Mark

Cheryl,

Yes i did feel you were harsh or frustrated and i understand that, but i still do not believe that i am throwing a low ball or presenting logical fallicies. Very briefly i will respond in a hope to answer some of your and others questions. Your original question was do i think a woman can teach good doctrine to men. Now i felt this was a loaded question because ‘teach’ is a broad use. 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.

In terms of the ‘higher’ gifts 1 Cor 12:27-31 further expands on Cheryls point. Paul clearly instructs the Corinthians to ‘eagerly desire the greater gifts”. And more than once is the listing of gifts given as apostles, prophets, teachers…

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;. For example Jesus is the ‘good shephard’ (Jn 10:11). Now compare this shepharding with Pauls exhortation of the ELDERS in Acts 20:28 to ‘shephard the church of God’. We begin to see that the gift of a pastor-teacher is officiated in the office of an elder. Now since again Paul only instructs the men to be elders it must necessitate then that a pastor-teacher will be a man and not a woman. It is vital not to read Eph 4 on its own ignoring all the other texts. By doing this i feel Cheryl that you have come to wrong conclusions on giftings.
Finally to respond to a few of your queries about my personal position. No i am not an elder. In fact the church i have been attending don’t even follow the biblical pattern of leadership in this way. This is something i have been wrestling with myself. However i do believe those who ‘teach’ in the sense of preaching at church should only be men who either are the pastor/elder or younger men training and gaining skills in that area.
In terms of prophecy, no we don’t have women or men prophecying in the church. I am in no way an expertise on the matter of gifting, and looking into it more closely is something i would love to do in the future in terms of searching out the different views as to whether certain gifts ceased at the completion of the canon. But like i said i need to do more study in this area before commenting extensively on cessationalism.
It is interesting for me Cheryl that you think by restricting a woman from being a pastor for arguments sake, that makes men higher. Why do you feel this way. After all only women can have children yet society does not make that a prejudice distinction.
My hope Cheryl is that your frustration may be a conviction about the position you hold regarding the gender debate. You say you are interested in only the truth and you know what i do actually believe you, i pray you come to see it.