Response to Reader

Upon the suggestion of a reader, I have posted my answer to another reader, Jennifer, who asked the following question regarding my last post:

“Okay, when you mention the pastors wife asking the girl “what she is going to do” Do you mean that you are against college or working till she meets a husband?”

Jennifer,

Thank you so much for your comment/question. It is a very common one, but a difficult answer awaits.

In essence I am not personally a fan of women leaving the home, whether to go to college or pursue an “outside” career, though there are unique circumstances where it might be a good option. I AM NOT, however, against a young woman pursing an education, or having a business. But there is a huge difference in the way we go about it. It is a slippery slope (a VERY slippery slope). If we embrace the biblical truth that women are to be full-time help-meets to their husbands (which is indeed a FULL time job), isn’t it silly to “program” their thinking in a different direction, only to suddenly switch gears again when they get married?

Am I against higher education–absolutely NOT! But when a young girl leaves her home and the protection of her father (unheard of in Bible times), and pursues a college education, where she will be inundated with feminist ideas(secular or Christian college), spends all of her time, money, thoughts, etc. pursuing this career, it is unlikely that when she gets married she will suddenly drop all of that investment and “new thinking” and be content with her role as home-maker. And even if she does, boy has she lost a lot of training opportunities! (No wonder there are so many wives that don’t even know how to cook a decent meal)…homemaking is an ART. One that must be treated seriously, cultivated, and refined. It takes time, energy and effort. Until we take the role of homemaker seriously, we will continue to undermine its need for preparation.

HOWEVER, a young woman, until she is married, CAN pursue a world of knowledge through alternate forms of higher education (a much better education than a stale college classroom can offer), remain under the protection of her father, train daily for her role someday as helpmeet, and she may very well pursue means of bringing in income. I know many, many young women who are flourishing in their gifts, and making great money at it while they are “in waiting.” We have leaned on the college degree as the ONLY key to making money, or being successful, or preserving us in a tragedy. What a lie. There are so many other avenues of industry and provision, (which is one of the points I was making in my post), that we have virtually forgotten because we’re too busy pursing what someone said we needed to make it in the world.

This may come as a shocker and stir up a whole new debate, but I pray my sons seek an alternate route to college if their specific line of desired occupation doesn’t require it. There are so many great ways of getting an education (and cheaper too) and making a living. We are so bent to the culture’s ideas of what women are “supposed” to do, that we can’t even think outside that box. This issue has many questions and discussions which I don’t have time to even touch in this response. I will suggest an EXCELLENT resource for answering such questions as “what if a woman’s husband dies, and the wife never got a college degree to support herself?”, and other such hypothetical unlikelys.

The book “So Much More” written by two (highly intelligent) young women (age 15 and 17) is one of the most well-written arguments and thorough explanations of this topic that I’ve ever read. I highly recommend the book.

The bottom line is, if you want an apple tree to bear apples, you have to plant apple seeds. We can’t exercise the world’s methods right up until our daughters marry, then expect them to suddenly change courses and become the godly wife, mother and helpmeet we never trained them to be.

This is a sticky issue…and it’s one that is so hard to wrap our brains around because of our own brainwashing. I know, I was blown away when I first heard the suggestion that girls should not be encouraged to go to college. But just like so many issues, when there’s a slippery slope, we can’t step on and jump off mid-slide.

We have to trace our current problems (women leaving the home in droves with no desire to be there), back to the source of the problem (our sending our daughters off into a feminist culture to be stripped of all the godly training we have instilled) and do something drastic about it. That’s my short :-), yes, short answer.