6. Her excellence as a saint.
She’s excellent as a wife, and a homemaker, and a neighbor, and a teacher,
and a mother, and lastly, her excellence as a saint, verses 30 and 31; “Charm
is deceitful, beauty is vain: but a woman who fears the LORD, she shall be
praised.” Simple point, look past the superficial. “Charm” in the Hebrew,
means “gracefulness of form; it talks about her “shape.” “Beauty” has to do
with the face–that is deceitful. That can all look good and really cover up
a wicked heart. “But a woman who fears the Lord, she shall be praised.”
So, Lemuel’s mother says, “Find a woman who fears the Lord, therein is the
beginning of wisdom.” She will be praised; give her the product of her hands
and let her works praise her in the gates.” What are the products of her
hands? All the good she has done to others; it will now come back to her.
All the sacrifice will be hers the rest of her life. Everything she did in
private will come back in public as they praise her in the gates, in the
middle of town. She will be famous for her godly womanhood–that’s her
reward.
Well, there’s the mirror–we look into it and measure ourselves against it.
Father, thank You for this tremendous passage of Scripture. We’ve just
touched the surface of it. Lord, we pray for the women of this church,
knowing their love for Christ, knowing their desire to fear you and honor
you, knowing their submissiveness to the Word of God. We trust, Lord, that
you will lead them to be the women that this great chapter describes that
they might raise a generation of children who will pass on their virtue, that
they might know the rich, rich reward that comes when the children and the
husband praise them. We pray for the families of our church; we know that
much lies in the responsibility of the husband, but much as well in the
responsibility of the wife. We pray, Lord, that You in Your grace would
forgive us for our shortcomings, for all of us have fallen short of the
standard, both for men and women, and husbands and wives, and fathers and
mothers. Lord, help us to pick up from the failure and to move ahead and to
be obedient, to be what you want us to be. We pray especially on this day
that you would cause all the goodness that so many women have given to their
families, to come back in the joy and the thankfulness and the blessing of a
generation of children and of husbands who will praise them. And, Lord,
thank You for the grace and the strength through Your Spirit to be what you
want us to be. In Christ’s Name. Amen.
“This article originally appeared here at Bible Bulletin Board.”
