A Woman's Wisdom: How the Book of Proverbs Speaks to Everything (20 page)

We learn from the poem that exercising business skills while maintaining our unique call as nurturers of our family can certainly go hand in hand. It all depends on our reasons for putting those skills to use and how and where we choose to
use them.

What about single women, who, by virtue of their singleness, must earn their living outside the home? Proverbs 31 principles apply just as much to them, because what we should glean from verses 16 and 24 isn’t so much about working for a living as it is about maximizing our gifts, no matter our calling. Some time ago a single young woman wrote to a Christian blog and asked whether she should drop out of medical school. She hoped to meet a godly Christian man and get married someday, and she wondered if pursuing a medical degree would be detrimental to her marital hopes. The blogger did advise the young woman to quit the degree program, citing as her reason the fact that all the study was a waste of time and money, since the student hoped to be a stay-at-home wife and mother. This answer, I believe, lacked wisdom.

First, the young woman hoped to be married, but at the time of her question she had no particular young man even on her radar. Since she doesn’t know the future—if or when she will get married—pursuing a medical education, if she has the aptitude and inclination to do so, seems like a good way to prepare to support herself if she doesn’t marry or if she finds herself alone later in life. Second, if she does marry and winds up not practicing medicine as a career, she can certainly offer her medical skills and knowledge in service to her family, her church, and her community. Third, developing the gifts and talents God has given her is to exercise good stewardship of who God designed her to be, and it will conduce to his glory, whether or not those gifts wind up generating income.

If you are single and must earn a living or, at least, must prepare to do so, it is wise to take stock of your personal assets and cultivate them. It is not God-honoring to bury them for some potential future dream that may or may not come true. Some women don’t allow themselves mental or educational development of any sort as they wait for Mr. Right. In some cases this is complementarianism run amok. In other cases, however unwitting, it is sometimes a sort of spiritual blackmail: “God
has
to give me a husband if I devote myself to nothing but preparing for that and that alone.”

Lydia in the book of Acts was a successful businesswoman, and from what we know, a single woman, and her success did not compromise her femininity or her godliness. Maybe she’d had a husband at one point, or perhaps one came into her life later on. We don’t know. We do know that she ran a successful business and was able to use the assets for the good of the baby church in Philippi. It is clear from Acts 16 that she had the sort of home into which she could host the apostles and provide for some of their needs.

Financial Know-How

Perhaps going to work is not an issue for you. Even so, there’s still application to be made from the Proverbs 31 woman’s head for business. She is portrayed as a woman in touch with the family financial picture. Can we say the same? We covered this in chapter 7, so we won’t say much here except to consider once again, do we know what’s in the savings account and the 401(k)? Are the bills up to date? Even if we don’t manage the money, maintaining a handle on the details is a good idea.

As I write, a woman I know comes to mind, Rachel. Her husband was killed in an accident last year, and her grief at the sudden loss was compounded by stress in the months that followed as notices of delinquent accounts piled up. Because her husband had always managed the money, she had no idea what was owed to whom and when it was due. Unraveling the tangle of bills and learning about insurance premiums and paying taxes overwhelmed Rachel, and today she recalls that issue as being one of the most difficult aspects of the tragedy. Do you know what your family financial
situation is?

Wise women are also budget conscious. In other words, they live within their means. Something we can note about the woman in Proverbs is that being wise with money isn’t just about frugality.

Fine linen, purple, and scarlet weren’t inexpensive fabric choices. We learn from her that being budget conscious means knowing when to save a dollar and when a bit of extravagance is a good choice. Sometimes, as we consider the great needs in the world, we feel guilty about spending money on nice things, but we see something different here in Proverbs 31. Under ordinary circumstances, having nice things is one of the God-given benefits of wise living. That’s what we are meant to see from this poem, as well as from the entire book of Proverbs. But if you read through the poem, you’ll see that having nice things didn’t come at the expense of other priorities. She was able to give to the poor
and
provide for her entire household.

So, whether in the home or out, single or married, there is a wisdom in being financially savvy.

as a strong woman

Some months ago a popular women’s magazine featured a photo of a well-dressed, perfectly coiffed woman posing as a body-builder and flexing her muscles. The caption underneath read, “Women can be strong, be smart, be sexy, be mothers,
and
be powerful. We don’t need to compromise.” That’s not the sort of strength we see in the Proverbs 31 woman. She exudes strength, but hers is of a different sort altogether.

She does, however, keep herself physically fit, as we see from verse 17. There is wisdom in maintaining physical fitness—not the trendy sort that makes us feel backward if we aren’t active participants in the local Pilates or Zumba class, but the sort that simply keeps us healthy. Many of us have bought into the myth that we must work out three times a week to realize any benefit, so because we don’t have that kind of time to devote, we wind up doing nothing. For some reason, when it comes to exercise many of us have that all-or-nothing outlook. Yet a friend of mine keeps her triceps toned lifting soup cans, and another has done it by setting aside the mop and scrubbing her floors on hands and knees. If we are daunted by trendy forms of keeping fit, there are creative ways to work it into our daily routine.

In addition to strengthening her arms, the Proverbs 31 woman “dresses herself with strength.” In other words, she covers herself with it. The wording here seems to indicate something more than physical prowess, and when we look at her life, we see that she is indeed dressed with mental and spiritual strength also, something she does by guarding her heart in the fear of the Lord. Verse 17 is said another way by the apostle Paul: “While bodily training is of some value, godliness is of value in every way, as it holds promise for the present life and also for the life to come” (1 Tim. 4:8).

as physically attractive

Busy as she is, she finds time to
look nice.

Although this is the only mention of her appearance in the entire poem, even touching on this aspect of her person can turn some of us away from her altogether. After all, who has time to devote to outward appearance while caught up in the all-consuming tasks of raising children, managing our homes or careers, and serving in church? Something’s got to give, and it seems that of all the competing priorities, this is the one. And for some women, personal appearance has always been a sore subject. However, it might seem a lot less intimidating if we consider it from the aspect of love rather than from the aspect of keeping up with the world.

Looking good by worldly standards has more to do with pride than with love. What besides pride could it be when the objective is to look as good as or better than our neighbors or colleagues? Surely that was not what the poet had in mind when he described the Proverbs 31 woman’s attire. The fabrics she dons—fine linen and purple—were typically worn only by the prosperous, so we can assume the poet included these details to show the link between wisdom and prosperity. This point is reinforced by the fact that her entire family is clothed in costly scarlet (v. 21).

If we consider where else in the Bible we see scarlet and purple fabric, we wonder if the poet’s symbolism goes even deeper. Certain items in the Old Testament tabernacle and temple were made of scarlet and purple yarns, as was the linen ephod and breastpiece worn by the priest (Exodus 26; 28; 35). There were also jewels in the breastpiece, and we find jewels in the Proverbs 31 poem too (v. 10). The color purple is associated with royalty and status, as we see in Esther 8:15. Purple is also linked to wealth, as we see positively in the Proverbs 31 poem and negatively in the parable of the rich man and Lazarus in Luke 16:19–31. Jesus was forcibly dressed in purple so that people could mock his claim to kingship (Mark 15:17, 20), although we know he was indeed a king—the King. On the other hand, in Revelation purple is a sign of the corrupting influences of money (17:4; 18:6).
³
The color scarlet in Scripture has both positive and negative associations, but we see it in a number of passages that have to do with purification (e.g., Lev. 14:4; Heb. 9:19–20).
⁴

We certainly don’t want to read into the poem meaning that isn’t there, but at very least we can infer that the colors we find on the Proverbs 31 woman and in her home are meant to be symbolic of the nobility of wisdom.

In terms of practical considerations, we can simply say that she recognizes there is wisdom in presenting an attractive appearance. For one thing, her attractive appearance surely reflects well on her husband, and no doubt it pleases him. And if we think back to the advice given to husbands earlier in Proverbs, we see that her efforts to look nice will aid him in
following it:

From her we learn that making some effort to look attractive is a way to love our husbands. It’s also a way to love God. He is not glorified by women who let themselves go. That being said, it’s not an attractive appearance that brings him glory so much as it is the careful stewardship of her person that her appearance indicates.

Rachel Held Evans writes, “I’ve found nothing in the Bible to suggest that God requires women to be beautiful. . . . While young love is certainly celebrated in the Bible (Song of Songs, Proverbs
5:15–19
), there is nothing to suggest that a woman is expected to maintain a certain standard of beauty throughout all phases of life in order to adequately please her husband.”
⁵
Evans is right in at least one regard: there is nothing in the Bible that mandates a woman maintain her looks. However, as we learn from the Proverbs 31 woman, there is most definitely wisdom in doing so. Evans wrote her article to address the remarks made by some leading evangelicals who urge women to look good so that their husbands won’t stray. It is indeed regrettable if leaders place blame for cheating husbands on a wife’s failure to maintain her appearance; the blame for a husband’s unfaithfulness can never rightly be placed there. However, a woman can certainly help her husband avoid temptation by making a bit of effort with her appearance, and in this way, it can rightly be viewed as an act of love, not desperation. If any woman fears that she must look good to keep her man faithful, the problem, it seems to me, has more to do with the health of the marriage than with anything about the woman’s looks.

Looking nice is a way to love our husband, but there is a huge difference between making effort and obsessing. There is no wisdom in a preoccupation with looks, as the poem makes clear:

The point of the verse isn’t that looks count for nothing; it’s that looks, when weighed in the balance with godliness and all other aspects of wisdom, count for very little. As we view verse 30 in light of the whole poem, we can determine where to put physical appearance on our priority list (low) and what motive should govern those efforts (love). In other words, making a well-balanced effort with our appearance while also recognizing its limited value is one aspect of a woman’s wisdom. We see beautiful women on television or around town and note their beauty, but we forget them as soon as they pass on by. Conversely, we tend to remember women who make substantive contributions to the world, no matter what they look like, and we can note that the women most respected in the world are not the most beautiful.

as confident

If we had to pick a single word to describe the Proverbs 31 woman, a good choice would be
confident
.