first?

Second!!

I love that list of one another’s! Notice how so many are about love. We do not err if we make that the focus of christian life.

responding to ‘who is Mary Kassian’

well, she wrote, this: “but Scripture paints a radically different picture about the true nature of authority. It teaches that:
Authority is not about seeking prominence; it’s about giving prominence.”

I would have to say that the PROMINENCE of a human person (male or female) has nothing to do with ‘authority’, as it is not ‘assigned’ and ‘upheld’;

in sacred Scripture the understanding of the dignity of the human person comes from something far more permanent …. that the human person bears within them the image of God, and for that reason alone, is worthy of dignity and respect

‘authority’ has nothing to do with it, and a woman’s dignity has nothing to do with her husband granting it or ‘guarding’ it, or certainly not abusing it …

if there never was a ‘husband’ in the picture, a woman would have the same place of honor in creation as a man ….. no need for ‘headship’, no

the basic role of a woman is to live out life with dignity as one who is made in the image of God and men are not needed or required in this role

the role of a wife and mother also demands that a woman not depart from her ingrained human dignity by giving up her God-given conscience and right to decision-making in accordance with that conscience

the whole ‘authority’ thing needs to be re-examined in the light of the One Who spoke ‘as someone having authority’ and any ‘authoritarian’ departures from His Ways when He was among us need to be thrown out onto a dumpster fire, not lived out as ‘prescriptive’

Our Lord IS THE PRESCRIPTION for the Fall, not the ‘submission’ of women to their husbands

ishy’s words:
“Furthermore, he said he had to choose her husband for her because he had to make sure he was a “good Christian”. He defined “good Christian” as “someone from a well-known Christian family”. This is someone who taught pastors, and his idea of being a Christian had nothing to do with Christ.”

Apparently, people who professed Christ from non-Christian families like me, or those who weren’t “famous” in the little evangelical world, did not qualify as “good Christians”.

Ishy’s comment just kinda stuck in my brain ~ couldn’t help mulling it over.
Considering the limited number of available, proper young bachelor’s in the churchianity world, would the attitude this professor has result in inbreeding within two or three generations?
Perhaps it already has. That would certainly explain a few things!

BTW: I fell so special! This old rough-and-tumble, blatantly blunt country girl has been quoted twice in a TWW blog queen post!

A friend who is a Bible study leader and prayer warrior has to ask her husband for permission to use the car and leave the house.

She loves her husband, however, IMHO, these two clearly have a strange interpretation of marriage relationship, particularly as Christians. They are on a learning curve, perhaps?

JYJames wrote:

A friend who is a Bible study leader and prayer warrior has to ask her husband for permission to use the car and leave the house.

IF they were sharing the car, it would make sense to coordinate. Otherwise..

JYJames wrote:

A friend who is a Bible study leader and prayer warrior has to ask her husband for permission to use the car and leave the house.

Whoa, buddy. I usually let my husband know if I’m going somewhere, but I have never asked my husband’s permission to do so.
On the flip side, when my hubby fell off that ladder and messed himself up good, I did take all of the keys for a week. …. I hid his truck keys, my car keys, the tractor key, the riding mowers key………
I’ll freely confess that I have a bit of a mean streak. ~~~ I’m beginning to believe that a good, hard, incapacitating lump on the head might do some of these authoritative men some good!

@ Nancy2:

True, true. Now if only they could rid themselves of all the passages that do mention women doing things for God….

Lea wrote:

I love that list of one another’s! Notice how so many are about love. We do not err if we make that the focus of christian life.

It struck me while reading the “one anothers” list that this actually may prove one of the strongest Bible-based arguments for the kind of Kingdom mutuality that destroyed the cultural differentials of race, class, and gender in an ancient world where slavery, imperialism, and patriarchy were the norms.

There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. (Galatians 3:28, NIV, from Biblegateway dot com)

It should work in the modern world as well. The Scriptures themselves give us this “gridlock of Kingdom egalitarianism,” where the term egalitarianism is far more than just gender-equity, but a “belief in the equality of all people, especially in political, social, or economic life” and “active promotion of this belief” (from dictionary dot com).

Meanwhile, complementarian theologians get all fussy and flustered about how no verses specifically command men or women to be, do, and say what their theology states must be done or else it is “sin.” They’ve built it all on inferences supposedly found between the lines of Scripture. If they would just fulfill the one anothers in that very lengthy list, surely all their gender issues would dissolve, don’t you think?

http://cbmw.org/public-square/cbmw-announcement-denny-burk-named-cbmw-president/

JYJames wrote:
A friend who is a Bible study leader and prayer warrior has to ask her husband for permission to use the car and leave the house.

Lea wrote:

IF they were sharing the car, it would make sense to coordinate. Otherwise..

Let me finish that for you. Otherwise this is probably an abusive marriage. This man is exerting excessive control over his wife, who is by all accounts a Godly woman. I bet she has to rinse off the soap bubbles to his satisfaction, too. I bet she doesn’t even realize how controlling her husband is, and she spends way too much time trying to figure out how to submit better.

My ex-husband never stopped me from using the car, but he controlled in other ways. In the meantime I was out there teaching Sunday School, leading a homeschool group, singing in the choir, playing piano for the children’s choir, and more. I was STRONGLY encouraged by my husband to overextend myself because it made him look good.

Now? I don’t go to church. I’m considering attending the church around the corner, but haven’t been able to make myself do it yet.

Jeffrey Chalmers wrote:

it always seems to come down to “power” and “I am better than you because of ….

I haven’t seen any one on this blog or in the greater Christian arena who has said “Calvinists are NOT arrogant!” Arrogance comes with the territory, starting with Calvin himself 500 years ago. He persecuted any believer who entered Geneva who would not bow to his “right” doctrinal belief and practice. The new reformers are no different – they truly believe that they have come into the world for such a time as this to restore the gospel to the church that the rest of us have lost! And, of course, that would be Calvinism = Gospel; however, control, manipulation, and intimidation are not characteristics of true gospel preachers. New Calvinists only talk unity with other faiths until they can get the upper hand on you. The new reformers are doing that now in SBC and other denominations … calling for unity to buy them time to work their take over of resources they did not finance.

I’ve been looking for an article by Gavin Peacock that I read a while back. I finally found it. Here is his closing paragraph:
“True manhood is cruciform loving leadership, like the true man, Jesus: who took initiative for God’s glory, and despite the shame, overcame sin, Satan, and death on the cross, rising again to give life and redeem masculinity itself.”
Does this mean women cannot be of the “Elect”?

Thank you, Dee and Deb and awesome commenters. My impression that both New-Cal and Comp are primarily about control, power and money seems to be correct. It is hard to see Jesus in any of the things they emphasize and promote.

Nancy2 wrote:

True manhood is cruciform loving leadership

Cruciform means ‘cross shaped’. So, true manhood is ‘cross shaped’ loving leadership?

GC wrote:

Thank you, Dee and Deb and awesome commenters. My impression that both New-Cal and Comp are primarily about control, power and money seems to be correct. It is hard to see Jesus in any of the things they emphasize and promote.

Ditto, thank you all.

My impression is that the Comp deal is a wild goose chase camouflaging what GC articulates as control, power, and money.
Furthermore, the Neo-Cal and Cal deal is also a wild goose chase that camouflages, again, what GC articulates as control, power, and money.

Finally, my caveat with the wild goose chases is that if the powers that be can keep God’s people forever debating and going around in circles about theology and relationships (workshops, books, conferences, all bringing in good $$$), the work of rescuing people like the victims of Chaplain Dewitt will never take place as we are consumed with the work to articulate and “rightly divide the Word”.

ishy wrote:

Can someone give the lowdown on Burk?

I went to his site the other day, but all of my comments would be superficial, as all he did was link to Mary and all I did was look at his picture.

ishy wrote:

There won’t be any maids, chefs, and sex.

True, very raw, very well said, and LOL.

Nancy2 wrote:

redeem masculinity

Mr. Peacock obviously has a gender perspective on the work of the Cross of Christ which has no Biblical support. Redeeming masculinity was not on the mind of Christ when He paid the sacrifice for the redemption of ALL people. This is a warped view of the message and ministry of Jesus birthed by the new reformation. Peacock tries to take the spotlight off of his belief by saying things like “women were free to be who they were created to be.” Of course, he doesn’t believe that women were created to receive and exercise the same spiritual giftings of men; they were created to be subordinate to men in every arena of life.

however, I have persevered and have read through the 800+ comments (at the time of this writing).

And I am responsible for like 543 of the 800. I am sorry. 🙂

I feel honored one of my comments was considered good enough or whatever enough to be quoted. 🙂

Gram3 wrote:

Is CBMW tacitly backing away from ESS?

I don’t think so. This Peacock article is from 2015:
http://cbmw.org/topics/husbands-fathers/the-desperate-need-for-masculine-mentoring/

Peacock …… that name just says it all ….. makes me wanna pluck his tail feathers!

ishy wrote:

Can someone give the lowdown on Burk? I don’t know much about him.

http://www.dennyburk.com/

Max wrote:

Peacock tries to take the spotlight off of his belief by saying things like “women were free to be who they were created to be.” Of course, he doesn’t believe that women were created to receive and exercise the same spiritual giftings of men; they were created to be subordinate to men in every arena of life.

There you go again looking closely at what they are saying and not saying. You are supposed to just nod and amen whatever they say because Authority. Clearly you are one of those rebellious Bereans trying to blur the genders.

ishy wrote:

Can someone give the lowdown on Burk? I don’t know much about him.

He’s a professor at Boyce College, under the watchful eye of Al Mohler’s Southern Baptist Theological Seminary at Ground Zero. Nuff said?

Nancy2 wrote:

This Peacock article

From the article: “Paul tells the men of Corinth, “Act like men” (1 Cor. 16:13). Men should act in a masculine, not effeminate way. Paul doesn’t coddle men because he knows it produces self-pity. And self-pity is the blight of manhood because it leads to passivity. Abuse gets the headlines, but passivity is the silent killer of manhood. We know this from Adam’s passive indifference that caused the fall of man. In contrast, Jesus’ proactive passion was at the heart of redemption.”

Oh Dear. Yes abuse ‘gets the headlines’ but the REAL problem is passivity! Better abusive than passive, if you want to be a godly manly man. *headdesk*

Gram3 wrote:

I think the fundamental problem with their system is that they see individual humans as mere instances of the two sexual types.

I used to live in Moscow, Idaho, during the era when the Aryan Nations compound was still in northern Idaho (at Hayden Lake). One day I found some of their white supremacist literature on the front lawn. It happened to be a booklet that had a lot of background information about Aryan Nations’ beliefs — including that blacks and Jews were not the same species as whites. In other words, they did not share the same humanity, and this was the justification for subjugation. Given the news reports of how the white supremacists consistently treated non-whites, that seemed to have been a cornerstone of the Aryan paradigm. (See the history of how their Hayden Lake compound came to an end for an example. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aryan_Nations )

In my studies of how paradigms work, I look at patterns of behavior in a culture and then work backward to what the underlying beliefs and values are that drive those behavior patterns. This seems to work better than starting with what people say about how they are theoretically supposed to act, because they may not actually follow through on their supposed rules in practice.

Point being, regardless of what complementarian theologians say about the supposed parity of genders in their value to God and equal humanity, there have been enough dominant patterns of behavior over the decades of this debate to conclude some extreme complementarians seem to treat men and women as equivalent “separate species.” But, are we all of one humanity — or are there in effect two types? Same issue that comes up in Aryan Nations, but with race instead of gender as the dividing point.

Is it any surprise that the demonstrated actions of differential treatment of men and women continues to cause people to ask questions about what the true underlying beliefs and values are about said parity and equality in gender complementarianism?

I see the most recent dialogues about Trinitarianism, the Nicene Creed and Constantinople follow-up, and Eternal Subordination of the Son as crucial in bringing to the surface the actual beliefs and values of hyper-complementarian theologians. Their own scholarly peers in academia are holding them accountable to both the beliefs and behaviors of their gender system. The contrasts have been getting more stark about what the leaders in the Council of CBMW, and how some of their views on the Trinity stand outside the borders of historic orthodoxy that have been in place for almost 1,650 years.

FW Rez wrote:

What if the wife doesn’t comply with the husband’s request? The logical conclusion is that she becomes the sinner who is in disobedience to God by not being submissive.

You are not wrong, IMO.

IF Male Desire THEN Female Submission ELSE Female Sin.
IF Female Desire AND Male Submission THEN Both Sin.

brad/futuristguy wrote:

there have been enough dominant patterns of behavior over the decades of this debate to conclude some extreme complementarians seem to treat men and women as equivalent “separate species.” But, are we all of one humanity — or are there in effect two types? Same issue that comes up in Aryan Nations, but with race instead of gender as the dividing point.

Good comparison, Brad!

@ Nancy2:
I wonder what Thabiti Anyabwile, Voddie Baucham, and Tony Evans, etc. would say about Brad’s comment?

K.D. wrote:

Gram3 wrote:

FW Rez wrote:

What if the wife doesn’t comply with the husband’s request? The logical conclusion is that she becomes the sinner who is in disobedience to God by not being submissive.

You are not wrong, IMO.

IF Male Desire THEN Female Submission ELSE Female Sin.
IF Female Desire AND Male Submission THEN Both Sin.

Sorry, have not read WW in a while….had other local battles to fight….
I am assuming you mean the lack of female submission in the ” bedroom?”

No, generally. Desire was probably not the best word but I was trying to avoid “demand” or “command” because the Female Subordinationists could wiggle out of those two.

Nancy2 wrote:

@ Nancy2:
I wonder what Thabiti Anyabwile, Voddie Baucham, and Tony Evans, etc. would say about Brad’s comment?

They are in total denial about this. However, in fairness, they are concerned about the social breakdown in certain African-American sub-cultures (though that is generally true of modern society as well.) Tony Evans has been preaching about fatherlessness for a long time and urging men to not be feral fathers. Thabiti has been very strong (and right, IMO) about separating race or ethnicity from culture and not associating either dysfunction or function with “race.” Voddie Baucham is not as familiar to me.

I think these men are correct about the problems but their solutions are not really solutions to the problems they see. “Assertion of Authority” is not the solution to problems in any culture. “Personal Responsibility and Caring for Others” is a better solution, IMO, and that does not mean hierarchy.

But that is probably a discussion for the ODP.

I should clarify my comment about “assertion of authority” not being the solution. The assertion of authority of male over female is not the solution. That is merely a substitution of patriarchy for de facto matriarchy. The assertion of legitimate authority like fathers and mothers over children or teachers over students and the willingness of children and students to yield to legitimate authority would help a lot, IMO. Also (not being political here) the willingness of political leaders and other elites to submit to the Rule of Law would go a long way toward repairing our society.

Deb wrote:

the

Who was the president, Owen S.?

ishy wrote:

ishy UNITED STATES on Thu Jul 21, 2016 at 10:32 AM said:

Can someone give the lowdown on Burk? I don’t know much about him.

I comment on Denny’s blog, but about a third of what I write doesn’t make it passed ‘moderation’. It’s unusual in that on some topics, dialogue that is diverse seems permitted, but not on other topics. I pretty well know that if I comment on the Mary Kassian post, I will not be allowed through ‘moderation’.

I kind of think that Denny has been chosen to take the incoming brunt of the new (and well-deserved) criticism of the ESS/CBMW brou-haha. The higher-ups are going to ride this out by hiding behind people like Denny. I can say Denny has never ‘lectured’ me or sent emails to me that are what I would consider disrespectful, as another blogger has done.

I don’t know how much of Denny’s devotion to ESS/CBMW is due to his job obligations, or how much is genuinely unquestioned in his thinking, nor would I try to evaluate that. I hope he is not conflicted, in one way; and I wish he was in another way …. but he’s a younger man with a family to support, and it can’t be easy to be conflicted in matters of personal job security and the integrity of one’s beliefs.

Lea wrote:

Thank you for the reminder, because this isn’t ‘unity’. This is the appearance of unity. True unity is making a decision together, however you come about it.

And it’s hard, which is why I think these guys who push extreme complementarianism and church authority are simply cowards in the end. They want to just tell everyone what to do and what to think instead of trying to work it out the hard way.

ishy wrote:

And it’s hard

Indeed. I think that’s what Ruth was getting at. Just saying ‘the husband decides’ doesn’t make it all happy happy joy joy when two people disagree.

This subject of male authority is so important to these people that they created an organization for the sole purpose of promoting it. Not for promoting Jesus Christ and what he has done for us – not to proclaim the good news and set captives free – but to promote a certain formula they believe the sexes must follow.

Their meetings were secret and their motives and goals were not made clear. They are using many means to push this teaching onto individuals and into churches. Yet there is a lot of obfuscation going on as to what exactly they mean by these so-called ‘biblical gender roles.’

For instance, in Mary Kassian’s latest post, http://girlsgonewise.com/does-a-husband-have-the-authority/ there is no clear idea of exactly what is meant by a husband’s authority. She says that his authority is really more of an obligation. What is this actually supposed to mean? Has the meaning of the word ‘authority’ changed? Or is it circular reasoning- he has ‘an obligation’ to rule over his wife? She says it is the wife’s choice as to whether she will ‘submit.’ But they teach that the wife would be in sin against God if she doesn’t submit. What kind of a choice is that? It is no choice at all.

Kassian says the husband may not resort to physical abuse to force his wife to submit. But at the same time, he supposedly has ‘an obligation’ – an obligation to do what, exactly? The lines are always fuzzy.

Kassian says, “a husband’s position as head of the home does not give him the right to rule, but rather the responsibility to provide loving oversight. A husband is not imparted with privilege; he is entrusted with obligation—the obligation to love, cherish and shepherd, in emulation of Christ.”

I feel that this is just wrangling over words. Absolute, iron-fisted authority to one person is ‘shepherding’ to another. Those who interpret these teachings in a reasonable light will end up, in practice, living out their marriage as equals under Christ, only with a layer of weird uncertainty over them as to whether they’re doing it “biblically” enough.

Apparently this teaching is so complex, it requires leaders who are constantly guiding and directing people on how to live it out.

In practice, this teaching of male authority lends itself as a covering to abuse. It provides no benefits. It’s not required by scripture.

Because wives in a certain situation were urged to respect their husbands and the husbands to love their wives doesn’t translate into a formula that encapsulates the definition of marriage to all people for all time. We know from the whole of scripture that we are ALL to love one another and we are ALL to respect one another. We are ALL to seek to live in emulation of Christ. I must surmise that there was a reason to emphasize those particular aspects to those particular persons at that particular time.

The Christian life cannot be reduced to a formula.

Why do these people feel such a drive to introduce and enforce this system of hierarchy on all believers? What is in it for them? What is their end goal? What is it to them how other believers work out their marriage and family relationships? Why is their focus on human relationships and hierarchy instead of on the person of Jesus Christ?

siteseer wrote:

Apparently this teaching is so complex, it requires leaders who are constantly guiding and directing people on how to live it out.

It is almost like that is the point! And said leaders are more than willing to provide “resources” and “learning opportunities” for a price. And, naturally, you will require frequent refreshers and CE. For a price. Doubt and uncertainty can be erased!

JYJames wrote:

A friend who is a Bible study leader and prayer warrior has to ask her husband for permission to use the car and leave the house.

My sister had a friend whose relationship with her husband started like this. This was a woman who sincerely wanted to honor and follow Christ. They were good friends and could really talk about things together. Over time, the husband took more and more control, putting more and more limits on the wife’s life. One day she called my sister and said she was sorry but she couldn’t be friends with her anymore- her husband had ‘discerned’ a ‘spirit’ over my sister’s home or some such thing, and he would no longer ‘allow’ the friendship. They moved away not long after that and we always wondered how life went for her.

Velour wrote:

If a CEO of a business lost 200,000 customers a year, the Board would fire the CEO and get a better one.

The SBC cash cow is drying up!

siteseer wrote:

For instance, in Mary Kassian’s latest post, http://girlsgonewise.com/does-a-husband-have-the-authority/ there is no clear idea of exactly what is meant by a husband’s authority

The Deebs have been wisely pointing out for some time that the Comps are very weak on definitions. They seem to be frequently explaining that “what you think you heard I said…”. The problem is that they know they would get totally discredited if they stated clearly what they really think, and it is not “you’ve come a long way, baby”.

Velour wrote:

If a CEO of a business lost 200,000 customers a year, the Board would fire the CEO and get a better one.

The only thing close to an SBC CEO is Frank Page, President and CEO of the Executive Committee of the Southern Baptist Convention. Once an outspoken anti-Calvinist, Page even wrote a book “Trouble With The Tulip” about the ails of Calvinism. In more recent years, he appears to have compromised his position on this in view of the explosion of New Calvinism in SBC ranks. He chaired a Calvinism committee a few years ago to explore complaints about the reformed movement and basically reported back to SBC membership that it wasn’t any big deal to be concerned about and called for unity across the membership to agree to disagree with the Calvinist brethren. SBC’s national leadership appear to have surrendered to Mohler’s campaign to reform the denomination. Mohler is effectively the CEO of SBC now.

Gram3 wrote:

Clearly you are one of those rebellious Bereans

I resemble that remark 🙂

The thing about the Bereans is that Paul said they were more noble than the rest. We don’t have any record of the Bereans running around and saying that about themselves. On the other hand, the New Calvinists love to be seen and heard – I think Paul said that about the Pharisees.

JYJames wrote:

My impression is that the Comp deal is a wild goose chase camouflaging what GC articulates as control, power, and money.

The reformed youngsters particularly like the New Calvinist icons talking about comp all the time … they see it as a way to manipulate their young wives into submission in every compartment of their poor lives. The YRR are just a bunch of flesh babies.

Sam wrote:

I think Victorious nailed it. Come to think of it, Grudem, Piper and the rest of them really don’t talk about these passages. I wonder why….

When you bring such verses or passages to the attention of some complementarians, like one guy who used to post here regularly, he claims some of those verses are not meant for husbands, but only for wives (even though the text and context of the verses say no such thing).

And as you probably already know, most complementarians claim to take the Bible seriously and at face value – sure they do, until and unless it proves inconvenient to their position.

@ Daisy:

I like your assessment of the complementarian nonsense.
The complementarian way is so confusing, not because we don’t understand it, but because it makes no practical sense.
The egalitarian way is so easy and makes sense.
And which one fits better into Jesus’ principle of His burden being light and easy to bear, unlike what the pharisees taught about God.

Patti wrote:

@ Daisy:
Just for my own ponderings, what are some of the secular feminists ways that you don’t agree with? I know most are pro-choice and I don’t agree with them. But there are pro-life secular feminists too.

Yes, there are pro-life secular feminists. I know them.

Daisy wrote:

At one point, Byrd writes:

The point of headship is unity.

Unity. I think it comes from what this passage in Philippians describes:

Therefore if there is any encouragement in Christ, if there is any consolation of love, if there is any fellowship of the Spirit, if any affection and compassion, make my joy complete by being of the same mind, maintaining the same love, united in spirit, intent on one purpose. Do nothing from selfishness or empty conceit, but with humility of mind regard one another as more important than yourselves; do not merely look out for your own personal interests, but also for the interests of others. Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus, who, although He existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself…

This is not instruction to ‘husbands’ or ‘men’ but to all of us.

Fellowship… love… affection… compassion… being of the same mind… love… united in spirit… one purpose… humility… putting one another first… with Christ as the example for our attitude.

How does putting one believer in authority over another accomplish the unity this passage speaks of? It is a different paradigm.

In the example she gives of the couple trying to decide whether to move, she describes more the process Philippians outlines. Yet, if they come to an impasse, then the husband is to make the decision. One question I have is, if they sincerely practice Philippians, will they come to an impasse? What about taking some time to pray about it, seek more information & counsel, and continue to discuss it?

But if the husband can step in and make the decision unilaterally in the end, does that negate the former part of the process? I.e., was it just for show?

Great points on the rest of your post, Daisy.

siteseer wrote:

Also, she quotes this person: As Robert Wall describes, the head is to continuously “think about the mission, describe it, communicate it, keep it constantly before the group, and develop goals on the basis of it”

Robert Wall makes marriage sound like an army of 2: the husband is the commanding captain, and the wife is the Private 1st Class. That’s such an attractive, intriguing comparison!

Max wrote:

The thing about the Bereans is that Paul said they were more noble than the rest. We don’t have any record of the Bereans running around and saying that about themselves. On the other hand, the New Calvinists love to be seen and heard – I think Paul said that about the Pharisees.

Exactly!

Bridget wrote:

But why are they doing this? Why do they not do it in other instances?

The Usual Suspects I suspect are doing it for the usual reasons. I think (projecting my own thinking on them) for traditional and non-hierarchical complementarians (especially confessional ones), it is a case of seeing things the way they have always been seen and also working from life experience where the comp paradigm works (mainly because the relationship is functionally mutualist) and there is simply no perceived reason to think about it further than a plain reading of the clobber verses.

On a plain reading without considering cultural context and sometimes textual context, it is easy, IMO, to confuse descriptive and prescriptive. But it is unlikely that someone will be consistent with that kind of hermeneutic, as many have pointed out before WRT greeting one another with a kiss, etc. However, if one’s bias is to see the Bible as a handbook of precepts and propositions, then it is easy to see definite prescription rather than possible description. I think it is because some steps between exegesis, interpretation and application are skipped.

When you combine that with the historical fact that at least some *denominations* have affirmed female ordination while not affirming inerrancy, it is reasonable from the POV of a conservative evangelical to reject female ordination because it has been associated so strongly with abandonment of the authority of the Bible as understood by conservative denominations like NAPARC or SBC.

While I am not ascribing my experience and thinking to other conservatives on this topic, I have a lot of empathy for women like Aimee Byrd. For a woman in a conservative tradition to say what she has said is a very big deal, and she will pay a price for it. As I’ve said before, I was not open at all to considering the possibility until I was forced to consider that possibility, and that is why the Bent Tree Bible elder’s statement resonated so strongly with me when he said he never looked at the issue in depth before he needed to look at it in depth (my paraphrase of his statement.)

Apologies if this does not make sense. 🙂

https://baptistnews.com/article/council-on-biblical-manhood-and-womanhood-announces-leadership-change/
Here we go. Russell Moore is in it neck deep. OBHLHS, on leaving has been quoted saying that with Hilary Clinton poised to be the Democratic nominee, we are questioning as whether it is God’s will for a woman to lead the nation.

@ siteseer:

One other thing I’d like to add about the “tie-breaker” philosophy of ‘headship.’ I would caution about using this in practice.

Every decision that is made has the possibility of bad consequences. If one person made the decision and the other was forced to go along against their feelings, and the decision works out badly, it can instigate resentment.

Using the example Byrd gave of moving, let’s say the husband and wife can’t come to agreement on whether to move, so the husband casts his tie-breaking vote and says, “we’re moving.” Then let’s say the move works out badly. Maybe something bad happens to them at the new place, maybe the new job or neighborhood or school turns out to be a disaster. Maybe the kids fall in with a bad crowd and trouble ensues. Maybe the wife had misgivings about some of these things in the beginning. These can end up being really difficult issues to deal with if she felt forced into it. If both decided together, acknowledging the risks but deciding to go for it, and it doesn’t work out well, well then they at least have each other’s support in deciding how to deal with it from there. Resentment can be a real bear to deal with in a marriage.

Patty in Massachusetts wrote:

Did BLHL Owen want out because CBMW is a loser organization? Is Denny Burk sort of obligated to step in?

I looooove to speculate, and if Bruce Ware can speculate about intra-Trinitarian relationships, then I can speculate about a backstory.

It may be that Mohler’s statement was an early indication of where this is going. I think they are going to temporarily back away from the ESS angle at CMBW while at the same time not disavowing it. Owen, the Beautiful and Gloriously Thrilled One, is too closely associated with Bruce Ware who is, after all, his father-in-law. Denny Burk is not publicly as visible (and therefore vulnerable) on this issue though, IIRC, he supports ESS. In other words, it was time for at least a soft reboot.

I think that Denny Burk received an offer he could not refuse. And I think that CBMW will become increasingly irrelevant, particularly now that conservative scholars are taking a look at the underpinnings of this ideology.

Max wrote:

He chaired a Calvinism committee a few years ago to explore complaints about the reformed movement and basically reported back to SBC membership that it wasn’t any big deal to be concerned about and called for unity across the membership to agree to disagree with the Calvinist brethren. SBC’s national leadership appear to have surrendered to Mohler’s campaign to reform the denomination. Mohler is effectively the CEO of SBC now.

I think Page was afraid of all the other boys in the SBC!

So I am a widow, bless his heart, my 1st husband went home to heaven.

Earlier this spring, a Christian engineer friend of mine (thus an educated Christian professional that I’ve known for some time), proposed to me, or rather told me we were to be married with, “God has spoken and told me that you are to be my wife.”

Really. I said I would pray about it and see what God tells me.

Later in the same conversation this friend told me that when a couple has a difference in decision-making, and it takes too long to come together, then the decision defaults to the guy’s point of view, so that action can be taken without delay (caused by the woman’s indecisiveness).

Needless to say, I am no longer seeing this guy even as a friend. A couple of emails he sent me after that night are equally creepy. Not gauche or obscene; he is definitely devoutly religious, and himself a widower.

I could never step into the confines of such a relationship. That, I believe, would be out of step with what God wants in my life.

My guess is that this devout engineer has some scripture and community to back up his point of view. I didn’t go there. No sense in arguing, trying to wrap one’s head around it and getting bent out of shape.

However, I’d have to say that reading TWW and Jesus Creed, and now Tim Fall, posts and comments, are keeping me sane in a very confused church in 2016 in the USA.

Max wrote:

New Calvinist leaders will live to regret playing the “comp card” so early in the game. They should have waited to release this aberration more gradually into the reformed movement. They may have some intellectuals at the helm, but they are not very smart.

“You don’t need any intellect to be an Intellectual.”
— G.K.Chesterton, one of the Father Brown mysteries

Hi TWWers,

Quick announcement.

1. Shauna (goes by screen name “Maquis”) and her teenage son have immediate tangible needs with monthly expenses and food needs. https://www.gofundme.com/pxs5dk

Dee set up the GoFundMe account after the TX church they went blamed them for the son’s being sexually abused by another church member. The pastor and church members cost the mom, who is single, house cleaning jobs. There situation is still difficult.

The mom’s most recent post on the Open Discussion thread.

“Thank you for all of your prayers and support for billy. I am not sure if this is appropriate to ask for help still. I don’t even know how you repost my gofundme that dee set up. I’m embarrassed to even mention that we are struggling. My car broke down a few weeks ago and I’m still repaying those who helped me pay for repairs. It set me back in paying for my utilities, phone, food, gas, insurance, and ect….. Billy and I are cutting it so close that I’m rationing our food currently. I have had reschedules and cancellations with housecleanings so that takes away immediate income. I don’t know what else to do as those who have prayed and helped already provided such relief. I hate having to tell billy no on wanting to eat up everything. He’s not starving but he’s a growing teenage boy who has hollow legs and wants to eat non stop. I have to monitor just in this area because food has to stretch until I get paid. That only happens with housecleaning for which im still working off for what was advanced for the repairs on our car. Ok , I am hoping by sharing that we are in need that you will be able to pray specifically and possibly help. If no one can help I understand and I’m just grateful for what has been done already for me and billy.”

2. Also Jeannette Altes thanks everyone for helping her with her expenses as she has faced a job loss, tumor treatment, and is looking for work. Her GoFundMe account is on the Open Discussion thread.

Thank you!

JYJames wrote:

So I am a widow, bless his heart, my 1st husband went home to heaven.

I’m sorry – been there. I know what it’s like. I was widowed at the ripe old age of 27.
My first husband was very gentle and passive …. really a momma’s boy. The fights we had were over his mother trying to run our lives!

You be careful. There are a lot of users and abusers out there. I know, I dated a couple of them!

mot wrote:

They are definitely not seasoned and are not ready for prime time IMO!

Unfortunately, they are in prime time right now. By the time they are done working their mischief, the SBC will have to be re-primed if it’s still around.

brad/futuristguy wrote:

Meanwhile, complementarian theologians get all fussy and flustered about how no verses specifically command men or women to be, do, and say what their theology states must be done or else it is “sin.” They’ve built it all on inferences supposedly found between the lines of Scripture. If they would just fulfill the one anothers in that very lengthy list, surely all their gender issues would dissolve, don’t you think?

All of what you say is very true, and I agree.

To me, what you said is tied in with how complementarians are so focused on the bark of individual trees that they don’t see the forest.

They really narrowly focus on a small number of verses (about women being quiet or submissive and so on) while overlooking the overall pictures and themes in the Bible of how Jesus came to shake up things as we know it.

(Then, of course, there are examples in the Bible of women doing things with God’s blessing or calling that complementarians say women should not be doing.)

Anyway, complementarianism seems like one big exercise of missing the ‘Big Picture’ to focus on little details. Focusing on those small details gives a distorted view of things.

JYJames wrote:

Later in the same conversation this friend told me that when a couple has a difference in decision-making, and it takes too long to come together, then the decision defaults to the guy’s point of view, so that action can be taken without delay (caused by the woman’s indecisiveness).

How big an evil is ‘delay’ really? I don’t recall the biblical directives to make decisions immediately.

I think you were right to back away slowly from this sort of thinking, but what a shame it is that men seem to be being brainwashed as well to think these things. It’s not good for any of us, and he probably lost a great friend over it.

JYJames wrote:

caused by the woman’s indecisiveness

Or rebellion, right? Sheesh.

@ Lea:

Oops, sorry that was my quote not yours. I mean to quote the ‘woman’s indecisiveness’ comment.

Lea wrote:

How big an evil is ‘delay’ really? I don’t recall the biblical directives to make decisions immediately.

When a woman delays a decision she is being indecisive. When a man delays a decision he is waiting on God’s direction.

Off topic prayer request: Could folks please pray for a woman named Penny. She posted a searing story over on Liberty for Captives about being 67 years old, failing eyesight, and being horribly treated at her church when she discovered that her husband was a pedophile. She has been shunned by the Body of Christ, by family who don’t want to deal with it, and have taken sides.

I referred her over to this blog, Julie Anne’s Spiritual Sounding Board, Jeff Crippen & Barbara Roberts’ blog a Cry for Justice, and a few others.

ishy wrote:

many Christian men must just feel entitled

Comp deal?

@ Nancy2:

Gram3 wrote: “Is CBMW tacitly backing away from ESS?”
Nancy2 wrote: “I don’t think so. This Peacock article is from 2015…”
++++++++++++++++++++

so, if not backing away from ESS, then tying themselves up in knots championing thing A and then championing thing B which contradicts thing A.

(ESS – Jesus obeyed the Father rather than taking initiative)
(Peacock – Jesus, “who took initiative for God’s glory…”)

it’s amazing, and not without comedy, how they step all over each other with their assertions. that can’t get their story straight.

(fyi- the quote about ‘who took initiative’ and the article Nancy2 referenced further down are one & the same)

elastigirl wrote:

it’s amazing, and not without comedy, how they step all over each other with their assertions. that can’t get their story straight.

That is the trouble with an on-the-fly and ad hoc “solution” to a problem. The ad hockiness is going to come out sooner or later. And they have done themselves no favor by insulating their ideas from any questioning which might have sharpened their thinking and formulations. That is the way that robust arguments and theories are formed. I just had to work in “robust” because Gramp3 informs me that “robust” is the new “winsome” at CBMW.

@ Gram3:

“That is the trouble with an on-the-fly and ad hoc “solution” to a problem. The ad hockiness is going to come out sooner or later.”
+++++++++++++++

so, they holed up in a hotel conference room in Danvers, Mass, to come up with a brand new doctrine(!). since then they have campaigned their doctrine as the only normal and viable way, as well as the arbiter of legitimate christian versus not a real christian.

and the best they can do to explain this utterly crucial doctrine is ad hoc?

Lea wrote:

Tim wrote:

How big an evil is ‘delay’ really? I don’t recall the biblical directives to make decisions immediately.

I didn’t even catch that, but if they disagree, she’s not exactly being indecisive, is she?

‘Patience’ is a fruit of the Holy Spirit. Maybe the clown who needs an ‘answer’ or a ‘decision’ quickly ought to consider that the ‘voices’ in his head might not have anything to do with God.

I have never been stalked, but I can only imagine the horror of having it happen. Unstable people have been interviewed on Dr. Phil who have stalked others and they send out a creep factor that is at the top of the charts.

I think woman today must take the responsibility of being a lot more careful for a lot longer time before beginning to ‘trust’ someone enough to give out a phone number, an email address, or God forbid, a personal address.

too many crazies out there

Lea wrote:

You can get someone’s address online. Privacy is mostly dead.

nightmare!

elastigirl wrote:

and the best they can do to explain this utterly crucial doctrine is ad hoc?

I think it is safe to say at this point they would have articulated a coherent argument from the actual texts if they could do that. I believe they cannot do that. If you read Danvers, it is one big appeal to fear wrapping around various logical fallacies and prooftexts which do not actually say what Danverites say that the texts say. But if one glosses over it and does not test the presuppositions or arguments or texts, then it can seem plausible to someone who has taken the fear bait.

They are relying on people’s fear of abandoning God’s authority and the authority of the Bible. And also human desire for neat answers to tough problems. And guarantees. And on our craving for the affirmation of our tribe. In my experience in conservative churches, very few people have even read Danvers or know about it. They have not even read the real Female Subordination bible, RBMW.

Velour wrote:

Off topic prayer request: Could folks please pray for a woman named Penny. She posted a searing story over on Liberty for Captives about being 67 years old, failing eyesight, and being horribly treated at her church when she discovered that her husband was a pedophile. She has been shunned by the Body of Christ, by family who don’t want to deal with it, and have taken sides.

I referred her over to this blog, Julie Anne’s Spiritual Sounding Board, Jeff Crippen & Barbara Roberts’ blog a Cry for Justice, and a few others.

Velour, that was a very kind note you wrote to Penny and I do hope she comes here so that we can offer her support.

Gram3 wrote:

In their framework, we are not, first and foremost, instances of a human type (though I would argue we are individual persons and not merely instances)

This sounds like OOP (object oriented programming). I read several books on that topic (it’s been awhile, though).

The way some of the programming books explained classes and other jargon was to say something like, if you designed a poodle dog, you might first start by creating a very general class and call it “animals.”

Then, you would, under that class, create a sub-category of creatures with four legs, then under that, ones with fur – and so on and so forth, until you get down to the category of “dog,” then specific breeds.

I do think “human” is a top-most category, one that filters down to other specifics (such as gender). Complementarians want to put gender at the top of the pyramid.

(I’m also shocked I actually remember anything about OOP. It was a dry topic for me to read about.) 🙂

Lea wrote:

Because that’s what the cross was about. Redeeming ‘masculinity’.
Do they even hear themselves?

Don’t forget, per CBMW (or whomever Tweeted it), it wasn’t even really Jesus that saved humanity but rather “sanctified testosterone”

Gram,

You ask whether CBMW may try to move away from Danvers. Given Denny Burk’s announcement of presidency yesterday, his statement included exactly 33824729 mentions of Danvers and submission to Danvers, and God was only mentioned once. No Jesus, Holy Spirit, etc. He even stated that “Danvers is our true north.” Get them fists raised minions! It’s buckle down and cognitive dissonance time for the great agenda that is clearly being defeated.

Unless it has been recently discovered that Danvers is the long lost last name of Jesus Christ, see Jesus Christ Danvers, and that he means to say Jesus is the true North…but in their mind Jesus = Danvers ideology.

Their words betray them and their loyalties and what they’re really about. I mean, he literally admitted clear as day that Danvers is salvific to them and in the role of Christmas (and maybe Mary Kassian is Holy Spirit? No, the Spirit has no function or even placeholder, that’s how much the Spirit is devalued.) Or…she is probably legitimately mother Mary, chosen at a young age to give birth to Danvers who now is here to save us.

Daisy wrote:

“Christians are facing unprecedented challenges to the Bible’s teaching on gender and sexuality, and CBMW has its work cut out for it,” Burk said.

It is so sad to see them obsessing over this.
I feel bad for them that they have chosen this ‘hill to die on’ when this hill wasn’t even brought up in the gospels. They have chosen the wrong hill.
They are spending their lives on wind and shadows. They are sowing to the wind and are blind to the fact that they are now reaping the whirlwind.
It would be comical if it weren’t so pathetic.

JYJames wrote:

ishy wrote:
There won’t be any maids, chefs, and sex.
———–
True, very raw, very well said, and LOL.

My mom used to listen to country music a lot, so I was expose to quite a bit of it, including this, which should be the Christian Gender Complementarian / CBMW theme song:

Put Another Log On The Fire
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BWpYQjuJ0u0

Partial Lyrics, (sung by a husband to his wife):
———————
Put another log on the fire.
Cook me up some bacon and some beans.
And go out to the car and change the tire.
Wash my socks and sew my old blue jeans.
Come on, baby, you can fill my pipe,
And then go fetch my slippers.
And boil me up another pot of tea.
Then put another log on the fire, babe,
And come and tell me why you’re leaving me.

Daisy wrote:
Correction:

But then she’d often tell me to imitate me and ask me “What would Jesus do”

She told me to imitate JESUS – not “me”

Max wrote:

they were created to be subordinate to men in every arena of life.

When I was growing up, I would sometimes hear other people’s parents tell them if they wanted some boy at school to like them back or date them, to act stupid around the guy, or let the guy beat them at tennis or whatever game they played together.
It seems that the parents who give that sort of advice generally believe in complementarian type views of the genders.

I find it amusing how on the one hand, supporters of traditional gender roles tend to think of women as being more inept or dumber than males, but..

On the other hand, part of them has to admit (when giving dating advice) that sometimes some girls and women are better or smarter at certain pursuits than some men and boys.
So the women are told to dumb themselves down, because supposedly all men are turned off by, or scared of, competent, smart women.

Daisy wrote:

Many Complementarians do spend an awful lot of time in their material instructing women on how and why to be a submissive doormat to a husband…
But very little telling them how, or encouraging them to, be more like Christ.

A woman I know, when healing from being married to an alcoholic, told me, “I wasn’t just a doormat that said ‘Welcome’, I was wall-to-wall carpeting!”

That’s the message of CBMW: be wall-to-wall carpeting and let people walk all over you.
You have no value. Your daughters have no value.

CBMW teaches ‘another Gospel’.

JYJames wrote:

And to illustrate this, when I did not accept his proposal, his answer was, “Well, then I’ll just have to wait until you come around, and see it my way, what God has told me.” In other words, I’m right and you’re wrong, and you need to see this my way.

He doesn’t just sound like a bully, he sounds like a stalker.

Gavin de Becker, a threat assessment professional to entertainers and government officials, said in his book The Gift of Fear that men who can’t take ‘no’ usually choose women who can’t say ‘no’.

He said it’s very important to be explicit in the rejection: “I am not interested in you and I never will be.”

Lea wrote:

Dear Lord, please keep these people far, far away from the little girls! They will learn nothing about gods design for them.

Amen! This garbage comes from the pits of he–!

Velour wrote:

He said it’s very important to be explicit in the rejection: “I am not interested in you and I never will be.”

I’ve had guys pretend not to see me when I spoke. They’d look up at the ceiling or to the side if I said anything. I also have had guys who have told me that I didn’t really mean it when I told them I wasn’t interested and to stop calling me. I remember one told me I was playing hard to get, and that must mean I really liked him.

These guys weren’t all Calvinistas. They were just desperate chauvinists, and most of them were really socially inept.

FW Rez wrote:

What if the wife doesn’t comply with the husband’s request?
The logical conclusion is that she becomes the sinner who is in disobedience to God by not being submissive.

I think your understanding of Kassian’s page was spot on.

About the part I quoted by you in bold face type, that is one thing I’ve been asking and wondering about for a long time.

Say I do end up marrying a complementarian man. And say I don’t want to submit to him, what then?

I don’t believe in one-way submission in a marital relationship, or that submission is based on gender, so I refuse to go by the complementarian understanding of submission if I marry.

I think Deb and Dee did a post a long time ago about -(was it by Doug Wilson??) – where the preacher was saying a wife refused to wash dishes by hand, or right that instant, per her husband’s request.

The dirty dishes stacked up in the sink. The preacher’s (Wilson’s?) advice to the husband was to get him to call the couple’s church’s elders, tattle on the wife about the dirty dishes, and get the elders to come to the home and scold the wife.

There is so much wrong and ridiculous about that, one of which being, I don’t think it’s a church’s business to get into the mundane, nitty gritty of a married couple’s life, treating them as though they are 5 year old children who need supervision.

The guy who wrote this blog post tackled some of these same issues:

“Control: The Reason The Gospel Coalition and CBMW Cannot Actually Condemn Spousal Abuse”
http://fiddlrts.blogspot.com/2016/01/control-reason-gospel-coalition-and.html

Lea wrote:

Wasn’t there something somewhere about these guys liking Jane Austen movies? This bit reminded me so much of mr Collins! Maybe they don’t realize he’s not the one they’re supposed to emulate.

Some of them have been EXACTLY like Mr. Collins!

Lea wrote:

Russell Moore…said he is excited about Burk’s selection

Oh yes, New Calvinist icons are chiming in on Twitter to endorse Burk (Mohler, Strachan).

This may be a little off topic or only a tad related. Someone on another site posted this.

Can you spot what is wrong with this? (Referring to a Bible-based mistake, nothing to do with politics)
(transcript from a radio show)
—————————
FALWELL, JR.: Well, I think Jesus said we’re all sinners.
When they ask that question, I always talk about the story of the woman at the well who had had five husbands and she was living with somebody she wasn’t married to, and they wanted to stone her.
And Jesus said he’s – he who is without sin cast the first stone. …
———
Source:
http://www.npr.org/2016/07/21/486854408/political-star-power-comes-out-for-day-3-of-the-republican-convention

That’s a little like saying, “I remember the Bible story where God told Moses to lead all animals two by two into the ark, and then Jeremiah raised Lazarus from the dead.”

@ Daisy:
Yes! When I attended a comp church the ladies were frequently told to ask their husbands how they could serve them better. My husband was never told to ask me how he could love me better! A man’s measure of success as a leader was based on how good his wife made him look in all her submissive glory.

Daisy wrote:

I’ve said this before on other threads, but for all their complaining about delayed marriage or no marriage, they are not doing themselves any favors with complementarianism. I have no desire to marry a complementarian Christian, and based on comments I’ve seen of single Christian women on other sites, neither do they.

I know that Katie Botkin (blogger/writer/photographer) has escaped the NeoCalvinism world/Comp world and her ex-husband goes to Doug Wilson’s church in Moscow, ID.

Botkin’s cousins are those famous, single sisters — living under the authority of daddy at home despite being well into their 20’s or more. And they haven’t gotten married. So much for the Comp dream coming true if you follow “the formula”.

Several men have commented on blogs that they would NEVER date or marry a woman who was enmeshed with her father and it’s not healthy.

Nancy2 wrote:

Lea wrote:
t Burk’s selection and looks forward to “working with CBMW to serve the church toward a biblical view of God’s good design for men and women, girls and
Did you read what Owen is reported to have said about this year’s election?

I saw it briefly on Twitter about him not believing in a woman president. And I didn’t have time to Tweet but will soon: “OK, for the women who believe like you do — tell them NOT to vote AT ALL, in ANY election, because it was the women in my family who helped get the 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution passed [womens’ right to vote].”

I was raised with elderly women who told us stories about what it was like to be in graduate school in university and NOT have the right to vote. They worked very hard to get us the right to vote and I get so tired of the ingrates and whiners who take it all for granted.

Daisy wrote:

When they ask that question, I always talk about the story of the woman at the well who had had five husbands and she was living with somebody she wasn’t married to, and they wanted to stone her.
And Jesus said he’s – he who is without sin cast the first stone. …

Yes, he’s confused by two separate passages: The Samaritan woman at the well and the woman caught in adultery.

@ Victorious:

Wow!

Lea wrote:

Deborah

I like Jael! : D

Nancy2 wrote:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/acts-of-faith/wp/2016/07/20/god-might-not-want-a-woman-to-be-president-some-religious-conservatives-say/
This one’s a doozy. Deborah – ” …. it was shameful for her to have to step up and lead Israel when the men faltered.”

Owen is so wrong on this!

Lea wrote:

Yes. And politics aside, Deborah. These inerrancy guys really hate stuff that’s actually in the bible.

They just pick and choose what fits their agenda. They seem very unconcerned about what happens when they leave this earth.

Dave (Eagle) wrote:

Here is what I got up…the Senior Pastor Dave Ward Miller of Rocky Hill Community Church in Exeter, California (EFCA) writes on his blog how a person should leave a church. My question….is this applicable? In the wasteland of modern evangelicalism does this work?
https://wonderingeagle.wordpress.com/2016/07/20/dave-ward-miller-of-rocky-hill-community-church-in-exeter-california-on-how-to-leave-a-church-my-question-in-the-hubris-of-modern-evangelicalism-is-this-applicable/

This is excellent!

mot wrote:

Nancy2 wrote:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/acts-of-faith/wp/2016/07/20/god-might-not-want-a-woman-to-be-president-some-religious-conservatives-say/
This one’s a doozy. Deborah – ” …. it was shameful for her to have to step up and lead Israel when the men faltered.”

Owen is so wrong on this!

Did you ever see mean girls? There is a part where her crush is trying to explain math, badly, to her and she keeps thinking ‘wrong. So wrong!’ That’s me every time he speaks. Except I’m not crushing.

@ Nancy2:

We are comp kinda except decent

= WACKED

Lea wrote:

@ Nancy2:
We are comp kinda except decent
= WACKED

That one is really good!

Daisy wrote:

It makes me wonder what the complementarians really think are the key differences between complementarianism and egalitarianism when they describe their position to sound so similar to the other.

When they are speaking to a friendly audience, they will talk more about subordination. When they are speaking to a skeptical or neutral audience, they sound much more mutualist because subordination is such an unwinsome idea. They try to have it both ways and end up being incoherent.

How My Fundamentalist Bible College Made Me a Feminist
http://theflawlessproject.org/how-my-fundamentalist-bible-college-made-me-a-feminist/

@ Dave (Eagle):
Dave Ward Miller’s article is just another form of control, manipulation and intimidation to keep the flock in line. If you are led by the Holy Spirit to leave a church – if that check in your Spirit is prompting you to move along – do so. As a believer, your soul stands competent before God to move freely in His Kingdom. You have a God-given freedom and ability to know and respond to God’s will for your life. Use that Christian liberty to exit a church if you sense His leading and don’t feel pressured by the pulpit in your decision … you have a free will.

Daisy wrote:

We Need A New Name
https://adaughterofthereformation.wordpress.com/2016/07/21/we-need-a-new-name/

I agree that they need a new name. They can’t use “traditional” because the traditional view was grounded in supposed actual inferiority. But few believe in inferiority anymore, so gender Roles in the church and home are somewhat ungrounded now. ISTM that a question these non-CBMW complementarians are going to have to grapple with is the purpose for God’s restrictions on women? What is the omnipotent “gar” for and what does Paul’s supposed rationale mean in 1 Timothy if Roles are not found in the Creation accounts? Are females restricted because the male was created first or because the female was deceived and sinned rather than sinning with a high hand? That, IMO, is a huge logical and exegetical problem because neither of those reasons make much sense. An alternative is that God is arbitrary or has hidden reasons, but that is not very satisfying, IMO.

I am very sympathetic to women like Rachel Miller and Aimee Byrd and Wendy Alsup and some others. They are bright and educated and courageous.

siteseer wrote:

Why do these people feel such a drive to introduce and enforce this system of hierarchy on all believers? What is in it for them? What is their end goal? What is it to them how other believers work out their marriage and family relationships? Why is their focus on human relationships and hierarchy instead of on the person of Jesus Christ?

It could be greed. Some of them do make money selling books and stuff about it.

With a lot of the rest of them, I think they sincerely see gender roles (as taught by them) as a remedy to things they are concerned about in culture, such as feminism, abortion, homosexual marriage, etc.

The funny thing is, I don’t see the Bible telling Christians to fix culture, and certainly not via gender role teachings.

Daisy wrote:

It only produces a surface, temporary unity, not a lasting, genuine one

These guys do not want a woman, they want some type of robot.

Gram3 wrote:

siteseer wrote:
Apparently this teaching is so complex, it requires leaders who are constantly guiding and directing people on how to live it out.
——————
(Gram3 said)
It is almost like that is the point! And said leaders are more than willing to provide “resources” and “learning opportunities” for a price. And, naturally, you will require frequent refreshers and CE. For a price. Doubt and uncertainty can be erased!

When they do bother to come up with teachings to cover every conceivable issue that can come up in marriage or a church, you end up with stuff like Grudem’s ‘List of 83 Things Women Should Not Do’ or whatever it was.

Wayne Grudem: 83 Biblical Rules for Gospel Women
http://thewartburgwatch.com/2012/12/03/wayne-grudem-83-biblical-rules-for-gospel-women/

It’s kind of like how the Pharisees added tons and tone of other rules and laws on top of the ones already in the Old Testament.

Daisy wrote:

I wonder how complementarians expect marital unity to come about via automatic female compliance to male wishes, when in the long term (as I was just explaining in a few pots above), this creates resentment, depression, and/or frustration in the female?

Honestly I think that many of these young men and women have come from fractured families and they desire stability. I think that many have no concept of how a marriage based on real unity of purpose without hierarchy is even possible. And many of them are so young that they have no living memory of a time when the doctrine of ESS was not “what the church has always considered orthodox.” Many are so young that they have not lived in the system long enough to see the fruit of depression and resentment you describe.

That is why I think there is going to be a huge wake-up call when they discover their daughters and/or granddaughters have married an abusive control-freak who has been taught all his life that God expects his wife to obey him. Reality is going to become very real. Most of these guys have pre-teens and have not even considered the possibility of their daughters being trapped with an abuser.

The flip side is the sons and grandsons who find themselves trapped in a marriage to an abusive female who feels entitled to everything because her husband is supposed to lay down his life for her whims because that is the deal she made. Or else.

Max wrote:

… they see it as a way to manipulate their young wives into submission in every compartment of their poor lives.

Unless those husbands are incredibly controlling…

There’s this nifty invention Al Gore created called the Internet, where their wives can find all sorts of blogs and articles refuting complementarian views.

I think complementarians are going to find it more and more difficult (thanks to the internet) to convince women they are to be submissive doormats to their husbands.

@ Patti:
I might have to get back with you later on that, because I think it might take me awhile to answer.

In a nutshell, I tend to have traditional values that align more with right wingers, whereas a lot of secular feminists tend to be liberal / progressive / left wing on most issues.

Bridget wrote:

In the mind of the comp, though, you can only have unity if someone is the head

http://frombitterwaterstosweet.blogspot.com/2011/06/you-have-heard-it-said-today.html

Lea wrote:

For a serious answer, I don’t think you need a label. You should do what works for you (in marriage/relationships) and let everybody else mind their own business.

Church is sort of different.

That makes a lot of sense to me, as far as individuals go.

And yes, re: Church … sort of different. FWIW, I expect some new kinds of terminology almost inevitably will emerge from this set of issues. Because in the flow of Church history, this contentious debate includes some highly serious implications about hitching one’s gender-theology wagon to a Trinitarian theology that is basically being called out as non-orthodox (i.e., “heretical”). And those who do not wish themselves (or their institutions!) to be associated with the Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood — and the inherent theological pitfalls in that connection — will need to find ways to dissociate themselves from the Council, its spokesmen and spokeswomen, its statements, and its theological errors.

Velour wrote:

take all of my NeoCalvinist books and toss them in the recycling container (I ripped them up and threw them out separately so no one could read them).

Guess you’re in good company …

Acts 19:18-20. Many who believed now came and openly admitted what they had done. A number of those who had practiced evil magic brought their scrolls together. They set them on fire out in the open. They added up the value of the scrolls. The scrolls were worth more than someone could earn in two lifetimes. The word of the Lord spread everywhere. It became more and more powerful. (New International Reader’s Version, from Biblegateway dot com)

Mara wrote:

Bridget wrote:
In the mind of the comp, though, you can only have unity if someone is the head
Have you heard this one? “Marriage can only have one head. If it has two heads then it becomes a two-headed monster.”
http://frombitterwaterstosweet.blogspot.com/2011/06/have-you-ever-heard-this-one.html

The head is Christ, not a mortal man.

Gram3 wrote:

That’s going to be tough since SBTS and CBMW both have addresses on Lexington Avenue in Louisville, if I am not mistaken.

There’s a whole lotta organization conflation goin’ on with this CBMW-style non-Nicene pro-ESS-etc complementarianism. So, it’ll take some diligent work to disconnect from the associations involved, should someone be so inclined.

@ ishy:

Well, you’re at least running into single, Christian men. A lot of Christian women wonder where they all hang out.

About every church I’ve visited or been to for months at a time lack single men from around ages 25 to 95. The only men that go are married guys or little boys.

The dating site variety of Christian men I bumped into during my time were vulgar horn dogs (this even includes men who were ages 35 up to their 50s).

I have no idea where, if one is a single Christian woman pat 30 or 35 years old, one can find a single Christian man of the same age range. You’d have better luck finding a four leaf clover in your front yard.

Gram3 wrote:

When a woman delays a decision she is being indecisive. When a man delays a decision he is waiting on God’s direction.

On a similar note:

When a woman teaches or believes false doctrine, it’s because Eve was easily deceived, and therefore all women should be barred from preaching or teaching.

If a man teaches or believes false doctrine, it’s no big deal, and men should not be barred from preaching or teaching.

JYJames wrote:

And to illustrate this, when I did not accept his proposal, his answer was, “Well, then I’ll just have to wait until you come around, and see it my way, what God has told me.” In other words, I’m right and you’re wrong, and you need to see this my way.
However, in marriage, he indicated he would not wait. It felt like he would bully his way as his God-given mandate. That was the creepy part. I felt at that point like I was dealing with a bully.

Yes, he sure sounds like one. And a flake and a kook.

brad/futuristguy wrote:

It struck me while reading the “one anothers” list that this actually may prove one of the strongest Bible-based arguments for the kind of Kingdom mutuality that destroyed the cultural differentials of race, class, and gender in an ancient world where slavery, imperialism, and patriarchy were the norms.

Much agreed

@ Nancy2:
From your link:

Russell Moore, president of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention, said he is excited about Burk’s selection and looks forward to “working with CBMW to serve the church toward a biblical view of God’s good design for men and women, girls and boys.”

There’s really not much “biblical” about complementarianism, when one takes a good, long hard look at it.

I also don’t recall the Bible saying God designed men, boys, women, and girls to be a certain way, and that they need to be taught to be how they were supposedly designed by God to be. Talk about reading your cultural assumptions in the Bible.

Velour wrote:

That’s the message of CBMW: be wall-to-wall carpeting and let people walk all over you.
You have no value

I was taught that and role modeled it by my mother, who believed in traditional gender role stuff, and to a degree, by my father.

I love them both, but their methods of parenting and certain views they raised me to believe did some long lasting damage I’m trying to work my way through even now.

When you’re taught to believe that way, you end up attracting all sorts of users, mean people, abusers, etc.

JYJames wrote:

Earlier this spring, a Christian engineer friend of mine (thus an educated Christian professional that I’ve known for some time), proposed to me, or rather told me we were to be married with, “God has spoken and told me that you are to be my wife.”

Bummer, sad to say I’ve seen many a strange “Christian” but I would hope a fellow engineer would have more good sense.

Gram3 wrote:

When they are speaking to a friendly audience, they will talk more about subordination. When they are speaking to a skeptical or neutral audience, they sound much more mutualist because subordination is such an unwinsome idea. They try to have it both ways and end up being incoherent.

They do tend to shift their marketing depending upon who they are speaking to at any given moment, which may explain stuff like…

Some complementarians are marketing
1. an Action Figure, Tough Guy version of Jesus to men,
But 2. telling women, “Jesus was such a passive, touchy feely, nuturing, sensitive guy, look at how well he Submitted to The Father and he loved being second banana!”

And Kassian-
1. telling women being a complementarian does not mean you have to marry, have babies, and bake casseroles all day, but
2. the next post on her blog has biblical, godly casserole recipes,
and the one after that cries over how evil secular feminists have convinced more Christian women to be single and childless.

@ brian:

That was a lovely post, Brian.

John wrote:

So discount this if you want, but as an outside observer now these things seem pretty obvious to me.

I struggled with it for such a long time but finally leaving church opened my eyes to so many things, things that ought to have been obvious to me, I think, but weren’t. I count it a blessing.

@ brian:

Thank you, Brian, and God bless you, as well.

Gram3 wrote:

That is why I think there is going to be a huge wake-up call when they discover their daughters and/or granddaughters have married an abusive control-freak who has been taught all his life that God expects his wife to obey him. Reality is going to become very real. Most of these guys have pre-teens and have not even considered the possibility of their daughters being trapped with an abuser.
The flip side is the sons and grandsons who find themselves trapped in a marriage to an abusive female who feels entitled to everything because her husband is supposed to lay down his life for her whims because that is the deal she made. Or else.

All of my close friends who married with this in mind have been divorced since. Some are on their third marriages. Most have had horrible experiences in their first marriages.

I think the patriarchists are dreaming if they think people are going to stay around and behave, which is why they are trying to force everyone to sign contracts. Even with that, people are probably not going to put up with it permanently.

Gram3 wrote:

That is why I think there is going to be a huge wake-up call when they discover their daughters and/or granddaughters have married an abusive control-freak who has been taught all his life that God expects his wife to obey him. Reality is going to become very real. Most of these guys have pre-teens and have not even considered the possibility of their daughters being trapped with an abuser.
The flip side is the sons and grandsons who find themselves trapped in a marriage to an abusive female who feels entitled to everything because her husband is supposed to lay down his life for her whims because that is the deal she made. Or else.

All of my close friends who married with this in mind have been divorced since. Some are on their third marriages. Most have had horrible experiences in their first marriages.

I think the patriarchists are dreaming if they think people are going to stay around and behave, which is why they are trying to force everyone to sign contracts. Even with that, people are probably not going to put up with it permanently.
Those ‘contracts’ …. if potential members didn’t realize the danger at the point they were given a ‘membership contract’ to sign,
then they were either too trusting OR
they were too ‘needy’ to join and to ‘belong’

I’m sure that the membership contracts likely screened out many who were ‘cautious’ of manipulation, and therefore not likely to ‘co-operate’ or be cowed by ‘authority’.

Those contracts were a ‘rite of passage’ in themselves: a ‘baptism’ that revealed a real vulnerability in those who ‘signed’ to ‘join’.

The ‘leadership’ required pliant, vulnerable members

ishy wrote:

Gram3 wrote:

That is why I think there is going to be a huge wake-up call when they discover their daughters and/or granddaughters have married an abusive control-freak who has been taught all his life that God expects his wife to obey him. Reality is going to become very real. Most of these guys have pre-teens and have not even considered the possibility of their daughters being trapped with an abuser.
The flip side is the sons and grandsons who find themselves trapped in a marriage to an abusive female who feels entitled to everything because her husband is supposed to lay down his life for her whims because that is the deal she made. Or else.

All of my close friends who married with this in mind have been divorced since. Some are on their third marriages. Most have had horrible experiences in their first marriages.

I think the patriarchists are dreaming if they think people are going to stay around and behave, which is why they are trying to force everyone to sign contracts. Even with that, people are probably not going to put up with it permanently.

Those ‘contracts’ …. if potential members didn’t realize the danger at the point they were given a ‘membership contract’ to sign,
then they were either too trusting OR
they were too ‘needy’ to join and to ‘belong’

I’m sure that the membership contracts likely screened out many who were ‘cautious’ of manipulation, and therefore not likely to ‘co-operate’ or be cowed by ‘authority’.

Those contracts were a ‘rite of passage’ in themselves: a ‘baptism’ that revealed a real vulnerability in those who ‘signed’ to ‘join’.

The ‘leadership’ required pliant, vulnerable members

(I TRIED AGAIN. THIS SHOULD BE THE CORRECTED COMMENT, please forgive the trouble, pain meds still in effect, yikes)

@ brian:

This is lovely.

Velour – thanks for the comments. I don’t know why there is a Canadian flag with my name. I am born and raised in the USA. I live in Tyler, Tx, which is east of Dallas, TX. I am still having rough days pain wise. I will update on my visit with my doctor later this morning. I am thankful my husband and I are egalitarians. Some of the thing I tell him about the comp people totally astound him.

Velour wrote:

take all of my NeoCalvinist books and toss them in the recycling container

Praise God, Velour, that you see it … once you see it, you can’t un-see it!

I frequent yard/garage sales in my area searching for vintage fishing stuff. I’ve noticed that when a Christian icon falls out of favor, his books end up on sale tables. Rick Warren’s “Purpose Driven Live” is everywhere! I occasionally see a Piper book – a good sign!

@ brian:
Good words Brian – your heart is speaking. As long as there is a genuine Body of Christ on the earth, they will speak for the hurting, the abused, those bound by the doctrines of men.

Lea wrote:

You can get someone’s address online. Privacy is mostly dead.

Well yeah, but back in the day (1995) when I started picketing Scientology, I put my address and phone number out on the Internet because I wanted the cult on notice if anything happened to me. That’s because Scientology made a big deal out of trying to find and out anonymous people. I figured being open and up front would take the wind out of their sails, and besides, I wasn’t an ex-Scientologist, just one of those crazy free speech Internet types.

It generally worked out OK, I never had anything bad happen as a result.

Lea wrote:

The comps who tell us about their good marriages aren’t following this nonsense! They are just checking off a box. They need to stop.

I’ve watched some of those women when I snoop at New Calvinist churches in my area. You can see the oppression on their countenance. A “good” Christian marriage is one characterized by freedom in Christ for every believer in the family. New Calvinist Comp teaching is a form of bondage wrapped in Biblical half-truth, designed to put women in their place in a place that does not exist in the Kingdom of God.

@ brian:

Thank you, Brian.

Daisy wrote:

We Need A New Name
https://adaughterofthereformation.wordpress.com/2016/07/21/we-need-a-new-name/

How about “mutual admiration society”?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bUfLHJg-CY0

Dave A A wrote:

Well, you see… Bossship is delegated pyramid-like, so each one has just one immediate boss except god the boss, of course. He’s boss of christ who bosses around the holy ghost who bosses the pastors who boss the pew-peon males who boss their wives who boss the kids who kick the dogs.

God is just the One with the Biggest Boot who Holds the Biggest Whip.

Daisy wrote:

The blogger tried explaining things to the preacher, but the preacher is so deeply steeped in this gender comp stuff, he seemed befuddled. Here’s the post:

Also the idea of marriage permanence no matter what. This is another example of taking a statement in the Bible out of its context and making it say something it is not saying. God hates divorce so no divorce. Except that is not the purpose of that statement which has nothing to do with leaving an abusive spouse and everything to do with God hating abusers who, in this case, were abusing their wives by divorcing them just so they could marry others. They never stop to ask why it is they think that God is pleased by someone staying in an abusive marriage and, at the same time, keeping kids in an abusive household. Millstones.

mirele wrote:

Just a reminder–complementarianism (not a word) does nothing for me and the 50% plus (since 2009) of adult American women who are not married (i.e., single, divorced or widowed). Let me repeat that: NOTHING. And again: NOTHING. I’d love to see these people address what they expect non-married women to do in their comp world, so I can rip it to smithereens.

As a never-married woman myself, I completely agree.

I’d also add childless or child-free women to that list.

Complementarians not only stress wifehood for women, but they equally promote motherhood (as being a woman’s only Godly purpose or calling in life).

So, if you’re an infertile woman, or a woman who doesn’t want kids, or who can’t meet a Mr. Right to reproduce, you are a Nobody in complementarianism.

I think comps are therefore also kind of hard on married women who cannot have kids or who do not want them.

But comps are definitely the pits in how they marginalize single women.

Max wrote:

freedom in Christ for every believer

For those who truly believe, the message of the Cross is this. God does not hold men accountable for Adam’s sin. God does not hold women accountable for Eve’s sin. ALL are set free from sin and death when we put our faith in Jesus. Men and women who accept Christ as Savior and Lord are co-heirs to the Kingdom of God in the here and now. “There is no longer Jew or Gentile, slave or free, male and female. For you are all one in Christ Jesus” (Galatians 3:28). The Kingdom of God knows no boundaries of race, social status, or gender.

mirele wrote:

I’d love to see these people address what they expect non-married women to do in their comp world, so I can rip it to smithereens.

Post Script.

On those infrequent occasions I’ve seen complementarians discuss un-married women, it’s either in the context of they assume you (the un-married woman) will marry eventually (so you are to practice being submissive to men in your single state as practice for marriage)….

Or, some of them think submission applies to all women, even un-married ones (even though the Bible does not call out single women specifically to submit to any males) –

So the only things they promote in regards to single ladies is to say run around making sure you are properly deferential to all males you are in contact with.

About a week ago on another thread, someone on here quoted J-Mac as saying something like it’s in the natures of ALL women (and he was including single ones) to be subordinate to all men.

-Which I really disagree with (I don’t see that being taught in the Bible), but what does that even mean in practical terms?

Am I, a single woman, supposed to run around cleaning the dirty socks of men for free,

Or peeling grapes for men one by one and feeding them, while fanning them with a bird feather duster, all to demonstrate how subordinate I supposedly am created to be to men?

mirele wrote:

I’d love to see these people address what they expect non-married women to do in their comp world, so I can rip it to smithereens.

I think there is an article on TgC website written about single women. I did not read it, but you might find it interesting. As you said, they don’t really have a consistent answer to the question of single women, and especially the ones who are flourishing. Similarly, they have nothing to say to single men who are flourishing beyond “find a woman and settle down.”

Gram3 wrote:

I think there is an article on TgC website written about single women.

There was one on C”B”MW I think that discussed hospitality for single women and it was basically ‘babysit for your married friends’. Like you can’t have a party at your house and invite people? And married people can’t invite you? That one was particularly irritating.

Gram3 wrote:

I do not remember Liquinet, but I certainly do remember Aquanet. Aerosol marine varnish.

I still keep a can of Aquanet around for dealing with bees and wasps that stray in the house. It’s non-toxic to cats and immobilizes the critters nearly instantaneously.

@ Gram3:

I went looking for that and the first one I read was a weird thing about a girl who really wants sex. The whole article is just her rambling about it and how hard it is.

There was also one a week ago about ‘why single is not the same as lonely’, that keeps talking about ‘illicit’ relationships, which as near as I can figure is dating that includes sex?

elastigirl wrote:

in their summaries of favorite things it seemed that “Sense & Sensibility” showed up often amongst favorite movies

Ah, that’s right. I saw that somewhere else too. I tend to think they like that movie, since the handsome charming guy Marianne likes turns out to be a jerk, so she goes for the old less interesting guy. I mean, I’m not anti-Colonel Brandon, but I always felt bad for Marianne. I prefer Pride and Prejudice myself.

ishy wrote:

A few of them have answered this. They say that women must have sinned against God to not earn a husband.

Or probably to me, they would say I sinned against God by rejecting their pitiful excuses for men.

You know, I ran into this on Facebook yesterday, where some “Christians” were all but saying that marriage and children were the default for women. I quoted 1 Corinthians 7:8: “Now to the unmarried and the widows I say: It is good for them to stay unmarried, as I do.”

Do people just not read their Bibles, or what?

@ Gram3:

Gram, I had a comment that’s stuck but I’m still skimming TGC articles and found this: “One Sunday, after hearing from our pastor that single women should encourage and follow appropriate initiative and leadership from single men”

Everything I read from them makes me shake my head.

@ Gram3:

I also think in cases like that is shows how deeply beholden some believers are to doctrine. Like the Pharisees mentioned in the New Testament.

Some people put adherence and loyalty to their interpretation of some point or another in the Bible over and above the healthy, safety, and happiness of people. Jesus seemed to have real problems with that attitude – if loyalty to doctrine over-rode how people were treated.

What makes it even sadder and more tragic is that these complementarian fathers and preachers who expect women to stay married to a jerk no matter what are basing this on a warped or incorrect view of the Bible.

The Bible does not really teach gender complementarianism (which entails, or may entail things like, female subordination, the permanence view of marriage, etc).

If you (general “you” there, not Gram3 specifically!) –
If you are going to be that loyal to some doctrine, one that has been known to cause great harm to people, I think you owe it to people to make sure, DANG SURE, that your interpretation of what the Bible says about it is accurate.

And be willing to consider your interpretation may be very, very wrong.

elastigirl wrote:

@ ishy:
“I’ve had guys pretend not to see me when I spoke. They’d look up at the ceiling or to the side if I said anything.”
++++++++++++
??? what was that all about? do you chalk it up to social ineptness or stemming from some kind of lower view of females?

I’ve heard married women who said this happened to them.

I think it may be more obvious in those cases.

In complementarian churches, these married women say, when they go to chat with, or greet, a man at church, and their husband is with them, that the man will ignore them (the woman/wife) but shake hands with the husband and make chit chat with the husband.

These women say it’s as though they are invisible and do not exist in such situations.

A variation of this also happens to single adults.

I’ve read single women (sometimes men) online who said they’ve been going to ‘Local Church on the Corner’ for years, are never greeted or included by the membership (which is predominantly married couples)…

But, the moment their PARENTS (who are married) show up to that church as their guest, suddenly, all those same married couples make a bee-line to the new married couples (the parents) to shake hands, yak with them, make luncheon invitations, etc.

I’ve also heard single men and women say they are ignored by their churches until they invite an opposite- gender friend as a guest to church on Sunday morning, who the church mistakes as being a new sweetie or spouse, and all the sudden, that single adult (who is usually ignored) exists and can be seen.

elastigirl wrote:

i’d say intuition or even simply a feeling of discomfort, that things are off.

I think our intuition is a gift from god. We should not discount it.

ishy wrote:

I had three of those “God told me” guys approach me at Liberty.

Is there a Liberty University survivors blog? There is much that is good there, but there is also a LOT of weirdness. I have heard other first hand accounts.

elastigirl wrote:

i’d say intuition or even simply a feeling of discomfort, that things are off.

Gavin de Becker, who is a threat assessment consultant, says you should not ignore those gut feelings. Your subconscious is trying to tell you something.

Daisy wrote:

Plug in the word “single” in about any complementarian- based site

I got a bunch, but half of them were about being a ‘single issue’ voter or something else random…

@ Lea:

Oh! And the other thing was that a number of the articles seemed to be about or written bythose with same sex attractions.

Lowlandseer wrote:

Here is a view of a Complementarian single woman.

Oh joy. “It’s also for me as a single woman. It helps me to have a correct view of how I am to personally submit to Christ as the supreme authority in my life. Christ is Lord. I am his servant.”

Pst. Your husband is not Christ. That was a metaphor. Christ being Lord does not mean your husband is lord. We are all to be servants, not just women.

FW Rez wrote:

The toxic nature of complementarianism can be attributed to the fact that it is a branch off of the poisonous tree of authoritarianism.

Yes. Submit, Submit, Submit. That’s all women are allowed to hear.

Lea wrote:

There was one on C”B”MW I think that discussed hospitality for single women and it was basically ‘babysit for your married friends’.

Yes, how could I forget this one.

Or, maybe it’s a variation on their teaching of, “While you are single, practice being a future submissive help meet to a future husband, by being a doormat to your male friends, male bosses, and male relatives in your single status.”

-It’s like, “practice being married Susie Homemaker now, while you are single, by reading Martha Stewart decor books, providing free babysitting for Christian married couples, etc.”

I once saw an article by a married Christian woman on a Christian magazine site that looked promising. I clicked on it. The introduction talked about how churches should do more to recognize single adults, and I was cheering her on, until I kept reading.

As her article went along, the married lady who wrote it told Christian singles that they are very valuable to the church – as her free baby sitters.

She said since her married Christian friends are too busy with their own families to help her, and her mother lives 2,00 miles away, the singles at her church could really be a service to her by babysitting her kids every week for free.

I wanted to throw my monitor into a lake after reading her article. It was that bad.

It started out like she was going to champion singles, but it turned into a “the only value singles have is doing favors for married couples, especially for me, because I am so worn out being a parent” thing.
-Which singles hear all the time in Christian books, blogs, and conferences anyway.

mirele wrote:

elastigirl wrote:
i’d say intuition or even simply a feeling of discomfort, that things are off.
Gavin de Becker, who is a threat assessment consultant, says you should not ignore those gut feelings. Your subconscious is trying to tell you something.

Spot on.

He also wrote in the Gift of Fear that if you don’t know what to do (and sometimes we waffle and are confused by a situation) stop and say: “Gut, what should I do?”

That simple sentence has helped me in one very dangerous situation and I think it saved my life.

mirele wrote:

Gram3 wrote:
I do not remember Liquinet, but I certainly do remember Aquanet. Aerosol marine varnish.
I still keep a can of Aquanet around for dealing with bees and wasps that stray in the house. It’s non-toxic to cats and immobilizes the critters nearly instantaneously.

It did the same thing to Annette Funicello’s hair during her “Beach Blanket Bingo” movie days.

I read this interview she gave once where she said if you observe her hair in the beach scenes, even though the wind is making people’s towels and clothing waft around, not a single hair on her head moves.

She said they would blast her hair in tons of hairspray before filming each scene.

CBMW says that egalitarianism is a slippery slope into liberalism. I say it’s the other way around. What is a single woman to do who wants babies but not be subject to anyone but Christ. She has a baby anyway without getting married.

Patti wrote:

CBMW says that egalitarianism is a slippery slope into liberalism.

If by that they mean that naturally conservative folks go to a liberal church, just to get away from the overbearing anti-female stance? Sure. Reading here, I’ve honestly began to feel that a liberal church is the only safe oppression free place for a woman.

Patti wrote:

CBMW says that egalitarianism is a slippery slope into liberalism

Liberalism is the boogeyman card that FUNDAMENTALIST have played for a long time now.

@ mot:

“we are questioning as whether it is God’s will for a woman to lead the nation.”
+++++++++++++++++++

actually, no one is quoted as having stated exactly this. this statement above is Bob Allan’s paraphase.

This is the Owen quote: “A good number of evangelicals would probably prefer to see men lead in the political arena, and I would be one of them,” Strachan said. “Many evangelicals would say that men need to be the ones who step up and take responsibility, not simply for the home and the church, but also for the community.”

i get the impression of a carefully planned publicity campaign.

Owen’s statement comes across as sort of benign (except we know what he really thinks, because of his more dogmatic statements). To woo people, instead of repel or polarize.

Bob Allan’s paraphrase is still on the nuanced side, but it betrays more. it goes farther, bringing God’s will into the equation. (which is a big leap — i think even the Recovering Biblical Manhood & Womanhood made an allowance for Margaret Thatcher)

my impression is that ‘they’ are canvassing things, positing ideas here & there in varying degrees of strength, scattered enough to make it look like it is NOT a deliberate, calculated campaign.

my impression is that ‘they’ are launching something which will ultimately be even further to the right of Recovering Biblical Manhood & Womanhood. Separating out soft comp from what is essentially patriarchy — & the latter will be the clarified platform.

@ Lowlandseer:

“At the end of the day, my life is about bringing glory to God. I believe I am able to do this best by living, in a comprehensive and joyful way, according to my complementarian convictions.”

She is free to do this. But there is nothing in Scripture that says I need to adhere to “complementarian” ways.

mot wrote:

I believe I am a conservative Christian, but in the SBC world because of my views on Women in Ministry I would be labeled a liberal.

Which is sort of ‘no true scotsman’ deal.

I will also say, that right now the traditional churches tend to be more liberal. Which seems weird to say, but if you like hymns you might find yourself at a liberal church that ordains women.

mot wrote:

Patti wrote:

CBMW says that egalitarianism is a slippery slope into liberalism

Liberalism is the boogeyman card that FUNDAMENTALIST have played for a long time now.

In the Sixties/Seventies, “Tortured for Christ” Wurmbrand had a tag line “Communists always denounce their opposition as Fascists”.

To which I added the corollary “…and Fascists always denounce their opposition as Communists.”

mot wrote:

Patti wrote:

CBMW says that egalitarianism is a slippery slope into liberalism

Liberalism is the boogeyman card that FUNDAMENTALIST have played for a long time now.

Even before the HOMOSEXUALITY card?

Daisy wrote:

It started out like she was going to champion singles, but it turned into a “the only value singles have is doing favors for married couples, especially for me, because I am so worn out being a parent” thing.
-Which singles hear all the time in Christian books, blogs, and conferences anyway.

Which is why Christians are so desperate to get married. (Including lotsa underhanded pressure tactics.) Once you say “I Do”, you get to sit at the Grown-Ups table with the other Grown-Ups and those Singles have to serve YOU.

@ Gram3:
Love it! Thanks Gram3

ishy wrote:

mirele wrote:

I quoted 1 Corinthians 7:8: “Now to the unmarried and the widows I say: It is good for them to stay unmarried, as I do.”

Do people just not read their Bibles, or what?

My guess is that their New Testament only has about 20 verses, because those are the only ones they talk about.

Just like that Oldies station (“Sixties Music”) on my shop’s PA system years ago:
Playlist of 20 songs, repeated over and over and over and over.
10 were “Dope is Groovy!” and the other 10 were “Get Out Of VIETNAAAAM!”
We has an employee mutiny within the week.

@ Lowlandseer:

https://9marks.org/article/complementarianism-the-single-woman/

I’m skimming it. Nothing really there of substance for single women.

Talks about how comps feel women should not lead men in church, and she carries this mindset into her career.

It’s a variation on the “use your single days (or your career with your male boss) as Practice for one day submitting to a future husband” type thing.

The Bible does not tell single women to submit unilaterally to every man on the planet, not a boss or anyone else, so she is allowing her cultural views (which have been tainted by gender comp) to color how she lives life and views relationships.

She says:

Submission means I do them anyway because I am called to obey my authority. This is an unpopular mindset, but I think it is a modern application of biblical texts like Colossians 3:22 and Ephesians 6:5.

In this regard, of course, men in the workplace are no different.

But those verses do not apply to women only.

Men are also told in Romans in the New Testament that the governing authorities are put in place by God above them as well, not just above women.

If you are a man with a job, you too are under your male boss’s (or woman boss’s) authority.

She says,

Lastly, complementarianism has even shaped how I view dating. For me, dating must always be marriage-focused. I don’t date just to date.

If there’s no possibility of future marriage, I will not date someone or continue dating someone. Of course, being complementarian means I view marriage as a covenant in which the husband is the head and the wife submits to him as the head.

[more marriage talk, here, marriage marriage marriage, what male headship looks like in marriage discussion by her, etc]

You don’t have to be a complementarian to hold the view that dating can be more than dating, but have marriage in view.

The rest of her page is more of, “practice deferring to men while you are single so you can be great at it when married one say.”

She says,

Therefore, I look for these characteristics in a potential husband.

…I need to be self-reflective in determining if I am capable of being a godly wife,

There we are again. Singleness just means Practice For Being Married Some Day.

What if you never marry, lady author? I’m in my 40s and still not married.

There is nothing in comp about singleness in and of itself, it’s all geared with this assumption that being single is just a launching ground for marriage.

She ends on this score:

Complementarianism has greatly influenced how I live my life as a single. I have come to understand it’s not simply for those who are married. It’s for everyone. Man. Woman. Single.

But she says that after spending 99% of the page describing what being a submissive doormat to a husband would look like, and how biblical and godly it is for a woman to be a submissive doormat.

Very little in her essay on being single and living life as single, except for the 1% bit where she goes on about practicing submission to a male boss in a job.

Velour wrote:

‘another Gospel’

There’s a lot of that going on in the American church! Just this morning, I heard a celebrity talk about her late husband in Heaven, even though there was no evidence he lived a life of faith. Lodged somewhere between a “A loving God takes everyone to Heaven” and “A sovereign God takes the chosen to Heaven” is the simple Gospel truth … that a loving, sovereign God chooses those who choose Jesus by their free will to inherit eternal life.

Lea wrote:

Oh! And the other thing was that a number of the articles seemed to be about or written bythose with same sex attractions.

Yes, if and when conservative Christian sites discuss adult single celibacy, 99% of the time, it’s about Lesbians or Homosexuals. They never discuss this stuff in regards to HETERO adults.

mot wrote:

labeled a liberal

You would only be a liberal if you prayed something like “Lord, please break the laws of the universe for my convenience.”

Patti wrote:

CBMW says that egalitarianism is a slippery slope into liberalism. I say it’s the other way around. What is a single woman to do who wants babies but not be subject to anyone but Christ. She has a baby anyway without getting married.

Something like that was discussed in the book “Quitting Church” So many single Christian women wanted to get married to Christian men, but they can’t find one to marry. But they want kids.

So many of them have gone to those clinics and were impregnated by donor sperm. They are raising kids single.

This gets back to how a lot of Christians refuse to help singles who want to be married to get married.

Singles are told, ‘tough luck, you are on your own, or go try a dating sites’ (and dating sites don’t work for everyone).

If married Christians would stop acting like human intervention is not necessary in getting men and women paired up, they could help single women (who wanted the help) to get married and then have a kid with a spouse.

@ Daisy:

More refreshing articles, contrary to Comp teaching about dating, from Tim Fall’s blog:

https://timfall.wordpress.com/?s=dating

elastigirl wrote:

my impression is that ‘they’ are launching something which will ultimately be even further to the right of Recovering Biblical Manhood & Womanhood. Separating out soft comp from what is essentially patriarchy — & the latter will be the clarified platform.

That is a possibility for the Wares and Owens. I think Mohler’s squishy statement about “tendency” rather than absolute “Role” shows that he is positioning to be the voice of moderation, despite his track record of promoting Female Subordinationism. He is, above all, a politician. There, I said it. Politicians look after their own interests while convincing their constituency (whatever flavor it is) that the politician is looking out for the constituency’s interests.

I wonder when/if CBMW will leave or be pushed out of the nest at SBTS.

Gram3 wrote:

If I have not said so before, I really appreciate your posts on Scientology. I had no idea. No idea at all.

There are (or used to be) a few really good web sites exposing

Scientology. One of them is Operation Clam Bake. You can spend HOURS on that site reading reading reading about the insanity of Scientology.
http://www.xenu.net/

There was another really good site about Scientology, but I can’t remember what it was called.

Lea wrote:

Patti wrote:
CBMW says that egalitarianism is a slippery slope into liberalism.
If by that they mean that naturally conservative folks go to a liberal church, just to get away from the overbearing anti-female stance? Sure. Reading here, I’ve honestly began to feel that a liberal church is the only safe oppression free place for a woman.

And maybe for men too.

A man who posts here (maybe it was LawProf) found that a more liberal denominational church had a hands off policy when it came to their Bible study. They were able to meet, including with fellow conservatives, and exchange ideas and had no church leaders bothering them.

Max wrote:

Patti wrote:
CBMW says that egalitarianism is a slippery slope into liberalism.
Max: They are a fine bunch to be talking about slippery slopes! New Calvinist “hills to die on” are about as slippery as you can find!

They wanna talk about slippery slopes? Complementarianism is a slippery slope into slavery!

Gram3 wrote:

Personally, I think more highly of God’s character *because* his prophet declares that God hates the men abusing their power to divorce their wives at will.

It’s pretty gross that they’ve turned around a passage about protecting women from ill use by men into one that SUPPORTS just that.

@ brian:
Something this beautiful, and this uplifting is never out of place

Max wrote:

That is the dilemma of the current theo-political struggle in the Southern Baptist Convention. Calvinist vs. non-Calvinist views of God’s plan of salvation are distinctly different. The SBC is comprised primarily of non-Calvinists who hold belief and practice contrary to reformed tenets. With the proliferation of New Calvinism in SBC ranks, the denomination is faced with “Can two diverse soteriologies co-exist in a single denomination

From what I’ve read, I get the feeling that, by and large, Cavinists want the SBC to stay together, while the “whosoever wills” want a split. Hmmm……

elastigirl wrote:

i think people tend to think the Holy Spirit will feel different from what they assume are their natural senses, and so they ignore those things as suspect. and wait for some lightning bolt from God.

This is taught in many brands of fundagelicalism, that you can’t trust your ‘feelings’ and that it’s not about ‘feelings’. It is also taught that the ‘natural senses’ are of the ‘natural man’ and cannot be trusted. How many times have we all heard the old clobber chestnut ‘we walk by faith and not by sight’?
Grain of truth? Yes. But when a grain of truth is allowed to grow into a hurtling asteroid, there’s danger.

Nancy2 wrote:

From what I’ve read, I get the feeling that, by and large, Cavinists want the SBC to stay together, while the “whosoever wills” want a split. Hmmm……

Well, sure they do! Who do you think is financing the tremendous assets they have taken over (seminaries, publishing house, mission agencies)?! The millions of “whosoever wills”! Their cry for unity is a selfish one.

Lea wrote:

It’s pretty gross that they’ve turned around a passage about protecting women from ill use by men into one that SUPPORTS just that.

If you stop at the plain reading of “God hates divorce” and don’t ask any more questions about why, then you get the idea that God’s main point is Do Not Divorce.

That is why I say that a big problem for the non-hierarchical complementarians is to explain Paul’s apparent rationale for his apparent ban on women teaching authoritatively which arises from a Plain Reading. Because the Man was created first? Because the woman was deceived? That is a non-sequitur, as far as I can see.

Really, they have much the same problem of drawing bright lines as the Female Subordinationists do. The PCA is divided over female deacons, so the solution is to have non-ordained women perform similar functions as *ordained* male deacons. The bright line of ordination seems to solve the problem, but does it really? I don’t think so because ordination is never actually…ordained in the text.

Gram3 wrote:

The PCA is divided over female deacons

I never realized growing up that there is a female deacon in the bible…given that, why would they be excluded exactly?

Estelle wrote:

And neither male lead is a particularly strong character unlike the two sisters.

I mentioned above, I wonder if this has to do with the dashing handsome guy being ultimately rejected in favor of the older, established guy?

Nancy2 wrote:

PS: don’t worry ’bout me. I’ll bounce back.

Good to hear it!

Daisy wrote:

Yes, if and when conservative Christian sites discuss adult single celibacy, 99% of the time, it’s about Lesbians or Homosexuals. They never discuss this stuff in regards to HETERO adults.

They say sex makes people stupid (and we’ve all encountered some brain-dead examples).
Well, homosex makes people crazy.

Just the word “homosexual” shuts down every neuron above the Christianese brainstem and waves the Bright Red Murder Flag in front of what’s left.

Lea wrote:

Gram3 wrote:
The PCA is divided over female deacons
I never realized growing up that there is a female deacon in the bible…given that, why would they be excluded exactly?

In most of the modern translations they translate Phoebe as a “servant”, because that solves the problem. Even though the Greek word they translate “deacon” for men is exactly the same.

Lea wrote:

@ ishy:
Kind of like that whole ‘older woman’ who are supposed to be teaching the younger being kind of the same word for elder (presbyteryish) deal? Granted I didn’t take greek, but I thought that was interesting…

I haven’t studied that one. I’ll go look at it now.

ishy wrote:

In most of the modern translations they translate Phoebe as a “servant”

Yeah, Phoebe was probably the director of kitchen ministries ….. Bet she really knew how to lay out a fellowship meal!

Lea wrote:

I never realized growing up that there is a female deacon in the bible…given that, why would they be excluded exactly?

That is a very good question! My opinion is that it is primarily tradition and the idea of ordained church officers. Ordination confers authority and authority cannot be exercised by a female in the church. That runs up against some very practical problems such as how does a male deacon appropriately minister to a large group of single women, widows, and divorcees?

“Deaconess” has been taken as wife of a deacon just like “older woman” in the Bible means an older woman while “older man” means an ordained elder. It happens when one picks and chooses their interpretive method to fit a pre-determined and necessary conclusion.

Velour wrote:

With all of the foster children in need of adoption, and states taking care of fees, why didn’t these Christian women adopt children?

I dunno. I can only speculate that women who want children believe they will feel most mother-like if they carry the baby in their own body and give birth?

I never had a strong urge to have kids myself, so I cannot relate to this wanting kids thing too much, so I can only guess.

The woman who wrote the ‘Quitting Church’ book adopted a child.

ishy wrote:

In most of the modern translations they translate Phoebe as a “servant”, because that solves the problem. Even though the Greek word they translate “deacon” for men is exactly the same.

And don’t forget Junia (NOT “Junias”), mentioned in one of Paul’s Epistles as an “Apostle” in her own right.

Even St John Chrystosom stood up for Junia as being a female Apostle. Considering JC was infamous for a LOW opinion of women (even by the standard of his time), that’s saying something.

mirele wrote:

Scientology has its fingers in so, so many pies. I have often said one could teach a good chunk of the law school curriculum, from contracts to First Amendment law, just based on the shenanigans of Scientology and Scientologists.

And Mega/Gigapastors mouths water at the thought of getting Scientology’s special treatment from the IRS. From Operation Clambake:

The Wall Street Journal reported that:

“The Church of Scientology paid the Internal Revenue Service $12.5 million as part of a settlement of a long-standing dispute with the tax agency. Details of the 1993 settlement, which helped secure the tax-exempt status of the main Scientology church, previously had not been released. The details included the church’s agreement to drop thousands of lawsuits against the IRS and to stop assisting others in other lawsuits against the agency based on claims before the Oct. 1, 1993, settlement date. The IRS canceled payroll taxes and penalties it had assessed against certain church entities and seven officials, and dropped audits of 13 Scientology organizations. The 1993 agreement ended a struggle that began in 1967, when the IRS argued that the main Scientology church should lose its tax-exempt status because it was a for-profit business that enriched church officials.”70 (Emphasis added.)

It is further reported that Scientology used, among other tactics, private investigators to pressure and harass certain IRS employees, including the Commissioner, until the IRS capitulated.71

…

“One of the biggest things that happens to people who stand up to Scientology is their pets start dying. Their animals disappear or die. It was a pattern throughout the IRS investigation. Those IRS employees being “investigated” by Scientology private investigators had problems with their pets.”72

Don’t Mark Driscoll, John Piper, Cee Jay the HUMBLE, Star Scott, Got Hard, Douggie ESQUIRE, the Jerk With The Kirk in Moscow, and all the corrupt MenaGAWD featured here at TWW wish they had THAT kind of clout? That THEY could be Elron Hubbard or David Miscavage? That THEIR YRR faithful could be the next Sea Org and GO? That THEIR Teen Interns (with looooong… waaaaaavy… haaaaair…) could be the CMO? That their Org could be the next Scientology?

Gram3 wrote:

ad hockiness

Oh how I love this. So when God gets mad, does he hit us first with the Tampa Bay Lightning and then consign us for all eternity to the Calgary Flames? 🙂

Daisy wrote:

Velour wrote:
With all of the foster children in need of adoption, and states taking care of fees, why didn’t these Christian women adopt children?
I dunno. I can only speculate that women who want children believe they will feel most mother-like if they carry the baby in their own body and give birth?
I never had a strong urge to have kids myself, so I cannot relate to this wanting kids thing too much, so I can only guess.
The woman who wrote the ‘Quitting Church’ book adopted a child.

Thanks for explaining that, Daisy.

Nancy2 wrote:

PS: don’t worry ’bout me. I’ll bounce back.

Hope you feel better soon. Sounds like rest is the ticket.

Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:

ishy wrote:
In most of the modern translations they translate Phoebe as a “servant”, because that solves the problem. Even though the Greek word they translate “deacon” for men is exactly the same.
————
And don’t forget Junia (NOT “Junias”), mentioned in one of Paul’s Epistles as an “Apostle” in her own right.

Will A Truly Honest Bible Translation for Women Ever Be Made (part 1 of 2 part series)
http://www.cbeinternational.org/blogs/will-truly-honest-bible-translation-women-ever-be-made

Daisy wrote:

Will A Truly Honest Bible Translation for Women Ever Be Made (part 1 of 2 part series)
http://www.cbeinternational.org/blogs/will-truly-honest-bible-translation-women-ever-be-made

That’s a tremendous article!

mot wrote:

Velour wrote:
That’s the message of CBMW: be wall-to-wall carpeting and let people walk all over you.
You have no value. Your daughters have no value.
CBMW teaches ‘another Gospel’.
I despise what they teach, it is not biblical!

Me too.

My ex-NeoCalvinist/9Marxist/John MacArthur-ite pastors/elders literally yell and scream at women and tell them to “obey” and “to submit”. When women have left for saner churches, the senior pastor has ordered that they be harassed for “not submitting” to their husbands (if married) or to the pastors/elders, or to all of the above.

According to the pastors/elders their Membership Covenant means they get to control a person’s life forever and you haven’t left and are under *Church Discipline*, whichever trumped up charge they decide.

In my area of California (Silicon Valley/Santa Clara), the issue has become so contentious it now involves the Santa Clara County District Attorney, the Y.W.C.A. of Silicon Valley and Next Door Solutions [who advocate for women and domestic violence victims, as well as for girls], the newspaper (San Jose Mercury News), five police departments, and the Santa Clara County Sheriff’s Department.

This is the U.S. and CA and we have legal rights, we aren’t property, aren’t slaves, and the pastors/elders can be arrested and prosecuted for what they are doing.

They have lied about and harassed so many people who have left. We’re voters, tax payers, and adults and we don’t have to put up with his jive.

@ Deb Willi:

Sorry–don’t blame Ishy or HUG for the text and history on “gender-neutral” Today’s New International Version (TNIV). Not sure why it posted as such.

That’s my post–for better or worse. But REAL history!

@ Friend:
It could be worse. It could be Toronto.

@ Becky Hill:
🙂

Dee,

Thanks for posting this. Very insightful comments from our readers. I would just add that I do believe there is a kind of seduction in the fundamentalist movement. I think some of these people started out with a genuine desire to do good (although many of them clearly didn’t), but the power structures and maybe something more sinister seduced them. Think about it – it has gotten to the point where the CBMW crowd is willing to reject the historic Trinity just to promote their ideas about “gender” “roles”. Denny Burke saddens me. He was never the brightest spark-plug in the engine block, but he was your relatively benign evangelical at one point. And then he fell into the poisonous orbit of SBTS and now he doesn’t even have the integrity to turn CBMW down. Those with an inside knowledge of the economics at SBTS can tell you exactly how these things work. All that to say that I definitely see a downward spiral in the movement. For example, no matter what one might think of Piper, he is the Duke of York compared to the crass, boorish, and petulant Owen Strachan. And somehow people like Strachan are allowed to be anti-Christ on the internet, and nobody in the comp crowd so much as blushes. I think some of these men have become blinded by greed for money and power.

Lowlandseer wrote:

Headless Unicorn Guy wrote:
ishy wrote:
In most of the modern translations they translate Phoebe as a “servant”, because that solves the problem. Even though the Greek word they translate “deacon” for men is exactly the same.
And don’t forget Junia (NOT “Junias”), mentioned in one of Paul’s Epistles as an “Apostle” in her own right.
Even St John Chrystosom stood up for Junia as being a female Apostle. Considering JC was infamous for a LOW opinion of women (even by the standard of his time), that’s saying something.
The Greek word diakonos is masculine and its primary meaning is ‘servant’. It was adopted as a term for a specific form of service in the church, namely ‘deacon’. Whether Phoebe was a ‘deacon’ in the formal sense is still debated but interestingly John MacArthur argues that there was a specific office of ‘deaconess’ in the NT church.
https://www.gty.org/resources/bible-qna/BQ060713/was-phoebe-a-deaconess

Greek noun genders don’t necessarily translate to their meaning. Latin is the same way. And I’ve seen no evidence in Scripture in Greek for offices in the church. It’s another thing that is added in English translations, and shows a bias.

Dr. Fundystan, Proctologist wrote:

I do believe there is a kind of seduction in the fundamentalist movement. I think some of these people started out with a genuine desire to do good (although many of them clearly didn’t), but the power structures and maybe something more sinister seduced them. Think about it – it has gotten to the point where the CBMW crowd is willing to reject the historic Trinity just to promote their ideas about “gender” “roles”.

Several thoughts about this:

* I think our sincerity in wanting to follow God and in having our lives make a difference for the Kingdom are key ways we end up being susceptible to those who know how to misuse those good intentions for their own self-benefit.

* That thing about the Trinity is serious. And eisegesis never ends up nice-egesis; there will always be damage done to those who put on blinders to their own bias and twist the Scriptures to make their warped views into God’s truth.

Dr. Fundystan, Proctologist wrote:

Denny Burke saddens me. He was never the brightest spark-plug in the engine block, but he was your relatively benign evangelical at one point. And then he fell into the poisonous orbit of SBTS and now he doesn’t even have the integrity to turn CBMW down.

I am hopeful that Denny may do some good. I think he has it in him, but he does seem to be a ‘true believer’ in neo-Cal patriarchy, which seems sad. I don’t think he is a bad person, no. I wish he could find a way out of that mess . . . maybe in time. His livelihood depends on his ‘usefulness’ to the neo-Cal leadership. He says he loves the CBMW organiztion. Oh well. I have to think the best and be hopeful. I know. I know. But it’s my nature. Darn it.

ishy wrote:

Greek noun genders don’t necessarily translate to their meaning. Latin is the same way. And I’ve seen no evidence in Scripture in Greek for offices in the church. It’s another thing that is added in English translations, and shows a bias.

Comps would likely minimize that since the word “head” in Eph. 5 is feminine. 🙂

Mara wrote:

Velour wrote:

I’m in CA

What do you mean when you refer to yourself as a CA?
Just curious.

In CA – surely this means that Velour is in the village of Cerne Abbas in Dorset, southern England. (That’s the only explanation that makes sense.)

Mara wrote:

Velour wrote:
I’m in CA
What do you mean when you refer to yourself as a CA?
Just curious.

California.

@ Velour:

It’s official.
I need glasses.
I misread your comment and thought is said that you were a CA.
My bad. Sorry.

Mara wrote:

@ Velour:
It’s official.
I need glasses.
I misread your comment and thought is said that you were a CA.
My bad. Sorry.

No worries.

Im in CA to or like I remember Cal or calif … 🙂 Im old.

Max wrote:

Max wrote:
freedom in Christ for every believer
For those who truly believe, the message of the Cross is this. God does not hold men accountable for Adam’s sin. God does not hold women accountable for Eve’s sin. ALL are set free from sin and death when we put our faith in Jesus. Men and women who accept Christ as Savior and Lord are co-heirs to the Kingdom of God in the here and now. “There is no longer Jew or Gentile, slave or free, male and female. For you are all one in Christ Jesus” (Galatians 3:28). The Kingdom of God knows no boundaries of race, social status, or gender.

Amen, brother Max.

Friend wrote:

So when God gets mad, does he hit us first with the Tampa Bay Lightning and then consign us for all eternity to the Calgary Flames?

You should probably send an email to Ask Pastor John because I’m sure he would know. I could not name a hockey team if my life depended on it.

Gram3 wrote:

Friend wrote:
So when God gets mad, does he hit us first with the Tampa Bay Lightning and then consign us for all eternity to the Calgary Flames?
You should probably send an email to Ask Pastor John because I’m sure he would know. I could not name a hockey team if my life depended on it.

San Jose Sharks

@ Friend:
Very funny!!

Daisy wrote:

Bridget wrote:

I completely agree. But why are they doing this? Why do they not do it in other instances? What is it so important, to them, that a man has authority or is the head? I believe they have some self examination to do – which I don’t see them doing. Christ was not fixated on being the head – but a servant, as we all should do.

That is a good point. In the Evans book about Verbal Abuse, she explains that in order to stop verbally abusing other people, the abuser would have to do some deep self-examination and/or go into therapy, probably for years.

She says most verbal abusers don’t want to do that, because it would force them to face some painful inner stuff and painful issues from childhood. (And it takes effort and a lot of hard work to face your inner issues and demons.)

So they find it easier, she says, to repress all that and keep on abusing. Maybe it’s similar with complementarians.

Supposedly that is also true with control freaks, like my former boss. I’ve heard that even therapists have a hard time convincing control freaks that they are control freaks. The denial is too deep. And woe betide the untrained layperson who tries to tell a control freak that she’s a control freak!! Retaliation will be swift and fierce!

Velour wrote:

Off topic question:

Someone here who posts – I thought they were Catholic – offered to get some clothes and other items for Shauna (Marquis) and Billy through her job, as her offer to help out.
That was awhile ago.

Marquis just posted that Dee has an email of Billy’s clothing and shoe sizes.

If you can still assist with these needs, could you please email Dee?
dee@thewartburgwatch.com

you can copy Deb too: deb@thewartburgwatch.com

That was moi. I work in the apparel industry, and we have a big sample sale coming up. Alas, I may be in Wilmington, NC, during that time, moving younger son into college, but if I prework the sale, I can do some shopping. I get my kids’ stuff at sample sales, because it’s a lot more bang for the buck. E.g., $5 for Champion boys’ basketball shorts vs $35.

Is it OK if I send the stuff to the Deebs? Or maybe even meet up with them to do a delivery? I am only an hour and a half away from Raleigh / Durham. Thanks!!!

Law Prof wrote:

The “Purpose Driven Life” can be found on the bookshelves of the average Goodwill for $2.

Hardbacks go for $1.00 and paperbacks at 50-cents at yard sales in my neck of the woods. “The Purpose Driven Life” can be found everywhere! As one lady said at a garage sale a couple weeks ago when I asked her what she thought about the book “It’s more psychology than Bible truth.”

Someone at another site got me to thinking about something.

Some complementarians don’t believe women should read the Bible aloud during church services.

The Bible itself quotes women as speaking, such as Mary asking Jesus to turn water into wine and so on. Since the Bible quotes women, why do complementarians think they should not read it during services, or where ever else?

Also, if they think a woman quoting verbatim from the text warps it in some way, why are comps OK with women reading the text silently to themselves in church or where ever else?

Aren’t they concerned that if a woman reads the same text to herself in her head that she will warp it?

Catholic Gate-Crasher wrote:

Oops, when I mentioned $5, I did not mean that I would charge anything. Between my job and my freelance work, I make pretty good money, and I can afford this. I used to preshop the sample sales for charity ministries like our local Casa Guadalupe, but that was backbreaking work, and I’m just too old for it. But I can still preshop for individual families. Much easier!!

Just checking.

Is this post in reply to me and my question and Shauna (Marquis) and Billy’s clothing needs in Texas? Thanks.

Dr. Fundystan, Proctologist wrote:

Probably in completely different orbits.

I’m thinking I found his paper on the PCA history website years ago when I was trying to figure out this Trinitarian issue. My memory does not always deacon me well, but I think he did his research for the infant PCA, so that would have been sometime around 1973 or so. Interesting that Susan Foh came up with her novel interpretation of Genesis 3:16 right about then at Westminster Philly. Put those two ideas together and there you have Grudem’s theology of gender. Took the Baptists 20 years to catch up with the Presby scholarship. 🙂

Lydia wrote:

My guess is comp is going to have to be the big unifier after taking so many negative hits from outside Reformed on the stealth and charlatans and even from inside Reformed over ESS.

How sad that sexism against women is a unifying point for some Christians. And they do this in God’s name and say that sexism is taught in the Bible.

Daisy wrote:

@ Velour:
Organizations who maybe still oppose singles adopting need to get with the times. Singles now comprise slightly over half the US population.

Indeed. And there’s a lot of talented, loving singles who are safe adults for children in crisis.

Catholic Gate-Crasher wrote:

Velour wrote:
Off topic question:
Someone here who posts – I thought they were Catholic – offered to get some clothes and other items for Shauna (Marquis) and Billy through her job, as her offer to help out.
That was awhile ago.
Marquis just posted that Dee has an email of Billy’s clothing and shoe sizes.
If you can still assist with these needs, could you please email Dee?
dee@thewartburgwatch.com
you can copy Deb too: deb@thewartburgwatch.com
That was moi. I work in the apparel industry, and we have a big sample sale coming up. Alas, I may be in Wilmington, NC, during that time, moving younger son into college, but if I prework the sale, I can do some shopping. I get my kids’ stuff at sample sales, because it’s a lot more bang for the buck. E.g., $5 for Champion boys’ basketball shorts vs $35.
Is it OK if I send the stuff to the Deebs? Or maybe even meet up with them to do a delivery? I am only an hour and a half away from Raleigh / Durham. Thanks!!!

Oh, thanks so much for this.

I didn’t see your post. I’m sorry. And I asked the question again.

Yes, please give things to the Deebs. We’ll figure out how to get it from North Carolina to Texas. Maybe a few of us could chip in for postage and send Deb money to get it to Texas (Shauna and Billy’s).

I know Dee has her hands full with aging, sick relatives.

God bless you.

Gram3 wrote:

If it were that clear, we would not have such an amazing variety of church polity models.

Not very clear at all if you ask me.

Velour wrote:

Lydia wrote:
skimmed over Mohlers article but MY GOODNESS! I have read these guys long enough to spot a desperate rebranding when I see it.
Captain Al Mohler thinks that the SBC NeoCalvinist Titantic is headed for Disaster and so a little re-branding will keep the *passengers* on board? He is sorely mistaken.
What do you suppose tipped him off to the problems? Social media. Scathing criticism from conservative Christians and theologians.
200,000 *passengers* a year donning life preservers, fleeing for the exits, and getting into life boats and rowing furiously away from the SBC.

Guys like Mohler don’t care what we or the pew sitters think. If he did, he would not have made fun of victims of child molestation at T$G –among other insulting things over the years.

Peer pressure is what is going on, IMO. Mohler is a political strategist and is getting in front a potential disaster on several fronts. He has always managed to sound reasonable after promoting much unreasonableness.

Lydia wrote:

Guys like Mohler don’t care what we or the pew sitters think. If he did, he would not have made fun of victims of child molestation at T$G –among other insulting things over the years.
Peer pressure is what is going on, IMO. Mohler is a political strategist and is getting in front a potential disaster on several fronts. He has always managed to sound reasonable after promoting much unreasonableness.

No, he doesn’t care.

And from everything I’ve read about these *leaders* (cough) they are real snakes.
Firing good people right and left at seminaries and replacing them with their party favorites, dumbing down the education and the departments. They are a pretty unethical lot.

Lydia wrote:

@ Velour:
I think Mohler is more upset that some Presbyterian theologians are questioning the scholarship coming out of SBTS. Must be mortifying for him. :o)

Serves Al Mohler right. He’s done so much damage.

Nick Bulbeck wrote:

In CA – surely this means that Velour is in the village of Cerne Abbas in Dorset, southern England. (That’s the only explanation that makes sense.)

Or she’s superglue (CyanoAcrylate).

Velour wrote:

Firing good people right and left at seminaries and replacing them with their party favorites, dumbing down the education and the departments. They are a pretty unethical lot

Amen! Amen! Amen! And that is the reason the SBC is going down and the leaders can try all they want the old ship can not be turned around.

Daisy wrote:

And they do this in God’s name and say that sexism is taught in the Bible.

The Bible ‘teaches’ no such thing. The only thing the Bible teaches is to love God and be a Mensch (Yiddish for good person).

@ okrapod:
In the body of Christ, too?

Argh. Sigh. The quote was supposed to be from the conversation about “God hates divorce.” Not sure what happened.

Lea:
“Gram3 wrote:
Personally, I think more highly of God’s character *because* his prophet declares that God hates the men abusing their power to divorce their wives at will.”

“It’s pretty gross that they’ve turned around a passage about protecting women from ill use by men into one that SUPPORTS just that.”

mot wrote:

Velour wrote:
Firing good people right and left at seminaries and replacing them with their party favorites, dumbing down the education and the departments. They are a pretty unethical lot
Amen! Amen! Amen! And that is the reason the SBC is going down and the leaders can try all they want the old ship can not be turned around.

I just pray that whatever organization that comes about (beauty for ashes as my friend Gail who posts here is fond of telling me) will be much more moderate and have much better practices in place across the board. And I pray that they will finally address the issue of child safety and protection, and a national database, etc.

Persephone wrote:

Lea wrote:
Tim
My ex-husband used that quote in several of his weekly identical, printed letters to my teenagers when I was in the process of divorcing him, trying to manipulate them, hoping to turn them against me. Thank God, they knew better because I had already learned the proper interpretation and meaning of that section of scripture.

Good for you and your children.

@ Gram3:
Yes. These are great questions. I don’t view these functions as necessarily static, either, as in oh dear the pastor is leaving one of the Ephesian gatherings and we have to recruit another one right away. That would be more like how an “office” works, seems to me. Not all the gatherings had elders, either. It seems the Corinthian church did not.

That seems to come into play with the need for the more mature to help oversee this chaotic new way in some places like Crete, for example. I don’t think it was so formalized or institutionalized. That, in and of itself, is not so much sinful but it can be quite stifling. It seems to me we see encouragement to develop gifts in all members of which functions in and outside the body. One has to wonder how many giftings were left at the door undeveloped over history. We are all poorer for it.

Lydia wrote:

I think Mohler is more upset that some Presbyterian theologians are questioning the scholarship coming out of SBTS. Must be mortifying for him.

The real Calvinist theologians ain’t seen nothing like this new strain of reformed theology, with all its abuses of Christian liberty. Must be mortifying for ‘them’!