In fact, one such encounter was intended to be included wherever the Gospel is preached. Perhaps a piece of this is because it seems we still need regular reminders of the meaningful ministry women have to offer the Body of Christ, even to this day. /end
This, ofc, includes women, even if the Church sometimes appears to have forgotten it, even though many women followed Jesus throughout His ministry and were entrusted with the first Gospel proclamation. 15/
This has so many implications for our theology, ministry, & church life, and, perhaps most importantly, leaves us all immature in our unity and faith. Ephesians 4 speaks to the way the church will never come to maturity without the full participation of every gifted person. 14/
Add in complementarianism & you get this framework: it is not good for men to be alone in their families, but it is fine & good for men to be alone in churches, ministry decision, translation teams, leading mission organizations, repesenting Christ . . .any number of areas. 13/
Many churches in the Protestant tradition, however, have inherited the restored value of vocational family life (a good thing!) which grew to displace and sometimes even erase other vocational models, leaving us all bereft. 12/
The language of belonging in the early church=siblinghood, & norm appears to be brothers & sisters co-laboring together. This practice across church history sanctioned things like female vocational orders & male vocational orders, oftentimes born as twin movements. 11/
The Church has always had & needed men & women co-laboring, and there are many variations on how that plays out. Priscilla & Aquila were married, yes, but many other co-laborers are listed in the epistles & book of Acts, & we don’t have a sense of their marital status at all. 10/
Whenever I write about this concept, I hear from people who seem to believe the “not good for man to be alone” concept to be solely about marriage. IMO this is myopic, especially given the NT witness that unmarried people have more time and care to devote to ministry concerns. 9/
This is bad for women, yes, but also for men who will, once again, be left alone.
It’s not good. It never has been. 8/
This has many practical effects, including the inability to take seriously women’s vocations, needs, leadership roles, or allegations of wrongdoing. Lip-service may be given to respect for women but in practice, it is only carried out if a man is on board. 7/
They miss out and—whether intentionally or incidentally—come to normalize sidelining women. They remain unaccustomed to meaningfully and regularly learning from or listening to women. 6/
But if that is the only place for women to minister, women will receive from gifted brothers (on Sundays) and from gifted sisters (in Bible studies, etc), but the men in the church will never receive from women. Never. 5/
Don’t get me wrong: I love things like “women’s ministry.” It makes sense that people of various backgrounds and experiences would have unique needs according to their stage of life. 4/
If we misread passages like Titus 2 to be re: women hosting women’s Bible studies, if we see women named as house church leaders in Acts & imagine they were busy fixing up the guest rooms, we miss the female priests and elders and leaders all across the pages of the NT. 3/
From Eden, the pattern appears to be men and women together as priests and prophets doing priestly work as living icons who reflect God’s image. Many churches, however, have inverted this, impoverishing the church by functionally withholding and muffling the witness of women. 2/
From the beginning, it’s never been good for men to be alone. But somehow many of us still insist on male-only ordinands, pastors, or leaders. 🧵
What books or resources come to mind when you think of “christian excellence”? Would love to hear from you! docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...
What resources would you add? I’d love to hear from you here in the comments, by DM, or please fill out the link in the linktree for my survey—I’ll be sending out questions later this month!
Thank you!
#christianexcellence #devotions #quiettime
💯💯💯
Feeling extra pleased I spent my work hours yesterday organizing all my Doug Wilson content over on my Substack yesterday.
open.substack.com/pub/mburtwri...
Grab your ☕️or 🫖and join us for a few minutes? Hope to see you there!!!
substack.com/@mburtwrites...
Hope you can join us for this tomorrow! substack.com/@mburtwrites...
Very glad to see this. Thank you to the panelists and organizers.
Register here: us02web.zoom.us/meeting/regi...
All the nice words about listening to women are empty if you silence them.
What a disgraceful capitulation to cancel culture.
Someone let me know that the ACNA governance task force deleted all reference to "trauma-informed training" in the proposed Title IV changes. Pls note this change and if you disagree with this change, make sure to let the task force know your thoughts before 3/20. anglicanchurch.net/title-iv-rev...
This starts tomorrow!
Come join us for a virtual book club discussion of Dr. Nijay Gupta's book "Strange Religion" during Lent. It's all opt-in—join for what you like!
We'll have discussion in the chat, a few virtual zooms, and Q&A with the author! Should be fun!
open.substack.com/pub/mburtwri...
Yeah, it was surprising even coming from her. I don't know what to make of it at all, but she unblocked just to offer those 2 comments, then reblocked, so I guess I'll never know.
Could be that Matt uses her account; seems more on brand for him.
Note: I directly called out 3 individuals in this 🧵, all public writers/teachers. I know all three agree w/me that public teaching/writing can & should be addressed publicly.
Even so, I wish I could tag them directly here as a courtesy, but they've all previously blocked me.
In that sense, the crashouts, the petition, the scornful laughter, the outraged demands or apologies all perhaps only underscore how much we need panels like these.
I hope the the ACNA decision makers have eyes to see it.
Register: us02web.zoom.us/meeting/regi...
/end
