Heroines and Pioneers

When I think of my childhood, some of the women I was taught to admire most were the pioneers of our country.   They had a hardscrabble life, worked their fingers to the bone, knew how to knit and sew, plant and raise livestock, chop wood, handle a rifle and hunt, skin and prepare game for their families, gave birth at home and teach their children to read the Bible and to love and honor God to the best of their abilities.  They were tough, and stubbornly determined to make a good life out of what they had.  They and all the other romanticized stories of the Wild West and the frontiersmen and women, formed images in my mind from the time I was young about what it meant to fight for what you believed in and succeed.  Of course in my mind all the pioneer women were beautiful too!  I suppose they have always been my heroines.  They fit so perfectly into the mold of the tough uncompromising heroes of faith in the Bible.

Heroes like Elisha who sees a huge army of enemy soldiers surrounding his house, and he doesn't even bat an eye.  "There are more with us than with them," he tells his panicking servant.  And sure enough, there was - a vast army of angels in chariots of fire covering the mountainsides as far as the eye could see, once those spiritual eyes were opened.

This has to be one of my favorite passages, because I use it often when I feel backed up against a wall.  When I feel the impending sense of doom creep into my emotions that everything is about to go wrong, I remember this.  I love being radically unafraid in the face of evil.  It honors God and it sure takes up a lot less energy that getting depressed, crying or having an anxiety attack.

I used to think that this kind of faith was reserved only for the spiritually superior, to the super holy.  But thankfully it's available to anyone at any time they're willing to use it.  The toughest part is killing off the negative emotions.  That's what messes up the whole thing.  Once you rid yourself of emotionalism, God provides the rest.

There is something so invigorating about being powerful against enemies.  When evil tries to defeat us, being able to send it running back where it came from makes me so very happy.  This is a kind of emotion I could get addicted to, the joy of fighting for what God wants of me, and overcoming.

I'd love to meet more Christians like that.  There are plenty of women who think they're being tough and strong by not conforming to traditional roles at home, to sleeping with whatever man attracts them and then acting like being a single mother has turned them into heroes.  That's so far from strength, not even close to being intelligent.  I'd like to see more pioneer women when it comes to faith. Not the part about butchering bear meat - I mean being uncompromising and tough when it comes to enemies and unwelcome intruders in their lives and families.  I'd like to see a new class of women come together to fight and overcome problems with unflinching faith.  A group of women who determine that they're not going to live in emotionalism any longer, but by the rational truths of God.  Anybody with me?