It amazes me all this emphasis now on reaching out to the gay COMMUNITY as if they constitute a legitimate community like Asians or Hispanics. This type of legitimizing from the church was just the beginning of sorrows. To those who invoke the all sin is the same blather, I’d like to know when you are going to start reaching out to the other communities Paul mentioned in I Corinthians 6:9-11, lifestyles he says will never enter the Kingdom?Wrongdoers, Sexually immoral, idolaters, adulterers, homosexuals, thieves, greedy, drunkards, swindlers, slanderers, extortioners. Why no emphasis on reaching out to those communities? Why is the all sin is equal crowd exalting one group of sinners over another and legitimizing their community as one who is worthy of special outreach? Why do we never hear them defending the Christian extortioner? Oh brother Vinny here is a Christian extortioner who is growing and learning. Such nonsense would be laughed at. But that is EXACTLY what churches are doing with gays, and they are actually afraid to list gays with the rest of the sinners Paul listed because, I know gays who never steal, extort or get drunk. Wake up PASTORS!! This is not the church’s fault. It’s the fault of spineless PASTORS!________________
Hi David Lewayne Porter, the husband being the head of his wife is mentioned in Ephesians 5:23ff, but “covering” isn’t. Nor is it mentioned in any other NT verse, as far as I know (including 1 Corinthians 11:10 which mentions the woman’s own head).
Christian women/wives have exactly the same access to God as Christian men/husbands. Husbands are not mediators of God’s will, or spirit, or salvation, or whatever you might take “covering” to mean. There is one mediator between God and humanity, the human-being Christ Jesus. We need to take care that no person tries to take on Jesus’ role, or comes *between* Jesus and his wife.
Furthermore, both Christian men and women have the same Spirit, and the Spirit gives his gifts without apparent regard of gender. The authorisation to serve and minister in any, and every, capacity, is an authority that comes directly from God and is not linked to gender and requires no “covering”.
@ David Lewayne Porter Head in what sense, my good brother? I hope that all women get the proper respect that they all deserve and need.
Mary,
I am sorry that a man that was struggling with his own personal trials and temptations put you through that in the name of Christianity. I am also sorry that the churches he was in and ministers that he was under did not have the discernment to see it and help. (I just lost a couple from my church because I told the husband that he needed to listen to the advice of his wife/help-meet as Pilot was warned by his wife concerning judging Jesus).
As much as all of that bothers me we still can not discount or over look the scriptures.
Please understand that I am not your enemy, and I am not against you. I empathize with you, yet I have to give The Scripture precedence, in spite of what I want or anyone else would like for it to say.
Your quote, “read your own mail”.
I did. That is where I always start. You see, as you let me into your point of view and why, You do not know why I take much stance – simply. You commented on my comment concerning “covering” so please don’t get upset when I address you individually.
1) we are to read the entire Bible, not just certain Scriptures (in some way All scripture applies to everyone.
2) it is not at all easy to submit to spouses all the time, that is,why our walk with Christ is also referred to as carrying our cross. A good example of a wife’s cross is believing wives setting the example for an unbelieving husband. (You are correct that husbands should give first priority in their marriage to loving the wife, supporting her (in ALL ways) not hating his own flesh). But what did Peter say to do if they did not? Please don’t get upset with a minister that simply quotes God’s standards.
I wonder if it would help this conversation if we reversed it with a believing husband dealing with an unbelieving wife. What if he wanted to work around the verse that tells him to keep trying and love her unconditionally.
Maybe you are correct – (poison pill) the issue is that each one needs to concentrate on what God said to them and leave the other party to God for conviction.
3) ? Did you pray over your marriage before you married?
Did God say to marry or was there an implied Godly allowance to marry? I believe many people marry those that they are not spiritually prepared to. I walked away from 3 engagements. My wife is everything and more than I prayed for. My wife prayed concerning the husband she would receive 6 years before we met and married.
As a minister after counseling I have refused to do the ceremonies of 4 couples. They married anyway. 3 divorced in under 2 years for reasons I pointed out during the sessions. The fourth told me I was right and they are determined to make it work.
(I personally believe people should pray more about their spouses BEFORE they marry instead of having to afterwards we would not be having all of the issues in their severity that we are having now.
(I don’t have time to go into the way my wife and I met and married) – that is my own mail.
@ David Lewayne Porter I really appreciate your fervor and passion, my brother in Christ, and I would like to talk with you more. God bless you and yours. Love is the greatest way to get points across. The truth in love. I love all of you! 😀
David Lewayne Porter I prayed. but my upbringing was so strictly old-fashioned Mennonite that I was groomed to see myself as nothing more than a help meet for a man.
We were taught strongly that every woman needed a male “covering… so much so that women had to wear literal fabric “coverings” on our heads. We were trained to be absolutely obedient in all things to our male coverings.
My Daddy died when I was a baby, and I know that, coupled with such strong teachings, pushed me into marrying the first man who came along, offering to be my covering.
My mother, my stepfather, and my church were all very much in favor of my marrying the man I did.
Because if it is bedrock truth that every woman needs to be under such headship, then any headship is better than none.
I have been set free. Please don’t put women under more bondage than the OT put them under!
Mary Ellen Nissley
I have not put women under bondage, yet I can not say the entirety of Scripture does not matter.
Go back and read my initial post. I have the upmost respect for women, especially ministers, but they have their God Ordained place.
I believe you are reading the scriptures with bias in light of your situation and that is not what God intended. Yet God still ordained his writers to explain headship and divine order in the home, marriage, ministry, and church.
Men are not to be domineering.
Women are not to rebel.
One is just as wrong as the other,
Are they not?
I actually advocate for women to be used in their God called roles in ministry. Yet they have to realize they are not submitting and doing so to a man but as until The Lord.
Any submission by man or woman that does not line up with the totality of Scripture is not from God.
Be blessed.
I am praying for your scars, for more, complete, deeper healing.
David Lewayne Porter I am suggesting to you that your view of Scripture influences your ability to see outside your box.
Throughout the Bible, women were used by God as prophetesses. Nowhere in the Old Testament was a woman commanded to sit down and shut up.
Yet, we have these two verses in I Cor 14: 34,35… that seem to contradict all that. They say women should keep silence, as also saith the law.
And I have seen these verses applied all kinds of ways except literally, by the churches who claim they are to be applied to the church.
Fact is, these verses do not flow with the context, unless you see them as what they are: a question Paul is quoting from the lost, original letter from Corinth. The law being referred to is not the OT, but the Mishnah! (Of course the Mishnah was only in oral form yet, at the time.)
I have read the Mishnah. Have you?
It’s what was being “said by them of old time” that Jesus rebuked so strongly. And in that Mishnah, you will find the precise words: a woman’s voice is not to be heard in the assembly–it is a vile thing.
The OT holds no such concept. This is why there was no such thing as a women’s court in the Tabernacle, or in Solomon’s temple. But under the influence of those women-oppressing rabbis, the women were separated from the congregation of the Lord, and place behind screens, both in the Temple, and in synagogues. This is not anything God ever commanded.
Instead, in the OT, you see Miriam set alongside Moses and Aaron, as a leader of the people. (Micah 6:4) You see Huldah consulted to verify to the king and the priest, what exactly was the Word of God… and she prophesied directives to them.
Even in the NT, we have Scriptures inspired through Elizabeth and Mary.
“What? came the word of God out from you? or came it unto you only?” 1Co 14:36
No. It came to and through women also.
Now, go back and look at the preceeding context of those two verses… It’s all about how ALL may speak. ALL may contribute equally to the services in the church.
If not ALL are allowed to contribute equally, then not ALL can be comforted.
Because being allowed to contribute equally is an integral part of being comforted.
May I share a bit more of my story?
I was part of a church that literally applied these verses.
The adult Sunday School class was integrated. (The men wanted their wives by their sides.) As a woman divorced against my will, I had no male representative to speak for me. I was held in strict silence, only allowed to listen, and not speak in the “open” discussion.
I came to a crossroad. Either I was going to sit down and shut up, and die inside, (I felt it happening) or else I was going to leave that church. I didn’t want to leave! About 50 people of that church were my extended family! We were very close! If I left that church, I was literally forsaking my family for the Lord.
I tried to settle down and just be silent.
But God sent me a strong warning through a dream– I dreamed I was standing before Christ, and He was placing people on His right and on His left. I was pretty sure I would be placed on THAT side– and I was! then I turned around, and realized I had seen it wrongly! I thought I was right, but I was LEFT!
I cried and screamed for mercy, but Jesus ignored me.
I felt the lostness of a soul facing hellfire for eternity.
I woke, and flailed to find my Bible, gasping, “Oh Lord, Please help me know I have eternal life!”
And the Bible fell open to Luke 10:25.
God was telling me I had to love Him with ALL my heart, soul, mind, and strength… otherwise, I was not fit for Heaven.
That was the turnaround. That’s why I had to leave my family, my security, and my culture.
God led me miraculously to the church I am in, and has set me into the ministry. Every day, as I pray, I hear His voice: I have called you to preach.
To disobey would be spiritual death. To pull back would be to cut off my oxygen. He is all I have left.
I do not want any authority over men. I do not long for a place to be recognized or given power. All I want is to serve my Lord with all I have to give.
My pastor, and everyone else in my church, tells me that I have a powerful anointing on my ministry. But that doesn’t really matter to me… I don’t want recognition. All I want is to do everything God has called me to do. There is SO much to be done!
You missed the forest for the trees.
I never lessened the role of a woman. I never said she was to sit down and shut up (as you put it).
You are trying to convince me of a point that I already adhere to. But and yet in God’s order the wife is still under the husband as far as submission and headship (just as Jesus did, does, and will do all He does at the directing of the Father).
You referenced Miriam, when was she allowed into the Holy place?
When did she see God’s face, face to face?
What happened when she exalted herself and came against Moses (she received a more swift judgement from God himself than did Aaron) and Moses whom she was set alongside of – as you state it – had to intercede for her healing, not even Aaron could do that.
If they were set along side each other, where was Miriam while Aaron was forming a calf, why was she not a spiritual enough leader to stop it? Where was she while Joshua accompanied Moses as close to God’s presence as possible? How about when God called Moses to the tent of meeting and when Moses returned to the camp Joshua stayed in the door of the tent?
But any way, enough of the speculation.
Sister I love your testimony.
The same way you said that you don’t want authority over the man, I don’t want authority over the woman, yet that is God’s Plan.
If we remove women from church history then we truly have no church because the women have carried the church throughout much of it’s history.
Being the head of the wife, church, any other person or situation gives us a chance of more harsh judgement.
Sister be blessed, I just hate that a man hurt you so bad that you are (afraid) of the true biblical meaning of Holy, Spiritual, God submission.
I hate that a church has treated you like this.
I think I would have loved to have been able to have you in my congregation.
I am praying for you.
Truly be blessed in Jesus name, by the healing of the Holy Spirit.
David Lewayne Porter Can you please show me the command in Scripture addressing you to take the initiative to bring your wife under your domination?
And I don’t think your theology is quite correct in how you view the eternal submission of the Son to the Father, within the Trinity, in eternity past.
Jesus learned obedience by the things he suffered. He never had to obey the Father before.
The Eternal Godhead exists in perfect unity. the Son flowed from the Father, as the Word, and thus was in perfect unity, without the need for domination or submission.
The only reason one ever needs to be dominating, is when there is a clash of wills.
In the Garden, Jesus prayed “Not My will, but Thine.”
This was a new thing. Jesus’s natural will was different from the Father’s will. And thus, he learned obedience.
Within the body of Christ, all Christians are to submit one to another. We are to dwell together in the unity of Love. What kind of love? The kind that flowed within the Trinity in eternity past. The kind that seeks not her own. The kind that vaunteth not itself.
And when that kind of love exists in a marriage between Christians, there is no clash of wills. There is no need of domination.
Sister, there is not a verse for a man to dominate his wife, [or anyone else]. I have not stated nor impied any of that in any of my posts.
I wonder if you have read my posts, you could not have read them all, totally.
If my wife had not displayed the character of a Biblical and Godly Spiritual lady, I would not have married her (I walked away from 3 engagements for that reason).
My wife had displayed her ability to minister with a confident yet submissive gifting and Spirit in the ministry before we ever met and discussed marriage.
I use women in my church to minister (when I will not use men) due to the peaceable Spirit the ladies possess (that the men lack).
To disagree with you again, show me where a Christian is to dominate others even if/when there is a clash of wills..?…
Sister
Please go reread my posts before you try to place words in my mouth or opinions in my head that are not there.
Be blessed (as long as you follow and obey God).
David Lewayne Porter, perhaps it would help to think of source or head as beginning point or origin. So the point of origin from which man sprang forth is Christ (because he is the first born of all creation and was before Adam was. He is the Logos) and the point of origin from which women sprang forth is man but the point of Origin for Christ is God. So, that’s our ancestral history. And since we are joint heirs with Jesus….. That is the argument that I see unfolding in 1 Cor. So far as advice for believing wives to to show respect to unbelieving husbands. I think it is good advice for how a Christian should conduct themselves in any relationship (male or female) – especially if they are intending to be an ambassador for Christ if they are hoping and praying to draw someone into a relationship with Christ. The point made is that submission to God and one another out of reverence to Christ is a way of emulating the example set before us by our Savior and elder brother, Jesus. After all – it was his submission to his mission as the word made flesh that created a way for us to be reconciled to God. How can we humble ourselves and lay down our lives to become the word made flesh to those around us in order to help lay a path for someone else to reconcile with God?
David, It is unwise to single out verses in 1 Corinthians 11:2-16. It is written as a chiasm, and the whole passage must be read, so that one can see the corresponding verses and Paul’s intention.
http://newlife.id.au/equality-and-gender-issues/the-chiasm-in-1-corinthians-11_2-16/
Nice. I would have liked to have seem some discussion about the proposition that head coverings were a symbol of marriage in that culture. I have heard that discussed elsewhere.
Thanks Karen. There’s very little hard evidence about what women wore on their heads in the first century. We have Greek art and Roman art which give us good clues but practically no Jewish art because of the graven image commandment. Veils aren’t mentioned much in literature until the second century, most noticeably in Justin Martyr’s “On the Veiling of Virgins”.
Margaret Mowczko, thanks for the tip off on Justin. It doesn’t seem that the head covering as symbol of marriage argument would work well when we look at what is being said to the men but I do find it an interesting possibility. I like the way the article sets up the outline of the argument in 1 Cor. It’s also good to remember that law students used to study the writings of Paul to learn how to argue a case. It makes sense that he would be setting up the question or item for debate before he would present his “case.”