Proverbs 31: 25. "The Warrior Wife"

Proverbs 31: 25     Strength and honor are her clothing;
She shall rejoice in time to come.

Proverbs 31: 25.  I feel really bad for a man who, day after day, has to wake up to weak coffee and/or a weak woman.  Neither one is going to help the brother get through the day.

And, sisters, I know that there are a historical and cultural forces that encourage you to dull your intellect, atrophy your strength, and let your boobs speak for you.  Fight against those forces.

It may be easier to project a perpetually wretched attitude.  It may be easier to pretend to be stupid until it’s no longer pretending.  It may be easier to let men pass you around like an unmarked cup at a frat party.  But in the end you will have only misery.

It’s more difficult for a woman to walk in her strengths, to lead with her brains and not her body, to be honorable in relationships rather than being gossipy, messy, and cliquish.  Yeah, that is much harder. But God promises and experience proves that you will be happier in the end.

God made you to be both strong and honorable. 

Not miserable and wretched.  Not weak and silent.   Not dumb and promiscuous.  Strong and honorable.

Strength refers to the ability to perform her tasks.  Honor refers to trustworthiness and loyalty.

Strength and honor sounds like a warrior traits, don’t they? 

Of course they do.

After all , a man needs a wife who will watch his back, much like a king needs bodyguards to watch his.

A king doesn’t ask the cook to watch his back if the cook is just a cook.  A king doesn’t leave guard duty to the butler if the butler is just the butler.  A king doesn’t dispatch the janitor to cover the flank while he charges toward the enemy, not if the janitor is just a janitor. No.   Unless------ the cook, the butler, and the janitor are really warriors undercover.   

Under the cover of marital submission, a man’s wife is really his most trusted and loyal warrior.

Now, I don’t need my wife’s physical protection.  Physical protection is my job. (Yes.  It is.) 

But I do need somebody to spot (and sometimes quietly eliminate) the intellectual, emotional, and spiritual threats that I miss.   That’s the job of my warrior-queen.

When I look at the woman God gave me to watch my back I know that she will and I know that she can.   I hear it in her conversation.  I see it in the clothes she chooses (and chooses not) to wear.  I feel it in the way her body tenses and her eyes narrow when untrustworthy people step into my personal space.   It’s all over her.

She wears strength and honor like clothing.

And that looks good on a woman.

---Anderson T. Graves II   is a writer, community organizer and consultant for education, ministry, and rural leadership development.

Rev. Anderson T. Graves II is pastor of Hall Memorial CME Church in Montgomery, Alabama, executive director of the Substance Abuse Youth Networking Organization (SAYNO) and director of rural leadership development for the National Institute for Human Development (NIHD).

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