The Virtuous Woman

The latest book I've been reading is a light-hearted book called The Virtuous Woman: Shattering The Superwoman Myth, by Vicki Courtney. (After I bought the book, I realized that this is the same woman who started the "Yada Yada" conferences, aimed at addressing issues of purity with young girls, one of which I believe was held at Irving Bible Church while I was there.)

Vicki goes through the passage in Proverbs, referred to as "The Proverbs 31 Woman", verse by verse. She starts out by saying that most women are drastically intimidated by the Proverbs 31 Woman. I mean, she not only makes clothes for her own children, but she makes the thread to make the clothes with! Who can compete with that? As she goes through each verse, she explains that it's not the amount of things the woman can do in a given day that make her "blessed", but it's the underlying character traits of the woman that we can cultivate, based on her example, such as seeking wisdom, being someone who builds up others instead of tearing them down with gossip or negative words, being a nurturing parent, blessing her husband instead of talking bad about him to other wives, etc.

Although this isn't exactly a "deep" read, I appreciated the author's transparency, (such as wondering if picking up food from the drive-thru for her family qualifies as "bringing food from afar"). It made you feel like, if you couldn't live up to some impossible ideal, neither can she, but it's okay, because it's not about an impossible ideal. It's about being a woman of virtue.