She Shall Be Praised
31:13–27 God has given a woman the unique responsibility of watching over the activities of her household (31:27). The word household shows up three times in this section (31:15, 21, 27), indicating the attention a woman of excellence gives to her family’s needs. She understands the central place that the home plays in the kingdom of God. And while the husband’s role is to be the head of the home, the wife is the chief operating officer—the internal home manager. She is never idle (31:27). Rather than bored, she’s industrious.
What we have here is a person with business acumen (31:14). She spends money wisely and uses it in the best way to get maximum yield for the benefit of her family. That’s what’s happening when she evaluates a field and buys it and plants a vineyard with her earnings (31:16). When Paul encourages women to be “workers at home” (Titus 2:5) and to “manage their households” (1 Tim 5:14), he doesn’t mean they have to stay inside the four walls of a house. He means that everything a woman does outside the home complements what goes on inside it.
The woman does have an outside ministry: she extends her hands to the needy (Prov 31:20). In other words, she’s not engaging on social media all day. She’s not gossiping. Instead, she’s helping the less fortunate. So she’s busy making money, making a difference, and investing in others.
When she does speak, she speaks wisdom, and loving instruction is on her tongue (31:26). She has the ability to use the right words at the right time as she encounters real-life situations. Her husband benefits from the fact that he’s married to such a rare lady (31:23).
31:30 The reason this woman was wise, the reason she could prioritize her family, the reason she had everything in order, is because she took God seriously. She had a divine world-view. The marketplace didn’t control her; her friends didn’t control her; the television didn’t control her. God controlled her.
31:31 The reason we forget to praise women of excellence in our marriages and communities is that we get used to them. We take them for granted. But offering praise is like watering a flower, thus allowing its buds to open up. So praise the godly women in your life and watch them blossom.