Leather and Lace
“We cannot love Adam while we are looking to him to validate us. It will usher in too much fear. If he’s the verdict on us as a woman, we won’t be able to truly and freely offer him our beauty.” John and Staci Eldridge, Captivating
Welcome to the year 2016 my beautiful sisters! We at Heart of a Woman hope that you had a peace-filled, and joyful Christmas and New Year. For myself, I’ll admit, I’m pretty glad it’s over, and that my kids (and me) are back into a routine! I go into overdrive during the holidays, and tend to put lots of pressure on myself, like many other women, but that can be a subject for another post maybe!
I thought for the month of January, we could talk about Adam. Yes. The male species. As women, our relationships with men are an important part of our mission in this life. It was designed to be this way by God, who created two separate and wildly different sexes. Think about that for just a minute. God created two completely contrasting and distinct types of the human form. Just as in everything that God does, there is intelligence in this. There is purpose. He can do all things, and He certainly could have created one type of human; not male, not female, but something else that I cannot imagine. But he didn’t. He created us in two forms, uniquely created to need each other. Why? So that we would improve, progress, and grow toward Him. We men and women need each other to simply survive as a human race, we need each other in order to reproduce, we need each other to point out our shortcomings, we need each other emotionally, we need each other in order to learn to love.
Men have deeply rooted characteristics that we as women need. Strength, protection, wisdom, the ability to convince us to be adventurous, fatherhood for children, and partnership with God.
I am not saying that we as women lack strength! Or cannot live without male protection, that we have no wisdom, or adventure, or that we cannot commune with God on our own! But I am saying that these qualities are more pronounced in men. Look at the stature and build of men and women and think of the God who created us this way. Simply put, relationships with men can give us MORE strength than we have, offer us FURTHER protection than what we have alone, allow us GREATER wisdom as we consider other angles of life’s problems, and invite us to be MORE adventurous than when we started our path on earth.
Likewise, women offer men more tenderness, compassion, spirituality, relational therapy, and love than perhaps they would have were they to live alone.
“It is not good for man to be alone.” (Genesis 2:18) Or for woman either. We gather qualities from and learn so much from each other. Next week, we will talk more about Adam specifically, and about the wounds and questions he has that need to be taken to God. In the meantime, enjoy these lyrics and video from Leather and Lace by Stevie Nicks and Don Henley:
Woman: Is love so fragile
And the heart so hollow
Shatter with words
Impossible to follow
You’re saying I’m fragile I try not to be
I search only for something I can’t see
I have my own life and I am stronger
Than you know
But I carry this feeling
When you walked into my house
That you won’t be walking out the door
Still I carry this feeling
When you walked into my house
That you won’t be walking out the door
Together:Lovers forever face to face
My city your mountains
Stay with me stay
I need you to love me
I need you today
Give to me your leather
Take from me my lace
Man:You in the moonlight
With your sleepy eyes
Could you ever love a man like me
And you were right
When I walked into your house
I knew I’d never want to leave
Sometimes I’m a strong man
Sometimes cold and scared
And sometimes I cry
But that time I saw you
I knew with you to light my nights
Somehow I’d get by
First time I saw you
I knew with you to light my nights
Somehow I would get by
Lovers forever face to face
My city your mountains
Stay with me stay
I need you to love me
I need you today
Give to me your leather
Take from me my lace
Lovers forever face to face
My city your mountains
Stay with me stay
I need you to love me
I need you to stay
Give to me your leather
Take from me my lace
Take from me my lace
Take from me my lace