9 Women in the Old Testament to Guide Your Walk with Christ
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Men often top the list of role-model-worthy Bible characters — think David, Moses, Abraham, or Joshua. In spite their great shortcomings, we can still look to them as examples in our own faith journey. After all, they were regular human beings, flawed just as we are, yet they teach us much about what it looks like to walk in alignment with the ways of the Lord.
But it’s not just men who earn these spots as examples. God’s Word is filled with a number of women who can teach us just as much as men. And men and women alike can learn much from these biblical women to shape and guide their own spiritual growth.
Here are nine women in the Old Testament to guide your walk with Christ.
1. Eve
In spite of Eve’s negative identity, we can learn much from the first woman God created. In Genesis 2:20-22, we’re told God created her to be the companion of the man. For as God said in Genesis 2:18, “It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him.”
The Hebrew word translated as “helper” is ezer, which also means “staff” or “strength.” So we can see that God’s intention in making the woman was to be a partner to come alongside the man and help strengthen him. This is an important role for womankind, and today we all can draw lessons from this. Women are not intended simply to be “protected by” man or “provided for” by man but to work and be helpful as an equal partner, strengthening their male partner so that, together, the man and woman can be pleasing to the Lord.
We can also take a lesson from how Eve went astray. Scripture tells us God warned Adam, the first man, not to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil (Genesis 2:17), and Eve knew this as well (Genesis 3:2-3). However, in spite of this knowledge, the serpent convinced Eve to eat from the tree anyway. She did, also offering some of it fruit to the man, who also ate, ultimately displeasing the Lord and getting them kicked out of the Garden of Eden (Genesis 3:16-23).
The lesson for us in our walk today is that we must listen to and obey God and no one else. God’s voice is the only one that matters. Do not heed the voices of the world.
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2. Shiphrah and Puah
Their names might not sound familiar to you, but you probably know these women by their actions. Shiphrah and Puah were the midwives who disobeyed the king of Egypt and did not kill the Hebrew male babies during childbirth. Shiphrah and Puah had been ordered to do so because the Hebrew men were becoming so numerous that the Egyptian king felt threatened by the growing population.
Back then, Egypt used the Hebrews as slaves, treating them harshly. But the Bible tells us Shiphrah and Puah “feared God and did not do what the king of Egypt had told them to do; they let the boys live” (Exodus 1:17). When the king summoned the women and asked why they disobeyed him, they lied and informed the king the Hebrew women were “vigorous” and gave birth before their arrival (v. 19). God rewarded them for what they did, and ultimately, the midwives’ actions enables the Hebrew population to grow and for Moses, God’s chosen servant, to be saved.
The lesson here is that sometimes you have to break the world’s rules to follow God’s rules. We might risk being summoned before the king, and even risk our lives to do this, but God’s rules trump the world’s rules, always.
3. Miriam
Miriam is another biblical woman whose story can help guide our walk with Christ. Miriam is the sister of Moses and Aaron, and she is the first woman in Scripture to be identified as a prophet (Exodus 15:20). Scholars credit her for helping Moses compose and lead the song sung when the Israelites crossed the Red Sea to safety when they left Egypt. Exodus 15:20 tells us Miriam took a timbrel (percussion instrument) in hand and led the women in dancing, singing to them in praise of the Lord.
She is also thought to have been the sister who looked out for baby Moses on the Nile (Exodus 2:1-10). While that passage does not name her, 1 Chronicles 6:3 later lists the children of Amram (Moses’s father) as Aaron, Moses and Miriam, so one can infer she is the sister who watched Moses until the Pharoah’s daughter rescued him from the river. She would also be the one who suggested the princess find a Hebrew woman to nurse the child, so Moses was allowed to stay with his mother until he was weaned.
Later, Miriam (and her brother, Aaron) challenged Moses’s leadership and she was punished, though God later healed Miriam after Moses asked for this (Numbers 12:11).
From Miriam’s life we can learn that women have a role as godly leaders in society. God gifted her both with prophetic vision and with dancing and musical skill, and she used those gifts to serve him. We, too, are encouraged to use the gifts God gives us for his purpose.
We can also learn that we should be very careful about challenging the leadership of those whom God has implicitly chosen as favored.
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4. Zipporah
Another woman whose story can guide our Christian walk is Zipporah. The wife of Moses and mother of his sons, Gershom and Eliezer, the Bible tells us that she helped save Moses’s life with her quick thinking. Scripture tells us that Moses headed to Egypt to do God’s will, but at a lodging place along the way, God met Moses and was about to kill him. However, the Bible says, “But Zipporah took a flint knife, cut off her son’s foreskin and touched Moses’ feet with it. ‘Surely you are a bridegroom of blood to me,’ she said. So the Lord let him alone. (At that time she said ‘bridegroom of blood,’ referring to circumcision)” (Exodus 4:25-26).
Zipporah’s quick thinking and quick action likely saved her husband’s and son’s lives that night.
Somehow, she understood the quick thing to do and say, and she did what was required.
We, too, should do the same. Sometimes, God gives us a flash of insight into the right thing to do. When this happens, we must do like Zipporah did, right away, without hesitation.
5. Rahab
Rahab’s story is found in the Book of Joshua. A non-Israelite prostitute living in enemy territory, Rahab seems like an unlikely role model. Yet when God’s spies take refuge in her home, she conceals them from her king, then asks the spies — in exchange for her continued silence — to save her and her family’s lives when the Israelites invade (Joshua 2:8-14). She also ferries them to safety, lowering them down the city wall by a rope through her window. The spies keep their word, and she goes on to become an Israelite herself and to father Boaz, an ancestor of both King David and Jesus.
The lesson we can learn from Rahab is that your past doesn’t matter, nor does your reputation or your place of birth. You, too, can choose God’s “winning team” and find redemption and rescue.
It’s never too late to repent and choose Christ.
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6. Deborah
Deborah has the distinction of being not only a prophet of the Lord but also the only female judge in early Israel. Before Israel had kings, they had judges; these judges led the people, settled disputes and managed military campaigns. When the Israelites were threatened by an enemy, and God called Barak to lead the Israelites’ military action, Barak would not do so unless Deborah accompanied him (Judges 4:8) — so she did. She rode into battle alongside Barak, and God led them to victory.
We can learn several things from this. Not only does God use anyone he pleases to be his leader, regardless of gender, but he calls us to obedience. When we obey what God asks of us, even if it seems frightening and requires much courage, he will reward us. Deborah stepped up when called, and we should do the same (Judges 5:7-8).
7. Ruth
Ruth was not a Jew, but she married the son of Naomi, a Hebrew woman who had become an immigrant in Ruth’s homeland. When Ruth’s husband and father-in-law died, she chose to accompany Naomi back to Naomi’s people. “Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay. Your people will be my people and your God my God,” Ruth famously declared to her mother-in-law in Ruth 1:16.
Her loyalty was rewarded, and she ultimately remarried Boaz, Naomi’s wealthy relative. Their son was an ancestor of both King David and Jesus.
Just like we learn with Rahab, our past and our upbringing matters not. We can choose to join God’s family and stake our claim with the Lord no matter our past. Loyalty to God and God’s people is the right choice.
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8. Hannah
Hannah, from the book of 1 Samuel, is another woman who can guide our walk with Christ. Hannah, an Israelite, was one of two wives of a man named Elkanah. She was not able to get pregnant and was subject to much scorn and ridicule because of it. Devastated, she persisted in prayer. One day she was praying so intensely in the Lord’s house that she was moving her lips, but not speaking, and the high priest accused her of being drunk (1 Samuel 1:14). But in her desperate prayers, she promised the Lord that if he gave her a son, she would give her child back to him (v. 11).
When confronted, Hannah defended herself to the priest and received his blessing — and the Lord’s. Scripture tells us the Lord “remembered her,” and she gave birth to a son, Samuel, who became a priest and a prophet. While she kept her promise and gave Samuel to the Lord, God further rewarded her with other sons and daughters.
The lessons here are twofold. One, persist in prayer even when it takes a long time, or when you look “weird” and even so overcome that you appear drunk. Your passion will be noted. Two, keep your promises to God. I cannot imagine how hard it was for Hannah to give to the Lord the child she’d craved for so long (remember Abraham and Isaac?). Yet she kept her word, and the Lord blessed her.
9. Esther
A beautiful young woman, the Hebrew woman Esther was chosen out of all the other women in the kingdom to be the king’s new wife. However, she concealed her Jewish heritage. Later, when the king was tricked into issuing a decree that would effectively exterminate all Jews in the kingdom, including his wife, Esther was asked to intervene. She was frightened, for appearing before the king unannounced could subject her to execution. But after fasting on her part — and requesting fasting from all the Jewish people — Esther took the risk. Her actions eventually revealed the deception, as well as her true ethnicity. The evil was stopped, and the Israelites were saved.
The lesson here is that sometimes God asks us to step out in faith and take a huge personal risk for the greater good. It takes courage, but if it’s part of God’s purpose, he will be with us. Another lesson is about the power and effectiveness of collective repentance. Not only did Esther fast, but she asked her uncle to have the people join her. Together, with all of them fasting, it became a group effort in repenting and turning to God in humility. Clearly, the Lord took notice. Whether we fast or pray or take part in some other group effort that turns our hearts and minds toward the Lord, we can know there is power in this.
These nine women are not the only examples of woman in the Old Testament who can teach us what it looks like to walk with the Lord. Others have much to teach us as well, like Sarah, Hagar, Abigail, Jehosheba, and many more.
Consider a fresh re-read of the Old Testament, and examine whether the Lord is teaching you something through the good, or even the misguided or wrong, lives of the women in Scripture.
Now read 6 Women in the New Testament to Guide Your Walk with Christ
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