The integrity of the upright guides them, but the unfaithful are destroyed by their duplicity.
Proverbs 11:3
As a woman who writes publicly about her faith, I’ve committed to telling my story, but if I’m honest, when I fear my truth will reveal some ‘bad’ thing about me, I get instant writer’s block! It’s not that I’m trying to be a ‘good’ girl, but I think it’s safe to say that being a ‘bad’ girl is a very un-Christian thing. So much of Christian credibility is hinged on goodness, especially for women, that we go all out to hide our failings.
No one can deny the unspoken pressure on women to divide life into two very distinct parts, the good and the bad, the holy and the hope-they-never-find-out. The hilarious thing about creating these divisions is that they are messy, hard to keep up with and (you’ll be relieved to know) totally unnecessary.
When we are tempted to divide our lives into compartments based on what is perceived as good or bad, Proverbs 11:3 gets in our way and asks,
“How about being a person with great integrity instead?”
“How about being women that lives that are consistent from the inside to the outside?”
That’s not the same as being perfect, or even ‘good’, but it so much better than having to cross-reference every thought, word or deed.
The warning in this verse isn’t about ensuring you are a good person, it’s about avoiding duplicity. Except, how do we heed such a warning when church women are adept at putting on two different faces, in fact, it is often encouraged? We try so hard that we sometimes create two versions of ourselves, one that we believe is esteemed and worthy, and one that we believe is somehow less worthy.
What have you been attaching your worth to?
- Volunteering and giving money
- Modesty and sexual purity
- Parenting and mentoring
- Submission and marriage
- Material success
- Public ministry
The things on this list are acceptable versions of us, but it’s a myth to believe that these things make us good people. In Mark 8:10, even Jesus asked, “Why do you call me good?” He then went on to say that no one was good but God. We can do good works in order to be a light that leads others to the only One who is truly good, or we can pursue goodness in order to have acceptance and worth. One approach is God-centered, the other is actually self-centered.
The call to integrity is not a call to goodness, it is a call to honesty, truth, self-acceptance and God’s perfecting love. A woman who realizes that God placed incomparable value on her before she ever knew him, can rejoice!
She is loved in her entirety because of his praiseworthy grace.
She does not have to divide herself in two in order to be accepted by anyone, not even the local church.
She will not be destroyed by duplicity.
She will delight in the Lord with whatever she has, as did Mary with her alabaster box, and His goodness will fill her soul.