20 My son, keep thy father’s commandment, and forsake not the law of thy mother:
21 Bind them continually upon thine heart, and tie them about thy neck.
22 When thou goest, it shall lead thee; when thou sleepest, it shall keep thee; and when thou awakest, it shall talk with thee.
23 For the commandment is a lamp; and the law is light; and reproofs of instruction are the way of life:
24 To keep thee from the evil woman, from the flattery of the tongue of a strange woman.
25 Lust not after her beauty in thine heart; neither let her take thee with her eyelids.
(Proverbs 6.20-25, KJV)
The phrase “strange woman” is here in Proverbs 6.24, and it is also in several other Proverbs (5.20, 7.5), and it is a woman who comes to church to destroy men who are ministers and who hope to be in ministry.
The next verse in Proverbs 6, is v. 26, and it says that “a whorish woman will bring a man to a piece of bread”. She will take someone who has a full and rich life and bring them to a subsistence level. The next part of the verse says “the adulteress will hunt for the precious life”. These women will drain the life out of men! They will go to church to destroy lives and get Christian men trapped!
Satan knows that the greatest asset in any church is strong, pure men with the hand of God on their lives, so he will do anything to target them – and one of his methods is a strange woman. Now you can gender reverse this, and ladies can fall for strange men, but it destroys the church more when men of integrity forget their integrity and forget their wisdom and have their life and prosperity stolen from them by a strange woman!
Every minister must be aware of this and on their guard for this sort of thing. The strange woman wants nothing more than to commit adultery or fornication with the man, costing him influence, stealing his life, and destroying his ministry.
Even a godly man who has lived pure all their life can be entrapped by a strange woman if they are not careful. There are strange women about today. I know men who have walked out on their wives, walked out on their future, lost their ministry, destroyed their church – all because they were immature and selfish around a strange woman.
We do not war against flesh and blood, but the enemy will happily use flesh and blood to seduce someone out of ministry and out of their position in Christ. God has put a lot of information about the strange woman in the Bible so you can recognize them, because adultery and fornication are sins that cause you to fall off the bridge and lose your place and lose your way and hurt your future a great deal. The devil loves attacking people with sexual impurity because it is so devastating.
There are many strange woman who are happy to go to church and seduce a minister and steal his precious life. Some know exactly what they are doing, others are damaged through their own upbringing and experiences, and are unaware of what they are doing. In churches, they often have a veneer of being spiritual – they sing in tongues in the service, they carry their Bible around and quote it – but they will readily have sex with anyone.
The church is the most precious place in the world. A meeting of saints is the most precious meeting in the world, and strange women hunt for precious lives – they want to destroy the precious saints. Precious people who really love God and would serve him with all their hearts, people who terrify satan just by getting up in the morning, and satan wants to target them.
When a young man decides to serve God with all his heart, satan will make them a special target of strange women. They come into churches and seek to destroy people. They will operate at night (Proverbs 7.9), which means in the church service they may seem normal, but suddenly they start to call the pastor well out of office hours. They also operate in the night of people’s lives – when some Christian leaders are going through difficulties – often a strange woman suddenly appears.
At night, you need to be very careful. I don’t text or call any women, let alone strange ones, outside of office hours. If you are engaged, I will tell you not to go out with your fiancee – but if you are married, you are not supposed to be going out with other ladies. Do not take your secretary out for a late dinner! Ever.
Strange women will be in the Sunday service, but rarely any other services. They will never be at a prayer meeting, because they cannot show off. But if you are off to the beach or out for a picnic, they will be there. They are at church to trap someone.
Proverbs 7.10 says they have the attire of a harlot. In modern talk that means they dress like a prostitute. They are not prostitutes, but they dress in a way that should make people a little shocked! If you are a disciple of Jesus Christ, you should pay attention to your dress. You should not be dressing in a suggestive or provocative way. I think we are all mature enough to know the difference between beautiful and dressed up, and someone who is a strange woman.
A strange woman will have a strange past – Proverbs 7.26 says many strong men have been slain by her. She will have stories in her past of defiling others. Now lots of people have a history and Jesus is a forgiver and a redeemer and loves restoring people, but when there is a pattern in the past that is still going on today – beware.
A strange woman will demand attention. Proverbs 7.11 says she is loud. She will be striking – she will have men flocking around her. Her appearance will be loud, her voice will be loud, her mannerisms will be loud. Proverbs 7.11 also says she is stubborn too. That means she will not listen to anyone – you will not able to teach her or give her input. If you ever marry her, she will never submit! And, if you marry her you will never know where she is (Proverbs 7.11 – her feet do not abide in her house) – she will not be in the home, she will be vague about where she is.
Another sign of a strange woman is they are obsessed with touching. Proverbs 7.13 says that this hunter caught the man and kissed him. These woman will be hugging everyone and it will suddenly end up with her body pressed against you, and a kiss or two. They will hold you, hug you, take your hand. They know full well it aroused the men, and it is deliberate tempting. She will be overly-familiar, not just in the touch, but talking about things that someone you barely know should not be talking about.
They are trying to make you close – they will comment on your hair, your body, your everything. They will not respect your fences, and they will not even care.
Finally, the number one trait of a strange woman is that she is strange. You will know nothing about her. She will lie about her past, trying to make it mystical. She will have so many secrets and you will never know where you stand.
In Proverbs 7.14, the strange woman had peace offerings. She did all the religious things – because that means men will put their guard down around her, but it is all fake. It is part of the strange. In this verse she is pretending to be a faithful saint, to attract a godly man. There are many such strange women in the churches, and we need to be aware they are cunning, they can fool religious people and steal life from men with great potential.
What can we do? Proverbs 6.25 tells us not to lust after her beauty, not let her take thee with her eyelids. She will look at you in a way to make you want to go after her. Do not fall for it.
Identifying a strange woman is half the battle. They might come to a pastor or a young leader in the church with many problems and need counselling and start sobbing. If you are ignorant you will put your arm around her and arrange to meet her, and she will take advantage of the fact that you are a Christian, a man of God, a kind, loving man.
Be aware – pray – seek wisdom from older more mature men. Be careful, do not let someone drag you over the edge of the bridge into the chasm, you may get very injured and may take years to get back to where you are going.
SELAH.
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