by Simone Allen
On Saturday 15 July 2023, Ons Jabeur played Markéta Vondroušová in the women’s singles final of the Wimbledon tennis tournament. Jabeur was the crowd favourite, pegged to win! My husband and I were sure we would see Jabeur secure her first Wimbledon victory and first ‘grand slam’ title, along with being the first single woman’s tennis player from Africa (she is a Tunisian) to win this coveted title.
Unfortunately this was not the case and it was surprisingly Vondroušová who went on to win the match. At the end of the match, Kate Middleton, Princess of Wales, came onto the grass courts to award both Vondroušová and Jabeur with their trophies. Jabeur received her award from Middleton and gave her acceptance speech for second place admitting the loss to be “the most painful of her career”. At the end of the awards ceremony, Middleton offered Jabeur a hug and rested an empathetic hand upon Jabeur’s arm as she shared some words with the tennis player – a video of this interaction went viral as viewers were moved by the moment of empathy and comfort shown by the Princess of Wales toward the visibly upset Jabeur.
When asked to write this blog, considering the prompt “Man, I feel like a woman”, it was continuously the thought of friendship, love and sisterhood that came to mind for me. I feel that women love each other and demonstrate support and sisterhood so uniquely, and in the above picture this is portrayed so beautifully too – so how does this look in the Bible?
Throughout Scripture we see calls to love and be in unity with our brothers and sisters within the body and to do good to them (Romans 12: 4-5, Colossians 3:12-14, John 17:20-21, Galatians 6:1-10 (all NIV) to list a few). These Scriptures are great reminders of how we as women can love and support one another.
Romans 12:10 (NIV) echoes this sentiment, instructing us (the body) to “Be devoted to one another in love. Honour one another above yourselves.” Wow. Take a moment to consider this instruction – it is no easy feat to get right. We need to be devoted to each other, we need to love each other and we need to honour each other and if this isn’t enough, we should honour one another above ourselves!
A beautiful example of this is the story of Ruth and Naomi found in the book of Ruth in the Old Testament. In short, Naomi’s husband and sons died (talk about traumatic) and Naomi was left a widow, along with her daughters-in-law who also happened to be Moabite women, who were (as the name suggests) from Moab and therefore not local to Bethlehem, the homeland to which Naomi intended to return. In this place of grief and loss, she encouraged her daughters-in-law to return to their mothers home (Ruth 1:8).
While both women were distressed and sad to leave their mother-in-law, Orpah eventually said goodbye. Ruth however, remained and committed to going with Naomi to Bethlehem, leaving Moab behind to commit to a new life with her mother-in-law in a foreign land (1:16-17).
If this is not an example of being devoted to someone in love and honouring them above oneself, I don’t know what is! What an incredible example to us. In this story we see areas of support and devotion worked out through loyalty and action – areas worth pursuing in our devotion toward one another.
A well known verse from this event is when Ruth says to Naomi, “Where you go, I will go, and where you stay I will stay. Your people will be my people and your God my God. Where you die I will die and, and there I will be buried.” (Ruth 1:16-17) Naomi had released Ruth to go yet she fought to be loyal and remain with her.
In friendship we have an opportunity to be loyal and love those women in our body, even when it isn’t easy, or there are more comfortable places to remain. What is incredible is how this loyalty is also not based on what they have in common. Ruth is a foreigner and goes with Naomi to Bethlehem as ‘the Moabite’.
In the body of believers there may be ‘foreigners’, people not quite the same as you, but still we are called to be devoted to our sisters and this is an incredible example of that. “Doing” is another area of devotion that we see in this interaction through Ruth’s insistence to follow Naomi.
We have the privilege of showing our devotion through action. Sometimes when our friends are in need of our support, love or devotion – they tell us otherwise. I have seen this in my own life, as well as in the lives of others: I have insisted I’m okay when I’m not and I’ve insisted I don’t need help, when I do. Perhaps in these instances we don’t want to be an inconvenience, maybe we are dealing with pride and insecurity preventing us from accepting help – whatever the reason – I think there is a powerful message in this biblical story in seeing Ruth insist on following Naomi, in-spite of Naomi urging her not to.
Ruth simply does what she sees as best for her mother-in-law. Boundaries are important but when a woman in our church body is in need I believe through prayer and practical avenues one can still show support and devotion through prayer, sharing Bible verses, dropping off food or groceries, organizing a coffee date, offering to step in and serve in their place – there are many areas in which we can show our love and devotion to one another, accepting that sometimes this may be at our own inconvenience or cost. I don’t think immigrating with her mother-in-law was convenient or comfortable for Ruth, but she did it.
This act of loving through action is also what Paul is addressing in Romans 12:10 (NIV). Our body is made up different women, much like a tennis player and a princess or a Moabite and an Israelite, but we have the gift to love one another, be devoted to one another and honour one another above ourselves. This is the uniqueness of being a woman and something to be enjoyed and celebrated.