Making Peace With Paul

Spring 2021

Men and women serving and leading as equals

CONT E N TS 4 8 13 18 22 26

DEPA RTMENTS 3 From the Editor

Paul Gives Me Grief

Seeing Paul as Our Advocate

Processing Paul’s words about women using the stages of grief as a model.

by Wren Bouwman

31 Praise and Prayer

A New Kind of Household: Colossians 3:18–25

31 Ministry News

Paul’s letter to the Colossians in its historical context.

by Amy Rowe

32 Giving Opportunities 34 President’s Message

Phoebe Through the Eyes of Paul

Priscilla Speaks

Phoebe’s position as deacon is not an exception.

by Julie R. Frady

ED ITO R IAL STA FF

She Desires a Noble Task What if 1 Timothy 3:1 was directed to the women from 1 Timothy 2?

by Jim Reiher

Modeling Jesus’s Power

Guest Editor: Katie McEachern Graphic Designer: Margaret Lawrence Publisher/President: Mimi Haddad

Paul teaches Christians to model the power dynamics of Jesus.

by Jennifer Reil

Mutuality vol. 28 no. 1, Spring 2021

Hanging onto Galatians 3:28: How Long After the New Testament were Women Ordained?

Mutuality (ISSN: 1533-2470) offers articles from diverse writers who share egalitarian theology and explore its intersection with everyday life.

Meet a group of early Christians who ordained women for hundreds of years.

by Chesna Hinkley

Cover design by Margaret Lawrence

Spring 2021

Men and women serving and leading as equals

Mutuality is published quarterly by CBE International, 122 W Franklin Ave, Suite 218; Minneapolis, MN 55404-2451.

We welcome your comments, article submissions, and advertisements. Visit cbe.today/mutuality.

All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the 2011 revision of the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

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From the Editor

by Katie McEachern

Seeing Paul as Our Advocate I can remember quite vividly the first time I really wrestled with the “terror” passages about women in the Bible, specifically the New Testament ones like 1 Timothy 2, 1 Corinthians 11, and all of the passages detailing the household codes. I was 18, it was my freshman year at a Christian university.

The environment at this college was much different from what I was used to. I’d grown up attending an evangelical church that was more egalitarian than not and located in a liberal college town.

I went to a school where I was one of the few practicing Christians. My mom was (and still is) a university professor and my dad was a full-time stay-at-home dad. Egalitarianism was assumed in my worldview; it was the baseline. It was all I knew.

So, when I got to college and a friend I had just made mentioned off hand that she didn’t believe women should preach or be pastors and that they also probably shouldn’t work after they had kids or at the very least that their careers should take a back seat to their husbands’, I was floored. People still believe that?

I thought. When I pressed her about why, she cited verses from the Bible almost exclusively written by Paul to back up her point, and I had my first enemy.

No, not my friend (who has since changed her mind), but Paul. Paul, the great persecutor of the church turned great apostle and missionary, remained the great persecutor of women, at least in my mind.

After that conversation I remember spending a significant amount of time pouring over texts like 1 Timothy 2, Ephesians 5, 1 Corinthians 11. I had never paid much attention to these verses before because they had never been wielded as weapons against me before. But these verses seemed, as I read them, to support my friend’s point. The thought that ran through my head was almost exclusively, If this is true, I can’t believe in this God. This issue of Mutuality is titled “Making Peace with Paul” because I am not the only person who has wrestled with the words of the apostle. I am not the only person who has felt how sharp the edge of 1 Timothy 2:11-15 bookstore :

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feels when it is turned into a sword and brandished to keep women away from church leadership or teaching the Bible. I am far from the only one; there are millions of us, maybe even billions of us, who have experienced Paul as enemy rather than Christian brother.

The good news contained in the pages of this magazine can be boiled down to this: the good news of Jesus brings equality, and Paul clung to this good news of Jesus above all else. He held it above Roman custom and law, he held it above social hierarchy, he held it above power itself.

Regardless of where you are in your journey of making peace with Paul, this issue will offer something to take with you for the road. You’ll be given space to walk through the grieving process of wrestling with Paul’s words. You’ll be invited to imagine yourself sitting in the Colossian house church when the letter Paul wrote was read aloud, hearing the implication of his words from an entirely different social location and mindset. You’ll be introduced to women Paul admired and empowered like Phoebe and Priscilla, invited to see them not as exceptions but reflections of the rule.

You’ll be given tools to think critically about how tradition has grouped verses in the Bible, and why that could obscure for us today what Paul was saying then. You’ll be asked to redefine how you think Paul thought about power. And finally, you’ll be given an example of an early Christian movement that believed what Paul said in Galatians 3:28 meant women could and should be ordained, just like we do today.

One of the articles in this issue ends beautifully by asking you to remember Phoebe first when you read words Paul wrote that seem to oppress women. I want to reaffirm and widen that sentiment: Remember Phoebe, and remember Priscilla, Lydia, Junia, and the many other women Paul called his coworkers, his equals. Remember Galatians 3:28. Remember the gospel of Jesus that Paul gave everything else up for.

Maybe, eventually, we will come to see Paul not as our enemy but as our brother in Christ and an advocate in the fight for our equality.

M U T U A L I T Y | “ Making Peace With Paul” 3

Paul Gives Me Grief

By Wren Bouwman

This article is one of the Top 15 2020 CBE Writing Contest winners!

I was introduced to the conflict of Paul’s letters during premarital counseling. “Wives, submit to your husband” (Eph. 5:22, Col. 3:18), I was told.

“Your husband should lead you in the right direction and protect your spiritual growth.” The burden placed on my husband’s shoulders 4 M U T U A L I T Y | Spring 2021

was emphasized repeatedly, as was my role as cheerleader. “You were designed to be his helper.” While my husband and I were put off by these verses and their application, we soon brushed them off as minor qualms and moved on to more important things like flowers and vows.

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What followed was a struggle akin to the Kübler-Ross stages of grief, as we searched to find hope in this daunting dogma.

Denial First, we poured over concordances and scientific studies, searching for every shred of evidence to prove that Paul didn’t actually say these things.

“This concordance says ‘submit’ can mean compromise, but I can’t find a source for it,” I would call out. “Here’s more about the lack bookstore :

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of biological gender differences,” my husband would respond.

to be workers and disciplinarians, we would have scripture that holds men back from tasks that are perceived as feminine. Instead, restrictions were placed solely on women.

Denial

gendered roles.

The man led the household and, since the church was a family of families, men led the Church. Scripture was thrown at every challenge, reminding women, “the woman was deceived first and became a sinner” (1 Tim. 2:14) and “I do not permit a woman to speak” (1 Tim. 2:12). The weight of these verses pulled at my husband and me.

At first, we played along in the hope that we would eventually understand.

As time passed, we became more and more fed up with the answers we were given to questions like “is there a biblical definition of masculinity” and “what makes women incapable of guarding their own spiritual wellbeing,” so we set to work trying to prove the opposition wrong. Our faith was fraying at the edges as we were told that God designed women to be “different” (and, consequently, without agency) while our hearts promised a loving creator. We found our church at odds with our experiential reality, and we were determined to find the God who loved their children and not just their sons.

We touched on many good leads during those first weeks, but every step forward was met with denial and more questions. When we found cultural context to Paul’s letters, we were told that the Bible transcends culture. When we found an alternative definition, we were either “quarreling over words” or those definitions were scattered and inconsistent. I had come to my first crossroads: continue to deny that Paul gave commands based on gender or start asking why.

Anger

Once I believed that the verse translations were accurate, I felt angry. I was angry I didn’t know about these verses sooner. I was angry that my church thought I was somehow more prone to deception than male churchgoers who post conspiracy theories on Facebook.

I was angry that my gender had been weaponized against me. I was angry that a God who loved me and made me in their image would make me less than others.

What I realized as I raged was this: there cannot be “separate but equal” gender roles when women are limited and men are not. Bible verses are not used to stop men from doting on their children or organizing a potluck. They are used to stop women from speaking from a pulpit and pursuing a career. Every time I was told about the beautiful (but different!) tasks set out for me because of chromosomes, I was actually being put in a box. If the Bible truly called for women to be exclusively homemakers and nurturers and men

When a man would bring a study to share with a group, it was heralded as a teaching, while my own studies were called “thought exercises.” I watched mothers miss entire services to change diapers and care for children, while their husbands engaged with the sermons. The Bible was being used as a weapon to limit me and other women from teaching and decisionmaking, which seemed to contradict our experiential relationship with the Holy Spirit.

My husband and I began to question our church leaders, and the more we pushed the angrier I became.

Repeatedly, I was reminded that, as a woman, I was too trusting and that made me dangerous. I needed a man to protect me or I might believe something that wasn’t true. I was pitied for doubting Paul and scolded for not trusting Scripture. My faith and my relationships were crumbling as I questioned every action and scripture that led me to God’s love.

Bargaining

In my anger with Paul, I started seeking out reasons not to trust him.

Who was this false teacher and what gave him the right to regulate my gifts? It became a habit to start bargaining with God over Paul. “I’ll keep Galatians,” I would say. “But you have to take back 1 Timothy because Paul might not have even written it.” I continued to

M U T U A L I T Y | “ Making Peace With Paul” 5

Jesus never said in the Great Commission, “Men, go make disciples of all nations. Women, prepare a hot meal for them when they return.”

He gave us all an equal task to do. plead with God over every argument. I challenged God on the historical Adam, on the nature of sin, on the purpose of family and relationships. I begged God for clarity, offering that if God would just make it really clear I was supposed to submit, then I would.

Surprisingly, a voice did not echo from the heavens telling me to either throw out 1 Timothy or to just submit to my husband. The outcome was, instead, a swift deconstruction of my faith. The more I pulled at Scripture, the more bricks came loose. The issue with dismissing parts of Scripture is that it forces you to look at the rest of Scripture through the same lens. If I can throw out 1 Timothy, why can’t I throw out the rape and genocide in the Old Testament? I haggled over every book and Sunday-school story with God, trying to leverage my faith with a more palatable Holy Book.

In the walls that contained my faith, I pulled out all the “Paul” bricks and a few “Joshua” and “Kings” bricks for good measure, evening out the empty spaces and trading them in for a “just Jesus” mentality until there

I was reminded that even in my doubting, I never doubted Christ.

was nothing left of my faith except a vague feeling that the Hebrew God was probably the real God.

Depression The problem with deconstructing is that, at some point, you end up sitting among the rubble of your beliefs, scattered and uncertain how to rebuild. When I lost faith in Paul, I began to worry I was losing faith in God. I had deserted the Scriptures, lost respect for my leaders, and I was scared I had started a process I couldn’t finish. I felt like I had tried to clean the house by tearing everything out the closets, and now I faced the daunting task of sorting everything into “keep” and “toss” piles.

I lost many hours of sleep blaming Paul for my doubt. If Paul really said these things, if my church believed them, how could I tell my friends about Jesus? How could I invite my loved ones to join me at the table when they might be told that God made women less than men? I struggled to see a point in having faith. If my purpose was to make disciples, I was set to fail.

I began devouring books and blog posts, digging at the rubble in search of a foundation. The beautiful thing, the thing that makes deconstructing worth it, is finding that foundation.

As I wallowed in doubt and worried I was losing my faith, I was reminded of Jesus. Jesus, who taught me to

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love others, who laughed, who wept, and who helped people. Jesus, who died so that I could spend eternity with him. I was reminded that even in my doubting, I never doubted Christ. So, I started building back up from my foundation.

Acceptance As a member of an epistle-focused church, it had been a long time since I had read the Gospels. But, as I scrambled to pick up the bricks of my faith through Rachel Held Evans books and issues of Priscilla Papers, I was reminded of the women in Jesus’ ministry (Luke 10:38–42). Mary, a woman, learned at the feet of Jesus.

I met women who were the first witnesses to Jesus’s resurrection and, consequently, became the apostles to the apostles (Luke 24:1–12). It was women who took Jesus into their homes and funded his travel.

These women traveled with Jesus alongside the twelve, witnessing Christ’s miracles and hearing his parables, too. Jesus loved these women and taught them. He never said in the Great Commission, “Men, go make disciples of all nations.

Women, prepare a hot meal for them when they return.” He gave us all an equal task to do.

In my search to reconcile Paul with Jesus, I stumbled onto descriptions of the Roman social order, pater familias, which prohibited women from owning property or making any legal decisions. I learned about Aristotle’s own household codes, laid out in Aristotle’s Politics: Book 1, XII, which call for husbands to dominate their wives. I read about the cult of Artemis, which boasted out-spoken priestesses that might have distorted the gospel. I discovered Jewish website :

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rebellions and distrust that made the Roman world a dangerous place for the followers of the Hebrew God. Each new discovery became a brick for me to hesitantly place. I learned the early church was in danger of being branded an extremist cult or a rebellion that needed to be quelled.

With this lens, Paul’s writing becomes a twist of what would have been familiar ideas to his audience. Where his readers expected husbands to rule over their wives, slaves to be without rights, the spiritually weak to be cast out, Paul called for care, humanity, and learning. The divisions caused by class, ethnicity, and gender were gone in the eyes of Christ, but Caesar still enforced them. Paul, who loved Christ but lived under Caesar, was charged with growing the seeds of Christianity in hostile soil. He found a way to break the inequities of the world from the inside, a task that we should be continuing in our churches today. We are so often told to be “in the world, but not of it,” but what we forget is that Paul was also in the world. Affected by the time and culture, he fought to bring Jesus to

people within the rules of his society.

Paul’s bricks fit better this time, as I placed them back into my faith.

They aren’t as simple, and some of them still don’t fit quite right, but he has a place there, reminding me to love Jesus in the time and place in which I exist.

Accepting the grief Paul caused helped me accept the humanity of Scripture, and my place in it. While I can’t know Paul’s mind, I believe his letters transcend his time and speak to the real-world application of Jesus’s teaching. They point toward progress; they point toward a new kingdom. We cannot correct every injustice but, just as Paul did, we can take steps forward. My own walls are far from rebuilt. There are still holes where I have questions and bricks that I will later find crumble just as easily as the old ones of patriarchy and oppression. However, these walls are still stronger than they were before. My process has not only equipped me to keep rebuilding, but it has also made me more prepared for when things fall apart. There is nothing easy about deconstructing

those walls of faith but, just as the stages of grief are a natural process to come to a greater understanding, every brick that falls and is replaced is a natural part of coming to love the God who loves us all equally.

Wren Bouwman is a graduate student in applied linguistics at Iowa State University.

She currently researches the Gothic language and translation techniques used in the Gothic Bible. She grew up in the church but became ardently egalitarian in the last year thanks to the hard work of other “e x - v a n g e l i c a l s” before her.

Paul, who loved Christ but lived under Caesar, was charged with growing the seeds of Christianity in hostile soil. He found a way to break the inequities of the world from the inside, a task that we should be continuing in our churches today.

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M U T U A L I T Y | “ Making Peace With Paul” 7

A New Kind of Household Colossians 3:18–25

By Amy Rowe

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I worship in a liturgical church tradition that follows a lectionary, a prescribed order of four readings for every Sunday of the church year: An Old Testament passage, a Psalm, a New Testament passage, and a Gospel passage. One or more of these readings corresponds to the weekly sermon, but the others are simply read aloud and received in an affirmation of the authority of Scripture. These non-sermon readings sometimes create uncomfortable moments, such as when a particularly brutal Old Testament proclamation of judgment or a particularly thorny Pauline passage is left ringing in the ears of the congregation without explanation, without sermonizing, without any wrap-up beyond a simple “thanks be to God” following in its wake.

Wives, submit yourselves to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord. Husbands, love your wives and do not be harsh with them. Children, obey your parents in everything, for this pleases the Lord.

Fathers, do not embitter your children, or they will become discouraged. Slaves, obey your earthly masters in everything; and do it, not only when their eye is on you and to curry their favor, but with sincerity of heart and reverence for the Lord.

Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for human masters, since you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a reward. It is the Lord Christ you are serving. Anyone who does wrong will be repaid for their wrongs, and there is no favoritism.

Colossians 3:18–25

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Colossians 3:18–25 is one of these uncomfortable passages. Its public reading produces clenched stomachs, inward groaning, the sting of old wounds, and the vigilance of self-protection among those in a congregation against whom such words have been weaponized. This passage has been used throughout the centuries to bless patriarchy, racism, slavery, and domestic abuse in the name of Christian obedience, and its proclamation from the pulpit is enough to make one squirm in the pew and scan the room for the nearest exit.

It may surprise a modern pew-squirmer, then, to know that this passage was likely received in a similarly uncomfortable manner on its very first hearing in a little house church in ancient Colossae. There, Paul’s words would have issued a discomfiting challenge to everything its listeners thought they knew about household life in the Roman empire. Remembering the original context of this letter helps us better grasp the new kind of household Paul envisioned and reclaim that vision in our own context.

Putting Paul’s Words in Context One key aspect of this original context was the makeup of the Colossian church itself. The community assembled to listen to Paul’s letter was already wildly subverting the social norms of the Roman empire.

Imagine a room of mixed genders, ethnicities, and socioeconomic statuses listening with rapt attention to the story of a humiliated, crucified criminal named Jesus. This story was being told by a prisoner named Paul and delivered by a runaway slave named Onesimus—a slave whose master was almost certainly in the room.

Something radically new and controversial was already underway in this little room, and the contents of Paul’s M U T U A L I T Y | “ Making Peace With Paul” 9

This was the philosophy in which the Colossian church was steeped. But against such a code, Paul had already warned the Colossians not to be taken “captive by philosophy and empty deceit, according to human tradition”. letter had the difficult task of calling this disparate fellowship to a lifestyle of Christian maturity in the face of overwhelming opposition. Whatever Paul had to say would be worked out in real time in the real relationships in this room. It was probably going to get messy, and it would certainly be uncomfortable.

Furthermore, it’s important to remember that these Colossian Christians would have listened to Paul’s letter in a single sitting. Paul’s household instructions in chapter 3 were not an isolated set of rules, but part of a broader letter that reimagined the entire notion of household altogether. Just minutes before the Colossians heard the words “wives, submit,” they would have heard that they were all heirs of the kingdom, all brothers and sisters, that God was their Father and Christ was their head (Col. 1:9–20). They would have heard those miraculous, reconciling words that in Christ, “there is no Gentile or Jew, slave or free” (Col. 3:11) and that everyone in this new household ought to treat one another with “compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience. . . . [and] love, which binds them all together in perfect unity" (Col. 3:12,14). And then, just minutes after hearing “slaves, obey,” they would hear Paul call the fugitive slave Onesimus a “faithful and beloved brother who is one of you” (Col. 4:9).

Gone was the patriarchy and hierarchy of the Roman empire. Gone was the ancient divide between Jew and Gentile. In their place was an entirely new social unit called the church, a big extended family in which all kinds of people would live as close as kin, humble servants of one another, equally loved in the fatherhood of God, equally submitted to the headship of Christ.

Sounds wonderful, doesn’t it? So why doesn’t Paul just . . . leave it at that? Why can’t he simply extol the egalitarian virtues of this new kind of household and omit those pesky rules about submission and obedience?

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Roman Households in Paul’s Time I cannot claim to know the mind of Paul, but I do know the context of the Roman empire in which he was writing.

In that context, the emperor was already giving detailed rules for how to order one’s household relationships, rules which demanded a Christian rewrite if Paul hoped to counter the empire’s claims. A few decades before Paul’s letter was written, the emperor Augustus had instituted sweeping social reforms designed to restore Rome’s mos maiorum (traditional social norms) and its publica magnificentia (public magnificence)—a sort of ancient campaign to “make the Roman empire great again.”1 The emperor knew that households— those most intimate habits and relationships of daily life—were the places where people’s true loyalties were formed. Thus, to produce obedient Roman subjects, the Roman empire set forth detailed rules for how people ordered their household lives.2 One such rule was compulsory marriage. Every man and woman between certain ages was required to marry or else face steep taxes. The head of each household by law was the oldest man—usually the father—and he answered to the head of all households, the emperor, who saw himself as father and head of the empire. Within this hierarchy, the male head’s job was to ensure that those in his household—usually wives, children, and slaves—behaved as good Roman citizens, paid taxes, sacrificed to imperial gods, and generally upheld the economy and order of the empire.

Thus when Paul assumes the household in Colossae includes husbands, wives, children, and slaves, he is not tacitly endorsing marriage, parenthood, or slavery as a superior way of life for the Christian; he is simply addressing the state-mandated household norm.3 But the empire cared about more than who was in the household; it also cared deeply about how those people

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related to one another. To regulate those relationships, the empire relied on ancient household codes developed

by Greek and Roman philosophers. Among the most famous of these was Aristotle’s. Every Roman subject, including Paul’s audience in Colossae, would have understood this code as the basis for relationships within the home. Aristotle’s code states: “For the male is by nature better fitted to command than the female. . . and the older and more fully developed person than the younger and immature. . . . All human beings that differ as widely as the soul does from the body . . . are by nature slaves for whom to be governed by this kind of authority is advantageous. . . . For the free rule the slave, the male the female, the man the child.”⁴ This was the philosophy in which the Colossian church was steeped. But against such a code, Paul had already warned the Colossians not to be taken “captive by philosophy and empty deceit, according to human tradition” (Col. 2:8). Paul’s reimagined Christian household no longer follows Aristotle or any other philosophy or tradition of the empire. Into this vacuum, Paul writes a new household code in Colossians 3:18–25, and this code’s empire-rattling subversiveness becomes clear when juxtaposed with the dominant code of the day.

Called to Be a New Household First, Paul’s code is centered on the Lord Jesus Christ.

Six times he references “the Lord” as the one who is reverenced, served, and pleased by well-ordered household relationships. Just as the Aristotelian code cultivated good subjects of the empire, Paul’s code cultivates good subjects of the “kingdom of the Son,” those whose lives demonstrate the new reality ushered in by the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus (Col. 1:13).

Second, Paul’s code makes no claims to natural order.

The basis of Aristotle’s household relationships is rooted in one’s gender, age, or social status: women, children, and slaves are by nature suited for servitude, while

Paul’s code is centered on the Lord Jesus Christ. men are by nature suited for leadership. In this way, the reasoning of this pagan philosopher finds odd resonance with early American slavery apologists and more recent evangelical complementarians whose arguments rely on a natural order based on race or sex.

But Paul makes no such claims. In his reimagined household, everyone is equally subject to the rule of Christ. The powerful now have duties, not just rights.

And the powerless now have rights, not just duties.

Everyone is called in one way or another to a lifestyle of serving one another; not because nature dictates they do so, but because loving submission is the way of Christ. As if to underline this new reality, Paul does something unheard of for his time: he addresses the bulk of his household code to the lowest people in the room. He speaks directly to wives, children, and slaves, acknowledging their presence, elevating their dignity, and including them in the conversation, just as Jesus had done throughout his earthly ministry.

Hearing Paul’s household code spoken for the first time must have created quite a stir among the fellowship in Colossae, upending relational norms between the people in the room and challenging them to new rhythms of loving servitude in their everyday lives. His rationale for these rhythms was not to produce happy marriages or obedient children (though such outcomes would be welcome!).

No, Paul was after something far more consequential: a new kind of household loyal to the kingdom of God, a household of liberating equality, radical welcome, humble service, and Christ-honoring love.

In his reimagined household, everyone is equally subject to the rule of Christ. The powerful now have duties, not just rights. And the powerless now have rights, not just duties. bookstore :

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M U T U A L I T Y | “ Making Peace With Paul” 11

For our identities and loyalties to be formed by the kingdom of God... ...we must practice the disruptive way of Jesus in our ordinary relationships, the way of loving submission described in Colossians 3:18–25.

Reclaiming Mutual Submission Today

accept the circumstances we constantly find ourselves in as the place of God’s kingdom and blessing. God has yet to bless anyone except where they actually are.”5 How can we live with Paul’s words where we actually are, now, in the 21st century? As we dig deeper into the context surrounding Paul’s letter, we can begin to make peace with these uncomfortable words. We can begin to dislodge them from their tragic legacy of racism and patriarchy, a legacy that more closely resembles Roman imperial philosophy than the radical way of Jesus. And we can begin to reclaim them as our own powerful words of empire-shaking resistance. This work of making peace, dislodging, and reclaiming Paul’s words is slow and sensitive, especially for those who have been hurt by them in the past. But ultimately, our work goes even further; not just to reclaim, but to actually live by these words. For our identities and loyalties to be formed by the kingdom of God rather than our contemporary empires, we must practice the disruptive way of Jesus in our ordinary relationships, the way of loving submission described in Colossians 3:18–25.

Paul knew, just as the Roman empire knew, that the ordinary relationships of our everyday lives are where our deepest sense of identity and loyalty are formed.

Theologian Dallas Willard captured this reality when he wrote, “Where transformation is actually carried out is in our real life, where we dwell . . . we must

Amy Rowe is the executive pastor of Incarnation Anglican in Arlington, Virginia, a church she helped plant in 2018. She is also a postulant for ordination to the priesthood, student at Trinity School for Ministry, graphic designer, wife, and mom of two.

1.

Paul Zanker, trans. Alan Shapiro, Augustus and the Power of Images (Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press, 1988), 2–6; 156–158.

2.

N.T. Wright, Colossians and Philemon: Introduction and Commentary, Tyndale New Testament Commentaries, Vol. 12 (Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic), 180–183, Scribd Ebook.

3.

Brian Walsh and Sylvia Keesmaat, Colossians Remixed: Subverting the Empire (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2004), 57, 211. See also G.K. Beale, Colossians and Philemon, Baker Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 2019), 753–754.

4.

Aristotle, Politics, 1259b, 1253b, 1254b. Quoted in Brian Walsh and Sylvia Keesmaat, Colossians Remixed: Subverting the Empire (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2004), 203.

5.

Dallas Willard, The Divine Conspiracy (New York: Harper One, 2009), 497.

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Phoebe Through the Eyes of Paul

By Julie R. Frady Paul taught that women were second-class citizens in God’s Kingdom. Or did he?

How Paul spoke of one specific woman, Phoebe, is telling. We know about her only through Paul’s eyes. What did he see?

In Romans 16, Paul affirmed twenty-eight co-workers in ministry, including ten women. Considering the patriarchal culture of the time, that is amazing!

Leading this list is Phoebe, of whom Paul wrote: “I commend to you our sister Phoebe, a deacon of the church at Cenchreae, so that you may welcome her in the Lord as is fitting for the saints, and help her in whatever she may require from you, for she has been a benefactor of many and of myself as well” (Rom. 16:1–2, NRSV).

Scholars agree that Paul wrote Romans. Yet it is hard to believe the man who authored Romans 16:1–2 thought that women should not speak in the churches or that women are easily deceived and should not teach or have authority over men. Even so, many people read 1 Corinthians 14:34–35 and 1 Timothy 2:11–15 to say just that. If we accept that Paul wrote all three of these letters (and I do), then this means we have misunderstood something somewhere. But why should two seemingly obscure verses from the final chapter of Romans cause us to reconsider the restrictions many believe Paul put on women in other letters?

A basic principle of Bible interpretation is to use “clear” texts to shed light on “unclear” texts, not the other way around. What is “clear” or “unclear” depends on the way Paul wrote in Greek, bookstore :

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M U T U A L I T Y | “ Making Peace With Paul” 13

Paul highly commended Phoebe so the Christians in Rome would know that he trusted her to read his letter exactly the way he wanted them to hear it. not on our English translations. If we consider 1 Corinthians as a whole, the passage in chapter 14 seems to contradict what Paul wrote in chapter 11 verse 5, when he gave instructions on how women were to speak in church. The 1 Timothy 2 passage lends itself to several interpretations. Yet many people interpret Phoebe’s ministry through the lenses of these unclear passages, rather than by what Paul clearly wrote in the Greek of Romans 16:1–2.

What Does Romans 16:1–2 Teach Us About Phoebe?

First, Paul commended (synistēmi) Phoebe to the Christians in Rome. Then, he called her a deacon (diakonon) of the church in Cenchreae. Next, he instructed the Roman believers to welcome (prosdexēsthe) Phoebe and give her any help that she needed because she had been a benefactor (prostatis) to many people.

As a suburb of Corinth in Greece, Cenchreae was far from Rome. Why would the Romans care who Phoebe was or what she did?

“I commend to you our sister Phoebe…”

Phoebe carried Paul’s letter to the Christians in Rome, and he wanted them to know they could trust her. The Greek verb for “commend” has a variety of meanings, but they all have to do with the idea of standing with someone in a trusted relationship. Paul was telling the Romans that he knew Phoebe well, and he endorsed her without reservation. Why would that be important?

Phoebe did not just carry Paul’s letter: she delivered it. Punctuation had not yet been invented to indicate how the text should be read, so couriers likely read letters aloud to the recipients, mimicking the author’s tone of voice and facial expressions. Phoebe would probably have rehearsed the letter with Paul, 14 M U T U A L I T Y | Spring 2021

noting where he spoke with sarcasm or sadness, and where his eyes rolled or flashed with intensity.

This was especially important because Paul had not yet visited the Christians in Rome, so they would not know how he spoke when he preached.

Paul highly commended Phoebe so the Christians in Rome would know that he trusted her to read his letter exactly the way he wanted them to hear it.

A man who believed women should not speak in church would never have done that. “…a deacon of the church at Cenchreae…”

After commending Phoebe, Paul informed the Romans that she was a deacon in the church at Cenchreae. Many churches have deacons today, and their duties vary by denomination.

What was a deacon in the early church?

Diakonos literally means “servant.” It is used with that meaning in the Gospels, but by the time of Paul, diakonos was being used by Christians to indicate a leader set apart for ministry. How did this come to be? People first filled the type of role we now recognize as deacons in Acts 6, when the apostles needed leaders who could minister to widows and heal relations between minority and majority culture Christians. The early church likely chose the word diakonos as a church leadership title precisely because it meant servant, as in Jesus’ command to his disciples in Matthew 20:25b–26.1 We see evidence in Acts and Paul’s letters that deacons referred to leaders who ministered to the poor and who taught and preached. We see Stephen and Philip preaching and teaching in Acts 6:8–10; 8:5, 26–40.

In his letters, Paul referred to Apollos, Timothy, Epaphras, and Tychicus2 as ministers, using the term diakonos. Much of the book of Acts depicts Paul’s ministry, and he referred to himself as a diakonos in five of his letters.3 The idea that deacons

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preached is not a new or controversial idea. Back in 1891 the Rev. B.T. Roberts wrote, “there is not a single passage in which the word deacon is used to designate an officer of the church, where there is any indication that this deacon was not a preacher.”4 How do we know that Phoebe was a deacon and not just a servant? First, Paul used the same term for the men named above as he does for Phoebe. If we are going to translate diakonos as “deacon” or “minister” for men, but as “servant” for Phoebe, then we make a distinction that Paul never did. Second, Paul wrote that Phoebe was a diakonos of the church in Cenchreae.

As Roberts noted, “The churches of that day had no servants, in the ordinary sense of the word servant.

The churches were poor. Their meetings were held in private houses. They had no church edifices.”5 When Paul called Phoebe a diakonos in the church at Cenchreae, he was not praising her “spirit of servanthood” to the Roman Christians. He was telling them that Phoebe held an official, titled position in her church.

This meant that she had been vetted in her character and doctrine, and she had authority to preach and teach.

She was thus qualified to be Paul’s representative and to interpret anything in his letter—including points of theology—that they did not understand.

He does not sound like a man who didn’t believe women should teach or have authority over men. “…so that you may welcome her in the Lord as is fitting for the saints…”

Paul then told the Roman Christians to “welcome” Phoebe “as is fitting for the saints.” The Greek verb for welcome used here means to receive, to accept

fully. That is, he was commanding them to embrace her and her ministry with enthusiasm. The prevailing culture considered women to be inferior, but Paul thought otherwise. By commanding the Roman Christians to receive Phoebe in this way, Paul declares that she is trustworthy and should be accepted as fully as a male believer in the same position.

In addition, Paul instructed the Romans to “help her in whatever she may require from you.” This may have included financial help. Given that Paul stated his desire to take the gospel to Spain and that he wanted the Romans to “assist me on my journey there” (Rom. 15:24b), Phoebe’s mission likely involved collecting money to fund that missionary journey.

He does not sound like a man who believed women are easily deceived and could not be trusted as leaders in the church.

But wait, there’s more! “…for she has been a benefactor of many and of myself as well!"

Paul then called Phoebe a “prostatis of many.” This term does not have an English word that perfectly communicates its various meanings, but many scholars agree that “benefactor” or “patron” are the closest. Many older English translations translate prostatis merely as “help” or “helper,” but a Greco-Roman prostatis was much stronger than that. A benefactor had the means to intervene on behalf of people in legal, political, or financial trouble. Benefactors wielded great influence toward the well-being of those under their care. Craig Keener notes that patrons of religious groups were wealthy individuals who facilitated meetings in their homes, adding: “A patron was generally a prominent and honored member of the group and generally

When Paul called Phoebe a diakonos in the church at Cenchreae, he was not praising her “spirit of servanthood” to the Roman Christians. He was telling them that Phoebe held an official, titled position in her church. This meant that she had been vetted in her character and doctrine, and she had authority to preach and teach. bookstore :

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M U T U A L I T Y | “ Making Peace With Paul” 15

What Paul clearly wrote about Phoebe in Romans 16:1–2 shows that we need to do more digging into what he must have meant in these other passages. exercised some authority over it.”6 Benefactor and patron best convey the sort of prostatis Paul intended.

However, he could have had other meanings in mind as well. One of the most respected Greek-English lexicons says that prostatis is the feminine form of prostates,⁷ and that a prostates is someone who “stands before” or is “a front-rank-man” and can refer to a president or ruler. A prostates can be a “protector, guard, or champion,” a patron who takes care of the disenfranchised, and even someone who can “stand before a god to entreat him.”.⁸ As a prostatis, then, Phoebe likely stood before the congregation to lead.

She had clout in both the community at large and in the church. Phoebe had power, and she used that power for the benefit of others, rather than for herself. That is why Paul told the Romans to give Phoebe whatever she requested.

He added that she had been a prostatis of not just a few, but many people, even Paul himself! Had Paul placed himself under the leadership of Phoebe in any way? Given the meanings of prostatis/prostates, that seems possible.

The Greek of Romans 16:1–2 is clear. If Paul wrote these verses—and I am not aware of any scholars who doubt that he did—then we need to use them to inform our understanding of passages like 1 Corinthians 14:34–35 and 1 Timothy 2:11–15. Phoebe could not have been just an exception to the rule of God-ordained male authority, because if God had so ordained, God would not make exceptions. Breaking manmade cultural taboos is one thing (Jesus did that, after all), but breaking God’s moral order is sin, and Paul would not have so highly commended Phoebe if she were sinning.

What Paul clearly wrote about Phoebe in Romans 16:1–2 shows that we need to do more digging into what he must have meant in these other passages.

Not an Exception to the Rule

Paul simply could not have written the way he did about Phoebe while also teaching that women should not speak in church, were easily deceived, or should not teach or have authority over any man. When we try to understand what Paul is saying about women in 1 Timothy and 1 Corinthians, let’s begin by remembering Phoebe.

Paul highly valued his relationship with Phoebe. He informed the Romans that she was a respected leader in her local church. The apostle esteemed Phoebe so much that he entrusted her to deliver an important letter to a church he had not yet visited, to explain complex theological issues to adults of both sexes, and possibly to collect a large sum of money on his behalf.

She was a teacher, a preacher, and a champion of others.

Julie R. Frady teaches Bible and preaches occasionally at her Free Methodist church in Kansas (USA). She plays saxophone, clarinet, and trumpet in the Praise Band. Julie has an M.A. in Spanish with an area of specialization in translation and is an experienced translator. She has also studied Koine Greek.

1.

See also Mark 10:42–43 and Luke 22:25–26.

2.

1 Cor. 3:5, Phil. 1:1, Col. 1:7, and Eph. 6:21, respectively.

3.

1 Cor. 3:5; 2 Cor. 3:6; Eph. 3:7; Col. 1:23; and 1 Thess. 3:2

4.

B.T. Roberts, Ordaining Women New Edition with Introduction and Notes, ed. Benjamin D Wayman, (Wipf & Stock, 1993), 74.

5.

Ibid., 75. Emphasis his.

6.

Craig Keener, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament, (Downers Grove: IVP, 1993), 44.

7.

προστατις. An Intermediate Greek-English Lexicon, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992), 698.

8.

Ibid., 698.

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SHE DESIRES A NOBLE TASK

By Jim Reiher

18 M U T U A L I T Y | Spring 2021

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It is a trustworthy statement: if any man aspires to the office of overseer, it is a fine work he desires to do. (1 Timothy 3:1, NASV)

This is a faithful saying: If a man desires the position of a bishop, he desires a good work (1 Timothy 3:1, NKJV)

Here is a trustworthy saying: Whoever aspires to be an overseer desires a noble task. (1 Timothy 3:1, NIV) --------------------Have you ever wondered how chapter divisions came to be in the Bible? They were not in the original documents.

They did not come in until the 1200s, in fact. When they did become a part of the text, it helped to change the way we read and interpret the Bible.

After all, we often study the Bible in chapters. We start and finish between chapter numbers. Some of the decisions about where a new chapter begins have been seen to be rather strange, even mistaken. Colossians 4:1 really should have gone with chapter 3, for example.

Other possible mistakes are not so obvious but should be noted.

The Interesting Case of 1 Timothy 3:1 1 Timothy 3:1 serves both as a conclusion to chapter 2 and as a segue into chapter 3. Because this verse is talking about elders in the church, many see 3:1 primarily as the logical start to the rest of chapter 3, which contains a long discussion about elders and deacons. However, I would argue it actually belongs as a conclusion to chapter 2, even more than an introduction to chapter 3.

This is of significance for women in church because it would mean verse 1 encourages both men and women to aspire to be elders. If it concludes chapter 2, Paul is seen to be supportive bookstore :

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of both genders serving God in leadership roles, so long as they are trained up and mature in the faith.

Yes, he has put some restrictions on women in the Ephesian church for the moment, but he does not want that to be seen as his “end game.”

Rather, he adds more generally that it is a good thing for men and women both to aspire to be elders.

The Problem of Immature Leadership in Chapter 2 To understand why I suggest this, we must consider also what comes just before 3:1: chapter 2:8–15.

(That passage, the controversial paragraph that is often used to suppress the ministry and leadership of women in the church.) Chapter 2:8–15 has traditionally been interpreted to keep women out of church leadership and ministry, but this is a f lawed interpretation. At the very least, we can say that there are other equally valid (even more valid) ways of understanding that passage. The key difference between these interpretations is whether we see this passage as some kind of universal command for all time, on every Christian in every culture and nation of the world, or if we see it as addressing a contemporary

M U T U A L I T Y | “ Making Peace With Paul” 19

issue in Ephesus in the late first century AD. In other words, is it like “love God and love your neighbor,” or is it more like “treat your slaves well, and slaves—work hard for your masters”?

1 Timothy 2:8–15 is about certain wealthy women in the church—probably newly converted from the Ephesian community—wanting to be leaders in the church before they are properly trained or mature in the new faith.1 They want to be elders who can teach and have authority in the church (2:12). Paul makes it very clear that he wants women to be trained up correctly (2:11).

That verse, interestingly, holds the only imperative verb used in the paragraph. That means verse 11 is the closest thing we have in the paragraph to a command by Paul: he insists that women be trained. It is a high point in his mind and writing. That is indeed the key to the paragraph: Paul wants all the members of churches to be trained up properly in the faith. Not just men, but men and women both. After being properly trained and matured, then teaching and leadership positions will be options for women and men alike.

Another word that Paul uses twice in that paragraph (1 Tim. 2:8–15) to specifically address women is the word often translated (I would argue mistranslated) “propriety” in verses 9 and 15.2 That word actually means “clear headed, mature, and rational in thinking; not muddled in thought.” Sometimes it can be combined with other moral qualities, but to leave it to only mean a specific moral quality is to rob it of its essential meaning. Paul wants women in the church to be clear thinking and proper in their understanding (in verse 9 to do with modesty and choice of clothing; in verse 15 to do with maturing and remaining in the faith) before they assume leadership positions in the church.

What If 1 Timothy 3:1 Was Directed Toward Those Women?

Then we come to chapter 3 verse 1. What does it say exactly? Well one thing it does not say is that “it is a good thing for only men to seek to be elders.”

No. It might be a reference to just men. However, it equally could be a reference to just women. Or, quite probably, it is a reference to both men and women.

The NIV has done the better translation here. The text says, “Here is a trustworthy saying: Whoever aspires to be an overseer desires a noble task.”

Some translations have inserted the English word “man” into 3:1 because of 3:2–14 (male elders, male deacons, female deacons or deacons’ wives, male deacons). Because of this decision many Christians have concluded that while there might be an argument for women deacons, there is no place for women elders.

This might appear reasonable on the surface, but it is a flawed argument. In verse 1 the Greek for “men” or “man” is not used. Nor is the stand-alone word for “he.”

The Greek word tis, however, is used. This same word is used for men and women. Similarly, the word for “he or she desires” is a verb stem for the word “desires” with the ending “he, she, or it” attached. Context has to decide who this verb is referring to.

If we group 1 Timothy 3:1 as the conclusion of 2:8–15, that verse then becomes a strong supportive comment affirming women’s leadership in the church. Because, as noted, the words used can be about men or women, it is possible that 3:1 might simply mean “if any women desire to be an overseer, that is a good thing she desires.” This means Paul could be communicating something like, “despite my insistence that women be trained up and that they can’t teach or have authority until they are mature and competent—it is a good thing for a woman to desire to be an elder.”

Finding Women in the Rest of Chapter 3 Chapter 3:2–7 then goes on to address elders, thinking of them in terms of the current male majority that they are made up of. My suggestion that verse 1 is a conclusion to the previous material and verse 2 really starts a new thought for Paul is supported by the opening words of verse 2 in the Greek: “it is necessary” (or “it is proper”). It can be translated as “then,” “now

He wasn’t the chauvinist that some people have accused him of being. He was someone willing to have women as well as men minister in the church.

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then,” “consequently,” or “therefore.” It is of course linked in thought to the previous, but it is a change of tack. Paul has just talked about training up women for ministry and not permitting them to be in authority until they are properly trained and mature in the faith, and he concludes by reminding everyone that it is not a bad ambition to hope to be an elder in the church. He then pauses, and then he addresses other issues relevant right then and there. “Okay . . . now then, concerning our elders right now . . .” This next material (3:2–7) is about the current or soon to be appointed elders in the church.

It is certainly reasonable to see 3:2–7 as a gender inclusive conversation if we can deal with the phrase, elders should be “the husband of one wife” or “be faithful to his wife” (as some translate it). Paul is likely using a “gender-generalisation” here. If the majority of the elders at the time were men, then it might be a way of saying “be faithful to your one partner.” I recall when I was lecturing in a Bible college in Melbourne during the 1990s; all but one of the faculty were men, and the one woman was part time. When we had special events of a social nature, it was common for the letter to go to all staff to include, “and bring along your wives.” Not only was the one woman arguably left out by that phrase, but the one single male lecturer felt overlooked too. I shudder when I think back to those kind of gender-generalizations. As much as I feel uncomfortable with them, it does not mean that we only had married male lecturers. Furthermore, considering this statement here (“be the husband of one wife”), if we were strict with such an interpretative method, then the commandment “do not covet your neighbour’s wife” only applies to men and has nothing to say to women

Rethinking 1 Timothy 2–3 So rather than the divisions of 1 Timothy 2:8–3:14 which we often see: • Women and men in church (2:8–15) • Male elders (3:1–7)

• Male deacons (3:8–10) • Female deacons (or male deacons wives) (3:11) • Male deacons again (3:12–14) We should see the movement of the letter this way: • Women and men in church (2:8–3:1).

• The current situation: addressing the current leldership in a gender stereotyping way (3:2–7).

• Male deacons (3:8–10).

• Female deacons (3:11).

• Male deacons (3:12–14).

However you interpret 3:2–7, the emphasis of this article has been to highlight 3:1. When seen as a conclusion to 2:8–15, it reminds women that if any woman desires to be an elder that is a good thing.

Even if you disagree, this verse is gender inclusive: if anyone, male or female, aspires to church leadership, it is a good thing! Even if you leave it at the start of chapter 3, it is still gender inclusive and would then point to the whole paragraph being gender inclusive as well. To see 1 Timothy 3:1 as a gender inclusive invitation to aspire to be leaders in the church is a most affirming aspect of the apostle Paul’s teaching.

Women have been deeply hurt by interpretations of Paul’s teaching in this part of the Bible. But I would suggest that with this alternative understanding of the passage, we can make peace with Paul on this account.

He wasn’t the chauvinist that some people have accused him of being. He was someone willing to have women as well as men minister in the church.

Jim Reiher has an MA in theology from Asian Pacific Theological Seminary. He has authored many articles and books, including Women Leadership and the Church (Acorn Press, 2006) and Timothy, 2 Timothy and Titus, an Egalitarian Commentary (forthcoming).

Previously a Bible college lecturer, Jim now enjoys teaching children's ministry using magic and clowning.

1.

To unpack the alternative view of this passage, see Women: Leadership & the Church, Melbourne: Acorn Press, 2006, pp.85–93. See also Judy L. Brown, Women Ministers According to Scripture, (Kearney: Morris Publishing, 1996), 279–312; and Rebecca Merrill Groothuis, Good News for Women: A Biblical Picture of Gender Equality (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 1997), 209–229.

2.

Walter Bauer offers the first and most obvious meaning of this word as “reasonableness, rationality, mental soundness.” He offers a second meaning of “good judgement, moderation, and self-control.” Gerhard Kittel likewise explains that when that secondary meaning comes into play, it is always because of sound thinking at work. The form used in 1 Timothy 2:9, 15 is only used in one other place in the New Testament: Acts 26:25. There it is always translated as “clear thinking” or “reasonable.” See William F. Arndt, F. Wilbur Gingrich, Frederick W Danker, Walter Bauer, and William Arndt, A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature. 2nd ed. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1979), 802; G.W. Bromiley and Geoffrey William Bromiley, Theological Dictionary of the New Testament, ed.

Gerhard Kittel and Gerhard Friedrich (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1964), 1097–1104.

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M U T U A L I T Y | “ Making Peace With Paul” 21

Modeling Jesus’s Power “In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus” Philippians 2:5

By Jennifer Reil 22 M U T U A L I T Y | Spring 2021

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The apostle Paul may be one of the most interesting, controversial, and yet beloved figures of the Bible.

After his dramatic encounter with Jesus on the road to Damascus, Paul shifted his entire life’s focus. Even though he persecuted followers of a seemingly failed Messiah, he later became a leader, church planter, and evangelist of that very same movement. His encounter with Jesus changed him. Despite Paul’s advanced training and knowledge of the Jewish Scriptures and faith, he awakened in that moment to something God was doing that he had missed all along the way. It’s possible for the most trained, most devout, most faithful, and most committed religious attendants to miss the very heart and work of God. That alone could be a message for the Christian church and should help to keep us humble in the pursuit of truth!

Fast forward several years after his conversion, to about 55 CE. Paul found himself imprisoned in Ephesus for his evangelistic work promoting the good news of Jesus.

It turns out Roman officials not only disliked the disruptions Paul caused when he came to town, they took seriously his claim to be promoting a different king and lord over Caesar as well. It is here, in prison, that Paul writes his letter to the Philippian church. Regarding the letter to the Philippians, N.T. Wright observes that “the heart of this short letter is Jesus himself.

Paul urges the Philippians to let their public behavior match up

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to the gospel, which will mean sharing the Messiah’s suffering— as Paul himself has done and is doing.”1 Paul’s concern is that his audience commit themselves to the way of the gospel, which is evident in just the first two chapters alone.

In chapters one and two he uses the term “gospel” seven times, urging the Philippian church to take its message seriously, despite pressure, suffering, or persecution that might tempt them to abandon the truth they have received.

The Gospel as Told by Paul Philippians 2:6–11 records a beautiful and heartfelt poem (or song or hymn) describing the embodied gospel message, Jesus the Christ. He desires his audience to remain committed not just to a confession of faith but to a way of life. Just prior to this poem, Philippians 2:1–5 provides some important context for the reader.

Here, Paul tells the church at Philippi to be united with Christ, taking on the same mindset, having the same love, same spirit and unity together. Rather than doing things from selfish ambition or vain conceit, they should put others before themselves, and look out for one another’s needs and interests. Right before the poem starts, he tells them, “In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus” (Phil. 2:5).

For Paul, the gospel is not just reciting theological positions, it is

something that should be embodied within our lives, within our communities, within our families, and within every interaction. It is this gospel that Paul is willing to live for and die for, to be in chains or be free for, and he is encouraging his audience to embrace that same mindset. But what is this gospel that Paul is so passionate about, and that he captures so vividly in this poem? Wright again identifies the main point, “The poem suggests, above all, a radical redefinition of power.”2 Philippians 2:6–11 directly challenge the power dynamics and the power holders within Paul’s context, which is set in a very patriarchal and stratified system.

Power in Paul’s Context and the Gospel’s Response To really grasp the fullness of what Paul was telling the Philippian church, this passage needs to be placed in his first century, GrecoRoman world. Paul was writing to people living in a Roman colony in Macedonia. They were part of a larger society where one’s status, power, and privilege mattered greatly. It was a highly stratified social culture where men predominately held superior social positions as husbands, fathers, and slaveholders. Slaves were considered “living tools,” serving the needs, wants, and desires of their master.

Women were inherently inferior to men , de f u nc t phy sic a l ly, emotionally, intellectually, and in every virtue. Children held no

M U T U L I T Y | “ Making Peace With Paul” 23

Where embracing hierarchy was normal, Paul says it shouldn’t be for God’s people. Christian communities are to reflect this same Christ-like posture toward one another. When Christian communities embrace hierarchy based on gender, where men hold power while women are excluded from participation, the gospel has become corrupted. status in the culture until they reached an age of maturity. In this society, some were meant to be ruled and others were made to rule, and the gods had placed free male citizens above everyone else.3 If a person had wealth, was male, and held citizenship, they held power over women, slaves, and children.

These were the accepted social norms of the time.

These norms were far from accepted

by Paul though. Instead, Paul tells the church at Philippi to check their privilege and status at the door and pattern their community life after the example of Jesus. The world and society surrounding Paul and his audience considered status and privilege everything, yet Paul tells the audience that Jesus considered it nothing. Despite his equality with God, he emptied himself of all his divine privilege and status.

Paul believes there is something about the way Christians within community treat one another that is reflective of the very nature of the gospel itself. Paul is challenging his audience to re-think their understanding of power, status,

and privilege. This poem hints at the fact that Jesus could have used his power to his own benefit, building an empire that surpassed Rome, and set up systems of operating that advantaged Jesus and any others he decided would be “insiders” during his reign. But that is not what he did.

Instead, Jesus relinquished any claims to power and emptied himself in humility to embrace a posture and position of a servant.

This was the call of the Christian community to which Paul writes, and it is the message that we are called to embody today as well.

What Does This Mean for Patriarchy?

Despite Paul’s best efforts, Christianity throughout the centuries has maintained a complicated relationship with power.4 The truth is, we love it. We love to be near it, we love to wield it. Proximity to power has become a marker of our success and even that God’s favorable hand is upon us. This is demonstrated especially in the treatment and ideologies surrounding women in the church

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and home. Those who accept a subordinate role for women attach their claims to the very nature of the gospel itself. They believe that if men don’t hold superiority, power, authority and leadership, the gospel is violated.5 Indeed, with this mentality, there is a violation of the gospel taking place!

Paul in his letter challenges this sentiment, claiming that the heart of the gospel is in laying down power, not demanding it or forcing others into submission. In Paul’s time, and sadly often in our own context too, the people who held positions of power were nearly all men. But rather than reinforcing hierarchy, Paul redefines power as something powerholders should “count as nothing.” Following the example of Jesus, Paul implies that Christians should seek to lay aside their claims to power, status, and authority over others, and should focus on serving those less powerful than themselves. This means that wherever free men held power, they were also challenged to lay aside their privilege in order to see those with less power, like their wives, women in general, children, and website :

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slaves, as their equals within the body of Christ and to treat them as such. Paul was not blind to the social stratification that existed in the culture he ministered to; he regularly exhorted Christian audiences to avoid patterning their communities and relationships after these corrupted social systems (cf. Eph. 2:11–22; Gal. 3:24–29; Philem. 10–19). Paul himself models this redefinition of power when he calls Phoebe, Priscilla, Mary, Junia, Tryphena, Tryphosa, Euodia, and Syntyche, among many other women, his sisters and valued co-workers in the work of the gospel, mentioning them alongside many men (Rom. 16 and Phil. 4).

Some may claim that Paul reinforced the social expectations of his time regarding women and their roles in society. Yet, passages like this one in Philippians challenge that assumption. Paul directly confronts a social system that valued people based on their status, age, and gender. Where embracing hierarchy was normal, Paul says it shouldn’t be for God’s people. Christian communities are to ref lect this same Christ-like posture toward one another. When Christian communities embrace hierarchy based on gender, where men hold power while women are excluded from participation, the gospel has become corrupted. We are no longer patterned after our Messiah; we

have lost our way. For those who claim Christ as Messiah and King, this message should challenge us and confront us.

Paul’s Redefinition of Power Today Paul’s words continue to call the modern church toward repentance for clinging to worldly power and prestige while marginalizing and excluding others. This may have looked different in Paul’s own culture and context, but it is still a challenge for us today to find the way others, especially women, people of color, immigrants, the poor, or any other marginalized group, have been devalued in favor of the powerful majority. It is a call to recognize that the very gospel is at stake when we corporately disenfranchise and exclude those who don’t “fit” our preconceived Christian molds. It is a call to recognize that the only true and perfect model for Christians is Jesus himself, and male-centeredness or wealth or able-bodiedness or whiteness are not the standard of “Christian” perfection.

This should move us toward selfreflection, where we call ourselves out for our contribution to racism and sexism that have plagued the church for generations. Selfish ambition and vain conceit need to be replaced with humility, where

we value others above ourselves and look out for their interests (Phil. 2:3–4). May Paul’s word to the Philippians be our unifying call to re-calibrate our communities and re-center our focus, so that in our relationships with one another, we would have the same mindset as Christ Jesus (Phil. 2:5). Maybe it isn’t Paul who we need to make peace with, but perhaps it is the uprooting of bad Pauline theology that upholds systems of corrupted power dynamics that needs to be confronted and dismantled. May the totality of Paul’s message, focused on cross-shaped service and humility, outweigh the theological systems some have built based on exclusion and malecenteredness, and lead us to a more faithful expression of Christian life together.

Jennifer Reil is a wife, mom, friend, daughter, cat lover, and most importantly, a disciple of Jesus. As a student, she’s pursued training in biblical studies by earning an MDiv and a ThM in New Testament Studies, both at Grand Rapids Theological Seminary.

1.

N.T. Wright, Paul: A Biography, (New York, NY: Harper One, 2018), 272.

2.

Ibid., 274.

3.

Plato, Laws, III.689-690. Aristotle, Nichomachean Ethics, Book VIII 11.1160b-1161a. Aristotle, Politics, Book I 12.1259b.

4.

See Kristen Kobes Du Mez, Jesus and John Wayne: How White Evangelicals Corrupted a Faith and Fractured a Nation, (New York, NY: Liveright Publishing Corporation, 2020) for an excellent survey of the history of American Christianity and its patriarchal relationship to power.

5.

Wright, 272.

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M U T U A L I T Y | “ Making Peace With Paul” 25

By Chesna Hinkley

Hanging onto Galatians 3:28 How Long After the New Testament Were Women Ordained?

By Chesna Hinkley

26 M U T U A L I T Y | Spring 2021

website :

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Orant, Catacomb of Priscilla Rome, late 2nd century through the 4th century CE

Ask anyone—liberal or conservative, Baptist or Catholic, patriarchal or feminist—and they will probably tell you that the subordination of Christian women was codified by Paul. For exactly this reason, many of my more progressive colleagues in ministry resent Paul and consider him out-oftouch and bigoted. Some might go so far as to say that Paul’s supposedly stodgy, uptight conservatism turned the egalitarian “Jesus movement” into puritanical, misogynistic “Christianity.” This is unfortunate because in reality, Paul’s theology is vibrant, cosmic, and joyful—a radically inclusive vision rooted in renewed creation.

Paul’s uncompromising zeal for the gospel can come across as rigid and intolerant. This creates the image of a rude and perhaps arrogant killjoy. Paul is mediated to us, of course, through the written word, and vivid as his personal correspondence is, it is impossible to know exactly what Paul was like in person. I often invite Paul skeptics to think of him as the gentle, earnest guy who is passionate and sometimes acerbic on Twitter (we all know one, right?). Paul’s intensity is directly related to his conversion experience, a revelation of the risen Christ. Who could settle down after that? Paul is, in my opinion, the Bible’s most endearingly authentic bookstore :

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writer. Though his occasional combativeness may rub us the wrong way, Paul’s lively insistence on the truth of the good, good news is a gift to the church.

Among CBE’s many resources, and in this issue of Mutuality, you will find plenty of information about Paul’s enthusiasm for women in ministry and the many individual women he partnered with to share the gospel. I am firmly convinced that women served in all types of ministry in the Pauline churches of the New Testament, and there is evidence in extrabiblical writing of early conflicts about this. This indicates that in the decades after Jesus’s first followers died out, women were leading in some places and not in others.

The question that sticks with me is, “what happened?”

How long did the ministry of women last and why was it finally suppressed? There is very little information about this. Though tantalizing and uncertain clues exist as to ministry leadership exercised by women well into the Middle Ages, especially in isolated places, it is difficult to construct a reliable historical narrative on the evidence available. Documentary evidence of early Christian worship practices is already sparse, and it is unsurprising that a minority viewpoint would not have survived in literature meant to give practical guidance for churches.

M U T U A L I T Y | “ Making Peace With Paul” 27

The New Prophecy movement had presbyter ae (female priests or elders) and women served in the role of bishops.

While references to women’s ministry leadership are sprinkled throughout the Bible (both the Old and New Testaments), they become harder to find in the second century and beyond. Were there Pauline churches whose tradition of female leadership outlived Paul? A recent anthology chapter suggests the answer is yes, with one example found in a group called the Kuintillians.1 Who Were the Kuintillians?

The Kuintillians were highly charismatic Christians, whose movement developed in the second century in a place called Phrygia under the leadership of a woman named Kuintillia.

To understand what made Kuintillians stand out, however, we need a bit of historical context.

Christianity in Phrygia at this time was closely bound up with a church movement called New Prophecy, also known as Montanism. New Prophecy Christians started in the catholic (meaning universal and orthodox) church, but they are remembered as being on the edge of orthodoxy. They were highly ascetic and preached the imminent end of the world, and they believed that the Holy Spirit spoke through their leaders in a direct way.

The major threat to Christian orthodoxy at this time was Gnosticism. Debates over the Trinity were just beginning. The eyewitnesses to Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection were receding into history.

This meant that in the melee of sects claiming a Christian identity, the authority of both the apostolic texts and those ordained to the apostolic succession was important to the preservation of apostolic 28 M U T U A L I T Y | Spring 2021

faith. New Prophecy’s strong emphasis on ongoing revelation posed an obvious threat to the quest for universal unity on the essentials of the faith.

Those who attacked the movement as heretical, however, were often focused on a different threat: the explicit leadership of women.

Responses to the Kuintillians The New Prophecy movement had presbyterae (female priests or elders) and women served in the role of bishops.2 Kuintillia herself may have been a New Prophecy priest, but this connection is uncertain.

Kuintillia claimed that her authority, not unlike Paul’s, came from a direct revelation of Christ.

The Kuintillians also ordained women and seem to have appealed to Paul for justification. We have no writings from the group itself, but Epiphanios of Salamis, criticizing them in the late fourth century, writes that the Kuintillians appeal to Galatians 3:28 to justify women priests, bishops, and prophets.

They also cite, he says, the Prophet Miriam, the four daughters of Philip (Acts 21:9), and Eve.3 Context is important here again, as the “wisdom” of Eve’s disobedience and her superiority over Adam was a theme in Gnostic teachings (also likely the focus of the harsh rhetoric in 1 Timothy 2:8–15).

Though Epiphanios’s proof texts are badly exegeted (and it is not always good practice to rely on polemicists for information about their targets) his objection to the appeal to Eve is reasonable. The New Testament is clear in its rejection of this Gnostic interpretation of the Genesis creation story. However, he has no answer to the other arguments—even though we hear of them only through his negative characterization! Miriam and the daughters of Philip, of course, are only a few of the multitude of women in ministry in the Bible. But then as now, the long tradition from Israelite religion to Pauline Christianity of Spirit-gifted women is ignored in favor of shaky inferences from a couple of passages that continue to stump scholars on all sides.

Ultimately, Epiphanios’s opinion of Kuintillian women’s leadership is not all that interesting. What is interesting is that the practice existed, especially in a place like Phrygia, which was off the beaten path and far from the emerging centers of church authority. Luis website :

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Josue Sales characterizes Phrygia as an “isolated time sparse evidence of Kuintillia smacks of this, but it is capsule” and rehearses the compelling evidence that equally possible that my gut is wrong.

Pauline Christianity was completely egalitarian.4 It is Ultimately, however, the personal motives of a leader not unreasonable to think that women’s leadership in are only so relevant. Phrygian Christian congregations Kuintillian and New Prophecy groups hearkens back were ordaining women to all levels of leadership 130 to Phrygia’s first missionary contact. According to years after Paul wrote to their Galatian neighbors, Acts 16:6, this would have been Paul in the early 50s, “nor is there male and female, for you are all one in just a few years before he sent the letter to the Romans Christ Jesus” (Gal. 3:28b). These early egalitarians with Deacon Phoebe (Rom. 16:1), which also greets appealed to many of the same texts, biblical figures, and a female teacher (16:4) theological logic that we and apostle (16:7), among do today, and to me, that is other women working in Phrygian Christian a powerful encouragement. the Lord. Sales contends Our brothers and sisters that an apostolic practice congregations were from hundreds of years ago lasting longer in isolated provide a witness to the Phrygia than elsewhere ordaining women to all truth we are rediscovering makes more sense than a and exploring today. I patriarchal church evolving levels of leadership 130 think Sales is right to think in just over a century to they were preserving, not ordain women to all levels ignoring, Paul’s teaching years after Paul wrote to of ministry.5 It would be on women’s leadership. especially surprising in a their Galatian neighbors, patriarchal church trying to survive persecution in “nor is there male and an even more patriarchal society.

female, for you are all one

Paul, Kuintillia, and Us

in Christ Jesus” (Gal. 3:28b).

The question of the Kuintillians' orthodoxy is still important. Were Phrygian Christians simply led astray by charismatic leaders? I do not know. The eventual excommunication of the New Prophecy movement suggests they subscribed to at least a few unorthodox beliefs. You do not have to look far today to find charismatic pastors—even well-meaning ones—brought down by the grandiosity of their personal vision. To me, the

Chesna Hinkley is Director of Christian Education and Outreach at Madison Avenue Presbyterian Church in New York City. She earned her Master of Divinity at Princeton Theological Seminary and wrote her master’s thesis on headship Christology in 1 Corinthians 11. She loves to travel, drink coffee, and bother her cat.

1.

Luis Josue Sales, "Galatians 3:28 and the Ordination of Women in the Second-Century Pauline Churches," in Women and Ordination in the Orthodox Church: Explorations in Theology and Practice, eds., Gabriel Thomas and Elena Narinskaya, (Eugene: Cascade Books, 2020), 58-78.

2.

Dale T. Irvin and Scott W. Sunquist, History of the World Christian Movement Volume I: Earliest Christianity to 1453, (Maryknoll: Orbis Books, 2004), 144­–146.

3.

Sales, 60–63.

4.

Ibid., 64ff.

5.

Ibid., 64.

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M U T U A L I T Y | “ Making Peace With Paul” 29

“Th

Fact or Theory?

is t e s o c achin –M lea imi r!” g is Ha dd

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The Truth About Women in Church History and the Bible

Breakthrough teaching separates facts versus theories for the main scriptures used to limit women. With fascinating timeline, 50+ scriptures explained, reconciliation teaching and time of prayer. New information for most viewers.

Five dynamic, concise videos. Great to share with others!

Viewable free at

FACTorTHEORY.org Jane L. Crane is a gifted leader and speaker who has taught this material on five continents. She was the Lausanne Movement’s first Senior Associate for the Partnership of Men and Women and holds a Masters in Peace and Justice.

Ministry News Eyes Open to Abuse eLearning Course Now Available!

Do you want your church or organization to be better equipped to address and prevent domestic violence? CBE partnered with Fuller Seminary to create “Eyes Open to Abuse,” a FULLER Leadership Platform guided eLearning course that can help.

Course description: As Christians, we are called to “do justice and to love kindness” (Micah 6:8), and a part of this is protecting and providing for the vulnerable. Those who have been or are being abused are particularly in need of our belief, support, and love.

We must create spaces of God’s shalom to those at particular risk and denounce abuse in our congregations. To help you on this journey to bring justice and kindness to your community, we will help you identify signs and characteristics of abuse and abusers and develop a plan to support survivors of abuse.

This course costs $20.00 per person and can be found online at cbe.today/fuller.

Three-Part Webinar on Christian Patriarchy Available!

The Freedom Road Institute for Leadership and Justice, Silence Is Not Spiritual, and CBE International are excited to offer a three-part, on-demand webinar series on Christian patriarchy. These lectures provide an in-depth assessment of patriarchy and its consequences from a biblical, sociological, philosophical, and humanitarian perspective. Lisa Sharon Harper and Mimi cover worldview, Scripture, history, and the systemic barriers women face when using their God-given gifts. Much of the content comes from the course Mimi teaches at Fuller Theological Seminary: Women in History and Theology.

These lectures can be purchased at FreedomRoad.us for $62.00 and are able to be watched on demand.

Visit cbe.today/freedomroad.

Praise and Prayer

Praise

Prayer

•

•

•

•

CBE’s year-end fundraising efforts ended with a great result! We thank Jesus for our donors who invested sacrificially in key projects, including our scholarship fund for women preparing for ministry, supporting our African partners, and supporting CBE staff with new laptops and computers!

We continue to be thankful for the health of CBE’s team—our staff, consultants, chapter leaders, and board, and their productivity despite distancing and remote work.

Join us in thanking God for significant progress made on CBE’s race and gender strategic plan. We are thankful for the crucial investment made by our consultant, board, and staff.

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•

•

CBE’s partnership with schools help us leverage our resources to educate more people about biblical equality.

Please pray for our continued collaboration with institutions like Fuller Seminary, Palm Beach Atlantic University, Denver Seminary, and Eastern University.

We are excited about our 2021 conference in London, “Men, Women, and God: Theology & Its Impact,” August 11–14. We would like your prayer as we support speakers and partners—please ask God to direct us as we plan to serve both in-person and online registrants.

We are also planning our 2022 conference! Please pray for CBE’s staff as we begin to reach out to speakers and partners about participating in this conference, set to take place in Atlanta.

M U T U A L I T Y | “ Making Peace With Paul” 31

Giving Opportunities Help more women answer God’s call in their lives.

Statistics prove that educating and empowering women leads to human flourishing for the entire community. We need to come together now to let our sisters in Christ know that God created and gifted them to lead in the church! If more women are empowered to exercise their gifts as God intends, imagine what it would do for the church and the world.

The Alvera Mickelsen Memorial Scholarship (AMMS) was created to help women answer the call to ministry by providing academic scholarships. It is designed to provide financial assistance to women who are pursuing a master’s degree in a ministry field related to preaching, communication, writing, youth ministry, pastoral work, or nonprofit work.

“Receiving the AMMS award would assist me in answering my call to ministry by giving me more financial freedom to pursue my goals. With a master’s degree in theology, I will be given many opportunities to do what the Lord has called me to do. God has placed a dream in my heart to be a voice for the lost, and I believe he will use me as a preacher, writer, and a clinician.” —AMMS applicant

We need your help to keep AMMS strong for many years to come by building up the fund with $30,000.

Join us in affirming women’s leadership and their call to ministry. Your support makes the Alvera Mickelsen Memorial Scholarships possible!

Please mail a gift today or give securely online at cbe.today/ammsfund.

Congratulations to last year’s recipients: Christy Chia

Fuller Theological Seminary

Fatu Kanu

Gordon College

Jessica Prieto

Talbot School of Theology

AMMS recipients have contributed to CBE journals—you can find their articles here: Christy Chia’s Mutuality article at cbe.today/christy Eliza Stiles’ Mutuality and Priscilla Papers articles at cbe.today/eliza Pushpa Samuel’s Priscilla Papers article at cbe.today/pushpa

32 M U T U A L I T Y | Spring 2021

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CBE will offer an online, virtual conference option.

Visit cbe.today/2021conf for details.

In addition to the in-person event in London, CBE is working to make this event internationally accessible online, on-demand.

2021 Conference Virtual Preview Panel, Part 3 What place do women have in the churches of Ireland? Amanda Jackson (director of the Women’s Commission of the World Evangelical Alliance) leads a hopeful discussion with CBE 2021 international conference speakers Ruth Garvey-Williams, Avril Heenan, and Trevor Morrow on the impact of patriarchy in Irish churches and the barriers that women face as a result.

Visit cbe.today/previewpanel3 to watch!

President’s Message

by Mimi Haddad

Priscilla Speaks As president, I frequently hear from people in complementarian, male-run churches. Some find their experiences relatively positive; others share concerns for how Scripture, and specifically passages written by Paul, are mismanaged, especially from the pulpit.

Priscilla’s Church After hearing years of teachings that demean women myself, it was a jolt when the “real Priscilla” burst in on my own life.

I remember vividly how this epiphany radically changed my view not only of women but also of Paul.

I had accepted the male-headship premise that Priscilla (also called Prisca) respected male authority because she taught Apollos in a private setting—her home (Acts 18:26). Then, one day, it occurred to me that first century churches were all held in private homes, often in the homes of women like Lydia, Chloe, the Elect Lady, Apphia, and Nympha. It was like Priscilla herself was asking me to hear her story from her perspective. When I did, here’s what I learned.

Priscilla: Equal to Her Husband and Teacher to Apollos In searching Bible resources, I was confused as to why so many cite Aquila without mentioning Priscilla when Scripture always referred to both together. In fact, Paul references Priscilla and Aquila more often than anyone else except Timothy. Priscilla is even mentioned ahead of her husband in four of six references (Acts 18:1–3, 18–19, 26; Rom 16:3–5; 1 Cor. 16:19; 2 Tim. 4:19). Her name precedes her husband’s even when correcting Apollos. Without hesitation, Apollos accepts her instruction (Acts 18:24–26)!

No longer silenced, Priscilla herself pushed back on years of prejudice blinding me to a radical truth about Paul and his closest female coworker. But there was one more hurdle!

Priscilla vs. 1 Timothy 2:11–12 Priscilla taught Apollos in a church she and her husband established in their home in Ephesus. She also corrected this prominent male leader in the very church where Paul (supposedly) tells women not to hold authority over men in 1 Tim 2:12. So was Priscilla at odds with Paul regarding women leaders in the church? No!

34 M U T U A L I T Y | Spring 2021

The word for authority used in 1 Tim: 2:12 meant to usurp, domineer, even abuse, which are not characteristics that can be applied to Priscilla’s leadership in this church. What is more, scholars believe Priscilla wasn’t even in Ephesus when Paul wrote 1 Timothy 2:11–15. She was likely with Paul in Rome as he was writing this letter! Shortly thereafter, Priscilla and Aquila return to Ephesus (2 Tim. 4:19), perhaps to help Timothy address the challenges mentioned in 1 Timothy 2. We can assume Priscilla used her teaching gifts then too, just as she had for Apollos years earlier Galatians 3:28: Paul and Women Reading the text through Priscilla’s vocation as an authoritative teacher, we can understand Paul more clearly.

Chosen by the risen Christ on the Damascus road (Acts 9:19), Paul becomes an apostle to the Gentiles. His renewal in Christ eclipsed the privileges of birthright he knew as a free, Jewish male (Gal. 3:28). These he called rubbish “because of the surpassing worth of know Christ Jesus my Lord” (Phil. 3:8). An apostle of newness of life in Christ, Paul celebrated the leadership of women made new as he was, like Priscilla, and also like Phoebe a deacon and leader in Cenchrea (Rom. 16: 1–2), Junia a prominent apostle (Rom. 16:7), women prophets (1 Cor. 11:2–-16) whose prophetic gifting Paul valued over all other spiritual gifts (1 Cor. 14:1).

To read Priscilla’s story through a lens of male-only leadership diminished her calling and also Paul’s. It also obstructs, demeans, and even abuses God’s welcome to women leaders and their male allies then and now! Women like Priscilla are mainstream for Paul. While there are eddies—small pools off the river—addressing specific local concerns (1 Cor. 14:33–35; 1 Tim. 1:11–15; Eph. 5: 22–24), these should be read through the demonstrated leadership of women like Priscilla.

In making peace with Paul, I had to first attend to Priscilla.

I could then embrace the lived theology of other women co-laboring beside Paul as teachers, apostles, deacons, prophets, and evangelists. These women represent Paul’s deepest held beliefs: that the power of Christ is able to do more than you or I can imagine (Eph. 3:20). Scripture must renew our minds, not distort our view of God, ourselves, and others. May God’s Spirit renew the church through the story of leaders like Priscilla.

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CBE INTERNATIONAL (Christians for Biblical Equality) MISSION STATEMENT CBE exists to promote the biblical message that God calls women and men of all cultures, races, and classes to share authority equally in service and leadership in the home, church, and world. CBE’s mission is to eliminate the power imbalance between men and women resulting from theological patriarchy.

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CORE VALUES

• We believe in one God, creator and sustainer of the universe, eternally existing as three persons equal in power and glory.

• We believe in the full deity and the full humanity of Jesus Christ.

• We believe that eternal salvation and restored relationships are only possible through faith in Jesus Christ who died for us, rose from the dead, and is coming again. This salvation is offered to all people.

• We believe the Holy Spirit equips us for service and sanctifies us from sin.

• We believe the Bible is the inspired word of God, is reliable, and is the final authority for faith and practice.

• We believe that women and men are equally created in God’s image and given equal authority and stewardship of God’s creation.

• We believe that men and women are equally responsible for and distorted by sin, resulting in shattered relationships with God, self, and others.

• Scripture is our authoritative guide for faith, life, and practice.

• Patriarchy (male dominance) is not a biblical ideal but a result of sin.

• Patriarchy is an abuse of power, taking from females what God has given them: their dignity, and freedom, their leadership, and often their very lives.

• While the Bible reflects patriarchal culture, the Bible does not teach patriarchy in human relationships.

• Christ’s redemptive work frees all people from patriarchy, calling women and men to share authority equally in service and leadership.

• God’s design for relationships includes faithful marriage between a man and a woman, celibate singleness, and mutual submission in Christian community.

• The unrestricted use of women’s gifts is integral to the work of the Holy Spirit and essential for the advancement of the gospel in the world.

• Followers of Christ are to oppose injustice and patriarchal teachings and practices that marginalize and abuse females and males.

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Priscilla The Life of an Early Christian Ben Witherington III Who was Priscilla and what is her story? Readers of the Bible may know her as the wife of Aquila, Paul's coworker, or someone who explained baptism to Apollos. In this work of historical fiction, Witherington combines biblical scholarship and winsome storytelling to give readers a vivid picture of an important New Testament woman.

Women in a Patriarchal World Twenty-five Empowering Stories from the Bible Elaine Storkey In Women in a Patriarchal World Elaine Storkey focuses on the stories of women who faced a range of challenges and life-changing decisions.

Her investigations will lead you to fully appreciate the authenticity of these accounts.

They will prompt you to see the connections with our own lives and times. And above all they will empower you to respond more faithfully and intelligently to the many challenges that women are still confronted with today.

The Making of Biblical Womanhood How the Subjugation of Women Became Gospel Truth Beth Allison Barr This book moves the conversation about biblical womanhood beyond Greek grammar and into the realm of church history—ancient, medieval, and modern—to show that this belief is not divinely ordained but a product of human civilization that continues to creep into the church. Barr’s historical insights provide context for contemporary teachings about women’s roles in the church and help move the conversation forward.

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A Church Called Tov Forming a Goodness Culture That Resists Abuses of power and Promotes Healing Scot McKnight and Laura Barringer The sad truth is that churches of all shapes and sizes are susceptible to abuses of power, sexual abuse, and spiritual abuse. How do we keep these devastating events from repeating themselves?

McKnight and Barringer explore the concept of tov—“good”—unpacking its richness and showing how it can help Christians and churches rise up to fulfill their true calling as imitators of Jesus.

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