I have never fitted what people at church seem to mean by a godly woman. Is there one shape I am supposed to be?

“And Deborah, a prophetess, the wife of Lapidoth, she judged Israel at that time. And she dwelt under the palm tree of Deborah between Ramah and Beth-el in mount Ephraim: and the children of Israel came up to her for judgment.”

Deborah appears in a violent, unstable period with no strong central leadership, and the text introduces her doing work nobody expected a woman to be doing: judging Israel and directing a military campaign. The narrator neither apologises for her nor explains her away. The women of scripture are far less uniform than church culture often suggests, and God's use of them is not confined to a single template.

“And Jesus answered and said unto her, Martha, Martha, thou art careful and troubled about many things: But one thing is needful: and Mary hath chosen that good part, which shall not be taken away from her.”

Martha and Mary are sisters in the same house behaving in ways that could hardly be more different, and Jesus does not tell Mary to get up and help. He redirects Martha's anxiety rather than her personality. The scene is often read as a rebuke of busyness, but at its centre is a woman being defended for choosing something other than the expected role.