Like the portraits of other women of her time period, she is the very embodiment of the image we conjure when we hear the phrase “God-fearing woman.” To call someone that today would sound archaic, maybe even tongue-in-cheek, but in Nancy’s day it would have been recognized as high praise, a direct reference to Proverbs 31:30. One suspects that if the artist had broadened his scope to include her torso, we would find her hands death-gripping a worn copy of the KJV. Nancy, in particular, wears the look of a woman who doesn’t get the joke. I take from their frozen expressions that life was not easy for them.

We refer to them affectionately as “the ancestors,” upstanding citizens of Congregationalist and Presbyterian stock, whose very frowns seem intent on keeping civilization from faltering. They are David and Nancy Coy of Homer, New York, my great-grandmother’s great-grandparents on my mother’s side. In my mother’s house hang two small, oval portraits of a man and a woman dating back to the late 1700s. For the purpose of the business at hand, I think Proverbs 31:30 deserves a second look-for what it says about women, and more, for what it says about God.

Arguably no chapter in Scripture is more over-referenced when it comes to addressing women, but stick with me as we teeter on the brink of cloying triteness. If you had told me five years ago that I would one day write a book for Christian women that led off with a quote from Proverbs 31, I probably would have punched you in the face.

None Like Him by Jen Wilkin