Wormwood said:
My point is not that God does not use our ministries, but that our obedience is much more important to God than our sacrifice. The Kingdom of God and its existence does not hinge on your home group, nor my local church. When we look at the churches in Revelation, Jesus was ready to snuff some of them out because of their lack of obedience. It is more important to God that we obey him than we serve him. I can give the church a million dollars a year, but if I am obtaining that wealth by oppressing and mistreating people, it is better that I stop my wrongdoing than continue to give a lot of money and do it in a way that is dishonorable. Jesus told people to leave their gifts and be reconciled first. God does not want our gifts if we are being disobedient. Our service is meaningless if we do not do it in a way that honors Him and His Word. That was my point.
“Let a woman learn quietly with all submissiveness. I do not permit a woman to teach or to exercise authority over a man; rather, she is to remain quiet. For Adam was formed first, then Eve; and Adam was not deceived, but the woman was deceived and became a transgressor.” (1 Timothy 2:11–14, ESV)
I would say that these verses expresses the will of God in the assembly of believers. So while you may have gifts from God that he desires you to use in various capacities, his expressed will is that teaching in the assembly of believers is not what he desires of you. I am not comfortable just dismissing these verses or finding a way to show that they are extremely limited in their scope and purpose when the context, grammar and history of the Church for 2,000 years suggests no such thing.
So I guess my question to you is: "Do you think that these verses are not God's will or that billions of Christians for 2,000 years did not understand them?"
I am not comparing the act of a woman teaching with a homosexual act. As I have tried to explain a couple times, the same hermeneutical principles that are employed to allow people to dismiss 1 Cor 14, Eph. 5, 1 Tim 2 and other verses are the very principles incorporated to suggest that homosexual prohibitions in the NT really only applied to specific cultures or abuses in the practice. For me, this is about how we read the Bible, not about suggesting the act of a woman teaching and homosexuality are the same. I hope that makes better sense.
Also, I think you are very mistaken with the notion that because none of us are "without sin" that this means we should allow homosexuals to be elders and teachers. Why not allow rapists to be bishops and overseers? Why not murderers? The idea that suggests that we all sin, therefore who are we to say someone else cannot serve is both prominent and dangerous in our churches today. Paul lists character traits for elders and deacons for a reason. They are to be examples of holiness and exhibit the patience, love and godliness that other Christians should seek to follow. Why have standards at all if we are just going to say, "Well we all sin so lets just let people do whatever they want." I doubt that is what you are saying, but that is how this type of logic works itself out in our churches today. We are to strive for holiness and we see Paul rebuking and having people thrown out of the fellowship because of unrepentant sexual sin. We most certainly are not to wink at such matters or act as if because we all sin that therefore no standards should exist. The Bible teaches quite the opposite. We should take the commands of God seriously and we show we love him through our obedience. To suggest we can love him and ignore his commands is contrary to the very words of Jesus.
I never claimed Scripture said you couldnt pray (or prophesy) publicly or out loud. We see people prophesying all the time in public settings in the NT. However, there is a difference in praying or prophesying publicly and doing this in the assembly of believers. When there is a formal assembly of Christians in an area that meets under the guidance of elders, this is when the Bible calls women to be silent as an act of worship and honor to God and not take the role of a leader or teacher. When Christians are not meeting formally, then certainly women prophesied and prayed and even taught others (such as Aquilla and Priscilla). Yet, it is clear both in the Bible and in church history that they did not do this in the assembly of believers. It was seen as offensive to God and was never practiced. Again, I would just want to know from you what you think you have learned that suggests that 2,000 years of Church practice and teaching is errant and the seemingly clear teaching of the NT on this matter actually not only does not condemn, but actually affirms this practice. I have seen no arguments from anyone on this board or in recent scholarship that actually gives any positive affirmation of this practice. The only thing I have seen is attempts to lessen the significance of words, make commands contextual to a particular setting (even though they reference the law and creation as rationale) or make arguments from silence. None of which are convincing to me. It seems like we have a cultural expectation at work here and then trying to find a way to make the Bible fit those cultural expectations.
I'm sure that you are aware that the Bible mentions several female leaders. My favorite, of course, is Deborah, who led Israel as her Judge, and who was also a prophet...and evidently a warrior. I was actually named for her.
There were others, of course, but you know that.
But there is no point in talking about the great women of the Old Testament. What we want to know is, were there female leaders in the early Church?
Does the Bible mention any?
Here is a list:
From
http://www.religioustolerance.org/femclrg5.htm#chr_ex
Women in the Christian Scriptures (New Testament):
These are important passages because some Christian denominations refuse to ordain women, citing as a reason that Jesus only chose male apostles. The Roman Catholic Church has repeatedly stated that it does not have the authority to ordain women as priests for that reason.
- Acts 9:36 The author of Luke referred to a female disciple of Jesus by her Aramaic name Tabitha, who was also known by her Greek name Dorcas. She became sick had died; St. Peter brought her back to life.
- Acts 21:8: Philip the evangelist had four unmarried daughters who were prophets.
- Philippians 4:2: Paul refers to two women, Euodia and Syntyche, as his co-workers who were active evangelicals, spreading the gospel.
- Romans 16:1: Paul refers to Phoebe as a minister or deacon of the church at Cenchrea. The Greek word which describes her function is "diakonos" which means literally "official servant." She is the only deacon in the Bible to be identified by name. Some translations say "deaconess;" others try to obscure her position by mistranslating the Greek as a simple "servant" or "helper". Paul later refers to Phoebe as a woman, calling her "our sister." This prevented later church leaders from hiding her gender as they did with Junia by changing her name and implying that she was a man.
- Romans 16:3: Paul refers to Priscilla as another of his "fellow workers in Christ Jesus" (NIV) Other translations refer to her as a "co-worker". But other translations attempt to downgrade her status by calling her a "helper". The original Greek word is "synergoi", which literally means "fellow worker" or "colleague." 1 It is worth noting that Paul refers to Priscilla and her husband as "Priscilla and Aquila" in this passage and as "Aquila and Priscilla" in 1 Corinthians 16:19. It would appear that the order is not important to Paul. As in Galatians 3:28, he apparently believed that there is no distinction between male and female among those who have been baptized into Christ.
- Romans 16:7: Paul refers to a male apostle, Andronicus, and a female apostle, Junia, as "outstanding among the apostles" (NIV) Every Greek and Latin church Father until Giles of Rome (circa 1000 CE) acknowledged that Junia was a woman. 2,3 After that time, various writers and translators of the Bible resorted to various deceptions in order to suppress her gender. For example:
The Amplified Bible translates this passage as "They are men held in high esteem among the apostles" The Revised Standard Version shows it as "they are men of note among the apostles". The reference to them both being men does not appear in the original Greek text. The word "men" was simply inserted by the translators, apparently because the translators' minds recoiled from the concept of a female apostle.
- Many translations, including the Amplified Bible, Rheims New Testament, New American Standard Bible, and the New International Version simply picked the letter "s" out of thin air, and converted the original "Junia" (a woman's name) into "Junias" (a male form of "Junia"). Again, it was probably inconceivable to the translators that Paul would recognize a woman as an apostle. Incidentally, there are no Junias' mentioned in ancient literature and inscriptions; it was apparently an unkown and unused name.
For some reason, this list leaves out the female disciples who followed Jesus, just as the men did, and who supported His ministry from their own funds.
Luk 8:1 And it came to pass afterward, that he went throughout every city and village, preaching and shewing the glad tidings of the kingdom of God: and the twelve were with him,
Luk 8:2 And certain women, which had been healed of evil spirits and infirmities, Mary called Magdalene, out of whom went seven devils,
Luk 8:3 And Joanna the wife of Chuza Herod's steward, and Susanna, and many others, which ministered unto him of their substance.
Were they leaders in the early church? It could be argued, I suppose, that there might not have been any early church without them. Anyhow, the Bible doesn't specifically say, but how likely is it that these gals went their ways after the resurrection and had nothing to do with the Great Commission? They thought enough of Jesus to leave their homes to travel with Him (gasp!), and to finance His ministry from their own funds (double gasp!!), and then when the resurrection was all over, they quietly went home? I'd bet my last Jesus fish bumper sticker that is just what they did not do.
There is a lot more on that website about women in the ministry, and I'm tempted to continue to follow it. But I decided that either you are curious enough to do it yourself, or you aren't. I gave you the link
http://www.religioustolerance.org/femclrg5.htm#chr_ex.
You asked me:
So I guess my question to you is: "Do you think that these verses are not God's will or that billions of Christians for 2,000 years did not understand them?"
Given that billions of Christians for 2,000 years have been sure that Mary Magdalene was a prostitute, when the Bible says no such thing about her, I'd have to say that, yes, for 2,000 years, those verses have been misunderstood. You are the scholar, WW...I'm just the hack writer from Alabama. So I will ask you...for how many of those 2000 years did the Catholic Church insist that the Bible was only for the clergy? How long before the Bible was made available to just plain folks? Just sayin'.
WW, I feel the same way you do about gay preachers as you do. But think about it. Is the pastor of your church a sinner? I know every member of my own little church would admit to being a sinner. The fact is, whatever church you go to, the guy behind the pulpit, the members of the choir, the guys who bring the offering plate around...right down to that sweet little lady who always sits in the third row with the little bald spot right
there...every one of these lovely Christian people is a dirty, rotten sinner. Personally, I would be quite uncomfortable with a gay preacher. But I honestly can't think of a scriptural reason why there shouldn't be gay leaders in the church.
I'm sorry. I believe with all of my heart that, in each of his epistles, Paul addressed situations that were specific to the church he was writing to.
In a town where there is a dangerous cult led by women who hold life and death power over every man in their sphere of influence, I'd have to agree with Paul that allowing a woman from that area to hold authority over men would be a very bad idea.
Given that men and women would be separated during the worship, just as they had been used to in the Temple, I'd also have to agree with him that, in a harbor town, it would be a good idea to tell these rowdy gals not to be hollering at their husbands and disrupting the service. Since Paul doesn't repeat these instructions to any other churches, how would they have known not to let a woman teach or preach? It's not like they could call each other up on the telephone and talk it over.
Yes, I know that the letters did circulate. But that is just the point. Suppose I write a letter to a friend in a crisis marriage. I tell her that I think she should separate from her abusive husband. Does that mean that I think all of my friends should separate from their husbands? Of course not! This is the same thing.
At least, that is The Barrd's opinion.
