How to be prepared for ANYTHING you face today

Perhaps the most notable thing about the virtuous woman is how she wakes up.

Have you noticed it?

Proverbs 31 tells us the virtuous woman gets up early and “dresses herself with strength.”

Now some women are naturally “strong” and The Proverbs 31 woman would seem to be one of them. We see her facing challenges with confidence. We see her laughing at the future, speaking kindly to her children, making wise decisions and providing for her family. We see her serving the needy.

But Scripture is so good! It shows us another side to this “strong” woman. Scripture show us the virtuous woman in the morning, when she first gets up.

Here we see her at the start of her day, before the others arise. She is dressing herself… but not with a fashionable top and flowing skirt. She is dressing herself with a mindset.

In other words, she isn’t necessarily a natural when it comes to waking up strong. She puts her pants on one leg at a time like the rest of us. Proverbs 31:17 tells us the virtuous woman’s means and method to being strong:

She dresses.

“Dressing” is a skill, a learned practice. It is not a natural ability that you either have or you don’t. {Isn’t that great news?}

The phrase here “to dress” means “preparing one’s self for something that requires readiness, strength, or endurance.”

Which pretty much describes life, yes?

Women and girls of all ages can learn how to put on the strength of the Lord in preparation for what lies ahead. Morning after morning.

She dresses herself.

We each must come to the place where we don’t expect others to make life easy for us.

As we learn to dress ourselves, we eliminate the “props” that hold us up and instead are stregthened by the Lord alone. When this happens, we stop making demands of our husband, children, friends, and church family. We stop emotional manipulation, tantrums, etc to get our own needs and desires met. We have learned to withstand difficulty.

I’ve known many women- even older women- who have never learned how to dress themselves with strength. They expect others around them to make their lives easier or more comfortable. They are “high maintenance” women.

Even if this describes us, the Bible has great news! No matter where we are on the spectrum, we can dress ourselves and be in a position to serve others. What tremendous freedom and joy!

She dresses herself with strength.

It is interesting to see what the virtuous woman clothes herself with: strength! Ever wonder why that particular trait is pointed out? I think it is because God places us as women in situations where we are overwhelmed.

The demands He places on us are flat out beyond our abilities. Just like the disciples in Mark 6:32-37, Jesus places us in these situation where we are stretched beyond our capabilities. There are multitudes of people around us with legitimate needs and demands and Jesus turns to us and says, “You feed them!”

Seriously?!

When we wake up to this kind of day, we can either sit there overwhelmed….or we can take up faith and clothe ourselves with the strength God supplies.

My friend, unless we have a good, solid understanding of how God equips and strengthens, we will either flatline or wear ourselves out serving in our own strength.

But when we understand that God graciously intends to include us in the fulfillment of His miraculous plans, we can begin clothing ourselves in His strength (see I Peter 4:10-11).

Whatever kind of day you are waking up to today, don’t miss out on living it in God’s strength! It’s a great day to start dressing strong … so let’s get to it!

To help you develop a “strong” morning routine, might I recommend this resource from my friend Crystal? I love what Crystal has done and her personal example of dressing with strength each morning. You can see what I mean by viewing Day One of her online course here. It’s FREE!

Let’s get serious about dressing ourselves with strength, sisters!

~AJ

Similar Posts

One Comment

  1. I love this reminder. I’ve read this verse many times but never looked at it intentionally. Dressing strong first thing tomorrow morning!

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.