When I saw the cover of this week’s TIME I was reminded of some of the stories friends who live overseas have told regarding the harsh treatment and overall low view of women by some of the extreme followers of Islam.

The young woman – 18 years old – featured on the cover of TIME ran away from the home of her husband and the abuse she claims from the her husband and her in-laws who treated her as a slave.

The Taliban found her and the picture tells much of the rest of the story.

While the Taliban doesn’t represent all of Islam, how does Biblical Christianity approach the position of women?

Jesus honored His mother and provided for her care after He died on the cross.

When Jesus saw his mother there, and the disciple whom he loved standing nearby, he said to his mother. “Dear woman, here is ‘your son,’ and to the disciple, ‘Here is your mother.’ From that time on, this disciple took her into his home.

(John 19:26-27)

When Jesus encountered the woman at the well, he spoke with her as an individual and she reported how he changed her life to the people of her village.

And what about Jesus’s approach to the woman caught in the act of adultery? While the men of His day wanted to condemn and judge, Jesus presented all with an opportunity for grace and a new way of living.

Consider John’s words:

3 The scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman who had been caught in adultery, and placing her in the midst 4 they said to him, Teacher, this woman has been caught in the act of adultery. 5 Now in the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women. So what do you say? 6 This they said to test him, that they might have some charge to bring against him. Jesus bent down and wrote with his finger on the ground. 7 And as they continued to ask him, he stood up and said to them, Let him who is without sin among you be the first to throw a stone at her. 8 And once more he bent down and wrote on the ground. 9 But when they heard it, they went away one by one, beginning with the older ones, and Jesus was left alone with the woman standing before him. 10 Jesus stood up and said to her, Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you? 11 She said, No one, Lord. And Jesus said, Neither do I condemn you; go, and from now on sin no more.”

What a difference.