Browsing Tag:

Identity

In Blog, Book Reviews, Womanhood on
August 29, 2022

Cultural Counterfeits

We’ve been lied to.

For decades, women have been told that it’s up to them to create their identities, that they can be whomever they want to be. It doesn’t matter what your body tells you. It’s your mind that is the real you, and you ought to change your body to match your mind if you really want to live a happy and fulfilled life on this earth.

But this is completely untrue. Our bodies and our minds should not be at war with each other. They are both equal parts of who we are as women, and they both are equally valuable in informing who we are and what we are like. We can’t just be whoever we want to be and do whatever we want to do, even if this means going against the identity that we’ve constructed in our heads. Our culture has made so many of these kinds of promises to women, but they have all fallen short and come up empty.

We are made for more. We need the truth. And as Jen Oshman writes in her new book, we ought to cast aside these cultural counterfeits and lies the world has offered us.

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In Blog, Feelings, Theology on
August 16, 2021

My Feelings are Valid, or Are They?

My feelings are valid!

If you’ve followed any female influencer who prioritizes self-love and self-care for any length of time, you’ve probably heard this phrase before. Or perhaps you’ve even used it yourself. We live in a culture that highly prizes, validates, and affirms one’s feelings, whether they be good or bad. And this culture is even trying to train us to always speak in a way that will never leave anyone out, offend anyone, or hurt anyone’s feelings. Rene Descartes, a French philosopher who lived in the seventeenth century, once said, “I think, therefore I am.”[1] But is appears our culture has changed this to, “I feel, therefore I am.”

Many people today find their identity in how they feel, so they want their feelings to be validated because that then validates their identity – who they are as a person. But the problem with this phrase is that not all feelings are valid. Therefore, as believers, we cannot and should not affirm those feelings which are in fact invalid.

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In Blog, Book Reviews, Spiritual Growth on
July 12, 2021

The Well-Watered Woman

I’ve had my share of dry seasons in my spiritual life. I’ve had times when my Bible study felt dull, when God seemed to be silent, when a cloud appeared to be hanging over my head. And my dry seasons weren’t for a lack of effort on my part. I still went to church every week. I tried different Bible studies and reading plans. I even went on mission trips to foreign countries. But there were times when I felt further from God on a mission trip than I did back home.

I’m sure you can relate. Every Christian struggles with dry seasons in their spiritual walk. Maybe you’re struggling with a dry season right now. You want to be close to God, but He feels so distant. You want to learn from God’s Word, but you can’t seem to comprehend what it’s telling you. You want to grow, bloom, and flourish in your faith, but you just feel stuck in the mud. If you’re feeling this way, Gretchen Saffles’ new book, The Well-Watered Woman, is just the book for you.

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In Blog, Identity, Theology on
August 10, 2020

Who We Are

There’s an interesting little buzzword that has increased in popularity over the last few years. It’s called “intersectionality,” and the idea of intersectionality has become so common in recent times that it seems like nearly everyone is accepting it. If you’re unfamiliar with the term, here is how the Oxford Dictionary defines it-

“The interconnected nature of social categorizations such as race, class, and gender as they apply to a given individual or group, regarded as creating overlapping and interdependent systems of discrimination or disadvantage.”[1]

Basically, intersectionality is the idea that one’s primary identity is found in their race, gender, class, sexual orientation, etc., and that identity reveals how disadvantaged or discriminated against one is in life. For example, according to intersectionality, the low-income LGBTQ minority woman is considered the most disadvantaged in our society, but the high-income straight white man is considered the least disadvantaged in our society. While there are several issues with the idea of intersectionality, the main one is this – it’s unbiblical.

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In Blog, Book Reviews, Identity on
November 4, 2019

If You Only Knew

If you only knew who I am, what I’ve done, you wouldn’t think of me the same way.

Has this thought ever crossed your mind before? I know it’s crossed mine. Sometimes I’m afraid of people knowing me, really knowing me. I try to protect myself by putting up a wall and pretending that I’m the perfect, happy church girl. But I’m not perfect, and life isn’t always happy.

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