Cheryl

Don and Terri,

Good thoughts on that audio. I also made some other notes on the audio regarding male and female equality. The vicar says that for people to say that men and women are equal is to say that men and women are the same. This is not true at all. This leads to CBMW now saying that egalitarian marriages are “same sex” marriage. This is poisoning the well. Egalitarians do not believe that men and women are exactly the same. That is why we are complementary. Yet to be complementary we need to work together. If only men teach, then there are no women who can complement the men at teaching. The fact that men and women both teach, shows the opportunity for a complementary view coming from the women teachers. I really feel sorry for men who do not allow themselves to be taught by women. Women get the advantage of having true complementary teaching given to them since they are privileged to have both men and women teachers. Male hierarchists allow only men to teach them so they do not experience true complementary teaching.

Another thing that I noticed about the audio tape was that he took a limited male view of 1 Timothy 2:9 where he equates “modest” dress with sexuality. Yet the context equates modest with not openly opulent with gold, pearls and elaborate hair styles. Although women should not dress sexually seductive, in context Paul is talking about showing off one wealth as if our importance comes from the style of clothing, the quality of jewelry or elaborate and expensive hair dos. Our importance comes rather from our character that is gentle and respectful rather than from our dress. Paul is not talking about women seducing men in this passage. This is why it is good to have women who can have a complementary view of scripture to show men who only see “sex” as a reason for dressing modestly that Paul’s emphasis is on elaborate style vs character.

The vicar also makes a comment that some things that Paul says appear to be contradictory for example Paul’s circumcising of Timothy when Paul said that men shouldn’t get circumcised. What he missed was that Paul made allowances for the prejudice of men in order to reach them even through their prejudice. He had Timothy circumcised so that the prejudiced Jews would not have a reason to hold back from hearing the gospel preached. Yet when they got saved, Paul would turn around and work on their prejudice so that they would not hinder and stumble others. I think this should help us realize that we can try hard to “work around” people’s prejudice so that we can reach them where they are. Once they have been changed, they will be more open to lay aside their prejudice and accept those whom they had previously rejected as their equals.