Women and men have exactly the same worth—they are made in God’s image with equal value. Together they more fully reflect the God who created them than does either alone. Out of nothing (Hebrew word bara) God created male and female in his own image and likeness. God not only gave women inherent worth, he also gave them assigned worth by giving women something important to do with their lives. He assigned them to be fruitful, to be rulers over the earth and to be partners with their husbands.

The year was 1963. I married Don Sunukjian that summer. President John F. Kennedy was shot and killed a couple miles from where we lived in Dallas. And Betty Friedan founded the Women’s Liberation movement in the United States by publishing The Feminine Mystique.

Ms. Friedan identified “the problem that had no name,” the dissatisfaction of American women with their role as a wife and mother. She, along with Gloria Steinem launched the modern female equality movement that today is so much a part of our culture that has almost ceased to be a separate issue any more.

The culture was restless in the ‘60s. And that restlessness was present in the church, too. Women lined up on both sides of the raging debates about the identity and purpose and worth of a woman—debate issues such as, a woman should be in the home rearing her children or a woman should be educated and in the work force; or, a woman is different from a man or a woman is just like a man.

Christians are often misled by the voice of our culture. The world system, led by Satan, gives identity, purpose and worth to a woman only as it is purchased or earned. It has to be bought. And the currency is beauty—a very important currency for women—or talent, intelligence, ethnicity, wealth, education or even rebelliousness. The world system, our culture, awards identity or worth based upon accomplishment.

Like Gloria Steinem and Betty Friedan, I was seeking to live out my true identity. Like other thinking women, I was trying to understand the almost cataclysmic changes that were going on in the culture. I wanted God’s perspective on my truest worth. I didn’t want to be misled by my culture.

The question became, what does God, my Creator, say about me as a woman? And how can I draw my identity and worth from what God says and not from the lies of the culture? God tells us that he made women and designed us in his own image—that we are like him in crucial ways: we have will, emotion, creativity, relational skills and decision-making abilities. And we are female, not male.

He created woman, first of all, with inherent worth when he made her. Genesis 1:27 says that we were created in his own image and in his likeness. The two words, image and likeness, seem to be somewhat interchangeable, and expand the meaning and emphasis rather than add a fresh aspect to the account.

Every woman has as great a worth as every man. Suppose two people are in a terrible car wreck. Is the driver of more value than the passenger? Of course not, how very ridiculous that would be. The paramedics are trying to save any life they can with no regard at all for who was driving and who was riding. They give care to the person who needs it most, because both have equal value.

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