Say What??

Based on several recommendations I’ve seen I’m now reading Sarah Sumner’s Men And Women In The Church. I’m about 80 pages into it and I ran across something that so stunned me I had to stop and have a conversation about it with my wife.

Sumner recounts going to a national women’s conference of sorts. Nearly all of the women in attendance appeared to be Christians. One evening at dinner she was seated with six anti-feminist women who had all attended Christian colleges. After they had all become acquainted she asked them this question: are women inferior to men? Amazingly, only two of them responded with an unqualified “no.” Three older women responded that they weren’t sure. Two young women under thirty both answered “yes.” Sumner asked those two young women if they thought they were themselves inferior to men and again they answered “yes.”

Well. I immediately put the book down and told my wife I had a question for her that might sound really bizarre and I asked her the same original question: are women inferior to men? Immediately after she pinned me to the ground and pummeled me like one of those guys in the UFC she asked, “What do you think?” No. Seriously. I can take her.

Actually, she immediately said, “no.” As in, “do you have any further ignorant questions tonight, dear?”

So, how would you answer that question? I’d specifically be interested in hearing from the women, but the men are welcome to answer as well. Sumner notes that the “equal in value” position of even those within the CBMW is an historical novelty that is very recent (which she states is important because one of the arguments of CBMW is that the egalitarian position has no historical support in the church).

Video Course For Women At SWBTS

Adjunct Southwestern Seminary professor lucaslabrador has made the lecture for his class in The Role of Women available online. I post it below for your enjoyment edification instruction….aw, heck, I post it below:

After you’ve watched that, watch this:

[HT: Bob Hyatt]

An Open Letter To Fathers Of Girls

Dear Dads, especially those of you with girls,

Parenting is difficult these days.  Of course, parenting has always been difficult.  But if you have girls it can be especially challenging.  Sociologists have been telling us for decades now that girls almost universally have lower self-esteem than boys. I believe it.  You should, too.  Whenever I tell my son that he’s a good kid, a good looking kid, a talented kid, a good soccer player, a good basketball player, he comes at me with one consistent response: "I know."

When I tell my oldest daughter that she’s the prettiest nine-year-old girl in the world, that she’s incredibly smart, that she has the prettiest eyes, that I’m proud of her, that she’s a good soccer player and a good basketball player, she gives me one consistent response: she looks sheepishly at the ground with a hint of a smile as if to say, "Aw, you’re just saying that because you’re my dad."  I remember being told in college, way back when water still covered much of what is now Oklahoma and giant lizards roamed the earth, that this is how things were, and I made a commitment to myself that if I ever had girls I would do my darndest to make sure they grew up being affirmed in every way I knew how, every bit as much as any boy I might have.  I’ve tried to make good on that promise.

I don’t know if it’s nature or nurture, but there’s still a difference.  I suspect a culture where the words "nappy headed hos" can be publicly uttered has something to do with it.  Call me a wuss.  Call me Mr. Sensitive.  Join Howard Stern in telling me to "@#%$! off!"  But there’s something wrong with a culture that can regularly refer to its women as "hos."  I’m not just talking about Imus, either.  Just weeks ago I had to delete some downloaded music from my home computer that one of the older girls had downloaded.  Among them was a song about hos.  Quite a few talked about their "baby" as nothing more than a sex toy.

I’ve now had "the talk" with our two oldest girls, foster kids, one 14 and the other 17.  I don’t mean the "sex talk."  I mean the "self-respect" talk.  Why would you listen to some cretin rapping about hos?  Why would you pay him money to talk about you that way?  Why do you let boys lie to you, two-time you and treat you like a play toy?  When you find out they are playing you, why do you go back to them?  It would be better for you to join a nunnery and remain single the rest of your life than to waste your time with people who degrade you, lie to you and disrespect you.  And sadly I’m not sure they get it.  Problem is their dads never taught them any different.  May have even reinforced that garbage.

So dads.  You who have girls of your own.  Spend every day of your life telling your girls how beautiful they are.  How strong they are.  How smart they are.  Tell them to never give a boy or a man the time of day who will not be honest with her, respect her, honor her.  Teach them to be discerning.  Most of all love them like crazy so they don’t grow up looking for the male affirmation of some loser because they never got it from their fathers.

High And Inside

Let me begin by saying that I’ve never really considered Mark Driscoll the rock star pastor that many seem to think of him as.  Recently he claimed to take one for the team by suggesting that pastors like Ted Haggard fall because, among other reasons, their wives are not sexually available to them and because those wives let themselves go.

Yeah, it’s the fat, ugly, cold wife’s fault.

I think Mark has given us the wrong metaphor.  He isn’t taking one for the team.  He’s pitching high and inside - throwing right at the batter’s head.  And I think he plunked someone on this one.

Our problem isn’t the wife who quit taking care of herself.  Fact is, I know very few women, particularly pastor’s wives, who would fit that category.  The overwhelming truth for myself and most every pastor I know is that we married up.  Way up.  I married so far up that if my wife did let herself go I’d still be looking up to her.  She’s constantly asking how I like her hair, what I think of the clothes she’s wearing.  I tell her that I like her hair however it is that she has fixed it and the only clothes I’d like better than the clothes she’s wearing are the ones she was born in

No.  It is a grievous error to blame the woman.  Driscoll might as well have said that if Ted Haggard’s wife weren’t such an ugly hag he wouldn’t have turned to meth-induced man sex.

The problem with Ted Haggard is the problem with all of us.  We struggle with some deep and dastardly demons.  And we need help.

At the risk of sounding trite, we need God.  We need grace.  We need the indwelling Spirit.  We need for someone to do in us what we are unable to do ourselves.

And we need one another.  What is at least as equally tragic as Ted Haggard’s fall would be the abandonment of his friends.  James Dobson has already backed out claiming to be too busy.  Yeah.  A guy’s going through the most difficult time of his life and I’m booked up taping radio shows and calling George Bush.  I hope and expect that Haggard will find better in his friends Jack Hayford and Tommy Barnett.  In fact, most often those sort of friendships are what we need before the fall.

As so many have already pointed out, positions of leadership, and perhaps especially church leadership, do not easily allow for the kind of friendships where one can be utterly and absolutely honest.  If a pastor goes confessing his faults to another he’d better have his resume up-to-date and be willing to move some distance.

I’m thankful for those who have been willing to share their own struggles and failures with the rest of us.  I’m thankful that many who at one time thought they would drown have found their way back to the shore.  I hope Ted Haggard and a thousand lesser-names much like him will find God and friends who can help them get there.  I hope the rest of us find them before we fall.

Why Men Are Vastly Superior To Women

Now that I have your attention let me assure you that I am not posting under the influence of Mark Driscoll.

I do wish, however, that when we discuss gender issues - especially as they relate to ministry - we could move beyond the extremes of the one end of the spectrum where the apostle Paul is portrayed as a misogynistic cretin [something advocated by a United Methodist minister who I served time with in CPE] and the other end where affirming anything less than a full and committed complementarianism leads to the denial of the Trinity or some such.

I don’t claim to have a settled position on this subject.  I’m neither pro nor con for one or the other.  I am, however, interested in a conversation that avoids the demonization of one side or the other.

Thankfully, Paul Burleson has gotten that ball rolling.  I hope it gains some traction.  To be fair I may need to read Grudem’s book, Evangelical Feminism and also Sarah Sumner’s book, Men And Women In The Church.  If you’ve read either one, or have thoughts on this issue, please share them.