Really loved your message, Wade! Very timely for me right now. Shared two different places. Thank you!

Advent Benediction: amazing words to think on, love it.

♥

Excellent, powerful sermon! Thank you!

Beautiful hymns as well!

And I’m curious about the very lovely church picture above.

Been around for a while, but I thought everyone might get a kick out of this article on “Intelligent Falling” an alternative explanation for the theory of gravity

http://www.theonion.com/articles/evangelical-scientists-refute-gravity-with-new-int,1778/

Thanks for all the comments E-Church Wartburgers! Appreciate each and every one of you and your unique and important contributions to the body of Christ. I trust this series will continue to be an encouragement in your spiritual journey.

Barb

Dee chose the Advent Benediction. I read it to my husband yesterday, and we.both love it!

I mostly read here, and usually just skim over the EChurch posts (usually one sermon a week at my own church is enough, no offence!) but the subject matter of this week’s sermon caught my eye. While it is safe to say that we are very different flavors of Christians, Pastor Burleson, it is also very safe to say that on this subject (with a nitpick or two I will let go) we are in full agreement! I appreciate hearing this, as I worry so much for women who are oppressed by their faith, and men who feel they must oppress others in the service of theirs. Christ came to free us, not bind us!

Dee,

Would you consider this video for your next E-Church

http://mainereason.blogspot.com/2011/02/finding-compassion.html

Oh, I will! A lot of people need to hear these. For me, pun intended, it’s preaching to the choir. 🙂

Thank you for this amazing sermon, Wade. It was very encouraging to me. I rarely get to listen, but am on the road and decided to do e-church this week. I’m so glad I did. I plan to listen to the entire series. And I have recommended it to several friends. I need anything I can get to counteract years of traditional teachings designed to control women. Again, a big “Thank you!”

Oasis,

Your comment is so refreshing. Your raw vulnerability, transparent honesty, and personal inquiry is rare, but needed among us all. Let me take a stab at each of your questions. I think some of what you are wrestling with will be answered in the following two lessons from this series “When God Became Human” and “Knowing God as Father and Mother,” but I will take the time to give you a personal answer. I am sitting at my kitchen table and typing “off the top of my head” (an expression meaning no notes or Bible), so be patient with me. I am heading out of town and will be gone for the next couple of days so I will not be able to follow up like I would like, but know you will be in my thoughts and prayers.

(1). Since God is spirit and not gendered, what can we say about our physical bodies?

Our bodies ARE made in the image of God. God possesses both masculine and feminine attributes, and our bodies reflect those attributes. For example, God’s power and strength are pictured in the testosterone and muscles of the man. This does NOT mean that a woman cannot be strong and powerful, but on the whole, one of the reasons that men’s athletic records cannot be matched by women is because the male represents the masculine attributes of power and strength. In the same manner, the womb and breasts of the female represents God’s attributes of nurture, care, tenderness and provision for His children–thus as John Calvin correctly points out in his commentary on Isaiah, “God is sometimes represented in Scripture as female and we are the fruit of His womb.” In addition, the Hebrew name for God “El Shaddai” (translated “God Almighty”) actually means “God with breasts” (or twin peaks), and represents for us that the spirit Creator sustains His children in the tender and affectionate mother/child relationship. Interestingly, when the Apostle John represents Jesus the Anointed One in His full glory in the Revelation, John says, “His breasts were girded with a sache.” Most translations refuse to translate the Greek word as “breasts” and substitute the word chest (male), because it is hard to see how Jesus Christ has breasts. However, if you understand that “in Christ all the fulness of the Deity lives,” then you have no problem with the apocalyptic image of the Warrior King being imaged as a nursing mother to His children – for God is spirit and possesses the characteristics and attributes of both genders. What you must remember is that the physical is only a picture of the eternal. When Jesus performed a physical miracle, it was always because He was representing an eternal truth. So too, the physical body is only a TYPE of the eternal character of God, who is spirit.

(2). Are our gendered bodies also an expression of who God is, in a sense?

Absolutely. In a sense is the appropriate caveat. Some human, physical bodies are deformed at birth. Some humans have been given both a male penis and a woman’s vagina. Though these occurances are rare, the human beings who have deformities of physical characteristics associated with gender are NO LESS HUMAN. The physical only represents the eternal God “in a sense.” In other words, I would say to any hermaphrodite that identity is not found in the sexual organ, but in the personhood (God’s image). The body only represents what is spiritual and eternal.

(3). Can I really say that gender (phsically) is a part of God’s image?

Of course you can! Like I said above, breasts and the womb represent love, nurture and care. The male sexual organs and the testosterone of muscles represnt strength, power, and stamina. When a man being becomes a child of God through faith in Jesus Christ, the life of God takes up residence in the soul of that man. Therefore, the strong and powerful man can be at the same time a gentle, tender and nurturing male! The life of the spirit God who possesses both masculine and feminine attributes is in him. Likewise, the female who comes to faith in Jesus Christ has the life of God within her. The strength of character, power in leadership, and anointing needed to persevere is hers because of Christ. The physical only represents the eternal character of God. With just a few exceptions, the Christian woman will never be as strong physically as the Christian man while living on earth, but male physical strength ONLY REPRESENTS the quality of strength of character and personhood which is present in the image of God. All believers have this strength, not just males.

(4). Is (physical gender) part of who a human is?

My last answer to this question is conjecture. This side of death and the eternal kingdom, we are males and females physically. Jesus said that “in heaven, there is neither marriage nor the giving in marriage.” Since there is no procreation in heaven, there is a very real possiblity that in the resurrected body there will be no sexual organs. Again, this is just conjecture, but I am not the only one who has thought this. If I am correct, then the sexual organs DO NOT DEFINE HUMANITY. What defines humanity is the image of God. If you want to know what the Perfect Human should look like, look to Jesus. In Jesus Christ, all the fullness of the spirit Deity lives, and in Him, all the feminine and masculine attributes of God were present. If a man wants to know how to live, look to Jesus. If a woman wants to know how to live, look to Jesus. Sure, Jesus was a physical man, but the sexual organ does not define humanity — it is only an emblem of the eternal character of God (in the same manner breasts and the womb picture God’s character).

Oasis, I hope this helps. I trust that God will continue to bring healing to you. The scars of sexual abuse are deep. I am praying the Balm of Gilead will turn those scars into a glorious testimony of grace. Frankly, when you commented above, I thought to myself, “Wow!! Oasis gets it. She IS IN THE IMAGE OF GOD, and the men who abused her will ANSWER TO GOD.”

Keep on finding yourself in the God who loved you enough to create you in His image, and don’t let any man’s sick desire to use a woman as a sex object define who you are.

Great sermon, Wade!

Deb, if you’re looking for music for the next two e-church services, here are two of my favorites from youtube you might want to consider:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MvjiVam2HO4

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pHf1p3C8iVw