In part 1 of my journey to gospel-centered womanhood, I recounted how I came to understand Scripture's instructions to women through the lens of the gospel. Apart from the gospel, the law kills. Presenting instructions to women apart from a thorough fleshing out of the gospel sets women up for failure. 

The second part of my journey involved understanding the curse of Genesis 3:16 and God's answer to it in the gospel. I had a strong longing that only God could satisfy that I repeatedly looked for a man to meet. How do we get from Genesis 3:16 (her desire will be for her husband) to Psalm 73:25, "...there is nothing on earth I desire beside God?"

It's the same today as it was for the Psal…

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(See Part 1, "Confessions of a Conflicted Complementarian")

Well before I understood that there was an aspect of the curse in Genesis specific to women, I experienced what it predicts: “…in pain you shall bring forth children. Your desire shall be for your husband,
 and he shall rule over you” Gen. 3:16.

The Difficult Truth

We all have a problem desiring God. As C. S. Lewis said, we all play in the mud puddles of the slum, ignorant of the joy of the holiday offered at the sea. But the curse in Genesis 3:16 teaches that such misplaced desires are core to the struggles women in particular will face.

Eve was created in the image of God to be a strong helper to Adam. Ezer is a term use…

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(Read Part 2, "My Journey to Gospel-Centered Womanhood")

I was raised in conservative Christianity and had visions of what my life would look like if I made the good Christian choices that good Christian girls were supposed to make. I thought a lot about the Proverbs 31 wife and didn't chafe against the expectations.

Then I collected a closet full of bridesmaid gowns with no wedding dress in sight. For a time, I was convinced that I would never get married, which in my construct of the Christian woman, left me void of any hope for meaningful existence. It was the darkest time of my life.

Finally Married! (But. . .)

I did get married before I worked that all out in my head but was fac…

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. . . the greatest of these is love (1 Cor. 13:13).

I have a friend who loves God and his Word and desires to raise her children to love him, yet one of her children has made a series of choices that has challenged their family. I asked once if she felt more peer pressure in her Christian culture to get her child to conform or to bear long with them in love? I asked because I too had struggling friends and family, and the pressure within me and from others outside was that these situations were unacceptable, and I needed to do whatever I could to change them.

I want control of my circumstances and gravitate to suggestions of things to try to fix situations. But at some point, as thing…

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