The Joys of Being a Woman
May 9th 2010
1. Women are Strong
A few years ago, I was visiting my grandma and she and I were talking about our ancestors. She suddenly stopped and placed her hand on my knee. Carefully she said, “Katie, I want you to know you come from a long line of strong women.” She never let me forget that, even up until the day she died.
What my grandma said was true. I am a daughter of the Utah pioneers and all you have to do is crack open your scriptures to see what types of things those women endured. I’m proud to say I come from a line of women who fought, starved, worked, bore children during the hardest times of their lives and continued to follow God’s law. But even putting that aside, I have a daily reminder of a strong woman in my life. My mom is a convert to the church and she has remained faithful and raised a family with my dad, even when the world seemed to close down on her.
Now that is just me. But, I believe every woman has a story and every woman has been and will continue to be asked to be strong. We live in a day and age where we are given trials that bend us beyond what we think we can handle emotionally. Often, we just have to learn how to manage our time.
Mary Ellen Edmunds said in a 1997 BYU devotional:
"We all have a long list of things to do, whether written down or rattling around in our brains: pray; study; exercise; plant a garden, eat it, raise brilliant, cheerful, reverent children; clean a basement; write in a journal, avoid fat, calories, movie theatre popcorn, and evil thoughts; pray for your enemies; do visiting teaching; store a year's supply of food; say yes to to everything anyone asks you to do and hunt for more things to do; plant trees; remember the pioneers and so on...."
Obviously it is Satan who would have us dwell on what we are not doing, instead of what we do everyday.
When it comes down to it, all women can be traced back to Eve, the mother of all living. No one can dispute that she was strong. So strong that she was not afraid to make a decision that affected us all. It brought pain and joy and allowed each of us to know God for ourselves. Bruce R Mckonkie said, “I rate Eve also as one of the greatest women among all those who have or will come to earth. She, as a mother of all living, set the pattern for all future mothers with reference to bringing up their children in light and truth.”
Eve also recognizes the importance of her own actions as she says, “Were it not for our transgression we never should have had seed, and never should have known good and evil, and the joy of our redemption, and the eternal life which God giveth unto all the obedient.” (Moses 5:11.)
There is no doubt she was strong and passed that strength onto her daughters to cultivate and apply in this life.
2. Women are Beautiful
I teach kindergarten and the other day our class went on a field trip to the Aviary. All the children watched as the Peacock walked about the grounds and strutted its stuff for everyone to admire. Back behind some garden equipment, the brown female peacock picked at the ground and remained hidden. Later that day, some of the teachers discussed why female animals are generally plain and un-adorned while in the world, women are the adorned and fancy gender.
Women of the world are given a very narrow door to pass through to be “beautiful.” A woman of the world must follow trends and wear more or less clothing in order to show her status. She must stay a specific size and have a specific hair color and hair style. She tends to worry more about herself and what others think of her looks than the needs of her family or community. A woman of the world is focused on herself.
But a woman of God is a woman who respects herself. She does her best to maintain health by following the word of wisdom. She accepts her body, (no matter how different it is from the world’s view) and she embraces modesty and virtue as her own. A beautiful woman of God smiles often and shows the light of Christ in her actions and demeanor.
Pres. Gordon B Hinckley said “Of all the creations of the Almighty, there is none more beautiful, none more inspiring than a lovely daughter of God who walks in virtue, with an understanding of why she should do so, who honors and respects her body as a thing sacred and divine, who cultivates her mind and constantly enlarges the horizon of her understanding, who nurtures her spirit with everlasting truth.”
All women are beautiful, but in this world, it can be difficult to feel beautiful. We can also slip easily into the trap of comparing ourselves to the standards of the world. That is why I am grateful to have the knowledge of who I am in God’s eyes.
3. Women know how to Love
All women know how to love. No matter how hard our lives are or how frustrated we get with our children or co-workers or families, all women have an amazing capability to love and that gift was given to us by our father in heaven.
Pres. Hinckley also said “The world needs the touch of women and their love, their comfort, and their strength. Our harsh envirment needs their encouraging voices, the beauty that seems to fall within their natures, the spirit of charity that is their inheritance. The God in whom so many of us believe has endowed His daughters with a unique and wonderful capacity to reach out to those in distress, to bring comfort and succor, to bind up wounds and heal aching hearts, and, most of all, to rear children with love and understanding.”
Women are blessed with a special power to nurture. The word nurture as defined by dictionary.com is: to feed and protect, to support and encourage foster, and to train and educate. Nurturing is also another word for loving.
I would like you to think back to the women of your life and how they have nurtured you. How have you been taught, educated, fostered, protected and supported? I think of my mother, my church leaders, my teachers, my mother in law and my sisters in law. These women have taught me, raised me and supported me in all I am.
An important part of being a woman is being a mother. Our bodies are blessed to be co-creators with God. We are the vessel that gives life to children. However, we all know, not all women will be mothers or even wives in this life.
Patricia T. Holland said “ Eve was given the identity of “mother of all living”… before she ever bore a child. It would appear that her motherhood preceded her maternity just as surely as the perfection of the Garden preceded the struggles of mortality. I believe mother is one of those very carefully chosen words with meaning after meaning after meaning. We must not, at all costs let the world divide us. I believe with all my heart that it is first and foremost a statement about nature, not a head count of our children. Some women give birth and raise children but never “mother” them. Others whom I love with all my heart “mother” all their lives but have never given birth. And all of us are Eve’s daughters whether we are married or single, maternal or barren. We are created in the image of the God’s to become Gods and Goddesses.”
This quote gave me comfort as I thought of the different trials women must face in this life. I have confidence that God does not forget his daughters.
I would like to close with a quote by Spencer W Kimball that puts all of this in perspective. He said, “One Does not have to be married or a mother in order to keep the first and second great commandments—those of loving God and our fellowmen, on which Jesus said hang all the law and all the prophets.”
So no matter what dream has gone unfulfilled in this life, no matter what painful trial has changed your life more than you ever expected, we can have confidence in our ability to love. It is our right as women to love with all our hearts and embrace the light of Christ.
I have a testimony that God love’s his daughters. He knows our pain, our losses and our fears. He answers our prayers through others. He wants nothing more than for us to know how much He loves us. What a blessed thing it is to be a woman.
I say these things….
