What's a Help Meet?

"Help meet" isn't a glamorous job description. The position isn't advertised at job fairs or in glossy secular magazines.

 However, it is a profoundly spiritual title that shows a woman's purpose established from the creation of the very first woman.  In Genesis 2:18-24 we read the beautiful narration of the Lord desiring, then creating, a helpmeet for Adam. 

Adam's rib + the Lord's touch = Eve

I don't call this a Bible story, because it's true. I also find it very encouraging.

In verse 18 the Lord says, “It is not good that man should be alone; I will make him a helper comparable to him.”  The Lord procedes to create all the birds and beasts and brings them to Adam to name. The Lord named the stars, but left the naming of the animals to Adam.  The first man was busy, but not fulfilled.

In verse 20, we feel his loneliness.  "But for Adam there was not found a helper comparable to him."

Doncha' think the Lord knew ahead of time the lions and tigers and bears, oh my, wouldn't do the job?  Do you think that maybe, just maybe, he was trying to prove a point to Adam?

Adam's job, taking care of the Garden of Eden, would not be fulfilling enough.

The hoards of animals, lions who needed their manes combed, the giraffes who had an itch on their neck they just couldn't reach, the cheetahs who just needed to burn off some energy, couldn't provide the companionship Adam's heart longed for.

The Lord knew that.  Adam didn't.  I think he had to be shown.

I think Adam and Eve coined the phrase, "love at first sight."  I hope there's instant-replay in Heaven, I want  to experience this  electrifying moment when the first man and woman  brought together by the Lord fall in love.

Our love stories today shouldn't be any different.

Just as Eve was created to be the perfect help meet for her husband, we can be the perfect help meets for our husbands.

Although the definition is simple, help meet means "one who helps" and doesn't give an exact spiritual role, it is a role adaptable each woman adapts to her husband.

Eve's "helping" included working in the garden of Eden, I'm assuming, and being with the animals. She didn't have to shop, or sew or mend clothes, or clean house. She didn't have to be hospitable because there were no other people to invite over.  She might have picked the herbs, made some salads, washed the dirt off the carrots. As we reflect on the busy lives we have had, we could easily get just a little jealous.

We're  not to exactly imitate her. The Lord gave her job description as an expandable vision, so each individual woman fits each individual man.

What are your husband's strengths? 

How are you helping him in this area?

What are your husband's weaknesses? 

How are you helping him in this area?

What are your husband's talents and hobbies? 

How are you helping him in this area?

What are your husband's spiritual gifts? 

 How are you helping him in this area?

What are your husband's emotional needs?

How are you helping him in this area?

What are your husband's spiritual needs?

How are you helping him in this area?

What are your husband's physical needs?

How are you helping him in this area?

Just as in Adam's case, the Lord desired a help meet for our husband before we desired to be the help meet of our husbands.

How do we make the Lord's desire for our husbands our desire?

We need to remember we're a help meet.

We need  to remember we're suitable.

Most of all, we need to remember we  need the touch of the Lord to fulfill our role as being a suitable help meet.