on me. I believe we should focus more on the goodness in us. After all, God created us in His own image, so there must be inherent goodness in us if He did that!
That’s just it, right? For people raised in the evangelical church and taught their entire lives that they are inherently evil, to fathom that they are not is incredibly difficult. Working to break generational cycles is rewarding, but rough!
Dear Owen,
I am not a lawyer, but I learned from Spider-Man that if the defamatory statement is written, it is called libel. Just thought you would want to know.
But it’s actually neither when it is true.
Godspeed,
A concerned woman
Dear Ed Young,
Women are not water. Or any other inanimate object. We are humans with feelings, desires, preferences, needs, etc, just like men. Women are human too! You talk like women are here for you to use. Do you realize that’s what you said? You said women are objects. Please stop it. We can’t have healthy sex lives until you see sex as something you do together with another image bearer for mutual pleasure, rather than something you have to coerce “your” woman into giving you (because forcing her isn’t allowed anymore).
Sincerely,
A woman
A-MENNNN!
Yep, there it is again. Consumption language. Always, always, always, the underlying belief that the woman is a commodity to consume.
I have been ashamed of how much this language is present when we(I) talk about people of color, too. I’m working hard to try and purge it from my brain and vocabulary.
Becca – thanks for sharing your life at high speed – love your just a Mother thoughts. Sheila – So here we go….I have finally figured out why you go bonkers and get so emotionally wrapped up in this Love and Respect message! I have to admit Shiela – some days I read and I go…here we go again…and it’s absolutely not that I think you are wrong. Some days when we are deconstructing the church I just don’t want to hear it. But today I have figured it out! It is way too much to write in 300 words and honesty I would love to just call you about it. My Friend is walking through a divorce. He is quite a close friend and we do not agree politically or in many cases even theologically. But I love him. He is a great friend. He is Catholic. This is not directed at any one religion but yet well..here we go lets lump them all together and call it Evangelics! Long story short is my friends Priest came over last night as a last ditch effort to mediate – essentially asking them to stop the divorce. Now on the back story my friends wife is truly going through mental health crisis to the point she is abusing her husband and her children – it is very extreme verbal and mental abuse – To put it in perspective she called the police on her kids because they had the TV to loud and she tried to get the committed to psych ward – she needs help and won’t get it and knows how to operate to not get it. It is sad.
But here is what upset me today: The Priest came to their house and had clear set boundaries as to not pick sides. He prayed and preached a message and in his messages was Gen 3, and Ephesians 5, 1 Corinthians about how the Wife is to submit to her Husband and the Man is to Love his Wife like Christ Loved the Church and then he goes on to tell me how the Priest then says Men need respect more and women need love and I am getting riled up just writing this Sheila! And then the Priest tells a story to demonstrate how that statement is true. He goes on to say that he can run the church without love but he can not run the church without respect. Therefore I choose respect over love! WHAT!!! REALLY! LIKE DUDE!!!! CHRIST LOVED THE CHURCH. WHERE DOES IT SAY CHRIST RESPECTED THE CHURCH!!! WT*? SHEILA! This is only part of the issue! Then my friend tells me and you know what really set my wife off during the meeting? When the Priest says and wives submit to your husbands and husbands love your wives as Christ loved the Church. And internally Sheila I couldn’t take it anymore and I respectfully yes there it is…I rebutted the theology and he said I know what you believe and understand and women are equal but me and my wife are on the same page about this theological topic. We believe in that doctrine. I wanted to jump out of my skin Sheila!! I really didn’t know what to do with it….so fortunately I was able to have some one on one time with my wife this morning in a vehicle and there I was yelling this stuff at her because I can’t freakin believe it! You know what my wife Grace says in response to all this? Well maybe…the wife went bonkers over that statement because she is done submitting! Maybe she doesn’t believe that anymore and while her behavior is off the wall and not acceptable maybe the root cause is an inner struggle with her beliefs? Maybe her insanity is in part caused by this? We will never really know for sure unless she gets honest and gets help and tells her story..but while I don’t like this thought about why this woman might be insane…it helped me be at peace a bit….meaning…not peace about the situation…just peace at being able to see it. I NOW TOTALLY GET YOU SHEILA! I TOTALLY GET YOUR MESSAGE FROM FRONT TO BACK – I SEE THE HARM. I see why you have to do what you do. The difference is you see it every day where as it has taken this event to jar me to see the full picture. I could keep rambling and there is more on all this for sure….but I just want to thank YOU Sheila, YOU Keith, You Becca, YOU, Joanna, YOU – ALL WHO SUPPORT US AND GIVE US THE TRUTH. THANK YOU.
Oh, Phil, that’s amazing! (And I’m so sorry about your friends! That’s a hard burden to carry when people you love are hurting).
But, yes, we see it EVERY FREAKING DAY. The emails that come in. The emails from people who tried to bring it up with pastors, with authors, with Focus on the Family…and they’re just told to submit submit submit.
Nothing ever gets fixed!
And I guess what gets me even more is how this is blaspheming the Holy Spirit. I really think it is. Jesus came to give us wholeness and abundant life. Not perfect life, but I interpret that to mean emotional health and healing and peace so that we can live our lives, no matter what may come. That’s the real abundance.
And instead of that we have active HURT people. We have propped up emotional UNhealth. And it is giving Jesus such a bad name! Woe to those who call evil, good and good, evil. That’s what the church has been doing! And the more it does this, the more it shows it doesn’t know Jesus at all. And that’s what I have such a difficult time processing.
You are so brave to share your “about face” on Sheila’s and her team’s mission, Phil. Oh, that destructive authors, theologians, and marriage ministries would do the same!!!
I know nothing about your friend and his wife, but I know from personal experience that “unconditional respect and submission theology” has had the impact of truly making me lose my mind. I became a shell of a human being around 5 years ago.
Daily life became unsustainable because I deteriorated to a place of feeling afraid to say a single word lest I would be “sinfully disrespectful” toward my husband, thus “causing” him to behave in ways I now know are emotionally abusive.
I got to a place of such overwhelming confusion, shame, guilt, fear, and self-hatred that I wasn’t eating, wasn’t sleeping, and wasn’t even able to grocery shop without extreme anxiety due to “being unsubmissive” if I made a choice with which my husband disagreed.
When I saw a concerning character trait in one of our children and shared it with him in order to be on the same page to discipline, and he didn’t see the child’s lying or sneaking or backtalk as a big deal, I felt sick to my stomach because I knew that, if I disciplined her on my own, I would likely be accused of “undermining his authority.”
If I made even the smallest financial decision without consulting him, I knew it could trigger him to criticize my overall judgment and perhaps give me the silent treatment for days or even weeks.
If I asked anything of him, I felt sick inside because I was convinced my “inability to respect him by doing more, being better, and fulfilling my every commitment” would result in what I came to believe I must deserve: punishment.
This kind of fear destroys a woman from the inside out. I didn’t realize what was truly happening, so I blamed my “sinfulness,” my obvious “perpetual disrespect” of him.
I didn’t know I could share what was happening with anyone, because the women in my church always offered the same advice: “Never criticize your husband. Never break him down by saying anything negative: not to him, not in front of him, not to others behind his back.” These exhortations were supported with Scripture. Of course.
I internalized the “call to silence and unconditional respect” as a worthy Christian woman. As a result, I became clinically anxious and depressed. I felt disoriented and hopeless. I couldn’t trust myself in any sense of the word.
At times, I would descend into screaming and crying fits on the floor of my closet because I couldn’t go on. These moments during which I outwardly broke down became further confirmation to myself and my husband (and several dear friends) that something was indeed very wrong with me.
So yes. His wife may indeed be “going crazy.” Perhaps she has very valid reasons for this.
RS – thank you for your reply. I do appreciate your story as it is helpful. If you dont mind I would like to just say that My true about face if you will came about 3 years ago or so when the whole love and respect thing “went down” here on the blog. Truth be told I did not agree with what was happening at that time but was truly trying to understand – understand because I trust/trusted Sheila. We actually got into a battle of sorts over it until a reader here helped me by offering a different perspective. I am grateful for her. That being said, my message today would be more of a complete understanding rather than an about face. I have been on board with Sheila and team since that day for sure. I guess what has come up for me today is that on some days I open up the blog and there is the message about how someone said this and it harmed this person this way and I close it and wait for the next day for something positive…why?…here is what hit me today. I guess I am just disappointed. I have been fully violated by the church and a leader in the church by sexual abuse. I have separated those events as that was the person not the church. The problem here is that apparently yes people are the problem not the church – but people are the church and bad messages are so engrained it is BIG it is HUGE and I guess I am just disappointed some days that the grind will never end. Not until Jesus comes again. Today it hit me as to why we must grind and somedays suck it up and deconstruct…I see the picture more completely.
Making necessary changes to a big, strong system of beliefs and the teachings and actions that result from those beliefs is TEDIOUS and DRAINING…but ESSENTIAL! I absolutely understand why you feel weary of what seems like negative dialogue. Simultaneously, when I consider my story and the stories of so many Christian wives I know and love, the exhaustion of the corrective dialogue pales in comparison to the cost of the destructive marriages they are caught in. (I mean cost to them, to their children, their husbands’ character and salvation, and the Gospel of Christ as a whole.)
Thank you for persevering through what is indeed hard!
I remember that day, Phil! I remember being at times exasperated, but also so impressed at how respectful you were being! 🙂 So glad you hung in!
Power is still out, but we went visiting for warmth! I’ve had a conversation about the child raising comment and I disagreed with them.
We all are born with a sinful nature. But that’s not the same thing as a child’s spirit! We all develope an urge towards selfishness and sometimes pure evil.
But while teaching up a child, in things like self control,self respect, and self motivation for life, it’s vital not to crush the spirit! That spirit was created special for them, by God, and I just don’t how anyone can decide it’s evil. That spirit grows up to have interests and passions, which God can use greatly!
On the other hand, I’ve read bio’s of “Christian leaders” who came off as completely miserable in their “Christian walk”.(different than persecution). And I believe they were probably mislead and living a life that God didn’t have for them.( in the bio’s, they pass it off as spiritual warfare…which I question. They could just be in the wrong career! God doesn’t call you to something that appears to crush your soul)
I want my child to passionately love what they do, and do it well. so that starts with teaching them to value their own character and personality. Not break and mold it, into the current “Christian” frame and force them to live in misery.
(I remember trying to become my mom and being full of, just bluhhh! Once I realized that being me wasn’t bad, but exactly what God wants, I felt so free! And I pursued my strengths instead of nonexistent personality traits)
I’ve heard the comment about having kids making you realise we’re all sinful, but it’s never come across as focusing on bad things kids do. More that even ‘innocent’ little children do bad things. E.g. I’ve never seen a parent have to teach their child to be selfish. I’ve seen many parents have to teach their child to share.
And the Bible says that we ALL sin. Everyone.
Yes, it’s important to encourage the good things kids do. To focus on what they get right. But it doesn’t mean they ARE good through their own efforts. If it were possible to live a perfect life through our own striving, then Christ need never have died for our sin.
“Asking the Powers that be to do their job”
No kidding.
They are not doing their jobs.
They are tickling the ears of Narcissists and immature men, teaching them how to NOT love their wives as Christ loves the church. They can’t even teach these husbands how to do unto their wives as they would have it done unto them.
But then again. Which came first the chicken or the egg? Bad teachers to pervert the word to the unsuspecting, or people wanting their ears tickled and accumulating teachers in accordance to their own desires?
Tough to say.
But happy to say it appears that the tide is changing.
“ we are just normal women. And we aren’t taking your crap anymore.” Love it.
And 1000% agree about kids and goodness. Are they immature? Of course. They’re SUPPOSED to be. Are they sinners? Yeah, we all are. Is parenting hard and frustrating sometimes? Yes, but it is much less anxiety-provoking for everyone once you realize that it isn’t your job to “fix” your kids.
My own mom bought into the Focus on the Family “kids are little sinners who need to be straightened out” school. As a kid it was confusing. I knew she loved me but she also had so much anger at times. I now think this grew out of the anxiety that she felt from believing she had to battle our sin natures every step of the way. Every little issue becomes magnified, and even pretty run of the mill stressors or conflicts feel like a threat to your kid’s soul. I know because I experienced it myself with my own children. It’s very freeing to realize that this is not what God expects of me as a parent.
This is so incredibly resonant to me, CMT. Healing and life-giving truth when you finally can parent not from fear of your children’s “incorrigible sin nature,” but rather from a place of embracing Spirit-led discernment and Christ-centered mercy for them. I believe the outcomes in their hearts and lives are largely reflective of our parenting framework.
“embracing Spirit-led discernment and Christ-centered mercy for them”
Yes. For me this connects back to what I think God thinks about me. After my youngest (and only daughter) was born, I struggled with my mental health and I was questioning a lot faith wise. Through all that she was and is so uniquely precious to me, and I kept coming back to the words of Matthew 7:11. “If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good things to those who ask him.” Somehow having a little girl, seeing myself in her and seeing my own mama in me, just opened up this view of God’s heart to me in a way I never saw before. If my kids are this precious to me, and we’re all ordinary humans, how much more does God treasure me, and them?
So, my kids didn’t teach me about sin or condemnation. They taught me how much more God delights in us, how much more generous he is, than we can fathom. Not that I, or they, don’t sin. We do. But “horrible sinner” isn’t the label God slaps on me, so how can I turn around and do that to my own kids?
Thank you, Pastor Young, for continuing to beat a drum that’s been being beaten for decades, centuries, millennia. Men need and want sex. We heard you. We heard you the first million times too.
When are you going to preach on what women need and want? Or do you think women have neither needs nor wants? Perhaps you’ve never actually asked a woman (or two) if she has any needs or wants. After all, asking a woman (or two) such a question might accidentally cause you to LEARN from a woman (or two), and that might upset be too upsetting to a man, especially a highly respectable preacher.
For all those who maintain that men derive a lot of their core identity from sex, did it ever occur to you that there’s the slightest chance that women might derive even a minuscule part of their identity from sex? When a sizeable percentage of women say that having sex with their husbands leaves them “feeling used,” does anyone suppose that there are no repercussions to a woman’s well-being, including her mental, physical, emotional, and spiritual health? If a woman feels like a prostitute in her own home, what’s the likelihood that that reality has a neutral effect on her outlook on life rather than a highly negative effect?
It’s ironic in the extreme that a man, with a mere penis, would think he’s more sexual than a woman who has a God-given, multi-orgasmic clitoris, so maybe men feel a continuous need to keep women’s sexuality down by any means necessary, since a man being forced to acknowledge that a clitoris is sexually superior to a penis might be…deflating (pun definitely intended).
Oh, and let’s consider how these highly negative outcomes of feeling used and like a prostitute affect a woman’s view of God.
The man-centric sex teaching is purported to be God’s commands to men and women, so women are left thinking that it’s God Himself who’s ultimately putting women into such a negative condition.
And in spite of these results, women still tend to outnumber men in church. So please don’t try to say that women aren’t giving enough, denying themselves enough, or any other such dismissive conclusion.
Screwtape letter #26: “a man will live long in the Enemy’s camp before he undertakes as much spontaneous work to please others as a quite ordinary woman may do every day.”
I’d give this comment ten thumbs up if I could.
My son is remarkably sweet and considerate. We are fortunate. I’m not going to pretend that he’s something he’s not because it aligns with the strained theological views of randos. IMHO, it’s my job as a mom to love him, understand him, and do my best to raise the particular person that God created and gave to us.
I have a little boy like this too. The randos can keep their strained theological beliefs off him (and my other kids too for that matter).
Rebecca, keep giving yourself tons of credit for the astoundingly important mothering work you are doing. I remind myself regularly that it is in our intentional mothering that much redemption can occur, for ourselves and the next generation and the next! So encouraged by your prioritization of what is GOOD and TRUE and RIGHT before Christ!
Not relating to your post at all, but… I was curious about Strachan, so I looked at lots of posts on his ig account. He posted at one point about the nobility of waiting and laboring 14 years for your “Rachel, a godly woman.”
It reminds me of Dannah Gresh and others extolling the virtue of being pure and modest while waiting for your “Boaz”.
I feel like I didnt read the same stories as they did.
Rachel hid false idols under her in the red tent – the ultimate act of deception, imo.
Ruth brazenly went to the threshing room floor to implore an older man, who had already been or was married, to marry her.
Why push a narrative of godliness and moral virtue when the script says otherwise?
Its not to say that God was absent from these relationships, but I don’t feel they model what these people are saying they model.
Completely agree!
Agree with you on Rachel; she definitely had her moments of trying anything she could to get ahead. But there’s nothing in the narrative to suggest that Ruth was doing anything that was evil. Improper, maybe, but not wrong per se. She didn’t ‘wait’ for her Boaz, though – she went and pursued him! And she was a grifter, which is why Boaz was impressed by her, and she was a loyal friend to her mother-in-law. Ruth was quite the go-getter when you think about it, certainly not demurely waiting about for her man.
Just to be clear, I never suggested Ruth was evil or sinful or improper, but that purity culture rewrites her story to fit their narrative if moral virtue.
I am having trouble understanding the response to the Owen Strachan quote. Maybe I am misunderstanding something. If so please correct me.
As Christians we believe that humans have a sin nature. Therefore any human being has the capacity to do great acts of evil.
That is what I thought Mr. Strachan was saying. That if we give ourselves over to depravity it can lead to even greater acts of evil.
The example that popped into my head was that of pornagraphy addiction. Porn leads to dehumanization of women and can be a “gateway drug” to even more abhorrent acts.
That’s what I thought he was saying, not that Christian men in general were one step away from what Ravi Zacharias did. Again am I misunderstanding something?
Here’s the issue: We all have a sin nature. But we are not all serial predators and rapists. Do you really think you could start a sex trafficking ring? In any universe? Under any circumstance?
What this is called is sin levelling. Jesus didn’t sin level. Jesus very clearly said that some sins are worse than others–aka calling little ones to stumble. All sin separates us from God, but not all sin is equally bad.
No, I am very, very confident in saying that I would never start a sex trafficking ring under any circumstance, nor would I ever sexually abuse a child or rape someone. Ever. And that’s because I’m made in the image of God. We’re not just terrible sinful beings who will all do the worst possible things without God, because that ignores the goodness of the image of God that is also in us.
Besides that, when you hear about a Christian abusing their power and hurting others, the first thought should be for the victims, not for the perpetrator. The fact that he would identify with the perpetrator rather than the victim is quite telling.
Hope that makes sense!
Thanks for the response. It made a lot of sense and definitely helped me understand the situation better.
Like you I would never, ever start a sex trafficking ring or do similar heinous acts.
I think my confusion about the comment came from a teaching I have heard in some churches since I was a kid.
Basically it uses the story of Peter’s denial of Christ to argue that we as Christians should not say, “we will never do x sin”. It is implied that we are “daring the devil” if we say, “I’ll never do x.”
I also wholeheartedly agree with your point about how his comment left out the victims.
Yes everyone has a sin nature and is capable of doing bad things. To me the issue with what Strachan said is that actually a lot of other things had to go wrong besides one guy’s sin nature for RZ to do the things he did. There were wrong beliefs that primed him to act as he did, and a culture of enabling and complicity that he was able to build up around him. And the wider evangelical world supported all that. Strachan’s “there but for the grace of God go I” sounds humble and spiritual on the surface. But if that’s all one takes from the RZ scandal, it’s actually sin-leveling and a deflection of attention from the real root causes of what happened, and from the real women who were abused.
Exactly!
If you are referring to the protestant doctrine of original sin, not all Christian faiths have that specific doctrine. In Orthodox Christianity, the concept of original sin is quite different. It essentially states that we all will experience the consequences of sin but it does not state that we are born into sin in the way that the protestant doctrine does.
Good point. Not that I know a lot about this. But, in general yes it is worth remembering that the specific North American evangelical Protestant versions of doctrine a lot of us grew up learning in Sunday School are just that. They don’t always translate across different traditions. I wonder if you could point to some more information about this? I’m sadly ignorant about Orthodox beliefs and there seem to be a lot of different “flavors” (though obviously not as many as Protestants!)
LOVED Rebecca’s Instagram!
I know lots of people post cute pictures of their kids, but you really get a sense of her deepest feelings of love and devotion to them. It isn’t about using them as perfectly posed props, it’s about seeing that spark of Godliness in them. She’s an awesome mom, and you can tell that Conor is an awesome dad and she also has an amazing rapport with you on the podcasts.
Oh Owen, you are just hilarious! No one will take you seriously when you throw a tantrum. Own up to what you wrote.
I’m still laughing over his response.
I read what you mentioned about Ed Young. I hate that pastors are sending harmful messages. It’s really sickening. Will you please write about his book From Bad Beginnings to Happy Endings? My abusive husband with a porn addiction from whom I’m separated gave our teenage son this book. I found some harmful messages in it and it’s so very frustrating!!!!