Australian Conference On Women In Ministry Cheryl Schatzs Article Now Online

My anti-spam word is “woman” (singular!).

I really enjoyed your post Cheryl, thanks for all your work!

I would love any feedback that people might have regarding our Blog Conference and whether or not it is going to be positive in working towards unity and understanding.

Dave,
How appropriate the singular form of woman in this conversation! Thanks for letting us know that.

I would also request that those who are able to follow Pastor Dave’s blog conference let him know what you think and whether you believe it is helpful and a positive way to work towards unity.

Dave,

I really appreciate what you guys are doing over there. I especially appreciated the post on submission. I even copied it off to print!

But I am not as sanguine about unity as long as some see that exercising our gifts is a sin. I can see where there might be tolerance that we exist but the vitriol is so thick where I am that we are referred to as Jezebel’s, feminists and in rebellion to God. We are constantly compared to those who ordain homosexual pastors.

But, with that said, the only way to combat that is to exposit the Word. And your conference is a great way to do that. I hope you plan to keep the blog up for future reference.

Lin,
These verses gives me great comfort:

Mat 5:10 “Blessed are those who have been persecuted for the sake of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
Mat 5:11 “Blessed are you when people insult you and persecute you, and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of Me.
Mat 5:12 “Rejoice and be glad, for your reward in heaven is great; for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

1 Peter 2:19 For this finds favor, if for the sake of conscience toward God a person bears up under sorrows when suffering unjustly.
1 Peter 2:20 For what credit is there if, when you sin and are harshly treated, you endure it with patience? But if when you do what is right and suffer for it you patiently endure it, this finds favor with God.
1 Peter 2:21 For you have been called for this purpose, since Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example for you to follow in His steps,

It has taken me quite awhile to come to peace with the suffering that I have endured especially over the issue of women in ministry. However I have come face to face with the issue of suffering as a joyful thing because there are great rewards from God for patiently enduring, not fighting back but keeping focused on the goal and never, ever turning back.

James 1:2 Consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials,
James 1:3 knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance.

I know that not everyone will have come through the trials as I have but as one who has been called every name in the book I can truly say that after having gone through the trial and having endured I am a stronger person than I ever was. Now instead of looking inward when I am reviled and feeling sorry for myself that my passion for God has been spoken of as an evil thing, I can look outside myself and see Jesus. He traveled this road first. He faced everything I am facing and he never gave up and he didn’t let it get him down. He kept his eyes focused on the goal and he never looked back. He is my example and since I am told in James to “count it all joy” during the persecution, I can look outward and upward and consider it all joy.

I don’t know if that helps or not, but I am joyful today that God has considered me worthy to suffer for His name.

Lin, thanks for the encouragement and the feedback. Thanks Cheryl for the encouragement of knowing you have been through so much but consider it a joy to have suffered for our Lord’s name. That is powerful.

Perhaps my hope of unity comes about more because of what might be unique to our church, the PCAus. The way we deal with conflict is to simply bunker down and ignore each other. Very functional! I wanted my church to see that you can have a constructive conversation, you can get to know each other inspite of differences. I hoped that we might appreciate the seriousness with which both sides take Scripture.

All that said, over the last couple of weeks I have come to the conclusion that I have been a bit idealistic (though I am still hopeful!). I listened to Matt Chandler the other week when he was in Sydney, and he made it very clear the his church and the Resurgence have a “closed fist” policy in regard to complementarianism. They see this “law” as crucial to the purity of the church. This explains why a family left our church over the issue of women (this family just returned from visiting Mars Hill before they left us).

Ironically, I have never looked at this issue as one worthy of breaking fellowship over, I have not seen it as a Gospel issue, but rather an issue where some have not fully applied/understood the Gospel. For some though, it is a hill they want to die on. Sorry for the rambling!

Dave,
I could never mind your rambling on my blog! I like what you write.

I too agree that the issue of women in ministry is not one worthy of breaking fellowship over. We can be passionate and we can argue in a careful, biblical way, but I do not believe that we have the right to attack a brother in Christ as an unbeliever over this issue. It is not a salvation issue and must not be treated that way or we can cause harm to the body of Christ.

My biggest issue is getting Complementarians to think outside the box – to help them with questions and a reasoning that they may never have thought through before. In the end they may still agree to disagree but I am confident that if they actual engage the argument and are exposed to the careful reasoning that has gone into the egalitarian side, the fruit of that effort will grow in time with those who truly love the Lord and want to stay true to God’s word. I do want them to see that they must not ignore some of God’s inspired words to hold onto a male-only form of service. I believe that men are hurt when they are not allowed to listen to women teach God’s word. We have a perspective on scripture that can cause men to be more well-rounded in their view.

You may not see your conference and your denomination as touched as much by the egalitarian position as you would like, but know for sure that you are planting seeds that God can cause to grow in time. We plant. We water. And then we wait. Ah for the gift of more patience, eh?

Perspectives are interesting. As a woman hearing men who have set for themselves privileges in the church which they deny women, and who have a closed mind to the possibility of changing that, it reads as men who are closed to the value and equal worth of women. It is an arrogance that is deeply uncomfortable for some women to live around.

I remember some men from the 70’s who always spoke to women as “dear” and everything they said to us seemed to drip with an unspoken stance of the big and powerful patting the child like women on their dear little unknowledgeable heads. I was one of those women who finally became really irritated with that word ‘dear’ and forbid them from applying it to me. I noticed though how difficult it was for them to change their way of approaching women. They think women are inferior, no matter what they say to the contrary. It is how they treat the women.

Wow. The Aussie blog conference has been incredible. I loved your post, as well as the post on submission. Best dang explanation of something I’d been thinking: that when submission (which, thanks to The Shack, I’d come to understand as simply putting the needs of others ahead of my own interests and seeking to serve, rather than be served, a la Jesus) gets tied to authority (subordination) that’s when a good thing (mutual service and respect) can start to devolve into gamesmanship and struggles for power that Jesus Himself probably would not have participated in. Wish I had seen that sooner.

Alison,

I too really appreciated Pastor Dave’s post. I think that for a first blog conference on women in ministry it went over very well.