Women: Where do we fit in the Church? Part 1

While reading in 1 Corinthians these past few weeks I have found there is a part of scripture which leaves a very bad taste in my mouth. In fact, there are verses which I skip entirely because I have such a knee-jerk reaction to them. I never really thought about my feelings about these verses I just wrote it off as not relevant to me or my culture and read on. But I have since had to face these feelings and verses head on.

A friend recently gave me a book titled Created To Be His Help Meet by Debi Pearl wanting to have my take on what the author has to say about the roles of women as wives and what she (the author) believes about our duty as Christian wives to our husbands. Let me say right off that I am rebellious by nature (who of us isn't) and I don't like to be told what to do or how to live. I understand that God has placed authority in my life and I know it will be life long journey learning how to live as Christ in the area of honoring and respecting the authorities in my life. With that said I began a journey into the mind of Debi Pearl and actually found many things she said very valuable as well as helpful.

However, there is something she said about women and their role in the Church that well, to put it mildly, really pissed me off. Chapter 11 titled The Nature of Man and Women touched on the author's view of women teaching within the church, and lets just say she has some very strong views on the matter. I was left with the impression that her view is that women have no place to be in leadership roles within the church and cited many of the scripture verses about women and leadership roles which I had, up until recently, been avoiding. Because I had such a strong reaction to her opinions I decided to do a little research myself. What is the role of women within the Church? What does the Bible really say is my responsibility and privileges as a member of Christ's body. Does my ministry to other Christians differ from that of men? Am I only allowed to minister to other women and children? Because these questions and my attitude towards scripture that addresses this issue I decided to finally really delve into it and get some answers. I thought I would share with you what I have found and believe but I encourage you to study this further if it has been on your mind as well. (I got my information from the Bible, Vintage Church by Mark Driscoll and Gerry Breshears, as well as some websites)

 There are three schools of thought when it comes to men and women working together in the church:

Egalitarian  (Liberal view of women in church leadership)

• Defined by Miriam Webster: "a belief in human equality especially with respect to social, political, and economic affairs" 
• These Christians use Galatians 3:28-29 as the basis for their belief that women and men hold completely equal standing within the church. (There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. If you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise.) This equality extends to all forms of leadership within the church including elder and pastoral positions.
• Vintage Church describes it this way "Men and women are partners together in every area of ministry. All ministries and offices in the church are open to men and women. Gender is not a relevant distinctionfor excluding any person from any church office." p.68
• Some churches that follow this model are the United Methodists, Church of the Nazarene, some Presbyterians, and Lutherans. 

Complementarian (Moderate view of women in church leadership)

• Defined by theopedia.com "the theological view that although men and women are created equal in their being and personhood, they are created to complement each other via different roles in life and in the church"
• Vintage Church's take: Men and women are partners in every area of ministry together. Women and men are encouraged and equipped to fulfill all ministries and offices of the church with the singular exception of the office of elder, which the scriptures require to be a male-only office." p 68
• Some churches that follow the complementarian model are: Christian Missionary Alliance, Bible Fellowship church, and Orthodox Presbyterian

 Hierarchial (Conservative view of women in church leadership)

• Merriam Webster definition: "a ruling body of clergy organized into orders or ranks each subordinate to the one above it"
• Vintage Church describes it this way: "Women and men are created to operate in different spheres of ministry within the church. Women are not permitted to be an elder or deacon, serve communion, teach men, lead worship, pray or speak in the church service etc. Women should focus on building ministries for other women and children
• Some churches include: Amish and the Roman Catholic church as well as some fundamentalist Baptist

Now that I had a good idea of how churches define gender roles within the church. I began to search what scripture had to say about women within the church. I have always leaned towards a more complementarian view but without any real information to back it up. So I delved into scripture. I will share this with you in my next post so you don't get information overload. Also, please note that there are varying degrees of each of these concepts. Just like how politics has a wide verity of political parties and not everyone fits perfectly into each party, there can be churches that are anywhere between these three schools of thought.