DAUGHTERS OF SARAH

It is not an overstatement to say that here of late our sisters have become something of an issue. It is part of the larger scene. American women are threatening to state their case for equality in a constitutional amendment, and they have lots of help from men. Women are not only beginning to compete with men in business and politics, but they are to be found in such unlikely places as the judge’s bench in high courts of law and in the dean’s chair at leading seminaries. Some insist that women should bear arms as well as men, play football along with the fellows, and even pay alimony to their divorced husbands. The more radical would have both sexes use the same public toilets. And we have no more chairmen. The revolution has transformed them to chairpersons!

Most of the main-line denominations already have women clergymen or are debating the issue. Among our own people a few women have dared to venture beyond the usual assignment of manning the cradle roll or teaching the junior high girls class. Some are publishing their stuff in journals and books, and some are lecturing and conducting seminars — oftentimes they are the same ones. The ones I know are beautiful and intelligent, and they do their thing without being any less feminine, or so it seems.

But I am not talking about any of this in this short piece. While I applaud any and all efforts to give women their just place in church and society, I don’t have anything to say on that issue just now. And for the present I will not attempt to settle the question of the woman’s role in the assembly of saints in relation to that of men. What I have to say here is an entirely different approach, but it may well be most relevent to the larger question of the woman’s role. Amidst all the fussing and the furor about what our sisters can and can’t do, I would urge them, first, last and always, to be daughters of Sarah. It is a rather neglected admonition, even if soundly biblical.

While the apostle Paul is being browbeaten these days as a male chauvanist pig and a cynical misogynist because of certain limitations he lays down for the women, little or no criticism is directed against the apostle Peter, who himself had somewhat to say on the subject. It is he that asks that our sisters be daughters of Sarah, without bothering to prescribe other norms. Perhaps he felt that was the only principle really needed. Sort of like Augustine boiling all of Christian ethics into a single, startling sentence: Love God and do what you please! I find myself in Peter’s corner. If the sisters will simply be daughters of Sarah, that will do it — never mind all the rules! When my boys Philip and Ben talk about the girls, as 16 and 18 year olds sometimes do, I make short shrift of the whole thing with a “Simply find yourself a daughter of Sarah — like your Mother!” And sometimes I waste a little of Augustine on them when it comes to what they should do and not do: Love God and do what you please! Some kids had rather be told what to do than to think for themselves. Sometimes mine do not want to do either!

The apostle tells the scattered and persecuted believers that a daughter of Sarah may win her husband to the Lord by her reverent and chaste behavior, without his actually hearing the word preached. This means that her husband will see Jesus in her, which usually means more than a multitude of words. Williams’ translation says that the husband may be won “without argument” by their wives. Daughters of Sarah do not argue religion with their husbands. They rather reflect the goodness of Jesus in their lives, making the faith they profess irresistible.

Peter says the sisters “must be obedient to your husbands” as part of their chaste and reverent behavior. He goes on to say that the husbands “must be thoughtful in your life with your wives,” and he adds that the woman is to be honored as the weaker vessel. Nothing is said about any of this being custom, that pesky lettle word that we use to explain things away. Peter gives two reasons for such instructions: (1) man and wife are joint heirs of grace, and (2) “so that nothing may hinder your prayers.” Peter calls for honor to the wife and submission to the husband, not because of any social conditions, but because of their relationship to each other and their common link to God. Any woman who resists such clear apostolic instruction simply is not a daughter of Sarah. A man who has one of Sarah’s daughters for a wife and does not honor her for it is in trouble. He need not even pray!

Not only do Sarah’s daughters impress their husbands with their exemplary behavior, but they prove to be “very precious” in the sight of God. In all the Bible that is a rare statement, for something to be very precious to God. But that is the wording in 1 Pet. 3:4. Even repentance or baptism or the Lord’s Supper is not so described. Very precious! Every Christian woman should take note of that unique passage, for it shows how her behavior can be most precious to her Father in heaven.

The apostle tells how: “Let not yours be the outward adorning with braiding of hair, decoration of gold, and wearing of robes, but let it be the hidden person of the heart with the imperishable jewel of a gentle and quiet spirit, which in God’s sight is very precious.” God’s woman does not live for outward beauty but for inward loveliness. She will give only passing concern to hairdressing and clothes. She may be outwardly beautiful, with her hair and dress appropriate to her calling, but that is not where her heart is. Her emphasis will be on “the hidden inward self, with the undying beauty of a quiet and gentle spirit,” to quote Williams again.

Many a woman has searched for undying beauty, and Peter tells her where it is. But such women look in the wrong places, such as in health spas, beauty salons, and cosmetic counters. They fight sagging flesh and wrinkled skin all their lives, some even resorting to a surgical facial renovation. But it is a lost cause, however diligently the cosmetics are mustered. “All flesh is as grass, and its glory like the flower of grass. The grass withers, and the flower falls, but the word of the Lord abides forever.” Peter said that too.

It is a pitiable sight, some dear old sister, ageing with the passing years, fighting greying hair and wrinkling skin as if that is what life is all about for a woman, as if she were wholly unaware of the beauty of inward holiness. There is a way for a woman to find the undying beauty, which somehow is gloriously reflected in her outward features, whatever the passing years may do to her. My Ouida is an example of this, as is her Mother before her, who is now near 80. Ouida is as beautiful to me now as she was when I first met her at age 19. The loveliness graces her inward hidden self, makes her beautiful at any age. Her Mother is said to have had the outward beauty of all three of her daughters when she was young. But all who know her are impressed mostly by “the inside person.” That lovely hidden person radiates her whole being, making her warm and delightful company at whatever age. She was still in her 40’s when I first met her, and she was indeed a very handsome person (though quite old to me then!) Now that she soon celebrates her fourscore milestone, she continues to be a woman of radiant beauty. There simply is no such thing as an ugly old woman when Jesus is present inside.

McKnight renders Peter’s words to say: “Let the mind be adorned with the unperishing ornament of a meek and quiet spirit.” A woman’s hidden person is her mind. Paul says in Rom. 12:2 that one is transformed by the renewal of the mind, which in Tit. 3:5 is made the work of the Holy Spirit within us, by the washing of regeneration.

Let us be as concerned for the renewing of our sisters’ minds as for the liberating of their rights. Let them be free to think and to question, to grow and be strong in spirit. Let it be important to us what they think about various questions that come up. Let us realize that they are as intelligent as the rest of us, and that their insights into spiritual things may be as important as any man’s.

Henry Thoreau wrote in The Principle of Life that the greatest compliment he ever received was when someone asked him what he thought about something. That will be a new way for a lot of men to compliment their womenfolk — ask them what they think about something. Women too are to be thinkers. Their minds are to be renewed by God’s Spirit, and in a special feminine way, the Spirit cultivates that quiet and gentle nature within them, the hidden person of the heart, that is very precious to God.

Finally, Peter refers to the holy women of old who hoped in God as having adorned themselves with that inner beauty. They too were submissive to their husbands, he says. Sarah gets special mention, for she obeyed Abraham, calling him Lord as a token of her subjection. Then he says to his sisters in the Lord: “And you are now her children if you do right and let nothing terrify you.” Daughters of Sarah!

I have a strong suspicion that this is where the emphasis should be, even if we have to let the campaign for the Equal Rights Amendment shift for itself. I’d rather see our sisters be daughters of Sarah more than daughters of the republic. I don’t know how eager I am for Ouida to be storming the pulpits and leading seminars, asserting the rights of Christian women, but I am very eager that she always be a daughter of Sarah.

That way she will be very precious to God, and what more could a Christian woman want? What freedom is there greater than that? — the Editor