Calling out the vile currency and conduct of a fickle and flawed culture.

You know, I think I get you,

and I admire your authenticity.

I’m so sorry for all the

pain and suffering which

brought you to this point,

and also for what is to follow.

History will record your contempt,

sarcasm, exile and fate, but not

how egregiously he failed you,

disguised in defiant deflection.

 

However, your story did not

start with contempt at all.

He turned your sister away, but

he wanted you and the power.

In a showdown, he then doubled

down on your father’s bridal price.

Currency set to male foreskins.

To him, you were worth not 100,

but 200 foreskins, and he delivered.

Still, you loved your husband.

 

When your father turned on

your husband, you deceived the

former to protect the latter.

Your husband fled for his life, but

he abandoned you, and your

father cashed in on your hurt.

He gave you to another man.

No recorded foreskin price.

Discarded by the first owner,

marital possession of another.

 

Meanwhile, your first husband,

now king, married more women.

Despite his obvious disregard

for the law of Moses, he decided

that he also wanted you back, and—

WHAT THE KING WANTS, HE GETS!

The king’s agent escorted you, now

only the 100-foreskin-wife, back.

Second husband followed, sobbing.

He must have truly loved you.

 

This brings us to that moment.

You despised the man, the one

whom you opened your soul to.

The one who crushed it without

remorse and without regret.

The one who betrayed your

most intimate inner confidence.

Power and lust drove him to defile

the sanctity of all his marriages.

He saw. He seized. He violated.

 

Your sarcasm stung his ego.

You did not despise his worship,

only how boldly he exposed himself,

and how cowardly he hid behind God.

Still the ongoing narrative of men doing

vile things in the name of the Lord.

Your sarcasm stung his ego, and

to this day, some preachers still

follow suit, hang you out to dry,

and delight in your painful fate.

 

Now, I cannot and will not

presume to know what your

first husband’s motives were

when he deflected your contempt.

He was, udoubtedly, worthy of his title;

A MAN AFTER GOD’S OWN HEART,

but it speaks louder about the mercies

and grace of our faithful Living God,

and less so about the actions of His

beloved, but undeserving steward.

 

I want you to know that I get you.

Like me, you were created in

the image of our Living God.

Notwithstanding societal culture,

our God-breathed female DNA has

remained unchanged since creation.

Never meant to be oppressed,

exploited, violated, cheated on, or

traded like possessions, not even by

the greatest king ahead of the Messiah.

 

Let me conclude by saying—

I’ll admit that I find the

societal norms of your time

repulsive and abhorrent,

and in your shoes, I would’ve

been considered an

unbecoming, even a

repugnant Hebrew woman.

But I’m a Gentile woman,

redeemed by your Messiah.

 

He came to uplift women, and

restore the definition of marriage.

Union of two in holy matrimony.

Two equal sides of the same coin.

Husband and wife, side-by-side,

neither one the skipper, only Jesus.

No sales transaction, no foreskins.

Safe, secure sanctuary of trust.

Confidential. Intimate. Vulnerable.

The very best of two in one.