The Sound of silence, the woman’s role in church
The world has changed a lot in the last 60 years. I grew up watching TV sitcoms like “Father Knows Best” and “Leave it to Beaver.” These shows portrayed the Dad as the one with all the answers and Mom was the caretaker of the home. She was always perfectly dressed and oh, so cheerful.
But eventually June Cleaver left the comforts of her home and entered the work place.
In an article ‘Women in the Workplace’ By: Yenisse Alonso and Vickie Brint the following observation was made;
“In 1950, only one in every three women entered the workforce; by the 1960s, social and economic forces made higher education more available to women, thus increasing their job opportunities. As a result, more women married later and postponed having children. In 1998, the number of women entering the workforce had climbed to three out of every five women. And in 2006, women comprised 46 percent of the paid workforce.”
And Margaret Anderson hung up her apron for some combat fatigues.
Women in the Military: Combat Roles Considered Authored by Jake Willens, 7 August 1996. “There are approximately 32,000 women in the U.S. military, comprising about 13 percent of the total U.S. Armed Forces (Defense Almanac 1995). In 1970, only 1.4 percent of the total military was comprised of women, a number that more than tripled to 4.6 percent in 1975, nearly doubled to 8.3 in 1980, rose to 10 in 1985, 11 in 1990, to the current 13 percent (Government Executive March 1994)”.
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution June 27, 2005
Washington - With more than 200,000 women serving in the U.S. military, Americans have long been accustomed to seeing them marching in combat boots right alongside men.
The latest statistic places the number at 287000 or 15% of the total U. S. Armed Forces (Dept of Defense) Sept 30, 2011
Laura Pettri decided she no longer need Rob to raise little Richie.
According to Wikipedia; Since the 1960s, there has been a marked increase in the number of children living with a single parent. The 1960 United States Census reported that 9% of children were dependent on a single parent, a number that has increased to 28% by the 2000 US Census. The spike was caused by an increase in unmarried pregnancies, which 36% of all births by unmarried women, ----. In 2000, 11% of children were living with parents who had never been married; --- The results of the 2010 United States Census showed that 27% of children live with one parent, consistent with the emerging trend noted in 2000. 80% of these were women.
Harriet Nelson left her cookie baking for some wine tasting and we now find this statistic; ScienceDaily (Feb. 24, 2009) — “Low to moderate alcohol consumption among women is associated with a statistically significant increase in cancer risk and may account for nearly 13 percent of the cancers of the breast, liver, rectum, and upper aero-digestive tract combined, according to a report in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute.”
Donna Reed decided to light one up with the fellows;
Women and Smoking: A Report of the Surgeon General “In 1965, 51.9 percent of men were smokers, whereas 33.9 percent of women were smokers. By 1979, the percentage of women who smoked had declined somewhat, to 29.9 percent. However, the decline in smoking among men to 37.5 percent was much more dramatic. The gender gap in adult smoking prevalence continued to close after the 1980 report, but since the mid-1980s, the difference has been fairly stable at about 5 percentage points. In 1998, smoking prevalence was 22.0 percent among women and 26.4 percent among men.”
The Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) published the following article
"Girls born in 2009 will live shorter lives than their mothers April 19, 2012 (ATLANTA) - “From 1989 to 2009, life expectancy for men improved by 4.6 years on average but only by 2.7 years for women. And throughout the country, women were more likely than men to have no progress in life expectancy or to have their lifespans get shorter over time.
IHME’s research shows that the biggest drivers of health disparities nationwide are preventable causes of death, including tobacco, high cholesterol, high blood pressure, obesity, and alcohol. IHME found that a larger percentage of women than men had inadequately treated high blood pressure and high cholesterol.”
The June Cleavers and Margaret Andersons of the US are actually losing years off their lives due to the stress and abuse of alcohol and tobacco that their male counterparts have been experiencing for years. As the Virginia Slims ads said in the 70s “You’ve come a long way, baby”
But this is not really current events. Paul dealt with issues of women’s rights when he penned the letters to the churches and those he mentored.
Women in early Israel had no rights. They were treated as second class citizens. That was one of the things that made Jesus so controversial. He had women followers as part of his talmid, his followers. Jesus considered them equal with the men in the group. There are examples upon examples of his relationship with women. In Luke 8:1-3 we learn that Jesus took not only his disciples but some women with him, preaching and announcing the Good News.
Was the women part of the group that were preaching and announcing the Good News? Or did He feel they were to serve quietly and have no authority?
If so He may have been in contrast with his Father who in Judges 4&5 appointed a woman named Deborah to lead Israel. And I know that Jesus and God were never in contrast with each other.
So why did Paul take such a strong position against women being vocal in the church? To the church in Corinth he wrote;
1 Corinthians 14:34-35
Women should be silent during the church meetings. It is not proper for them to speak. They should be submissive, just as the law says. If they have any questions, they should ask their husbands at home, for it is improper for women to speak in church meetings.
So how ‘silent’ were they to be? Did he mean that they could not sing? Did this mean they had to refrain from greeting one another and fellowship?
Let’s put these verses in context with the rest of 1 Cor 14 starting with vs. 26 through vs. 28. "Well, my brothers and sisters, let’s summarize. When you meet together, one will sing, another will teach, another will tell some special revelation God has given, one will speak in tongues, and another will interpret what is said. But everything that is done must strengthen all of you. No more than two or three should speak in tongues. They must speak one at a time, and someone must interpret what they say. But if no one is present who can interpret, they must be silent in your church meeting and speak in tongues to God privately."
Who are they? The ones speaking in tongues. And Paul says if there is no interpretation than they must be silent. This would include men. Perhaps the problem at this church was women not understanding the orderly fashion of tongues/interpretation and were disrupting service by asking questions. “What did they say? What did they mean?”
And notice he said one will sing, another teach, another preach, another gives a message in tongues, another interprets. No where does he say a man will do these things. In fact he starts out with “brothers and sisters.”
So we must conclude that Paul asked for the women to be restrained from public speaking within the worship that would cause confusion.
So what about 1 Tim 2:12 "I do not let women teach men or have authority over them. Let them listen quietly."
When looking at this verse we must consider the Greek language. The word used here is “gyne” and can be translated women or wife. With that knowledge perhaps Paul was in fact relaying a message that wives should not teach their husbands therefore giving themselves authority over them. Some would say that this is a weak argument.
But let’s look at the first four words of Paul’s statement; “I do not let---” Was Paul just giving his opinion? Would Paul do so?
In 1 Cor 7:10 Paul says “I have a command that comes not from me, but from the Lord.” Then in verse 12 we read “Now, I will speak to the rest of you, though I do not have a direct command from the Lord.” Paul is stating here that this is just my opinion. Then again in verse 25 we read; “Now regarding your question about the young women who are not yet married. I do not have a command from the Lord for them. But the Lord in his mercy has given me wisdom that can be trusted, and I will share it with you”
So in his letter to Timothy, Paul does not declare that he is speaking with the Lord’s authority but rather what he will not allow.
I once had a pastor who would call on me to help with baptisms. One thing he was adamant about was insuring that my fingernails were clean. I have a manual job that leads quite often to dirty fingernails. So he would have me check my fingernails and insure they were clean.
He could have written a statement that said “I do not let anyone with dirty fingernails do baptisms.” Would that have discounted all people with dirty fingernails from doing baptisms or just those around him? Now I know he wasn’t the Apostle Paul and his words were not God inspired but it’s a possibility that Paul was instructing Timothy on the proper aspect of the function of the church based on his understanding of God’s instruction.
Paul was not a women-hater as some claim. He understood that they were equal spiritually to men. He would have understood what the prophet Joel had declared, the prophecy that Peter said was being witnessed in Acts 2.
Joel 2:28-29 “Then, after doing all those things,
I will pour out my Spirit upon all people.
Your sons and daughters will prophesy.
Your old men will dream dreams,
and your young men will see visions.
In those days I will pour out my Spirit
even on servants—men and women alike".
Prophesy “has its focus on encouraging or restoring covenant faithfulness” (The Strongest NIV Exhaustive Concordance). That sure sounds like preaching to me.
In Phil 4 Paul asks for help in settling a dispute between two women who “worked hard with me in telling the others the Good News”
In Romans 16 he commends a “sister” who is a diakonos where we get the word for deacon. It is the same title he gives to Timothy.
These are just three of the 15 women that Paul mentions that served with him in the mission field.
But we as a local church have a real big issue if we accept the role of women in church to be one of silence. We are members of Foursquare that originated from the ministry of Sister Aimee Semple McPherson. You can read more about her at http://www.foursquare.org/about/aimee_semple_mcpherson/p3
And if we believe a woman has no place in the pulpit or in teaching men then our entire congregation has been built on a fallacy. I for one do not believe that.
I know that the debate will continue. Nationally, just 8 percent of all congregations are led by women, according to the National Congregations Study released earlier this summer. Because many of the churches are small, about 5 percent of churchgoers attend a church that is led by a woman.
Here are more results from the survey:
-- 51 percent of churches do not allow women to become head pastors
--33 percent of churches do not allow women to preach
The latest statistics available from The Foursquare dated April 2009 stated 10% of Foursquare congregations were led by women in senior pastor roles. I know of no Foursquare congregation that ban women from preaching. I can not imagine there is one. And as for God’s blessings on this ‘denomination’ started by a woman, there are a total of 1,737 Foursquare churches in the US with a total attendance of 248,982. Foursquare has churches in more than 140 countries with a total membership of 8 million people.
I guess we all must decide for ourselves where we land in this dense argument of a woman’s role in the church. But there is one thing for certain. At whitestone ministry if God has called you into the ministry you will be supported, you will be encouraged, and you will be helped in pursuing that call in your life.
whitestone ministry meets in Denver, NC. For information email us at pastor@denverfs.org or go to denverfs.org
