Becoming a Woman of Grace

Hints for Personal Loveliness

Be easy to look at

Be easy to listen to

Be easy to talk to

Be easy to work with

Be easy to live with

I recently came across this excerpt from an old etiquette handbook and it really made me pause. I’ve always loved this kind of old-timey etiquette advice. Perhaps it’s the practicality of it all, the how-to’s of a gracious life. I, for one, don’t believe that good manners can ever go out of fashion. We, as a society, would quite possibly be better off if we paid more attention to these old ways.

Of course many points of this excerpt remind me of our lovely & virtuous Proverbs 31 woman. But it mostly reminded me of N.D Wilson’s words;

“Be grace in the world

Be grace to your kids

Be grace to your family

Do not be a panicking person who’s no fun

Be pockets of good weather in the world.”

These words have been echoing in my heart ever since I first read them;

“Be pockets of good weather in the world.”

Isn’t that beautiful?!

Those Hints on Personal Loveliness paint a picture of a gracious woman. A woman who is like good weather to those around her.

The picture of this lovely lady is one of grace. She is gracious in word,deed and appearance. She is someone who, in the words of J. R Miller, “Makes a little spot of the world a sweeter, better, safer place to live.” The atmosphere she carries about her makes it easier for “those to live worthily and beautifully who dwell within its circle.”

And that is my prayer for you, dear daughter.

And for me. That we will be like this lovely, gracious woman. That we will be women who know the grace and goodness of God and who share that grace with our little corner of the world.

That grace should start in our homes first, with our loved ones. Always remember, we should never give away to others what we have not given away at home first. The loveliness that grows out of a heart committed to God and His Word should show itself first to our husbands and children. They are to be the primary recipients of all the grace a life devoted to Christ will produce. When we live to serve those entrusted to our care we are living out God’s will for our lives as Christian women. The making of a lovely home, filled with joy and peace is a tangible way we can bring glory to God.

There is so much more I want to share with you about this topic- It is like a trousseau chest filled with so many lovely things! So this is the first in a series of letters to you about “Becoming a Woman of Grace”.

It’s from a life of overflow that we are enabled to be a blessing to others. Let us remember that, “Charm is deceitful, and beauty is vain, but a woman who fears the LORD is to be praised.

Give her of the fruit of her hands, and let her works praise her in the gates.  (Proverbs 31:30, ESV)