Bible Women

Whatever your understanding is of the ordination of women, I can tell you that I believe God set apart my Aunt Eva to teach me and many others the Word of God. She never would have set foot in a pulpit herself and felt that to do so would be unbiblical. She was outspokenly complementarian, a word she never would have known but a concept that she always affirmed. Within the biblical role relationships that she sought to live out from her convictions in the Word of God, she probably influenced more souls for salvation than many (male) pastors I know. That was her calling, her gift, her open door, her role.

There were many Bible women in the Word of God. In fact, I always am amazed at how God used women in the history of His people: to stand in the gap to lead Israel to war, as in Deborah's case; to save God's covenant people from annihilation, as in Esther's case; or the greatest example of all time, to raise the Lord Jesus Christ from infancy to manhood, as in Mary's case. In times of great trial, often in times of apostasy, the Lord chose a Hannah or a Ruth to bridge the gap between corrupt judges and faithful prophets. Maybe today is such a time. Maybe in days of great trial, God will raise up Bible women to roam the land, to teach the poor, to counsel the wealthy, to help all of us see the glory of Christ in our midst. How we need these mothers in Israel today.

My views on women in ministry match those of my Aunt Eva's. I am a complementarian because I believe the Bible teaches a role relationship of men and women in the body of Christ that matches the role relationship God established in the created order (e.g., 1 Tim. 2.12-15), but let it not be said that this view the unassailable position of the majority in the church for two millenia precludes effective ministry for women in the body of Christ. Indeed, we need godly, strong Bible women in our churches, in our families, in our world. Let them lay hands on our heads and soothe our weary brows. Let them teach us to pray by their untiring example. Let them tell us the stories of the Bible. Like me, some of our ministers might want to pause and sit at the feet of these Bible women and listen to the stories of God's faithfulness. I have done so many times as a pastor in nursing homes or hospitals or in a home listening to the professions of faith of children taught by their mothers. How I wish I could leave even this very moment and sit at my Bible woman's feet! But my Aunt Eva is with the One she proclaimed, the One she taught me to love.

Sometimes when I hear someone wonder about my commitment to the ministries of our young women and ladies studying in seminary (because of my own denominational affirmation -- I am a minister in the Presbyterian Church of America -- or our seminary affirmations), I listen with the secret I can't wait to tell them. I listen and I have to be patient. I want to hear of their strong convictions on the issue (for we want to cooperate with each other without compromise). Sometimes when I listen though, I seem to detect an assumption that because I hold to a complementarian view of the role relationships of men and women, I somehow cannot genuinely comprehend the place of a strong, gifted woman exercising gifts in the body of Christ, that maybe I even have a hang up about strong women in general.