Feminine ideals vary within the Christian community. Although purity is still given the highest premium, and some form of courtship is a must, maybe you imagined becoming a Christian mom and effortlessly balancing work, home, and PTA meetings. Perhaps you imagined being on the mission field and falling in love Elisabeth Elliot style.

t’s 8:57 a.m.

My toddler is rolling around in his playpen with a runny nose, stepping merrily on the handful of Goldfish I threw in there without a bowl. My kitchen sink is full of dishes that need to be loaded into the dishwasher, which currently houses the clean dishes that have been waiting for me since yesterday. I miscalculated our grocery needs this month, and just came back from grabbing toilet tissue at the gas station. I wanted to have this article written by 9:00 a.m., but that is definitely not going to happen.

My husband just told me he invited guests over tonight, and when I freaked out about how disheveled my living room is, he offered to clean up when he got home. He knows I have a to-do list as long as my arm: PowerPoints and test-writing for the class I’m teaching tomorrow, writing, helping him research for a project, folding the laundry that’s been on top of the dryer for two days, and chasing my toddler around.

Instead of saying thank you, I cried, “Oh, great. That’ll look really good. Me sitting in the dirty living room all day and you coming home after a hard day’s work to do my job for me.”

He gave me a look and I knew what he was thinking: Look good for who?

I’m not sure. But I’m often living my life for an unseen audience.

It’s 9:02 a.m.

“Biblical” Womanhood

Many conservative Christian women have grown up with an ideal of what it means to be a “biblical woman.”

For me, that ideal centered around marriage and family. A godly woman was June Cleaver with the theological know-how of Martin Luther, a spotless home, a blameless spiritual walk, and a bedroom manner spicy enough to keep her husband from ever straying.

Ideals like these vary within the Christian community. Although purity is still given the highest premium, and some form of courtship is a must, maybe you imagined becoming a Christian mom and effortlessly balancing work, home, and PTA meetings. Perhaps you imagined being on the mission field and falling in love Elisabeth Elliot style.

Regardless of its variety, the general facets of biblical womanhood remained the same. Based on a select few applied passages (Proverbs 31, Titus 2, 1 Peter 3), many of us grew up seeing adulthood as synonymous with saying, “I do,” and assumed that we would find our deepest meaning in life as a virtuous wife.

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