Ak­i­lah Hold­er

You are a woman be­fore you are a moth­er. I’ll say that again: you are a woman be­fore you are a moth­er; there­fore, hav­ing a child does not make you a woman. This dis­tinc­tion is im­por­tant be­cause we live in a world where — and some so­ci­eties are worse than oth­ers — for a woman to be con­sid­ered a woman, apart from the phys­i­cal qual­i­fi­ca­tions, she must meet the qual­i­fi­ca­tion of hav­ing had a child. We al­so live in a world that dic­tates to a woman that in or­der for her to be com­plete, con­tent­ed, and ful­filled, she must have a child. But this is prob­lem­at­ic.

It is prob­lem­at­ic be­cause there are two sides to be­ing a woman: one is the bi­o­log­i­cal side, and the oth­er is the emo­tion­al side. Some of us meet the phys­i­cal qual­i­fi­ca­tions for be­ing a woman, but we don’t meet the emo­tion­al qual­i­fi­ca­tions for be­ing a woman. This can be prob­lem­at­ic when it comes to moth­er­hood. While phys­i­cal­ly, some are moth­ers, they are not moth­ers in the emo­tion­al sense of the word. Some women are quite mis­er­able and dis­con­tent­ed, al­beit hav­ing ful­filled the so­ci­etal dic­tate of what makes a woman. Some are so dis­con­tent­ed that they end up be­ing lousy moth­ers be­cause they ne­glect their chil­dren, abuse their chil­dren, or aban­don their chil­dren.

There­fore, we must re­con­sid­er the de­f­i­n­i­tion of a woman, not just for so­ci­ety, but for the woman her­self. Why? Be­cause too many of us rush in­to moth­er­hood, with­out be­com­ing women, with­out be­com­ing whole, with­out be­com­ing con­tent in our­selves, with­out dis­cov­er­ing our­selves. And that is prob­lem­at­ic be­cause we go on to have chil­dren and are mis­er­able, and some­times make our chil­dren mis­er­able as a re­sult.

So, woman, who are you apart from your child­bear­ing ca­pac­i­ty? What do you want to do with your life? What are your likes? Dis­likes? What are your aca­d­e­m­ic de­sires? Ca­reer pur­suits? Who are you? What is your call­ing?

I sub­mit to you to­day that you are so much more than your phys­i­cal abil­i­ty to bear a child, and God wants you to know that. I sub­mit to you to­day that God wants you to be ful­filled out­side of hav­ing a child (out­side of hav­ing a hus­band, even). I sub­mit to you to­day that God wants you to em­brace and live up to your fullest po­ten­tial be­fore moth­er­hood if that is in His will for your life. Let’s face it, some of us are un­able to have chil­dren. And I sub­mit to you to­day that God would like to help you dis­cov­er your­self and live up to your fullest po­ten­tial.

That is why, for a woman es­pe­cial­ly, it is im­por­tant to cleave to Matthew 6:33, which teach­es, “seek ye first the king­dom of God, and all these things shall be added un­to you.” This verse stress­es the im­por­tance of a re­la­tion­ship with God be­fore we go chas­ing af­ter any­thing else.

But why? Be­cause every bless­ing that this life brings comes with prob­lems. Wealth comes with se­cu­ri­ty is­sues and en­e­mies; mar­riage comes with chal­lenges as two dif­fer­ent per­son­al­i­ties have to strive to be­come one; preg­nan­cy comes with phys­i­cal and emo­tion­al dis­com­fort, and moth­er­hood comes with heart­break and fear as your child or chil­dren will suf­fer things that hurt you, do things to hurt you, and you’ll just wor­ry about them. Moth­er­hood is bit­ter­sweet. More­over, kids have to grow up and leave the nest.

Ad­di­tion­al­ly, some of us al­low the bless­ing to con­trol us. When we gain wealth, we de­vel­op a sense of su­pe­ri­or­i­ty; when we mar­ry, we feel that we’re su­pe­ri­or to oth­er women, we be­come boast­ful and proud; when we be­come preg­nant, again, we be­come boast­ful, and the at­ti­tude wors­ens when the child gets here.

For those rea­sons, it is im­por­tant to seek God first. The com­mand­ment giv­en in Matthew 6:33, to seek God first, and then all ma­te­r­i­al bless­ings will fol­low, is for our pro­tec­tion. God gave it be­cause he un­der­stands the na­ture of life, and he un­der­stands the na­ture of the hu­man be­ing. You are go­ing to need Him to cope, and you are go­ing to need him to stay hum­ble – a qual­i­ty he ad­mires great­ly.

In ad­di­tion, as not­ed ear­li­er, chil­dren will grow up. How will you cope with an “emp­ty nest”? If a child pass­es, God for­bid, how will you cope? When par­ent­ing be­comes chal­leng­ing, be­cause it will, how will you cope? If post-par­tum de­pres­sion sets in, how will you cope?

So fo­cus on be­com­ing a woman, and let the Lord as­sist you.

For you are not a woman be­cause you are a moth­er, you can be a woman apart from moth­er­hood, and that is es­sen­tial for you to be a good moth­er, should that be in your cards. And God can as­sist you with that.