MzEllen & Co.

I posted the (short) list of how CBMW sees egalitarian teaching:

• God created male and female as equal in all respects. Gen. 1:26-27 makes no distinction between woman and man insofar as both are equally made in His image (i.e., ontological equality), and both are given the responsibility to rule over His creation (i.e., functional equality).
• Sin introduced into God’s created order many manifestations of disorder and corrupted relationships. Among the chief examples of sin’s defilement is the introduction of an illegitimate hierarchy in the relationship between woman and man.
• 1. Gen. 1:26-27 - shows that man and woman share the same human nature, both are made in God’s image, and both are given God’s commission to rule the earth. Not only is there equality of being or nature between man and woman, there is also, importantly, equality of function or task - both are commanded to rule. And note: no distinction is made to give the man a superior position in this rulership.
• 2. Gen. 2:18 - woman as “helper” is best understood as one who comes to complement (i.e., make complete something that is incomplete). So, far from the woman being subordinate to the man, this shows how indebted man should be to the woman.
• 5. 1 Cor. 12:7-11 - Clearly, God distributes His gifts to His people as He so wills, but one’s gender is not a factor in His giving any particular gift to a person. Women and men alike are recipients of all of God’s gifts (e.g., see 1 Cor. 11:5 for a statement of women having the gift of prophecy). Since God’s spiritual gifting is gender-neutral, and since God expects His gifts to be used in the church, it follows that men and women alike are equal in their exercise of gifts in the church.

How are these false?  If this is not generally correct, why not explain how, rather than make accusations?

Another person speculated about integrity and further speculated about insecurity about a blogger using their personal information in a wrong way (so I set this blog to not require any personal information in an effort to reassure that any attack that might be leveled at my integrity with personal information  need not be a concern)

What I was doing was attempting to answer concerns about CBMW teaching.  I quoted commenters questions and concerns and then quoted CBMW in an attempt to answer that concern.

(NOTE:  when objecting to CBMW teaching, I seldom see CBMW quoted or linked to and there are many claims of wrong teachings - or worse, accusation of lies (resorting to falsehood, which has a much different meaning that “believing falsehood”) without citation.)

What’s better than a snow day? We all like the extra day off, and a chance to stay at home…

What’s worse than a snow day? A snow day with no internet service… ;-(

The snow has pretty much stopped and Tom is shoveling us out now. There was ice overnight so I’m just running the car to warm it up, rather than scraping and brushing and scraping an brushing. (this part was written as a draft at home, to be published this afternoon when we go to a nice, toasty, bookstore (with a cafe with a fireplace - AND free wireless)

And the internet is down. We’re not sure if it’s a modem issue or a wiring issue (ours) or an area problem (theirs).

If it’s a modem or wiring issue, they are so backed up that they cannot get a technician out here until next Tuesday. I have an essay due tomorrow…and my Spanish homework is done online.

So…well…you saw the plan above: hit Schuler’s with our laptops. Drink lattes, eat salads (or something), read and do homework and play (I have to buy an children’s book about or from the Asian (or Asian American) culture for my class; well, I could borrow it from the library but for me it’s easier to buy than to remember to take the book back or end up paying fines, etc.) And that’s the plan…hopefully the problem is area wide (this has happened before in very cold weather so I’m hoping that when it warms up the connection will come back on)

Poems in English and Spanish by Jane Medina.

A very nice book with poems (either side by side or one after the other) in English and Spanish.

Grade 3-7-A collection of 27 insightful poems that limn the migrant experience from the point of view of a grade school child from Mexico. Jorge doesn’t want to be called George. He thinks the name sounds strange. “What an ugly sound!/Like a sneeze!” His struggles to fit in result in a friendship with a boy named Tim; a tentative coming to terms with American society; and some degree of sadness when, upon his grandmother’s death, his family must cross the river again. The poems, and the accurate English translations, are well laid out on the page and neatly complemented by primitive-looking scratchboard illustrations. While not as sprightly as Francisco X. Alarc-n’s Laughing Tomatoes/Jitomates Risue-os (Children’s Book Press) or as deeply moving and celebratory as Alma Flor Ada’s Gathering the Sun (Lothrop, both 1997), this book does carry significant emotional poignancy. An excellent choice to pair with Francisco Jim?nez’s La Mariposa (Houghton, 1998), it depicts the sometimes painful experience of adjusting to a new language and a new culture.  (School Library Journal)

I really liked this book - one of the poems is called “The Busy Street”

I’m holding Mimi’s hand very tight, again…

As tight was I held it when we crossed the river to come here…

I was so afraid…

Another book I would recommend, it tells of having to try to “make the grade” in a new school, with a new language, when you are used to being the “smart kid”.

I noticed something “funny” and sad a while ago.

I didn’t even realize it at the time.  GoogleReader sets up folders for categories of blogs.  I have the usual: “funny stuff”, “favorite”, “mom-blogs”, that sort of thing.

I have two different folders for similar blogs:  “Christian-men” and “Christian males”.  And yeah, somehow they are sorted within those two folders pretty accurately.

I tried. I really did.

After attempting to explain why Godly complementarian marriages are not “dictatorial” (and the response was [more or less”] “yeah…but they are”). I followed with an illustration with the difficulty of trying to apply political terms (dictatorial and “marital anarchy) and the egals don’t seem to like having terms that are mostly used in derogatory ways applied to their marriages. Go figure.

Accusations of “resorting to untruth” (instead of “you misunderstood what I was saying”) and setting up straw men (instead of “why did you post that particular quote).

Conversation stoppers abound and I have little faith that a truce, peace or understanding is desired.

[Edit:  I might further note:  the person who feels forced to leave the conversation is the one who chooses at which point the conversation is “stopped”.  The conversation stopped for me at accusation of untruth.  Nobody needs to be called a liar.  But I would ask again, will any of this make a difference in the moderation?  I am increasingly cynical.]

I’ve been looking at the matter of subordination within the Trinity (what is being called “heresy” today, what was declared “heresy” historically, what the term means today and meant then and Biblical support for either side)

Last weekend I read James White’s, “the Forgotten Trinity”

It’s a good start

Since I do not wish to ascribe personalities, I won’t put a name to the quote, but I do have some thoughts

(no, I will not comment on that blog; there is a reason that has been explained privately. Commenters here are free comment here or there [although there appears to be more freedom for accusations there]. I have also disabled the requirement to enter a name and email address in order to comment - although a name would be nice so there is no need to worry about me using a private email for public reasons or that I might sell it to Russian spam companies. My email IS on the side bar, so I am available for private discussion.

There is also the fact that this post is 5(five) pages long in a Word doc. Very long for a com-box. I will make the same offer - it a poster at the comp-egal blog would like to post it as a “guest blogger”, feel free)

Anyway…the quote:

One problem is that this is not a secondary issue to one relatively small group of people: those women God is calling to the kinds of ministry Packer thinks should be closed to women, who receive that calling in churches that agree with Packer. They literally have to choose between obeying their churches and obeying God. And when their churches are teaching them that they aren’t hearing correctly from God in the first place, it’s got to be a highly difficult dilemma, one which few people (including Packer) could begin to comprehend.

So yes, for most of us, this isn’t a super-important issue. But for some of our sisters, it’s a matter of spiritual life and death.

This is not so much a commentary on this particular quote, but more or less rambling with my thoughts (so there is no intent [please repeat after me: NO INTENT] to twist words.

I have three personal stories:

First: Two years ago this month, the church I was currently a member of had two guest speakers. Now this is a Christian Reformed Church, the main doctrines are out there for all to see…this is an important point.

The guest speakers were a husband and wife team (no, the problem was not that one of the speakers was a woman). They called themselves “apostle” and “prophet”, they were (are) Charismatic, Pentecostal, Third Wave AND Word-Faith. They also have language on their website that is reflective of “Oneness-Apostolic” (They do not believe in the Trinity, but rather “modalism”).

I raised concerns and was told “it’s a one-time thing”. Except that it wasn’t. There has been a continuing stream of guest speakers, conferences, workshops, etc. that feature Word-Faith, faith healers, Pentecostals - some Oneness, some Trinitarians, some simply don’t say.

I had to take a choice. Do I stay and fight that which I believe to be false doctrine?

Or do I abide by the commitment that I had made when I joined the church: to live under the leadership of the elders?

There IS a direct correlation to the above quote: And when their churches are teaching them that they aren’t hearing correctly from God in the first place, it’s got to be a highly difficult dilemma, one which few people (including Packer) could begin to comprehend.

For me, in that place, meant that obeying God would mean speaking the truth. The “apostle” and “prophet” were non-Trinitarians, affiliated with a Oneness organization that could loosely be called a denomination.

I spoke out again when it was made public that the church was sending the youth group TO THAT CHURCH to do work after Hurricane Katrina. To work IN that church, to STAY in that church, to WORSHIP in that church. It wasn’t long before I was known as the “mom who wanted to wreck our spring break trip”.

I really had three choices:

• stay and fight
• stay and shut up
• leave

I chose to leave because to stay and fight would be divisive and to stay and shut up would be counter to my conviction.

Second:

This part of my life actually came first. I had spent my entire life in Arminian churches (although not calling them by that name). I was currently in an Arminian church and had been challenged to at least take a look at Reformed Theology. The more I read, the more I fought. The more I fought, the more I realized it was my pride and my flesh that made me fight. The more I focused on killing the pride and my flesh, the more comfortable I became with Reformed Theology.

Then came the breaking point. I was talking to my kids about when they were saved. My son remembered all of it (I was there). My daughter asked, “Do you mean the first time or all the rest of the times?”

YIKES! Yes, we were in a church that taught insecurity.

The same three choices:

• stay and fight
• stay and shut up
• leave

Again, when I joined that church I had made a public commitment, on the stage, before God and man. Part of that commitment was that I believed the doctrine that the church taught.

What to do when you no longer believe that? I began looking for another church that was in line with what I believe.

Third: (this is not MY story, although I was there to hear and see it)

My sister’s husband was a youth pastor for a small church in the thumb of Michigan. The day he resigned to go to be an associate pastor of a church in another state, he spoke from the pulpit. His words were something like (but not a direct quote):

I have come to realize that it is very difficult for a man to be a pastor in the town he grew up in. There is too much known, too much familiarity, too little authority and respect.

and then he quoted Scripture:

“Only in his hometown and in his own house is a prophet without honor.” (Matthew 13:57, NIV)

With the pastors I have known, very few have pastors the church they had been a member in (my father-in-law was one; and that didn’t last long. The Nazarene church was another, but that pastor had been a pastor in another city and was in Grand Rapids to finish his doctorate; he had only been there a short time when the previous pastor left and he was asked to step in - so this was not a case where he had been a long term member or had grown up there).

SO: To a young woman who feels called to be a senior pastor in the church where she currently is (a church that she knows well does not believe as she does) I would say:

You have three choices:

• stay and fight
• stay and shut up
• leave

1) when you became a member, did you make a commitment to submit to the board of elders and to the doctrines of the church? If so, then are you willing to break your commitment (and most likely cause strife in the church) in order to fill your own personal desire?

If you ARE willing to break that commitment, are you willing to have one of YOUR congregation, a few years down the road, stand up and say that they don’t like what you are teaching and they are willing to fight. They will refuse to submit to your leadership, they will refuse to submit to the board. Does this young woman want to look at the possibility of a congregation member treating HER and HER board with the same lack of submission that she is willing to treat hers current pastor and her current board?

2) If you are truly that convicted that God is calling you to be a head pastor, you will be very unhappy with the shutting up option. I know that I was.

3) Why the church that you are in? Is a “comfort zone” thing? (For my brother-in-law, it was) A new pastor has an opportunity to find a new life, a new “place”, a place where it cannot be said, “Only in his hometown and in his own house is a prophet without honor.”

To this young woman (or any person, male or female, young or old): It is NOT a matter or “spiritual life or death” to look for a church that shares your beliefs. Many of us have done it and become stronger (not dead) for having examined ourselves (and our beliefs) and churches (and/or denominations) in order to find a truly good fit.

To undergo this examinition:

1. either strengthens a person’s conviction or changes it
2. keeps him or her with a clear conscience because he or she has been able to keep a commitment (and Scriptural instruction) to submit to the church’s elders
3. gets him or her out of his or her comfort zone.

In my opinion, this is a growth process, not a death process. I have that opinion because I have lived it. Twice that I have told of in this post.
Besides these things, there are a few other (practical) questions:

• Have you been to seminary?
• Do you intend to go to seminary?
• If not, does your current church ordain ANYBODY who has not attended seminary?
• If you do intend to go to seminary, which one?
• Does that seminary accept women who want to be head pastors?
• If not, do you intend to fight with that leadership also?
• If so, will you end up ordained in the denomination of that seminary, or your current church?
• If you will end up ordained in the denomination of that seminary, would it be a better choice to stay in a denomination where you are credentials?
• If you want to be ordained in the denomination of your current church, will there even be an opening for head pastor when you are done with seminary?
• If not, are you going to ask the current head pastor to step down so that you can step in?
• If you are NOT called by that church to be head pastor, are you willing to accept the possibility that there is a character or maturity issue that they may see, or will you blame it on gender (youth/too well known)?

These questions are questions that men have to answer as well. I know a man who left his church to go to seminary, only to find that the church he grew up in … already had a head pastor.

This is a beautiful book!

Written by Jacqueline Woodson and illustrated by E. B. Lewis.

From Publishers Weekly
Woodson (If You Come Softly; I Hadn’t Meant to Tell You This) lays out her resonant story like a poem, its central metaphor a fence that divides blacks from whites. Lewis’s (My Rows and Piles of Coins) evocative watercolors lay bare the personalities and emotions of her two young heroines, one African-American and one white. As the girls, both instructed by their mothers not to climb over the fence, watch each other from a distance, their body language and facial expressions provide clues to their ambivalence about their mothers’ directives. Intrigued by her free-spirited white neighbor, narrator Clover watches enviously from her window as “that girl” plays outdoors in the rain. And after footloose Annie introduces herself, she points out to Clover that “a fence like this was made for sitting on”; what was a barrier between the new friends’ worlds becomes a peaceful perch where the two spend time together throughout the summer. By season’s end, they join Clover’s other pals jumping rope and, when they stop to rest, “We sat up on the fence, all of us in a long line.” Lewis depicts bygone days with the girls in dresses and white sneakers and socks, and Woodson hints at a bright future with her closing lines: “Someday somebody’s going to come along and knock this old fence down,” says Annie, and Clover agrees. Pictures and words make strong partners here, convincingly communicating a timeless lesson. Ages 5-up. (Jan.)
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

This is exactly how I would describe the book! I cried the first time I read it (although admittedly I was PMS-sing and I’ve been known to cry at animal shelter commercials…)

One of my classes this semester is “Multi-cultural Children’s Literature” and this book was one of my “book talks” (I need a total of five).

I typically choose a mixture of cultural folk-tales, legends, non-fiction and “anti-bias”. This is an excellent book portraying the ability of people to look beyond the fence.

Highly recommended

this blog is currently set to allow commenters to NOT enter name and email address (although a name would be appreciated)

I’ll make  another public statement when I turn the option back off (or on, whichever way you look at it)

For reasons that have been covered off line, I will not be commenting on the comp-egal blog.  I welcome readers, commenters, I will read there and comment here.  Email addresses will not be disclosed (shoot, I have an alternate email address for using when I know my email address will be disclosed).

Charity said:

Taking the first definiton of someone who has “absolute, unrestricted control” here in a marriage relationship rather than a government, it seems to me that dictatorship is exactly the model propounded by CBMW for the government of marriages/households.

CBMW says:(From “Love and Respect in Marriage“) Since God himself cannot sin, he has not delegated to anyone the authority to command someone else to sin. Thus, if a husband instructs his wife to do something that contradicts the clear teaching of Scripture, she may properly refuse to obey, saying, “God has not given you authority to command me to do that” (see Acts 4:19-20; 5:27-32).

Thus, in just this one quote (used before on this blog) that CBMW teaches that a husband’s authority is NOT absolute, and thus does not follow the first definition that Charity refers to.

I also looked up the definitions within the defintion

absolute: (the definitions that I think are most likely to be relevant)

• Not limited by restrictions or exceptions; unconditional: absolute trust.
• Unqualified in extent or degree; total: absolute silence. See Usage Note at infinite.
• Unconstrained by constitutional or other provisions: an absolute ruler.

As I have already shown, husbands ARE limited (by God), authority IS conditional (a wife may refuse to submit and/or obey if the husband is sinning or telling her to sin) and IS constrained by Scripture.

Thus, “absolute, unrestricted control” is not applicable, even with your chosen definition.

This is the bulk of Charity’s comment from a previous post:

So, Ellen, are you saying that for you, the only alternative to unilateral authority is anarchy?

At the time that the Bible was written democracy did not exist anywhere - as far as I know the first emergence of democracy was roughly speaking about 1000 years after the last part of the New Testament was written. I think most Christians would however be in agreement that democracy is not anarchy, and again most Christians would prefer government by democracy to government by dictatorship.

I am not arguing in favour of anarchy, I am arguing in favour of adults treating each other as adults and finding a way of taking decisions together.

Abuse can occur in any system, but there’s a double whammy, if the abuse is shored up by what is seen as legitimate authority in the system.

Well that’s all well and good for the women who as he puts it have “chosen the right man” (and I would by the grace of God count myself among that number), but what about those who haven’t? Isn’t that the same thing as saying “well it’s their own fault for having chosen the wrong man”? I’m sorry, but I can’t go along with that.

Taken piece by piece:

So, Ellen, are you saying that for you, the only alternative to unilateral authority is anarchy?

No more so than having an authority in place is a dictatorship.  No more so than a Godly husband as head of the home is “dictatorial”.

By the way, why use “unilateral” as  a qualifier?  What authority is NOT unilateral? Is the qualifier needed by egalitarians to justify the portrayal of a wife as being without rights?  I’m truly wondering.
I like the Oxford University Press’s entry

A person, institution, or organization is said to have authority when the power it exercises is supposed legitimate, that is, authorized by some system of norms to which the speaker assents. The emergence of such norms in human society is a complex matter, with convention, habit, custom, and tradition playing different roles. Social contract theory is one kind of solution to the problem of the basis of authority; the evident utility of some rule-governed systems is another. While it is common to find scepticism about particular claims to authority, the idea that human co-ordination (and hence even communication) could exist without it is usually regarded as fanciful.

Back to Charity’s comment:

At the time that the Bible was written democracy did not exist anywhere - as far as I know the first emergence of democracy was roughly speaking about 1000 years after the last part of the New Testament was written.

Actually…no.

Democracy was first introduced in the part of world where the New Testament was written…around 500 years BEFORE Christ walked this earth.

450 - 500 BCE

“It is called a government of the people (demokratia) becaue we live in considertion of not the few, but of the majority.” - Thucydides on Pericle’s view of democracy

Paul, being an educated man, would have had the words to describe democracy.   He would even have had the word to use.

Charity said:

I think most Christian