Thursday 29 May 2014

The Unclaimed Space



The unclaimed space
 While trying to think of name for this post, to aptly describe what Father is showing me, I had a picture in my mind of a wide open space. When I mean space I don’t mean a little plot or land of space, I mean SPACE! Space that was so vast, so wide, so high and so big that Mount Everest was situated in the middle of it and yet still there was a vast openness of land all around. So vast and so high is this space that it can never be fully filled, no matter how many poured in to it. The air was open and unpolluted, the grass was green and water was available in correct measurements and quantities as was required. No houses, no people and no stuffiness filled the space; it was just open and so very unbound.
I am a straight talker and I am unafraid to be outspoken and speak the truth, so let me cut to the chase.
Do you because you are a woman, not believe that you are entitled to space?
Do you not believe that you are entitled to freedom? Unbound and unblemished freedom to be who you were created to be?
Do you not believe that you were called to more than taking care of his needs?
Do you not believe that you could be gifted to bring Glory to Yeshua?
Do you not believe that Yeshua saved you to unleash you and not to tame you?
Do you not believe that the Lion of Judah can roar from within you and change a nation?
Can you not believe that Yeshua wants to lift your head high my sister and carry all those burdens? Can you not believe?
What is the space I am talking about? I am talking about a place where you are unbound by society and theology, by pain, torture and torment. For centuries women have been enslaved and theology has sought to further peg down the skirts of women, simply because the Church fathers were men who viewed women and womanhood as something evil, beyond understanding. Imagine what theology would have been like today if we had had church mothers instead, imagine! I have met and continue to meet women from all walks of life, some fabulously wealthy, others spoilt; others are saved or unsaved, poor or straightforward. Lately, I am meeting more and more women who are mothers consumed with their status of being a mom. I think motherhood is a beautiful thing, filled with sacrifices, heartache and realities that children cannot appreciate. However, when your children are grown up and flown away, what happens then? Most of these women never talk about their husbands, I often have to ask if they are married or not, their husbands just don’t feature. On the flipside, I have met women who tell me that their gifting or calling in life is simply to minister to their husbands needs so that their husbands can (and I quote) “thrive.” I am really gobsmacked and horrified and dot, dot, dot to hear this. From the Biblical text and examples, we can understand that both husband and wife are called to serve one another; this is the highest form of servant hood which models Messiah’s example.

Added to this husbands in fact have the higher calling of and I quote, “Husband love your wives as much as Yeshua loved His bride or congregation and gave His life for her!” (Ephesians 5:25)
It is beyond this musing of mine today to uncover the actual realities of the scriptures used to convince women of their subservience. The scriptures need to be studied and clarified in order to understand their make-up, however from my work with abused women and extensive research over three years of women abuse in the Church, I have discovered that women continue to see themselves as less then what they were created to be. Theology and the Church in general has largely failed women and I can say this emphatically (my words were echoed by my university professors and the statician whom I worked with on my research, they were all men and pastors). Oppression and the seemingly rose-coloured glasses that are placed over women’s eyes regarding their callings, gifting and abilities is rife and that is why I am asking you “women do you not see yourself as Yeshua sees you?” The bar that Messiah set up in His sojourn on earth was extremely high concerning women. He had female disciples (Luke 8 and John 20), He went against the cultural norm and spoke to women as equals of men (John 4) even in this interaction with a woman, His disciples were concerned and shocked that Yeshua spoke with a woman! Even his disciples battled to understand what He came to do – to set all people free. Yeshua called women in to His space so that He could redeem their space. Women needed the space Yeshua offered (and continues to offer) because from the very beginning, history attests to the mistreatment and gross hatred of women. In the Brit Chadasah (New Testament) the early believers were amazed at the teachings of Messiah and the freedom it brought them. Messiah’s teachings were completely in opposition to the “Pater Familias” set up which existed in Rome. Throughout the Roman Empire, women were viewed as commodities under the “superior head of the family who was usually the father.” The head could sell his daughter off (today we call this trafficking) or he could give her a way in marriage to a horrid man who would beat her and send her off empty handed only to make her way in society as a prostitute. Women could own nothing, save the clothes on her back. Society was harsh and in many areas of our world today, this same reality exists. Just this week a beautiful Sudanese woman who was eight months pregnant was beaten for being a Christian and even as she speaks she is still imprisoned and facing the death sentence just for being a Christian.  Another woman in Pakistan was killed because she married a man of her choice without her father’s permission. Innocent lives were taken at a campus shoot-out by a young man who blamed women for not wanting to sleep with him, this action of brutality sparked a campaign which has garnered international attention through the horror stories women worldwide are sharing about their rape, domestic violence, assault and fear just about being a woman (#Yesallwomen). In India women are gang-raped and killed and forced to marry young in Islamic countries (round the ages of 4 or 5). Yeshua came to set man free from the wickedness of sin and its snares, women have to begin to see themselves as valuable and as something more, we are here for a purpose and God wants to take us, mould us and then release us but we have to be willing!
Psalm 68: 11 “God sent forth His word and great is the army of women who proclaimed it.”
God is preparing His army to march forward and out in to the dying world with a message of Good News, interestingly enough women are the ones who call that message forth and out. Are you ready to leave it all behind and truly discover who you were called to be? There is a space waiting for the women of this world. It's a heavenly, God-ordained space, unpolluted and unfilled - its a beautiful space and I am willing to travel there, its a space of purpose, it's a space for now. Don't let it pass you by!

3 comments:

  1. What a beautiful vision of "space." The pic is so meaningful, too. Your questions cause me to pause and reflect. Asking God to "redeem our space!" Thank you.

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    1. Bless you Trudy and may Father lead you and guide you to claim and redeem your space! you were made for a special purpose and reason! I bless you in this!

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  2. Like your words and ideas about space......"it is for freedom Christ set us free."...

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