Cheryl Schatz

Mark,

1 Cor. 7:10 says:

1Co 7:10 But to the married I give instructions, not I, but the Lord, that the wife should not leave her husband

Paul makes it clear that these are not his own instructions but God’s instructions. When Paul says that it is his own instructions and not the Lord’s, he is only affirming God’s desire for marriage without divorce and he makes application of this with an unbeliever. This of course has nothing to do with 1 Timothy 2:12 and contains no new “law” spoken in a man’s name.

As far as Paul’s apostolic “authority”, Paul rarely used it but as a “father” to many churches, Paul encourages discipline. He usually didn’t do the discipline himself although he threatened those who were sinning with his own personal presence disciplining them. Rather Paul encouraged the church to discipline an unrepentant sinner and in the case of 1 Timothy 2:12, I believe that Paul was encouraging Timothy to discipline in his own name. I don’t recall any other case of discipline where the situation was so difficult that the apostolic representative had to name drop in order to set up a boundary against the actions that were ongoing.

Other than discipline, I don’t recall any place where Paul takes authority over a believer. The gift of apostle was not about lording it over others but about laying down one’s life for the church. The initiating of discipline was not about lording over another believer but about erecting a boundary against sin.

I hope that helps!

Mark,

You mention my lack of Greek exegesis on Eph 4:11. Well let me enlighten you so that we can be on the same page. The grammar of Eph 4:11 some claim follows Granville Sharpe’s rule that says when one article is used for two nouns where they are joined by and “kai”, that they refer to the same person when the nouns are persons. For example Jesus is Lord and Savior, where Lord and Savior both refers to one person – Jesus. However this doesn’t apply to Ephesians 4:11 where spiritual gifts are listed with no person listed.

There is also no “office” listed in the Greek. This is an addition to the text. Rather there are two separate gifts listed together as a close association of functions between two kinds of ministry gifts. Yet they are separate gifts as 1 Cor. 12:28 shows teachers alone without the mention of pastors.

Although some seem to want to remove the gift of teachers in Ephesians 4:11 and make the term as a adjective instead of a noun (i.e. teaching pastors), The Pillar New Testament commentary says:

it is more likely that the terms describe overlapping functions (cf. 1 Cor. 12:28–29 and Gal. 6:6, where ‘teachers’ are a distinct group). All pastors teach (since teaching is an essential part of pastoral ministry), but not all teachers are also pastors.

As far as Paul’s not listing “some” and only one “the”, Paul expressed the gifts in lists in ways that also removed numbering for some gifts and removed the word “then” from before some gifts.

1 Cor 12:28 And God has appointed in the church, first apostles, second prophets, third teachers, then miracles, then gifts of healings, helps, administrations, various kinds of tongues.

Notice that Paul lists “first, second, third” and then drops the numbering system. For miracles he lists “then miracles”, “then gifts of healings” and then Paul removes the “then” and just lists the gifts. Does this mean that all the gifts are now residing in one person because they are without the ordinal?

So as far as Ephesians 4:11, there is no direct evidence that Paul is referring to one person, but there is evidence that there is a connection between Pastors and Teachers and that they have a similar function. Both teach God’s Word, but a teacher does not necessarily have to have a pastoral ministry to be a teacher.

You said:

Again pointing out that a pastor is a shephard, and likewise so is an elder, what do we have here in Ephesians?

The Bible doesn’t say that an elder is a pastor. Just as someone can teach without being a teacher so an elder can do pastoring without being the gift of pastor. There is a difference between the noun pastor and the verb pastoring. They are not the same. And no where does the Scripture call an elder a pastor. An overseer may be pastor but also may not be. Sometimes God gifts Christians with multiple gifts and sometimes He does not.

You should not claim that i am noodling under an assumption of yours. I am not ‘noodling’ with the text, rather the complete opposite, being faithful to it.

It is not faithful in my opinion to disregard the gift of teacher in Ephesians 4:11. The passage does not say pastor/teacher without the conjunction. The conjunction makes the two gifts as separate even though they have a close association of functions. But to deny that a person can be a teacher in Ephesians 4:11 without that person having to be a pastor is defining away women whom you apparently deny that God can choose to gift them as pastors for the edification of the church.

You fail to correlate a shephard to an elder, thus removing Pauls teaching on eldership which has a massive bearing on any leadership discussion.

The Bible never correlates a shepherd (noun) to an elder. If doing shepherding (verb) makes one a shepherd, then teaching through prophesying must also make one a teacher. But you deny that prophesying is teaching so you have a big problem because you are inconsistent.

Also we have been talking about the gifts of the Holy Spirit and not leadership per se. The question is whether the Holy Spirit has the freedom to gift women to be pastors or teachers or any of the other gifts if He so desires. Those who say that He cannot gift them because they are women will have a problem with denying the Sovereignty of God. God is God and we cannot tell Him who He can gift with what gift.

Now I would be interested to know whether you consider the “teacher” in 1 Cor. 12:28 to be a lesser kind of teacher than in Ephesians 4:11? If so why do you have degrees of the gift of teacher? And why would Paul list teachers as third in the list of gifts while pastor doesn’t even show up in the order of gifts?

Also why do you think that Paul said “pastors and teachers” instead of “pastor teachers” or “pastoring teachers”? Why make a distinction between the gifts if they are fully connected without distinction?

I look forward to your responses.

Jack,
Welcome to my blog!

This post deals with the problems that come from the complementarian position where the restrictions that are “heard” from complementarian sources cause more restrictions than perhaps the original author intended. John Piper is candid enough to explain where one man took control off his wife’s every move as a result of how he applied the kingly authority that he thought he had over his wife. Perhaps you could explain where the consequences of a belief is misrepresented. I have seen many women who have been taken over by their husbands as a result of the comp teaching that husbands are to have kingly authority over their wives and it is a good thing to discuss the fall out of an unbiblical teaching. If you have further comments about how the commenters here have misunderstood or misrepresented Piper, I am sure they would be interested to hear that.

I believe that it is a wonderful desire to serve God and to honor and glorify Him, but I do not believe that one does this by taking an authority over one’s spouse even if it is for what one thinks is noble purposes. Differing thoughts and comments are welcomed here.

If a person had killed someone and there were no people as witnesses, the bloody knife in his backpack would be one witness, etc.

The issue is that there has to be documented evidence, witnesses so that a charge of wrong doing can be confirmed.

A witness can be a physical witness other than a person. For example a woman’s witness plus DNA evidence would qualify as two witnesses. Jesus claimed that the miracles He did were a witness and God’s word was a witness. So witnesses are other than just people.

dbrock,
Thanks for providing the update. We also just heard that the group was fine and accounted for. We are praising God!!!

Thanks!

Thank you truthseeker. I take my husband in the morning for surgery and with worries about the pastor and team and other things, I have been very distracted of late. Thanks for your prayers!

Well said Greg!

Kay,
You are so right! The world of hierarchy has taken Paul’s words and made them into a law without Paul’s permission. Surely Paul who understood the two or three witnesses rule for legal cases (and he quoted the rule in 1 Tim. 5:19) would have done a better job of creating a legally binding law if he had the permission to create such a law. Paul never appealed to God Himself nor did he appeal to a second witness or an original law that was in existence set up by God. Paul’s statement is a helpful comment to Timothy on how to get a job done. Paul’s authority was to be used by Timothy. It was not given to all men to restrict all Christian women for all time! Those who think this is a universal law have never been able to explain why it fails the requirements of God’s law. But they also don’t want to let it go as a situational problem because frankly they like what this so-called “law” does for them. It gives them power and authority and all kinds of “rights” that make them very special…in their own eyes. Unfortunately they have failed in the Christian way of servanthood that is to be given towards the congregation in order to lift them up to serve not push them down to stop serving. To me this is the Christian way turned upside down for the benefit of those who have a felt need to be important. I find that very sad as that has never been the Christian way.

Mark,

I now think that I understand you. You said:

IF you meant pastor, then no, if you meant teach in prophecy then yes. It is only in your last post that you made it clear that you meant the spiritual gift of ‘teaching’ from i presume Eph 4. So i will now look at that.

If I am not mistaken, you do not believe that there is a spiritual gift called “teacher”. You believe that a person with the gift of prophesy can have an element of teaching but that there is no gift of teaching per se as teacher is connected to pastor. When the Bible says pastors AND teachers, you dismiss the “and” Greek “de” and take this as a combo – full meal deal. If I understand you correctly a teacher is just another name for pastor? Am I correct?

Now about Eph 4. Is it a gender restricting gift of ‘pastor-teacher’. Note the greek word ‘poimenas’ (translated pastor in Eph) is the only instance in the NT where it is translated this way. Every other translation is ‘shephard’ or ‘Shephard;

That is not a problem at all. You can easily say that Ephesians 4:11 shows that God has gifted the church with Shepherds. That is also an acceptable word.

So what I want to know is why do you take the gifting of the Holy Spirit in Ephesians 4:11 and make it to be gender based when the fact is that no one can be spiritually gifted unless the Holy Spirit gifts them and He can do whatever He wants? Also why do you remove the “teacher” and attach it to “shepherd”? Why do you remove one of the gifts of the Holy Spirit and make one less gift?

This kind of reminds me of the ten commandments and the Catholic Church. Years ago they removed the commandment against creating a graven image. But after removing the commandment they were only left with 9 commandments, so they fixed up one of the other commandments, split it in two to get back to ten commandments.

Mark, are you noodling with the Greek text to create one less spiritual gift? Please give us a reason for the belief that is in you and how you can change the inspired Greek to remove one of the gifts?

Also note that the “shepherd” in Eph. 4:11 is a noun not a verb. Why are you confusing the noun and the verb? Are you saying that one who is teaching (like what happens in those who prophesy) must also be a teacher? So that the noun = the verb? Please do explain.

My frustration in your position is that you never made it clear that you do not believe that there is a gift of teacher. Please do correct me if I am wrong, but I can see that you were skirting all the questions because you were not being upfront enough for us to understand that you only believe that there are pastors(/ teachers) a combined gift so that it is impossible in your mind for a women to be a teacher unless she is a pastor? Am I understanding you correctly now?

I do hope that you are in the same position as I am Mark, and that you too only want the truth. I look forward to your answers.

rejoice,

It is very possible that God can call a man overseas and the wife resist for fleshly reasons so I don’t see the passages mentioned above about having authority over the spouse’s body as a legitimate answer in the scenario I’ve given.

I just think that if God is going to call a man and the wife is resisting for fleshly reasons, then the man needs to find out how to keep his one-flesh union intact while serving God. If God is faithful in calling, then He is also faithful in finding a way to answer if the spouse is a believer. If the spouse is not a believer then that may very well be different.

I just think that more time may need to be given for prayer and working out the problems. There are no easy answers for sure.

Mark,
I must also apologize to you if my correction came across harsh in any way. I didn’t think so, but I do respect your feelings. It is my usual manner to try to balance out “correction” with positive affirmation. I think that is the respectful way and I failed to do that yesterday. Not only was I worried about my husband (who had three days of pain and pain can be very draining even for a care giver) but I was experiencing my own frustration with constantly being misunderstood and seeing the subject (at least the way I see it) as being high-jacked. Honestly, Mark, you are a tad frustrating. Not sure what tad means in Australian, but here it means “a little bit”.

When the game (the discussion) calls for a high ball, you throw me a low ball. I keep looking and hoping that you will actually, eventually throw a real high ball so we can examine it and commend it and go on even if we have to say that we agree to disagree. But the low balls can be frustrating. The low balls are when you replace one word with another and treat them as if they are the same. It is difficult to get through on a level where we can understand each other when people are playing a different ball game.

The best thing, though, is that we do not attack the other person personally. Ideas can be challenged and logical fallacies can be identified and tossed out, but people are precious and valuable members of the body of Christ who should be corrected and encouraged and edified with patience. If I have come across in any way impatient, I sincerely apologize. I will try to do better with the next “ball”.

Mark,
You said:

Also i never said that men have a higher gift than women. This is a very wrong assumption you continue to make.

I am the one saying that men have a “higher” gift if they are the only ones allowed to teach in the church. If women are restricted and one gift is withheld from them because they do not have male “parts” and if teaching and preaching are the gifts used in the congregation for the learning time, then I rest my case.

Please tell me how women “prophesy” in your congregation? What is your average service like? How many women are allowed to “prophesy” in church? How do they do this? How is the entire congregation edification by the women of your church prophesying?

Like i said above, prophecy is a higher gift, the very gift Paul expects women to have.

It is not a higher gift. It is only higher than speaking in tongues UNLESS the tongues speaker has an interpretation. Then they are equal. Please support your view that prophesying is always higher than teaching.

If you realised this you would not be saying that i am making men more important than women.

I can’t realize that prophesying is a higher gift since it is not. What I do see is that you have relegated some gifts to men alone. If men are privileged in having the Holy Spirit see them as special and deserving of some gifts set aside especially for them, then how is it that men are not more special than women? Please do explain.

This is an issue i think you need to deal with within yourself.

Why? I don’t need to worry about what gifts I do or don’t have since I am very content to allow the Holy Spirit to decide. When He gives me His gifts I am responsible for using these gifts. Should I be too concerned if men want to restrict my gifts? As long as God opens a door for me to minister, I will go through that door. I desire earnestly to be faithful to God as to obey God is better than to obey men.

Anyhow i have tried to give you an answer to your question. We have gone far and wide to try an answer it extensively so i hope you feel i am trying to explain my views to you. I will begin to look at question 2 in more detail and post a response soon.

I do feel that you are trying to explain your views to me. You just have been doing it by not answering the questions I have given you. You have consistently brought in issues that are irrelevant to the issue of gifted women. If we are talking about God’s gifts, then if your view is valid and can be documented by God’s restrictions on gifts, then we can all have a look. I do not see that a valid point of view should ever have to resort to logical fallacies for support. This is an extremely weak way to argue.

Do you remember that I gave you the very first opportunity ever to present an article on my blog that came solely from the complementarian viewpoint? Why would I do this? It is because I have a high view of Scripture and I believe that a solid Biblical view with a solid defense and a weak unsupported view can both be tested by mature Christians. By testing each view, I believe that we can grow and become more mature. We have nothing to fear in having our Biblical view tested. We should also not fear in testing other people’s views by the Scripture. If we seek first to understand and then use the Bible to measure the view, this correction can be used to teach people.

I look forward to hearing your answers to question #2. I think we can all learn from it. You can learn and I can learn and all my blog readers can learn.

Mark,
You said:

But in terms of ‘manly’ that is a distinction you are making.

Sure that is my own distinction as a way to express what you consider as male only. Do you have a problem with the term “manly”? If the gift of teaching is a male only gift, then surely it can be called a “manly” gift, eh? I would also be interested to know if you believe there are some “womanly” gifts that males are forbidden to use?

“Here you are implying that only those with the gift of prophecy need to be tested and those who have the gift of teaching the body are not to be tested in the same way.”
Not at all. IF you read it again what i am saying is that the prophecy of the NT is not the same as the prophecy of the OT because it is spirit led utterance and is instructed to be tested. I said this to show how it is wrong to make a large correlation between the prophecy of the OT and the NT which some egalitarians do in an attempt to enforce female pastors.

You seem to go off the topic again. The question was about testing those who teach. And no egalitarian needs to enforce female “pastors” for those whom God has not gifted will not be pastors. God gifts. Egalitarians do not create the gift and neither do complementarians. The body recognizes the gifts that God has given.

Mark,
You said:

Let me be very clear, i hold a very high view of scripture. Just because i don’t agree with you Cheryl does not make me someone who is more interested in myself than the truth of the bible.

While I cannot say that you don’t hold a high view of Scripture in other areas, how can you hold high the truth by adding to the Scripture a restriction on God’s gifts when no such restriction is ever listed in the lists of gifts? It is your opinion that God’s gifts are restricted in some of the gifts. That will remain your opinion until you can prove that God Himself refuses to gift women with these gifts and has set up “blue” gifts for men only.

I am really interested in seeing how you work out this belief of yours in reality whether you also restrict men or if the restrictions are on women alone. Do you deny men who are not elders from teaching the entire body? If you do not, why not? Have you ever taught in church? If you are not an elder (yet) but have been using your gift of teaching for the church, why would you do this? Does it not bother your conscience when someone who is not an elder stands up to teach the church? Do you stand up and rebuke them? Do you make it a point of telling men who are not elders that they are committing an act against God’s Scripture by teaching? How do you apply your belief so that you do not come across as chauvinistic? If you apply the belief in biblical restrictions to all and you have tried to correct erring men who would dare to try to teach the church without being an ordained elder, then please do share this with us.

Mark,
You said:

“I noticed right away that you said “it is my opinion”. Wow, enlightening! Isn’t any exegesis or interpretation one’s attempt to explain a passage.

There is a difference, Mark, between someone’s opinion and giving reason for your opinion. You have yet to give a reason for why teaching is restricted to elders. That may be your opinion and your are entitled to it, but that is just your opinion. It is my intention to push people towards giving reasons for the hope within them. When you use logical fallacies rather than biblical reasons, it isn’t good enough. I know that you are really trying, Mark and I respect that. But your personal opinions doesn’t have the weight of Scripture. If you want to persuade and defend, you will need to do it with Scripture taken in context and with well reasoned logic from the Scripture.

Let me give you an example of what I see you doing:

The Scripture says that elders are to be husbands of one wife and ones who have their children under submission. Therefore only elders can be husbands of one wife and only elders are allowed to have children under submission.

Do you see the difference between something that is necessary for elders to do and your position that only elders may do the actions? It does not compute. It does not go together. It is a logical fallacy and inappropriate for Scripture argumentation.

Mark,
You said:

Please show me where elders do not have a teaching responsibility.

You are twisting this. I never said that elders do not have a responsibility to teach. I am saying that elders are not the ONLY teachers. Paul shows quite clearly that the way the church was set up was for everyone to participate. Our way of doing “church” where one man stands behind a “pulpit” and preaches for an hour while everyone else is silent and not participating except to listen is not the biblical pattern of using the gifts in the church.

There is also no biblical pattern of setting up elders as gatekeepers of God’s gifts. The biblical pattern is to equip the saints for the work of service:

Eph 4:12 for the equipping of the saints for the work of service, to the building up of the body of Christ;

When the church is being taught today that only a specific number of people and only one gender has permission to do the work of service in the body of Christ, the “work” of elder has been completely turned against the original intention. The elders would be responsible for building up the body so that the body can grow up into maturity and minister to itself. When elders are being used to stop ministry instead of encouraging ministry there is something gone wrong in the body.

Please show how women are included in eldership. Please show how prophecy and teaching are the same gift?

We are not talking about “eldership” but about God’s gifting. Why are you asking me to show how prophecy and teaching are the same gift when I do not believe this? I am wondering why you seem to have a problem understanding my position? Is it possible that you just skim through my comments and never actual read them? Am I really difficult to understand? I think it might be helpful for you to ask questions rather than ask me to give an argument for something that I don’t believe. Do you understand how that might be very frustrating?

Mark,
You said:

This is an interesting paragraph. I will assume it was because you were stressed with your husband. None the less i have not once twisted scripture. I quoted scripture which clearly shows that one of their responsibilities is teaching and that the bible only ever instructs men to be elders.

Telling someone they have twisted scripture is part of what I do. It is loving to correct error. You have not quoted scripture that equates teaching with elders alone. You have used logical fallacies to attach the two, but you have never established that scripture shows that the gift of teaching is given to men alone.

If your point is that only elders may teach the congregation, then to be consistent, men who are not yet elders also should never teach. Are you an elder? Do you teach?

I then said how i think that the gift of propechy is not the same gift as teaching. Now why is that twisting?

You twisted the scripture talking about the gift of teacher and you did a bait and switch by substituting elder. Elder is not a gift. You have twisted scripture by trying to change and passage on the gifts that is non-gendered and you have replaced one gift with something that is not a gift. You have admitted yourself that an elder is not a gift so why do you do this switch? Do you honestly not see how you have twisted the scripture?

I would also like to know if you are open to being corrected? Or is correcting a faulty application of the scripture something that only an elder is allowed to do and you will not allow me to point out your error and correct it?

Mark,
You said:

“Are you saying that only men are allowed to “rebuke false doctrine” and that only men are to have “sound knowledge of good doctrine”?”
No i am not, i simply quoted the bible which instructs elders to do this- it is part of their responsibility.

So tell me, Mark, are women allowed to rebuke false doctrine in the church? Are they allowed to also preach and teach the good news just as Jesus originally instructed his first resurrection witnesses?

If you restrict teaching to elders and then say that elders are to rebuke false doctrine, it comes across as only elders can rebuke false doctrine. We are not talking about elders. We are talking about gifts. It is up to you to establish that God has restricted some of His gifts from being given to His female “sons”. That is the issue. I welcome you to argue that point as it will be on topic.

Mark,
You said:

This is perplexing since several times Paul instructs that elders are to teach and protect the church.

They certainly must teach and protect, but this is quite different than saying that ONLY elders can teach and ONLY elders can protect. The gift of pastor also is a gift that protects.

My entire ministry is based on my gifts that protect the church. When you come against women using the gifts of protection/pastoring/shepherding, you come against my own ministry. Is it your intention to stop my ministry to the church in protecting them from the cults?

It is hardly a comparison to say that the first witnesses to Jesus’ resurrection were ‘preachers’ in the same sense as someone at a pulpit. These have no correlation biblically.

Well I have to agree with you here. There is no comparison at all. The witnesses to Jesus’ resurrection who were personally ordained as preachers of the good news by Jesus Himself are not the same as those who think they have special authority because they stand behind a pulpit. When we compare Jesus’ personal ordination of individuals to a non-biblical pulpit, honestly there is no comparison at all.

Mark,
You said:

Now you seem to think that i believe there are 2 gifts of ‘teaching’, one manly and more important than another. This is not true. I do believe that there is a gift of teaching. I also believe that there is a gift of prophecy. The difference is i don’t believe that the gift of prophecy commended for women by Paul in 1 Cor 11 is the same gift as that of teaching in Eph 4:11.

So what you are saying is that the prophecy commended for women by Paul in 1 Cor. 11 is a non-gendered gift but the teaching in Ephesians 4:11 is only for men (gendered gift). Is this correct?

Paul numerously distinguishes between the 2 gifts which is all i am doing.

No, you are not distinguishing between the 2 different gifts. You are creating a teaching gift that disallows God the Sovereign choice to gift women. If I have misunderstood you, then you are going to have to explain why you list teaching in Ephesians 4:11 as somehow out of bounds for a woman.

I’d be interested to know if you distinguish aswell since i have heard it several times used on this blog in an attempt to prove that ‘prophecy’ is not different to teaching.

Actually this is not quite right. What has been said is that there is a teaching element that happens with prophecy. Paul himself said that all may prophesy so that all may learn. If one is learning then it is obvious that prophesying has a level of teaching that happens as an outworking of the gift. However the gift of teaching is not the same. Prophesying is more rightly aligned with preaching, while teaching is just teaching.

Now what is interesting is you think that i am saying that ‘teaching’ is higher than the prophecy. However does Paul not list prophecy before teaching and instruct us to desire the ‘higher’ gift.(1 Cor 12:27-31).

I don’t believe that any of the gifts is “higher” than the other. However since you seem to appeal to teaching as something that only one gender may do, it becomes quite obvious to me that “teaching” is a higher gift in your explanation because it is one of the two gifts you appear to reserve for males alone.

It seems that you feel that teaching is the higher gift and it is unfair if a woman is not aloud to be a pastor, when infact a woman with the gift of prophecy has a higher gift than that of a teacher.

Again, I don’t believe in a “higher” gift. I do believe that whatever gift we have, we need to use it for the benefit of all as the gifts that are the best ones are the ones which are given for the benefit of the whole body not just one individual.

As far as the gift of pastor, only God distributes the gifts and whoever He gifts should be allowed to exercise God’s gift. My point is that restricting people from benefiting the whole body with their whole-body-gifts is not a valid oversight. God has not gifted for the purpose of having us restrict His work. We are not to grieve the Holy Spirit and restricting the bodies access to body gifts hurts God and hurts the body.

There is nowhere in the Scripture where “pastor” or “teacher” is a gift withheld from women and distributed only to men. Not only is the restriction never listed in the lists of gifts, but the fact that we can identify gifted women as gifted as a pastor and gifted women as gifted as teacher proves that God has done His work and we need to allow Him to decide.

Mark,
You said:

If you continue to feel that i haven’t answered the question i fear it is based purely on our understandings of the various type of ‘teaching’ or gifts given in the NT.

It onus is on you to prove that “elder” is a gift. If you cannot do so, then I would ask you to deal with the topic at hand which is spiritual gifts.

I agree with you that an elder is not a gift, and like you stated an elder is someone qualified with other gifts…Cheryl i am also intrigued why you feel that the issue of eldership is not important in a discussion about teachers. This is perplexing since several times Paul instructs that elders are to teach and protect the church. Is it that you think elders have nothing to do with teaching?

We are discussion what women are allowed to do in the body of Christ. We have dealt with the issue of “elders” other places and we likely will talk about this again. All elders are teachers but not all teachers are elders. If we can establish what a woman has full freedom to do in the body of Christ, then that discussion comes first. When you say that a woman can teach doctrine to men in the church, and then you deny that women cannot teach doctrine as this is a task assigned only to elders, you are contradicting yourself. Your contradictions are very frustrating as it has been difficult to get you to answer my questions and when you do answer them, you turn around and contradict your answer. It makes me wonder if you are really interested in being understood or if you are might just want to stir the pot for entertainment value. There may be other reasons why you are evading the questions. I just find it very frustrating because I don’t see you as upfront with your answers.

Mark,
You said:

I have to disagree that i failed to answer the original question. What i attempted to do was distinguish between the different gifts because i felt your question was a little broad. So i tried to demonstrate that the oversight ruling and teaching is different to other teaching like prophecy.

What you have done is to commit a logical fallacy. While you said my question was too “broad” you actually made it “broader” by exchanging “work” of an overseer and renaming it as a “gift” over “oversight ruling”. Thus while we were only talking about gifts, you exchanged the topic for a discussion on a “work” that can be appointed.

Red Herring
Topic A is under discussion.
Topic B is introduced under the guise of being relevant to topic A (when topic B is actually not relevant to topic A).
Topic A is abandoned.

We were talking about spiritual gifts. You introduced the topic of overseer and then claimed that only elders can teach in the church. Your conclusion is faulty and out of order as well as unbiblical and I reminded you that you did not answer my questions. You even admitted at the end that you were not going to answer my question.

This kind of evasion and an introduction of a logical fallacy can be very frustrating to have to deal with.

I am going to break my comments up into smaller bites so my responses aren’t as long.

SM,
I deleted a comment of yours that was a duplicate. Looks like a typo in your name caused your comments to go into moderation. Looks like all is fixed now.

The idea that “prophecy is a higher gift” comes from 1 Cor. 14 and Ephesians 4. The first is 1 Cor. 14:5 where the one who prophesies is said to be “greater” than the one who speaks in tongues. The reason that Paul says this should be obvious from the entire chapter. Paul’s focus is on edification of the church. The one who speaks in tongues will edify himself, but no one else will be edified unless there is an interpretor. Paul isn’t meaning to pit one gift against another because he uses the qualification of “unless”

1 Cor 14:5 Now I wish that you all spoke in tongues, but even more that you would prophesy; and greater is one who prophesies than one who speaks in tongues, unless he interprets, so that the church may receive edifying.

Paul then lists ways that Christians can use their public gifts for the edification of the church.

1 Cor 14:6 But now, brethren, if I come to you speaking in tongues, what will I profit you unless I speak to you either by way of revelation or of knowledge or of prophecy or of teaching?

Since prophecy is listed before teaching in verse 6 and Paul tells the church that they should all desire to prophesy, the church has considered it a higher gift.

Also Ephesians 4:11 lists prophets before teachers.

There has always been a temptation to compare one’s gifts to another to see whose gift is more important. Even the apostles had been arguing who would be the greatest in the kingdom. But I believe that Jesus made it clear that if we are looking for importance in the kingdom we are to be a servant to all. Those who desire to give up their own glory by working hard to serve the church and grow the church without prejudice by allowing each part of the body to function freely with the gifts that God has given, will be the greatest.

Does this help?

…continued…

Mark,
you said:

Also in relation to the ‘prophecy’ of the New Testament, it has to be understood that we can not relate it exactly to the prophecy of the Old Testament. For example the OT prophets spoke the very words of God, with full authority, and ultimately it was recorded as scripture for us. The prophecy of the NT does not seem to function this way. Note in 1 Cor 12 Paul seperates the gift of ‘prophecy’ to the gift of ‘teaching’

You are implying that a woman may have the gift of prophecy but that the manly gift of teaching is higher as it is separate. But God has not limited the gift of teaching to men and in the NT church Paul says that the one who is gifted with speaking is to speak as the very words of God. Paul here lumps the speaking gifts (prophecy, teaching) to speaking forth the Word. Those who have the gift of prophecy as just as encouraged to speak forth the very oracles of God as the ones gifted as teachers. There is no separation as if one is a higher gift than the other so that one is only an encouragement while one is manly preaching.

You said:

Not only that, but the prophecy Paul describes in Corinth is one of spirit guided utterance that needs to be tested.

Here you are implying that only those with the gift of prophecy need to be tested and those who have the gift of teaching the body are not to be tested in the same way. But that is not true. Paul said that we are to “test all things” and the Bereans are praised for even testing the Apostle Paul, one of the greatest teachers God has ever given.

You said:

Therefore it is evident that we should not stress to much on the continuance of prophecy of the OT to that of the NT. There seems to be variable differences. Paul expects woman to be gifted in this way and allows them to use that gift. However the gift of elder is only ever spoken of in relation to men, and men should only be in a position of oversight of the church and the teaching and preaching of the word.

Again you make a serious mistake by equating elder with one of God’s gifts. The elder is never listed in the lists of gifts and prophets can be elders, teachers can be elders, apostles can be elders, etc. What you don’t deal with is the gift of teacher that is in the very list that you quote. Can women be gifted teachers in the body of Christ teaching correct Biblical doctrine to men and rebuking error? There is no secondary gift of teaching that restricts women from using their full gift as teacher.

The error that you continually make by saying that only elders should teach and preach the word is that the Bible never says “only” nor does the Bible list a restriction on gender for teaching or preaching or protecting. A “pastor” should be a shepherd protecting the sheep, but pastor is never ever restricted to males. It is one of the gifts given by the Holy Spirit and not put into a list where gender, race, social standing or wealth restricts the operation of the gift.

You said:

Cheryl, now in relation to me showing you where a ‘law’ is that tells us how many times a woman can teach, I hope you can see that I have no intention of answering this question because it is not what I have said.

The problem is that you are redefining “teaching” to something less than the full gift of God. Where is “teaching” listed as a gift but as a lesser gift for women?

By redefine teaching as a lesser gift for women, you can now state that only men are allowed to teach and preach in the church and this kind of “teaching” is a higher teaching that is only allowed for one who has been ordained an elder, but you have failed to show that there is a secondary gift of teaching and that only those who have been ordained as an elder are allowed to teach.

Secondly if only men are allowed to teach and preach, then by doing something that is not “allowed” women must by necessity be in “sin” for doing that is not allowed. What I have been asking you all along, are women who are gifted by God as “teachers” (only one level is identified not a primary gifted teacher and a secondary subordinate gift of teacher) and women use these gifts for the edification of the entire body of Christ as Ephesians 4:11-14 show as well as 1 Peter 4:10- 11, are these women who do what you qualify as not allowed actually in sin?

You have answer “no” in the first place only because you have chosen to redefine the gift of teaching. Instead you state that teaching results from many things including singing. But I am not talking about what may end up as teaching but about the actual God-given gift of teaching.

What I am saying is this. The ‘teaching’ or ‘preaching’ of the word must only be the responsibility of the elders who the bible says are to only be men. I believe women may ‘teach’ in the sense of prayer and prophecy and singing etc but this teaching and gifting is different from that of the elders.

This is your opinion but it is not a Bible rule. You will have to show where God has stated that He will not gift women with doctrinal teaching for the entire congregation that will feed them and protect them. If God meant that a woman is not allowed to teach the church and not allowed to protect the church then He should have said it. A prohibition is a serious issue and God is never ambiguous on sin.

If a woman is Spirit-led and Spirit-gifted, where in the Scripture does God give the right to men to silence the working of the Holy Spirit? Is it possible that men have taken the “right” to protect the congregation and are instead of protecting from the wolves have turned aside to protect the body from the Holy Spirit’s work? Is this not grieving the Holy Spirit?

I think there are different levels of calling and different levels of agreement needed. If God calls one person to teach a group and the other spouse disapproves this call may not need the spouse to agree. However if one is going to leave the country and go into missions and the spouse doesn’t approve, I believe that it would be a matter of prayer and waiting. The Scripture says that a husband has authority over his wife’s body and she also has authority over his body and they are not to hold back unless by mutual agreement. How could one person think they could go into ministry and leave their wife behind without her express consent? I think that often people can be quick to go for an easy solution (the husband’s authority) without making it an opportunity for the Lord to work out a solution.

I do believe that a woman can be “called” by God without her husband’s permission but it can be a challenge to know how to answer in the best way without appearing to dishonor him.

Mark,
You asked how Christmas was. It was good but also came with its trials. We had to rush my mom into the hospital with high blood pressure. There were a couple of very busy and somewhat stressful weeks and today after posting my first comment I had to rush my own husband into the hospital who was suffering from an extremely painful case of kidney stones. All I can say is praise God that his pain is gone and it looks like the stone has fallen down waiting to be make its entrance into this world. One doesn’t know what a blessing pain-free living is until something like this happens!

Mark,
You have once again failed to answer my questions. The original question was:

Is it a “sin” for a godly Christian woman to teach correct Biblical doctrine to men in the church? Yes or no?

Originally you said “No” but then you tried to qualify “teaching” and to state that only elders can “teach” the church while women can teach in a sense through singing and prayer and prophecy. The problem here is that I directly qualified what I meant by teaching and that is teaching Biblical doctrine. Is it a sin for a woman to teach Biblical doctrine to men? Since you did answer no at one point, let’s take a look at the Biblical “gift” of teaching to see if there are two Biblical gifts or one.

Eph 4:11 And He gave some as apostles, and some as prophets, and some as evangelists, and some as pastors and teachers,
Eph 4:12 for the equipping of the saints for the work of service, to the building up of the body of Christ;
Eph 4:13 until we all attain to the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fullness of Christ.

Ephesians 4:11-13 is not gender based and so “teachers” here is not restricted to men. According to Ephesians 4:11-13 what is the purpose of these gifts including that of teacher? The purpose is for equipping the church (the saints, the body of Christ) for work, for building up the body, for attaining to the unity of the doctrine of faith, for attaining the doctrinal knowledge of the Son of God, to bring the body of Christ to maturity. This is not some secondary “teaching” but a full doctrinal ability to grow the church.

Are women allowed to grow the church? All women allowed to equip the church doctrinally? Are women allowed to provide doctrinal instruction to build up the body and for bringing the church into unity of the faith? Are women allowed to nurture the church and bring the church to maturity? According to Eph. 4:11-13 God Himself is the one who equips in this area and it is His gifts that He gives to individual members of His choice. These are people who are not “picked” as elders but “gifted” as doctrinal and instructional teachers who bring the church to maturity.

What other kind of teachers are “gifted” by God?

1 Peter 4:10 As each one has received a special gift, employ it in serving one another as good stewards of the manifold grace of God.
1 Peter 4:11 Whoever speaks, is to do so as one who is speaking the utterances of God; whoever serves is to do so as one who is serving by the strength which God supplies; so that in all things God may be glorified through Jesus Christ, to whom belongs the glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen.

“Each one” Peter says has received a special gift. The purpose is to serve one another as a “good steward” of the grace of God. The one who speaks is to speak as speaking the very utterances of God. The Bible never limits the speaking by dividing the speaking into two classes – one for males and one for females. Neither does the Bible ever divide up the gift of teaching into gender related appropriate teaching.

Mark, you have stated that there are different kinds of teaching gifts, one that is allowed for women and one that is reserved for men alone, but you have given not even one verse that limits God’s ability to gift women with doctrinal teaching nor have you give any verse that defines the “secondary” gift of teaching that prohibits women from teaching doctrine to the church as one who serves the church, equips the saints and protects the flock. Where are these two gifts of teaching listed? And why does the Bible never state that women who speak with the authority of God are in sin while men who speak with the authority of God have a higher gifting?

Whether you believe that men alone are to be elders or not, that is not the point. That is a point that can be argued at another time. We are talking about God’s gifting of individuals for service to the body of Christ. There is not a single place that God lists a secondary level of gifts nor is there a single place that “restricts” God’s gifts to a gender or to an ordination by men. While you say that only the elders are to teach, the Bible does not say that. You are going beyond the scriptures in order to restrict God’s own gifts. While an elder must be able to teach, it would be adding to the Word to state a restriction that ONLY elders have the permission to teach.

The bottom line is that God’s gifts are not to be restricted but they are to be encouraged and empowered. There is no “law” that restricts God’s gifts when they are given to women.

You say that women are not allowed to “preach” but “preaching” is an announcing and is attached to the proclaiming of the gospel. Are you telling us that women are not allowed to announce the gospel? Has the gospel now become limited to the mouths of the men? The very first “preachers” of the gospel were the women who were instructed to announce the resurrection. If women are not allowed to preach then why would Jesus pick them as the first ones who were commanded to preach the good news?

While I have continually asked questions about God’s gifting, you have continually gone back to “elders” which is not a gift. Why do you do that? Where does the Bible limit God’s gifts and deny the full use of the power that the Holy Spirit gives when the vessel He uses is a woman?

Mark, you said:

Here Paul further qualifies that they must be able to rebuke false doctrine by sound knowledge of good doctrine.

Are you saying that only men are allowed to “rebuke false doctrine” and that only men are to have “sound knowledge of good doctrine”?

God has gifted me in that area. I worked directly with former Jehovah’s Witnesses for 16 years while I unravelled their false doctrine and taught them the truth of the gospel. Am I sinning against God by using my gifts in this way? If I am allowed to “rebuke false doctrine” and give out “sound knowledge of good doctrine” to lost men, then what stops me from using my gifts when these men become Christians as many of them did? Where does the Scripture say that I become a sinner for preaching the good news to men and correcting their error?

You said:

Now to further expand on my point, being that men and women ‘teach’ each other in various ways. 1 Corinthians 11 teaches us that women can pray and prophecy in the church. Now to me, that would involve some form of ‘teaching’ to men in the congregation. However it is not the same ‘teaching’ as to those who are called and gifted to be elders of the church.

There is no such “gift” as elder. And the “gift” of teaching is not limited to males. Why do you twist the words of Scripture and remove the gift of teacher and add the gift of elder? Why do you make the gift of teaching to have two levels when there is no such division in the Scripture? Is it possible that you have to change the Scripture in order to fit your own bias? Should we be listening to you as a “teacher” when what you say about the gifts isn’t found in the Scripture? Are you gifted in giving out Scripture doctrine just because you are a male? If you are gifted why does your teaching not match up to the inspired Word?

You said:

Now it is my opinion that since we are talking about a ‘church’ scenario and this is what the letters of Timothy and Titus are addressing (an already established church), the gifting of apostles, evangelists, prophets (Eph 4:11) are not to be understood as having the same responsibility for the ‘teaching’ and overseeing of the church as the elders do.

I noticed right away that you said “it is my opinion”. Mark, this is part of the problem, in that you put your opinion above the clear Word of Scripture. People’s opinion is to be tested by the Scripture. Ephesians 4:11 does not stop with this verse. After giving the amazing job that the gifts of God are responsible for building up the body, Paul goes on to say:

Eph 4:14 As a result, we are no longer to be children, tossed here and there by waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, by craftiness in deceitful scheming;
Eph 4:15 but speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in all aspects into Him who is the head, even Christ,
Eph 4:16 from whom the whole body, being fitted and held together by what every joint supplies, according to the proper working of each individual part, causes the growth of the body for the building up of itself in love.

The gifts of God are also clearly for the protection of the body from false doctrine and trickery of men that results in deception. The fact is that those who are gifted become elders. An elder does not have higher gifts than a teacher or a prophet. An elder is chosen because the person already exhibits the necessary gifts that are needed to care for and protect the body. An elder is one who is approved by the job that they are already doing. The gifts don’t come when one has a “title” of elder. God is the one who gives the gifts and the church is never given the responsibility to decide on which of God’s gifts they want and which they can reject. God’s gifts are there because they are all needed. People become unbalanced when the gifts are neglected and pushed aside as unnecessary.

More coming in the next comment….

Jewel,
It is mankind that is created in the image of God and for His glory. Mankind is all of us – male and female. The earth and the animals were created for our benefit and for male and female to rule over the earth. Once again it is both male and female, not just the male.

I hope this helps!