True Women Come Together

Leslie Basham: What is a true woman?

Woman on the street #1: Oh man, that is the ultimate question.

Leslie Basham: Paula Hendricks explored that question with some women on their lunch hour. Paula’s a blogger on TrueWoman.com.

Paula Hendricks: What do you think true womanhood is?

Woman on the street #1: Doing what you want, and not being asked where I’m goin’ and when I’m coming back because when I get there I get there. Point blank.

Paula Hendricks: So being in control?

Woman on the street #1: Yeah. Right. Exactly.

Leslie Basham: It’s an important question, and tough for most people to answer on the spot.

Woman on the street #2: That’s a really good question.

Leslie Basham: And we appreciate those who were willing to share their thoughts.

Paula Hendricks: What do you think a true woman is?

Woman on the street #3: A woman who has a job and more or less takes care of herself. Free and happy. (laughter)

Paula Hendricks: Are you free and happy?

Woman on the street #3: Oh, yeah.

Paula Hendricks: And what makes you free and happy?

Woman on the street #3: Security. A roof over my head and food in my stomach.

Paula Hendricks: What do you think a true woman is?

Woman on the street #4: I would describe a true woman as a true human being with sex organs that are different than men.

Paula Hendricks: What would you say is a woman’s most important role is?

Woman on the street #3: Being happy. Getting what they want.

Paula Hendricks: Would you say other than physiological differences, are there any other differences between men and women?

Woman on the street #4: You know, no, I don’t see them.

Woman on the street #5: Not in today’s society the way that there used to be, no I don’t.

Paula Hendricks: Who would you say is the authority on what it means to be a woman?

Woman on the street #3: I kind of learned on my own.

Woman on the street #4: I think I’ve carved out my own path.

Woman on the street #5: I just try to live the best I can.

Leslie Basham: How would you answer if Paula wandered up to you.

Paula Hendricks: What do you think a true woman is?

Woman on the street #6: A true woman follows God, is faithful in her work, is faithful in her family, is faithful in just about every corner of her life.

Paula Hendricks: So do you think every women out there just intuitively knows how to be a woman?

Woman on the street #7: No. So I guess we would say the Bible, because the Bible teaches us the roles that all of us play: as parents, wives, husbands, children.

Leslie Basham: This past weekend thousands of women did look to the Bible to learn how to become God’s true women.

Kay Arthur (message): God, You know what you designed for me to be. I want to fulfill Your purpose for me. Speak to me through Your Word.

Leslie Basham: This group converged at the Fort Worth Convention Center to discover and embrace God’s unique design for their lives.

Kay Arthur (message): The time for you to decide what kind of woman you want to be is now!

Mary Kassian (message): True womanhood is not about exalting womanhood. True womanhood is about exalting Jesus.

Nancy Leigh DeMoss (message): We’re praying that God will send out thousands of women from this place to live out the message of true womanhood and to reproduce that message into the lives of those around us.

Kay Arthur: (message) Women play a pivotal role. Not only in the times in which we live, but in the future of a nation.

Mary Kassian (message): Because we know that when we get womanhood right, we glorify God and we put the Gospel on display.

Leslie Basham: This is Revive Our Hearts with Nancy Leigh DeMoss for Thursday, October 21.

Nancy Leigh DeMoss (message): I believe that God has given us an opportunity today to be a part of His great redemptive plan for “such a time as this.”

Leslie Basham: One week ago today, women arrived at the Fort Worth Convention Center.

Bob Lepine: Well, good evening. Welcome to True Woman ’10 here in beautiful downtown Fort Worth. My name is Bob Lepine from FamilyLife Today, and it is great to be here with you ladies.

Leslie Basham: We’re about to explore the question: What is a true woman? We’ll do it be hearing from some of the speakers and attendees who came together last weekend.

Bob Lepine: We’re going to hear our opening message tonight from Dr. Crawford Loritts.

Dr. Crawford Loritts (message): I really want to kick off this conference talking about an old-fashioned word that we need to grab a hold of. It’s the word worldliness.

Lori Pajeau: What I appreciated about Crawford’s message was how we need to unplug from things of the world and make sure we’re putting our first attention and love into the Lord and not be distracted by other things.

Dr. Crawford Loritts (message): What in the world do we want?

Dr. Crawford Loritts (interview): I talked about the influence of the world on us. Sometimes when we talk about worldliness people think we are getting a little weird and spooky.

Dr. Crawford Loritts (message): You can’t say that someone is worldly because they live more comfortably than we do, or because they have more liberties than we do. You can’t say that someone is worldly because they have a shorter list of rules than we do.

Dr. Crawford Loritts (interview): But the culture has drastically influenced us. I think we’ve come through a season in Christianity in this culture and in this country over the last 20 years where we’ve gotten so close to the world, frankly, because we’re a little bit embarrassed to be identified waving the flag of biblical Christianity, and we so much wanted to be in vogue that there has been a compromise of our holiness, our walk with God, and these things have tended to redefine us.

Dr. Crawford Loritts (message): We’re not to have an internal attitude of allegiance to this world’s system.

Dr. Crawford Loritts (interview): You can’t change or impact that which you worship.

Dr. Crawford Loritts (message): Maybe the question is not so much the influence of the world but the legitimacy of our relationship with God.

Lori Pajeau: He is to be our first love.

Dr. Crawford Loritts (message): Loving God is everything!

Lori Pajeau: And there are just so many things that want to draw us away from Him. We can do it very unknowingly. And things that seem reasonable and okay, like work and family, can become too much of a focus.

Dr. Crawford Loritts (message): Does what I want consume me? Control me? Or change me?

Lori Pajeau: Then we lose our attention and first love. So that really struck me. I really appreciated his focus on that.

Dr. Crawford Loritts (message): Does this desire, this person’s opinion of me, or issue, is it controlling my behavior? If the answer is yes, by default, we’ve just committed idolatry. Ask the worship question.

Dr. Crawford Loritts (interview): I really believe that once we understand why we were created and who we represent in the context of human history, then the world will respond to the truth of God’s Word. But if we compromise who we are and try to be so much like the culture in which we live, then we will really abort that which transforms our lives.

Nancy Leigh DeMoss (message): I’m so grateful for our brother, Crawford, who has delivered a message from God’s Word, a powerful message about what we love. I want to pick up on some of those themes in a different passage.

Fern Nichols (interview): Oh Nancy, she’s just absolutely anointed

Nancy Leigh DeMoss (message): The book of Titus, chapter 2

Fern Nichols (interview): Paul’s thoughts to Titus, Holy Spirit thoughts, of who woman is in the sight of God and what God wants to do in and through her life. It was very riveting

Mary Kassian (interview): Nancy asked three questions at the beginning of her session.

Nancy Leigh DeMoss (message): What in the world is a true woman? How can we become true women? What difference does it make whether or not we are true women?

Mary Kassian (message): A true woman is someone who embraces . . .

Nancy Leigh DeMoss (message): . . . the Word of God.

Mary Kassian (message): Who says, “Yes” to doing things God’s way.

Nancy Leigh DeMoss (message): How can we become true women?

Mary Kassian (message): We become true women when we take a look at Scripture and begin to use Scripture as our guide for how to live our lives rather than just turning to our own gut feeling as to who we should be as women.

Nancy Leigh DeMoss (message): I’ll tell you what the world will believe. They will be persuaded by the reality of the Gospel as they see it lived out in our lives and our relationships.

Lori Pajeau: Probably the one the resonated the most was we need to have character before we can pursue a calling.

Nancy Leigh DeMoss (message): Life comes before ministry. You can’t teach others what you have not learned or are not practicing yourself.

Lori Pajeau: That’s what I admire about Nancy. I think she’s very authentic in her walk. That’s one thing, in every message she’s very honest with the listeners.

Nancy Leigh DeMoss (message): I know that there are areas of my life where I say, “I can’t teach that to others, I’m not there in my own walk, in my own character. That’s why Paul says you need to have character that is in accord with sound doctrine and then you can turn around and teach those who are coming behind.

Mary Kassian (message): Why does it matter? Well, ultimately why it matters is male and female were created to display the glory of God.

Nancy Leigh DeMoss (message): Oh ladies, there is so much more at stake here than just our individual lives. There’s the ripple effect of our lives that extends much further than most of us realize, our impact on the unbelieving world. That’s what makes Christianity believable—when we live as Christian women of God. So I would ask you tonight, does your life cause husband, your children, others around you to disrespect or to doubt or to revile God’s Word? Does it give them ammunition to attack the Gospel you claim to believe? Or does your life adorn, enhance to doctrine of the Gospel of Christ?

Susan Hunt: I love to watch Nancy Leigh DeMoss and to see how the Lord is using her. I think one of the reasons I love to watch her is because I know this is not a woman who seeks the spotlight but she’s a woman with God’s call on her life and she obediently yields to that call, even though the cost is high. I have some idea of the cost that it has been to her. But women can identify with her. She is so approachable, and all of us feel that Nancy cares individually about us—and she does; she really does.

Nancy Leigh DeMoss (message): Don’t underestimate the impact of your swimming upstream, of living a Gospel-centered life by the grace and power of Christ.

Leslie Basham: The next morning the True Woman conference picked back up with Kay Arthur.

Kay Arthur (message): Do you want to be a true woman? What God intended you to be: godly, righteous, loving, faithful, holy, fulfilled—not frustrated, triumphant and not defeated, a woman of God for this time and hour? Do you want to be that kind of woman?

Natalie Heinrich: She was just phenomenal.

Kay Arthur (message): Answer me! Do you? (applause)

Natalie Heinrich: I love direct people who don’t sugar coat and who just hit you right in the core.

Kay Arthur (message):If you want to be a woman of God, this Book has to be your daily bread.

Natalie Heinrich: I do a lot of Bible studies which are great, but I’m not studying the Word, word for word like I should be. Where she can literally say in . . .

Kay Arthur (message): . . . Matthew 4:4, Jesus quoted it to the devil, and He says, “It is written, man does not live by bread alone but by every word that comes out of the mouth of God.”

Natalie Heinrich: I spent my whole life in school and two-and-a-half years day in and day out—8-20 hours a day studying to be in a profession. But I haven’t studied to be in the profession that I was called to be in. I think, “Look at all the time we spent in a career, but we won’t spend it in the Word of God. So how can we be prepared to do anything?”

Kay Arthur (message): You hold in your hands, precious ones, the very Words of God.

Natalie Heinrich: She’s the one that really stuck with me this week.

Nancy Leigh DeMoss (conference): Well, I’m privileged to be the one to introduce our next speaker who has a heart for passing the baton of faith on to the next generation—Fern Nichols. Would you greet her?

Leslie Basham: Fern Nichols from Moms In Touch International told the story of a paralyzed man who couldn’t get to Jesus because of a crowd.

Fern Nichols (message): And yet he had four friends . . .

Leslie Basham: . . . who lowered him from a hole in the roof.

Fern Nichols (message): They believed that if they took their sick friend to Jesus, that Jesus could take what was impossible and putting it face to face with the Almighty God, could make it possible and heal this man.

Leslie Basham: And Jesus responded with a miracle.

Fern Nichols (message): Not only did he heal the man, He saved him!

Leslie Basham: Fern then called the audience to be like those four friends.

Fern Nichols (message): This is what happens when we come together in united prayer. We take a corner of the mat and we place our child who does not know Jesus on the mat. As intercessors, we cry out; we pour out our heart like water before the face of our Lord.

Leslie Basham: Fern says it make a big difference when women pray together.

Fern Nichols (message): We’re going to stand up and this is going to be a moment in which you are going to gather around in little groups of two, three, or four and be mat carriers for one another’s children.

Fern Nichols (interview): What a privilege to come together with other intercessors and cry out to God for their salvation.

Fern Nichols (message): We we’re going to pray for the lost; we’re going to pray for the prodigal; we’re going to pray for our schools.

Fern Nichols (interview): I heard a lot of response on the mat.

Tim Challies (blogger): I go to a lot of pastors’ conferences and see a lot of talk about prayer, but I don’t see a lot of prayer.

Leslie Basham: Blogger Tim Challies was covering the True Woman conference.

Tim Challies: That’s what really jumped out to me at this conference is how much prayer there is; how much the women are praying, and how much the leaders are encouraging the women to pray. There is prayer before the sessions, during them, after them. It’s really impressed me—this total commitment and dependence on prayer has been really neat to see. I think the pastors’ conferences could learn quite a bit from that.

Fern Nichols (interview): Prayer is powerful.

Karen Loritts (message): I talked about the blood of Jesus. I was in defensive prayer. I went; I was battling for the very soul of our family.

Fern Nichols (interview): What was so sweet about Karen as she spoke to the women, she really bared her heart.

Bob Lepine: Would you welcome to our platform Karen Loritts.

Fern Nichols (interview): That it’s not always easy to be a true woman.

Karen Loritts (message): Our family was violated by someone we had loved and known for over 20 years. Ladies, let me tell you, I have never been so broken and in such despair and so worried about our little family as I had been that night in February.

Anjila Holiday: Okay, I get that.

Fern Nichols (interview): I’m sure she touched many hearts with being so vulnerable.

Anjila Holiday: I get that completely when she said her family was split down the middle. Yes, when she said she wanted it to go back to normal—I get that.

Karen Loritts (message): I wanted to take my fist and punch somebody. I wanted to hurt somebody for hurting my husband and my four children.

Fern Nichols (interview): A true woman who trusts and obeys God’s Word.

Karen Loritts (message): “He who trusts in his own heart is a fool, but he who walks wisely will be delivered.” And God, I need deliverance. I don’t know what is going to happen to our family.

James MacDonald (message): I knew what it is to kneel down and pray. I had all that. I had the kneel down thing. But I had to learn what it was to lay down on the carpet and see your tears falling this far from your face [a few inches]. I did not have that. I have it now.

Leslie Basham: Pastor James MacDonald.

Pastor James MacDonald (message): Really, a three-year period of time my wife and I have gone through. When I began to study and preach these things, I didn’t really think it would ever end. Our church was on the verge of bankruptcy, we had people leaving en masse, I had cancer, I had a prodigal daughter that was absolutely breaking our hearts.

Woman: Sometimes you have to go through those trials to get that knowledge and wisdom you can share with other people.

Pastor James MacDonald (message): The difference between a heart-broken follower of Jesus and a heart-broken person without hope and without God in this world is the difference between day and night. That’s why Christians have difficult marriages; that’s why Christians have difficult children. That’s your chance, man! That’s your chance to shine for the Lord! To stand for Him. To show how awesome He is!

Karen Loritts (message): Your plan is perfect—bewildering, puzzling, troubling; but perfect. Ladies, I commit to trust and obey God.

Leslie: The True Woman conference reconvened with author, Mary Kassian.

Mary Kassian (message): When God created male and female, He provided an object lesson. He provided a parable, as it were, of His character and of His entire redemptive plan.

Carolyn McCulley: I thoroughly enjoy sitting under Mary Kassian’s teaching and especially hearing her latest messages around Girls Gone Wise.

Mary Kassian (message): When God described the work of His Son as the sacrifice of a husband for His bride, He was telling us, in Ephesians chapter 5, why He made male and female and why He created marriage and sex. Christ and His bride is the reason.

Carolyn McCulley: She brings so much fun and energy to the situation, with so much biblical wisdom.

Mary Kassian (message): These are critical images, women. These are critical images that reveal the nature and character of God to us and to our world.

Carolyn McCulley: You enjoy it and you hear it and you receive it without realizing we’re getting heavy duty teaching here.

Mary Kassian (message): It’s not because we want to go back to the 1950s. It’s not because we want to come up with another checklist of what womanhood should look like or establish a new formula for women’s happiness or show how many people we can get on our side or start a competition about whose ideas are best. We bang on the womanhood drum because we know that when we get womanhood right, we glorify God and we put the Gospel on display.

Nancy Leigh DeMoss (message): How many of us with words have chipped away at the courage and the faith and the manhood of the men around us? Can we put an end to that?

Leslie Basham: On Saturday morning Nancy Leigh DeMoss opened the Bible and focused on the story of Deborah.

Nancy Leigh DeMoss (message): Here’s a woman who shows the model of being an encourager. She inspired courage, rather than tearing down this man.

Anjila Holiday: That’s something I had to learn.

Nancy Leigh DeMoss (message): Some of these men are so patient with us women being controlling and conniving and manipulative and like Ford, always having a better idea.

Anjila Holiday: This weekend, I’m really able to say, “I’ve learned something.” I’ve always been that strong person.

Nancy Leigh DeMoss (message): The battle was located far from where Deborah lived. She could have stayed behind on the sidelines, uninvolved. But she had to get involved because God had a call on her life, and she had a heart for God and a heart for His people.

Paula Hendricks: What do you think true womanhood is?

Fern Nichols (Manifesto reading): We believe that God is the sovereign Lord of the universe.

Nancy Leigh DeMoss (Manifesto reading): We consecrate ourselves to fulfill His calling and purposes for our lives . . .

Fern Nichols (Manifesto reading): . . . to bring Him glory.

Nancy Leigh DeMoss (Manifesto reading): We will seek to love the Lord our God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength.

Paula Hendricks: Would you say, other than physiological differences, that there are any differences between men and women?

Mary Kassian (Manifesto reading): We believe that the creation of humanity as male and female was a purposeful and magnificent part of God’s wise plan.

Ginger Georges (Manifesto reading): Men and women are both created in the image of God and are equal in value and dignity.

Nancy Leigh DeMoss (Manifesto reading): We will show proper respect to both men and women..

Mary Kassian (Manifesto reading): Man and women were designed to reflect the image of God in complementary and distinct ways.

Ginger Georges (Manifesto reading): They have distinct roles and functions in the home and in the church.

Paula Hendricks: Are you free and happy?

Rene Hanebutt (Manifesto reading): We believe sin has separated human beings from God.

Nancy Leigh DeMoss (Manifesto reading): We glad yield control of our lives to Christ as Lord.

Rene Hanebutt (Manifesto reading): Our only hope of restoration and salvation is found in repenting of our sin and trusting in Christ who lived a sinless life, died in our place, and was raised from the dead.

Nancy Leigh DeMoss (Manifesto reading): We will say, “Yes, Lord” to the Word and to the will of God.

Paula Hendricks: Who would you say is the authority on what it means to be a woman?

Angela Temples (Manifesto reading): Scripture is God’s authoritative means of instructing us in His ways . . .

Nancy Leigh DeMoss (Manifesto reading): We will be women of the Word . . .

Angela Temples (Manifesto reading): . . . and reveals His holy pattern for our womanhood.

Nancy Leigh DeMoss (Manifesto reading): . . . seeking to grow in our knowledge of Scripture.

Paula Hendricks: So do you think that everyone out there just intuitively knows how to be a woman?

Nancy Leigh DeMoss (Manifesto reading): We will live out the mandate of Titus 2 as older women, modeling godliness . . .

Devi Titus (Manifesto reading): . . . by discipling younger women in the Word and ways of God and modeling for the next generation lives of fruitful femininity.

Nancy Leigh DeMoss (Manifesto reading): . . . as younger women, receiving instruction with meekness and humility.

Paula Hendricks: What would you say a woman’s most important role is?

Rhona Macgregor (Manifesto reading): All women, whether married or single, are to model femininity in their various relationships . . .

Nancy Leigh DeMoss (Manifesto reading): We will seek to establish homes that manifest the love, grace, beauty, and order of God . . . 

Rhona Macgregor(Manifesto reading): . . . by exhibiting a distinctive modesty, responsiveness, and gentleness of spirit.

Nancy Leigh DeMoss (Manifesto reading): . . . and extend Christian hospitality to those outside the walls of our homes.

Yvonne Welch (Manifesto reading): We are called as women to affirm and encourage men as they seek to express godly masculinity and to honor and to support male leadership in the home and in the church.

PJ Beets (Manifesto reading): To demonstrate a noble submission to authority that reflects Christ’s submission to God His Father.

Nancy Leigh DeMoss (Manifesto reading): We will honor the sacredness, purity, and permanence of the marriage covenant whether ours or others.

Kristyn Getty (Manifesto reading): Human life is precious to God and is to be valued and protected from the point of conception until rightful death.

Amy Lumpkins (Manifesto reading): Women are uniquely designed to be bearers and nurturers of life . . .

Nancy Leigh DeMoss (Manifesto reading): We will receive children as a blessing from the Lord.

Amy Lumpkins (Manifesto reading): . . . whether their own biological or adopted children, brothers and sisters, nieces and nephews, or other children in their sphere of influence.

Nancy Leigh DeMoss (Manifesto reading): And we will pray for a movement of revival and reformation among God’s people that will result in the advancement of the Kingdom and Gospel of Christ among all nations.

Nancy Leigh DeMoss (message): What does it mean to be a true woman? If somebody asked you, if Paula asked you . . .

Paula Hendricks: What do you think a true woman is?

Nancy Leigh DeMoss (message): . . . what would you say? What is a true woman? What does a true woman look like?

Leslie Basham: We’ve been exploring the question: What is a true woman? We’ve heard portions of the True Woman Conference that began a week ago today. What next? I hope you’ll ask God to give you a fuller definition of biblical womanhood.

I hope you’ll take some next steps. You’ll hear many of the complete True Woman messages over the coming months on Revive Our Hearts, so I hope you’ll keep listening. You can also read the True Woman Manifesto for yourself by visiting ReviveOurHearts.com. While there, you can add your name to the document.

Today when you make a donation of any amount to the ministry of Revive Our Hearts, we’ll send you the book, Voices of the True Woman Movement. It includes chapters from the speakers from the first True Woman Conference. You’ll better understand what it means to be a true woman of God through these pages.

Ask for Voices of the True Woman Movement when you donate any amount. Our number is 1-800-569-5959, or donate at ReviveOurHearts.com.

Do you ever find that your prayer time feels like reading a grocery list to God? Learn how to go deeper tomorrow on Revive Our Hearts.

Revive Our Hearts with Nancy Leigh DeMoss is an outreach of Life Action Ministries.

*Offers available only during the broadcast of the podcast season.