Today we want to come back to and wrap up our little series on training young homemakers. As moms trying to teach our daughters to love the home, we can often feel alone and helpless. On one side is our culture, trumpeting the feminist message, and it has technology, media, and star-power on its team. And then there is Mom. Just Mom. How can we possibly compete?
We must remember that we have the Holy Spirit. He is eager to help us, and He is more than able to move our daughter’s hearts to love the perfect ways of God.
This story, from a young woman named Kristin, is a reminder to trust in His power to change a heart deceived by feminist ideology. It is also a story to share with your daughter—an illustration of the destructive ends of feminism for women and families and the contrasting joy and peace of following in God’s plan.
Kristin, thank you for sharing your testimony with us.
A few years ago I was far away from learning about how to serve my pastor-in-training husband. I grew up in a non-Christian home. In high school, I was saved into a liberal church, where there was no discipleship, and our associate pastor was a woman. At home, I was not taught to pursue being a godly wife and mother--my parents were very 'hands-off' in their parenting. The mood that was present in our home was influenced heavily by our culture and its prevalent feminism.
I attended a liberal Christian university in Orange County, south of LA. Meanwhile, my good friend from high school and the church I grew up in, Bobby, attended USC, where a friend invited him to John MacArthur's church. As he began to be cherish the Bible and grow in hunger for a deeper understanding of the Word, I was influenced more by the un-godly culture of my university. I majored in Cultural Anthropology and, for a time, Women's Studies. I was taught Evangelical Feminism. In one of my Women's Studies classes my teachers attempted to destroy the arguments of Piper and Grudem found in Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood. At this time I became increasingly verbal in my assualt of homemakers, women who got married young, anyone who didn't think women should be pastors, and on and on. Bobby, meanwhile, was learning to cherish the gospel, being taught solid theology and coming to love true manhood and womanhood under the wise instruction of Rick Holland at Grace Community Church. Whenever we would talk briefly to catch up on how we were, he would tell me I was being taught lies and God had different things to say about women's roles and everything else that made me angry. Of course, I thought he was arrogant and strange and under the influence of some crazy legalists, which I told him. Needless to say, we did not talk that much. I do know he prayed for me.
I continued in this way for the first two years of school. Near the end of my sophomore year I was beginning to grow tired of always being angry and on my toes. I realized those around me where not exhibiting any fruits of the spirit, and that my feminist agenda was more important to me than glorifying God. The Lord began strongly convicting me through Scripture about my attitudes and beliefs. I had been attending a liberal church, and the Lord helped me grow in discernment as I realized we weren't being taught much Scripture--it was more like the pastor's 'Thoughts on Life,' which to my increasingly discerning mind began to seem more and more off-center from what the Bible seemed to be clearly saying.
The final break away from feminism was the summer after my sophomore year. I was interning for a non-profit that worked with low-income Hispanic communities, and I was living with a Mexican family. The father had committed adultery, and left the family two weeks before I got there. As I watched this woman and her children deal with the ramifications of their husband and father leaving, I felt like I had been punched in the gut. Of course husband and fathers are important! Of course it is difficult for a woman to raise kids and work and go on her way without a husband! Simple truths, but they hit me like a ton of bricks.
I realized immediately that God spoke clearly in His Word about the role of fathers and mothers. I got Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood and read almost the whole thing. I realized I agreed with everything it said. This all took place in about a week. Clearly, the Lord had been working on me for awhile. I am so grateful he literally opened my heart and eyes on this issue, and that I was able to see and understand how wrong I had been, to repent, and submit myself to the Lord, His Word, and His loving and protective call for obedience to Scripture.
I immediately called Bobby and told him I had been wrong, that I now agreed with the Bible and that I knew I had been taught, believed and perpetrated false teachings. He was excited but appropriately skeptical. He sent me a list of books to read, solid books dealing with the gospel, Christ and the Christian life. As I read, I understood how my life needed an overhaul. I started looking for a new church, but it was hard for me to know where to look.
After a few months of trying to find a church, Bobby intervened and sent me a list of churches to visit. The second one I attended was a PCA church plant near my college. The second Sunday there, I joined a small group led by a couple in their thirties with three young kids. The wife, DeAna, became my first Titus 2 mentor. She was instrumental in my growth and a huge encouragement and practical help. After attending church there for a couple months, Bobby asked me to court. In our first conversation he clearly told me he wanted to be a pastor, that he was going to have to go to seminary, that we would probably be poor, and that he wasn't sure where we would end up serving. He also made it clear that if our courtship worked, we would get married as soon as we could. If I didn't want that, we would stop the courtship immediately. I of course was fine with it...a far cry away from the venom I had spewed at him only a year and a half before. We got engaged in six weeks and married as soon as I finished school in December. We just moved to DC and I am excited to be a wife and mother. The Lord's grace is evident over our story, and I am humbled every time I think of where I have been and where I am now.
Praise the Lord for the kindness he has shown us in Christ, and in all other lesser blessings!
Kristin
We all laugh when we remember Nicole and Kristin’s poodle perms, my
lime green baseball hat and Chad’s endless collection of soccer cleats.
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