My claim that I understand women is outrageous! But being attacked by fierce women is a great motivator for asking for God’s wisdom.
There are three different levels or types of helpful information that can make a difference between success or failure, life or death. Several important ancient authors spoke of this, including the wisest of all Solomon. He spoke of wisdom, understanding, and knowledge, each of which stems from and relates to the three levels of human existence, the spirit, soul, and body. He especially implored the listener to obtain understanding.
Before we are saved we desire knowledge. After we are saved we desire wisdom. It was not until I was 55 years old that I desired understanding.
First came the realization that I was totally lacking in understanding. I was doing things wisely, but had no understanding as to why, or why others were reacting against me.
Wisdom is of the Spirit. Knowledge is carnal, of this world. Understanding, which is of the soul, connects the two areas of our being.
There seems to a deep resistance to understanding, even among believers. "We may never understand why God does what He does!" is almost a mantra! But this excuse for ignorance is total nonsense! "IN ALL THY GETTING, GET UNDERSTANDING!" I am not the originator of this quote. Solomon was. This parable is the before and after of receiving understanding.
I worked with perhaps one of the fiercest women on the face of the earth. She and I had discussed this openly, so this is not back stabbing gossip, but stark truth. Her fierceness in the right circumstances can be a thing of beauty.
This quality of fierceness was brought out in my former colleague (I have since this writing retired) after the father of her child came home drunk, beat her, and marred her with burning cigarettes. She waited till he fell asleep, then carefully sewed him up in the bed sheets. She then took a base ball bat, and proceeded to soften him up until his lung collapsed and his jaw was broken in three places.
Another incident demonstrates her fierceness. New alarms were placed at our work area. The first setting was too sensitive, and the alarms went off repeatedly. When an engineer failed to respond to repeated pages, my fierce colleague took our radio phone over to the alarm, and placed the mouth piece of the phone over the alarm for about a minute, sending the blaring racket over the plant wide public address system.
The engineer showed up almost immediately, and quickly solved the alarm issue. Shortly afterwards they placed a regular phone in our area, and took away our radio phone.
I admit freely that I was not innocent in the conflicts that we had. I was given the name Mad Dog by chance, but I earned the right to keep it for a variety of reasons, one of which was my anger. I rarely lost my temper, but when I did lose my temper I had a gift for sarcasm and belittlement that was an urban legend at work.
Other reasons for conflicts concerned the fact that I am a focused individual, which means that sometimes I lack awareness of what is going on, and mistakes in our area can cost hundreds, and even thousands of dollars.
There is also the structural conflict caused by my third shift personality being tired and grumpy at the end of the shift, and her day shift personality being tired and grumpy at the beginning of the shift.
My constant mistakes were causing this lady a lot of extra work, which in turn were causing conflicts between us.
I was also having conflicts with another fierce woman, my late loving and lovely wife. To say that I was clueless would be the understatement of the century. I was treating both women with old fashioned respect, but my total lack of understanding angered both of them. My only salvation was the blessed fact that they never met and talked, or my dilemma would have been infinitely worse.
My lack of understanding made me assume that whenever our opinions varied, I was right, and they were wrong. In some cases, I would admit that they were right and I was wrong. But in many conflicts, I was unable to see the obvious truth that both parties were right!
The conflicts at work and at home, combined with the real possibility of losing my job and our health insurance, along with my late wife’s deteriorating health were causing a perfect storm of desperation in my prayers, and one day God decided to take me to a mountain top and give me understanding.
My claim to understand women is tempered with the knowledge that my understanding is not a Ph.D., but only beginning class 101. Solomon vastly overreached his God given understanding, and I have made the same mistake more than once, although thankfully I have had only one wife at a time. (Since this writing, Lynne has passed away, and I have remarried .)
The beginning of the unfolding happened when I repented, or turned back to God. Yes, I was already a believer, but I had fallen into a pattern of trying to solve my own desperate problems. I had stopped thanking God and praising God, and my prayer life was a constant whining about how miserable my life was. I had forsaken my original commitment to praise God always, and thank Him in all things and for all things.
I began to worship and praise Him 24/7 and I began to thank Him always. I began to seek to understand God, rather than understand others, or to get others to understand me. As I turned back to Him, and as my thankfulness returned, I began to glorify the Triune God, and my foolish darkened heart was enlightened.
As I renewed my worship of God, and as I sought to understand Him more deeply, He shared with me the key. This key to understanding women is simple and somewhat obvious, so much so that when I share it with you, you will slap your forehead and say “duh!” Yet most men do not have this key!
As I looked more and more at the beauty of God, my understanding awakened, and God gave me the “duh” key for understanding women. I had known that men were in the image of God, but I had thought of women as alien creatures, unfathomable, incomprehensible, a mystery hidden in a riddle inside of an enigma. But God shared with me, His ignorant but inquiring child, that women are also made in God’s image.
Women being made in the image of God explained the incomprehensible fierceness, for God is also a fierce God, with burning passions. I quit treating my fiery colleague and my equally fiery wife as weak and helpless childish creatures, and began to respect them as fellow warriors in the battle of life. I quit trying to help them do their job, and focused on doing my own.
God opened my eyes to finances, and I sought to invest in companies that had the focus of men and the awareness of women. I bought low and sold high, and at the height of the stock market boom, I withdrew all my 401K and spent it lavishly on my now loving and respectful wife.
Her health was rapidly failing, and my spoiling her in her last days was the best investment I have ever made. God’s great grace began to work a spirit of great peace on our area, and the quiet that prevailed among the tower operators was notable in all the plant, and just a little frightening.
If any one came into our area with a false accusation about one of us, my fierce colleague sent them scarred and scurrying. Former enemies began working harmoniously together. People observed and shook their heads in wonderment.
My colleague has been told this whole story, and so far she has not laid claim to any of the money I made in the stock market, nor expected any thing more than what she has always wanted, the towers running smoothly when she arrives.
The real credit goes to the Lord God Almighty, whose great and merciful gift of grace can work wonders in an ignorant man, a fierce woman, and a tumultuous factory. And now you know why my passion for worship has deepened. Praise His mighty name!
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