Frank

Cheryl, I just went through the “Aussie” debate you had with Peter Barnes. I’m sorry the debate ended before I could make a comment or two on some points he made that piqued my interest.
1. Like you, I did a thorough study of the prophetic gift and ministry in both the NT and the Early Church. I noted that in his discussion on Irenaeus and the problems of Montanism, he failed to note that while Irenaeus was against the excesses of Montanism, Ireneaus did not deny men and women could pray and prophesy together, nor that the Holy Spirit still gave this gift and ministry to both men and women. In his dispute with fellow bishops who spoke against both John and Paul’s teaching on the Holy Spirit and his gifts as the cause of the Montanist movement, and who forbade those writings of John and Paul that promoted this “heresy” from being read in their churches, he charged these bishops with sinful overaction. The answer to this problem he argued, was not the suppression of the prophetic ministry by men and women in the orthodox churches, but in the strict enforcement of the Pauline guidelines laid down in 1 Cor 11-14. And for them to do otherwise was to sin against the Holy Spirit himself. After exposing and refuting the errors of the Montanists, here is what Irenaeus says about these anti-charismatic bishops:

Others, again, that they might set at naught the gift of the Holy Spirit, which in the latter times has been by the good pleasure of the Father, poured out upon the human race, do not accept the Gospel of John in which the Lord promised he would send the Paraclete; but set aside at once both the Gospel and the prophetic Spirit. Wretched men indeed, who in order not to allow false prophets set aside the gift of prophecy from the Church…These men cannot admit the Apostle Paul, either, for in his Epistle to the Corinthians, he speaks expressly of prophetical gifts, and recognizes [both] men and women prophesying in the church. Sinning, therefore, in all particulars, against the Spirit of God, they [i.e., the anti-charismatic bishops] fall into irremissible sin (AGAINST HERESIES, III, 11.9).

And it is also a know fact that later in his life, Tertullian, whom Elder Barnes would recognize as a orthodox Christian theologian, also became an active Montanist, who wrote one or two books defending the movement, prior to some members in the movement going extreme. My point here is, of course, you can find material in the early Christian writers that can be used either by a egalitarian or complementarian. The question is if it is quoted out of context or if it truly expresses the writer’s view on a given subject. Ooops! I have to run an errand. So I will close for now.