I woke up at 2am
and headed for the kitchen at about 3:15am. I turned on the gas, got out the
items I bought the previous night and proceeded to make breakfast for my
family. I was meticulous about the meal because I didn’t want anyone to feel
mummy’s absent.
I’m the first of
five children and so it’s kinda natural to step into mummy’s roles when she’s
out in the North for your cousin’s wedding.
A delicious (in my
opinion) pot of spaghetti in a mouth watery tomato sauce sat ready on the gas
cooker after a bit.
I turned to the
sink, cleared dishes from the night before and proceeded to Iron my work wear
for the day and my seven year old brother’s school wear.
I returned to bed
at 4:15am and was grateful to God for the gift of power holdings (NEPA).
Meanwhile, my seven
year old brother slept in another room with my younger sister. I had him crying
lightly just before I headed for the kitchen. I went to the room where he laid,
picked him up and took him into my bed. I wrapped him up in a wrapper and
cuddled him for a bit.
Then morning came
(6am), I woke the little one up, we said a quick prayer and I gave him a bath,
mouth wash and got him dressed for school.
I raced into the
kitchen to dish my delicious spaghetti (of course I re-heated it). I served my
seven year old brother and told him to be done before I’m out of the bathroom.
I got out of the
bathroom and the food was still sitting on the table. Brother has taken a
stroll outside to do only God knows what.
I quickly got
dressed.
I called out to the
fine young man, “Giovanni, why haven’t you eaten?”
His response?
Oh you don’t want
to hear it.
He said, “Nana, the
food is not sweet”. (He calls me Nana ever since he began to speak. I later got to know it meant mother in some languages).
At his response, My
heart sank!
I said to myself,
I’m sure it’s because it’s hot. I’m aware he doesn’t like his food steaming
hot; but couldn’t he just say, I’m waiting for it to get cold? Did he really
mean that this “delicious spaghetti isn’t sweet?
I thought.
Well you should
know that I’m not the kind to taste a meal when cooking. I just throw in the
required measure of ingredients and trust that it’s the perfect measure. 98% of
the time, I’m correct!
As usual, I cooked
this spaghetti the same way.
Did you know that
after my brother said that to me, I went back into the kitchen and tasted my
meal? My confidence in the spaghetti was strengthened. It tasted just right!
“So why did Giovanni
say my food isn’t sweet?” I thought (Emphasis on MY).
I proceeded to pack
his school lunch box when I suddenly felt someone hug me from behind.
It was Giovanni.
I said, “Why are
you holding me when you said my food isn’t sweet?”
He said, “I’m
sorry, it’s sweet. I’ve started eating it”. He turned away and returned to his
meal.
I shook my head
with smiles on my face. The only word that got out of mouth was, “Children”.
I returned to find
Giovanni raking the remaining strands of spaghetti until his plate came clean.
The conventional
thought about a woman’s purpose is usually centered around wifery and
motherhood. While I do not negate those two as part of a woman’s life, I see
them (wifery and motherhood) as
roles in which a woman expresses purpose
and not purpose in themselves.
The society we live
in, find it almost impossible to differentiate womanhood from wifely duties and
motherhood. Yet, a man is regarded as a man even without being a husband and a
father.
Something isn’t
right about the society’s perception and I will uncover that as we proceed.
We also cannot deny that the average Nigerian family
defines a good woman by how well she cooks, makes a bed, bargains at the
market, keeps a clean home and perhaps mend shirts with missing buttons. She is
also regarded as a complete woman, so long as she gives birth within the first
year of her marriage. Some parts of
Nigeria even go to the extent of disregarding a wife’s womanhood if all she
births are girls.
Do you relate with these?
What
we don’t see as a society is that roles are an extension of something beyond
the obvious.
Roles are created
based on needs.
Needs change.
If needs change,
then roles change.
Since roles change,
roles cannot define a person.
And if roles cannot
define a person, roles cannot be a person’s purpose.
This is why a man
can cook his own meals as a bachelor and it doesn’t remove his male organs from
its position. There’s a need for him to eat, therefore he fills in the role of
a cook. Do we now say the purpose of a man is cooking? Even if he does it for 25 years?
This is what we
have done to the personality called WOMAN.
She cooks, she
cleans, she births and we say that’s her purpose.
I beg to differ.
Those aren’t her purpose but roles!
The
problem with tying our purpose to roles is that we will forever feel
inadequate.
Did you notice how
I felt when Giovianni said, “my food”, isn’t sweet? Although, I didn’t mention
my emotions, I’m sure you noticed that his thought about my food bothered me.
I woke up in the
middle of the night to make that meal. I wrapped you in my arms when you were
bothered in your sleep and all I get is “Nana your food is not sweet?”
It was an
understanding of his place as a child and my confidence in my culinary skills
that made me not feel sad/depressed or unappreciated. I was bothered about how
to get him to eat the food not necessarily about what he thought of my food.
However, if it were
true that the food wasn’t tasty, I WOULD NOT feel like I’ve failed as a woman! I
would have tried to make up for it because I can’t have him go to school
without a meal.
What’s my point?
A
woman’s worth is in her purpose; not in her roles - click to tweet this
I can let a poor
rating of my meal pass because I understand that my purpose is not tied to a
pot of spaghetti. Since it isn’t, then a meal rating cannot be the measure of
my worth as a woman. Unfortunately, this isn’t the case for some women.
A poor rating on
their home making skills or approach to motherhood, have kept their heads bowed
and their souls broken. Those rating have a weighty effect on their self esteem
because they are yet to differentiate a woman’s worth (which is tied to her
purpose) from her roles.
This is not to
excuse excellence in our responsibilities as sister, daughter, wife, boss,
employee, mother or mother-in-law. I am a woman committed to giving her best in
whatever role I have to fill and I encourage women all over the world to do
same.
However, it is
dangerous to define the value of your worth based on those roles because as roles
change, so does the consistency of your performance.
I hope I’m speaking
in plain English?
Read: Benchmarking your worth
What
is the purpose of a woman?
Now if roles aren’t
a woman’s purpose and her worth isn’t in her roles but in her purpose; what
then is the purpose of a woman?
Below is an excerpt
from my book Prothesis.
“Purpose is the
original intent for the creation of a thing. It is the essence or the
determiner of an object’s value.
Everyone was designed
with an intention in God’s mind. When God was forming your eyes, determining
the structure of your bones, framing your nose and designing your legs, He did
so in alignment with the intents of his heart concerning you. Hence, we must
understand that purpose is that reason why God created us.
The fullness of our
value as humans cannot be attained until we find and walk in God’s purpose for
our lives.
Purpose refers to the call of God on a life. When we operate outside God’s purpose (calling) for our lives, we waste
our potential on irrelevant things. The reason most people live and die
unfulfilled in spite of their numerous wealth, is because they spend their
time, energy, finance and other resources trying to live out their own purposes
rather than God’s.
The word “purpose” is
translated “Prothesis” in Greek. It means
a resolve, intent or design which one sets forth as his plan, aim or objective.
I will like us to pay attention to the word design. This simply says, “Purpose is God’s design for your life.”
From the excerpt
above, we can decipher the following
The
purpose of a woman is the reason God created the woman
The
purpose of a woman is the call of God on her life.
The
purpose of a woman is the intent, resolve or design which God set forth as his
plan, aim or objective in her, through her and for her
The
purpose of a woman is God’s design for her life.
The purpose of a woman is the reason God created the woman
The LORD God said, "It is not good
for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him." Genesis
2:18 (NIV)
Man was alone (having no one else
present).
God didn’t say let’s make a COMPANY. He
said let’s make a HELPER suitable (that fits him). It is one who has a task at hand that is
helped. Therefore God considered man’s task before he said let us make him a
helper.
Now to understand what the woman is to
help with, we have to look at the man’s task.
This is found in Genesis 2:15, “The
Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden
of Eden to work it and take care of it.
Therefore if working and caring for
Eden was man’s task for which he needed a helper? Then the reason God created the woman was to assist the man in working
and caring for the Garden of Eden. In a sense, the woman was also to work
and care for the garden but only as an assistant not a fore runner/boss/lead
player.
However, both of them failed God, yet
the bible never says eve fell or both of them fell. The bible often said Adam
fell (Romans 5:12).
Why?
This is because he was in charge and the
leader.
God didn’t ask Eve where she was
when He walked into the garden. He called out for Adam (Genesis 3:9).
When
something goes wrong, you don’t question the assistant before the director. By
calling out for Adam first, God was saying, I put you in charge. I brought the
woman to help and not to run this place.
Most preachers use this scripture to
explain the place of a woman in marriage. They are right. However, to say that
a woman has no “reason” for being until there’s a man in a garden to help is to
say single women have no reason for being. That will not only
be offensive but wrong.
I believe the
reason the human race began with a marriage, was because God needed the man and
the woman to fill the earth with more people. These people will not be born
married and would have to grow from foetus to full adults- an experience that
Adam and Eve didn’t have.
Therefore, what would their purposes be?
The answer to that
question is found in God’s original intention for making mankind.
Genesis 1:26-27 , “And God said, Let us
make man in our image, after our
likeness: and let them have dominion
over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle,
and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the
earth” So God created man in
his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.
The word man in the above verses is
translated as Adam which means mankind. Hence, the use of the pronoun “them”. Infact, to avoid
misinterpretation, the bible clearly stated, male and female created he them.
By that we know, that the word man referred to the male man and the womb-man.
We agreed earlier that purpose is the
original intent, resolve, design for making something right?
Now if the above verse clearly states
that God’s original reason for making MAN (mankind) is to have DOMINION. Then the purpose of the woman is to have
dominion on earth as much as it is for the man to have dominion.
Since the word dominion in that verse is
translated radah in Hebrew which means to reign. Then, man and woman were created to
reign over all the earth.
So the first purpose of a woman is to
reign!
You don’t have to be married to reign! You only need to be aligned with
the command to reign!
Man (male and female) lost the ability to reign after the fall
(Genesis 3) but the ability was restored in Christ Jesus who conquered sin and
death (which conquered Adam initially) as seen below.
Therefore, the way to align with the
command to reign is to be joined (be one) with Christ (1 corinthians 6:17). A
person becomes one with Christ by the principle found in Romans 10:9 “If you
declare with your mouth, "Jesus is Lord," and believe in your heart
that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.” Been saved qualifies you
to receive the spirit of God which automatically makes you one (joined) with
Christ (Romans 8:14-15).
Now what does it
mean to reign?
To reign is to have authority, weight,
power, influence over a thing or people.
God said man was to have dominion
(reign) over the
Fish of the sea (Hydrospheric creatures)
Fowl of the air (atmospheric animals)
Over the cattle and every creeping thing (terrestrial
animals)
All the earth
This means man was to decide what
happens to them and the first expression man gave to this dominion was to name
everything.
As man named everything in the earth, man was speaking
the exact mind of God because he was ALIVE IN GOD as the express image of God- Genesis 1:26
He(Adam) knew the mind of God and so he expressed the mind
of GOD in that garden; by expressing the mind of God, man reigned/had dominion
upon the earth and everything there in.
Eventually, Man lost that ability to reign when he
did that which was contrary to the mind of God (do not eat the tree of the
knowledge of good and evil- Genesis 3:11
Here’s the point darling?
The purpose of the woman is to be
aligned with GOD and reign (express God’s mind on the affairs of the earth).
Are you aligned with God?
Are you expressing His
mind/will/intention on the affairs of the earth?
If you are not, then you aren’t living
out your purpose as a woman.
This truth, is what single women ought
to be aware of. We are supposed to draw our identity and worth from how much we
are aligned with Christ and establishing his will on the affairs of this
earth!!
That is your primary purpose, woman!
That is your purpose!!!
For the married,
In marriage, your purpose is to help
your husband fulfil that purpose of mankind – align with God and
execute/express God’s will on earth.
Therefore woman, you have not failed,
if you burnt the rice last night. You have not failed if the comment about your
food is poor. You have not failed if you’ve never conceived. You have not
failed if your birthed a deformed baby. You have not failed if you are unable
to breastfeed your baby due to one illness or the other.
You have failed if the man you married
seizes to align with God and execute/express God’s will on earth as a result of
having you in his life.
There’s no difference between our mother eve and the
woman who distracts or turns her husband away from HIS PURPOSE (align with God
and execute/express God’s will on earth.)
For the single,
The ministry of helps isn’t easy. So
stop rushing into marriage!
If it were so easy, Eve wouldn’t fail.
Being a help meet means you have your
opinion and may have to keep it to yourself.
It means you have to consult with the man before making decisions.
If Eve had consulted Adam, she
probably wouldn’t have tasted it such that the sweetness made her give to Adam.
You think being a help meet is easy?
I don’t think so.
It’s a huge responsibility because you
determine if your man succeeds at the assignment or fails!
Therefore, while you wait for your man,
rather than scout through all the latest Bellanaija wedding posts and reigning
aso-ebi (which fuels some people with envy and discontentment) build up yourself
in the Lord.
Live out your purpose (align with God
and execute/express God’s will on earth) so that when your Adam comes, you will
be so used to reigning such that helping him reign comes NATURAL!
PS: I am not
discrediting Bella Naija please. They are doing an amazing job. I’m saying don’t
spend too much time feeding your mind with information that makes you anxious.
Know the balance!
In conclusion,
The purpose of a single woman is to REIGN
(align with God and execute/express God’s will on earth)) ON EARTH.
The purpose of a married woman is to
HELP HER HUSBAND REIGN ((align with God and execute/express God’s will on
earth)
Apostle Paul says is better 1 Corinthians
7:34
An unmarried woman or virgin is
concerned about the Lord's affairs: Her aim is to be devoted to the Lord in
both body and spirit. But a married woman is concerned about the affairs of
this world--how she can please her husband.
(NIV)
Woman, are you presently living out your
pupose aka THE REIGN MANDATE?
Committed to your fulfilment
Anne Atulaegwu
Secure your future and harness the present with the help of my newest book. Get it here
Secure your future and harness the present with the help of my newest book. Get it here
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