A thought that has primarily been on my mind for many months is this idea that God created the woman to be a "helper". We find this true when we read Genesis 2:18 when God says "...I will make him a
helper comparable to him." Typically, when we think of our role as a "helper" we think of it in the marriage relationship, a woman coming alongside a man in marriage and becoming his partner, his helper in life. I've watched the marriages around me and seen the women coming alongside their husbands, helping them. What an incredibly important and awesome role! But can this role only be experienced in marriage? Am I only able to just wait and hope to some day be able to experience this "helper" role because I am a single woman?
I have a hard time believing that God would wire us to be helpers and yet only allow it to be developed and utilized within the confines of marriage alone. At the same time, I often find it difficult to be creative and think outside the "marriage" box when it comes to being a helper. The other day, I was reflecting on the importance of encouraging and exhorting one another in the Lord and it struck me that this is a way that ALL woman can be helpers.
It may seem odd to think of encouragement/exhortation as a mode of being a helper. But, as I look at a more familiar picture of a "helper" in the marriages around me, I've noticed my friends being helpers to their husbands by encouraging them. Encouraging them to be faithful to their families, to their assemblies, to their God. Encouraging them in their role as fathers, brothers and sons. These "helpers" have recognized wonderful characteristics in their husbands and have encouraged them to continue on in these behaviors as well as recognizing their potential and encouraging them to strive to reach that potential.
Personally, I can think of times in my life where someone saw potential in me that I didn't recognize in myself. They came alongside me and encouraged me to pursue that potential. That is how I want to be to those around me...I want to be in tune, recognizing the potential of those around me and encourage them to pursue it! I want to be the sort of "helper" that can come alongside another with a pure desire, not with manipulative or selfish motives, but to really see others become a more devoted and faithful servant of the Lord. If we all were to seek and encourage unrealized potential in those around us, I wonder how the body of Christ would be changed? Would we see more of our young men becoming Godly leaders and more of our young women becoming Godly helpers?
Whatever the case may be, the Lord has been challenging my heart to seek opportunities to encourage one another in our faith that our "labor may not be in vain." Praying this very thing for each of you today!
"...we sent Timothy, our brother and minister of God, and our fellow laborer in the gospel of Christ, to establish you and encourage you concerning your faith, that no one should be shaken by these afflictions; for you yourselves know that we are appointed to this. ...lest by some means the tempter had tempted you, and lest our labor might be in vain."
I Thessalonians 3:2-5
**I'd love to hear your thoughts and observations on what it means to be a "helper"!
