Lies and An Assignment

"What's the opposite of truth? Lies. Any lies in the world? Have you run across one? The last decade...

In John 8:44, Jesus says that Satan is the father of what? Lies. That lying is his native language, that all he's ever done is lie. When you and I lie, we're doing something demonic. And a lie is where we don't tell the truth, or we only tell part of the truth, but we don't tell the whole truth. 

Satan is gonna lie to you. Satan is gonna lie to us. Satan lies to us all the time. And something need not be true to be powerful. You notice that? If I told you right now. Let's say you're absolutely healthy. If I told you, 'You have cancer. You have two weeks to live. You're gonna die.' True or False, that would affect the next two weeks of your life? 'It's not true!' It doesn't need to be true. I need to get you to believe that it's true. If I walk up to a woman and say, 'Ya know, your husband has a girlfriend. He's been unfaithful to you the entirety of your marriage.' And it's not true, but she believes it true. Does it affect their relationship? Yes. See Satan knows that something doesn't need to be true, it just needs to be believed. So he's gonna lie. He's gonna tell you lies. He's gonna send false teachers. He's gonna send bad counselors. He's gonna try and stack and pack your life with things that aren't true. And if you believe them...now he's responsible for lying, but you're responsible for believing. This could be lies about God. This could be lies about yourself. This could be lies about people in our church. This could be lies about leaders in our church. This could be lies about the Word of God. It doesn't really matter. 

Some of you are really governed by lies. Satan has got a deep, deep, deep foothold in your life. Let me give you an assignment that I've been giving people now for 17 years at Mars Hill. People who believe lies and they struggle with lies, those lies lead into dark places and bondage. Jesus says you'll know the truth and the truth will what? Set you free. So the truth gets you out of your captivity. So here's what I tell people all the time:

      Take a notebook and just write a line right down the middle. On the left, just write "Lies". One category.

      On the other, "Truth". When you hear a lie, when you believe a lie...even as you look back on your life

      and you understand lies that you believed about God or about yourself or about others, write those 

      down. And then go to the Word of God and find out what is the Truth. What is the Truth? And then your 

      life is really collecting: Satan's lies, God's Truth. Now you've got a decision to make. Will I live in light of 

      the lie? Or will I live in light of the Truth? I've see this absolutely deliver people and change their life. 

'Well I thought that God didn't love me and I thought that what I had done was not forgivable. And I thought that I shouldn't be in Church because once people got to know me they would be ashamed of me...' Lie, lie, lie. What's the Truth? Live in light of that, because the Truth sets you free. I want you to use this as well as we counsel and comfort one another. You're talkin to somebody and you're like, 'No that's not true.' And people sometimes, that have been lied to, will say things like, 'I feel ...' Okay well there's your problem. You need to think. You need to think: 'Is this true or false? Is this right or wrong? Is this from God or Satan? Does this lead to captivity or does this lead to freedom?' And encourage those who are struggling with lies, they're believing lies. You need to recall them, you need to recount them, you need to record them. And then over time they will begin to lose their power. Because when you hear them, you'll be like, 'No, actually that's not true.' And your response time will be far shorter."

- Mark Driscoll

from: http://marshill.com/media/who-do-you-think-you-are/i-am-victorious

Why Do We All Love To Hate?

I've been listening and thinking through Mark Driscoll's sermon series on the book of Ephesians, "Who Do You Think You Are?" for a couple of months now. Each sermon has encouraged me in various ways and I've posted a lot of quotes and links to each one. The only one out of the series that I really wasn't agreeing with was "I Am Appreciated." I can go into reasons why at another time. In other sermons, there may have been points that I wished he would expound on (or that I know he's already expounded on in other sermons), or that I wasn't sure I agreed with him on, but as a whole, the sermon was quite good and biblically based. I really would recommend the series to all Christians who want to think more deeply about the passages in Ephesians, and also about what we sink our identities in. Here: http://marshill.com/media/who-do-you-think-you-are 

Now, onto a lengthy aside that I actually didn't intend when I started writing this. A lot of people really seem to hate Mark Driscoll. I can respect some people's disagreements with him, and don't agree with him on everything myself. I've probably said this before, but I don't think that there are any  preachers or teachers out there that are perfect and who have everything perfectly correct. For me, it just depends on what specifically that preacher or teacher is right or wrong about, judging by what the Bible says.  Some preachers'/teachers' issues are easy to spot and it's not hard to say, 'Okay, well that's definitely an issue but it's not something that necessarily discounts everything else he or she is teaching, and it doesn't totally throw out important parts of what the Bible teaches us.' With others, there is no doubt at all that what they are teaching is totally wrong and that their teaching is not redeemable until they get the key tenants of the Christian faith right. I am a huge advocate for not just accepting anything a teacher says just because it sounds nice and/or because I like how they say it. I am more interested in truth than whether or not a person entertains me or makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside. So please, use the brains that God gave you and be diligent in your discernment of what a person is teaching. Oh and also, READ YOUR BIBLE. That's a big one. People seem to forget that that's kind of a necessity in being a Christian and being able to discern between what's true and what is false. Don't just trust your fallen mind to figure out what's right. There's a reason why we have the Bible and why we need our minds renewed (Romans 12:2). 

My Mom (@Karen Rose) made a good point awhile ago in a conversation on this topic of teachers that made sense to me. We're all sinful, we all have our areas where we desperately need to grow in Christ with the help of the Holy Spirit, and there are some of us who are called to do big things in the Kingdom of God. She wondered if it's possible that there are some obvious issues in certain historical teacher's lives that God left in them for a time so that people would know something important; so they would know that that teacher's good works, the big things that they were doing, and the power that they were doing them with, was all from God. As one can easily see, in this country especially, we tend to idolize and put people on pedestals. We tend to do this especially with our favorite preachers or teachers. In doing this we tend to forget that they are human, fallible, and fully able to lead others astray. A good example of this is Martin Luther. Yeah, Luther's a pretty important guy in Church History, right? A lot of people still read his writings and he has helped many Christians along in their faith. But then there's that glaring bit about him being an Anti-Semite towards the end of his life. Hmmm...so should we throw out all of what he did and said? I'll let you think about that one. 

Another good point made by my Godmother. With the age that we are currently in, where there are so many teachers/preachers with much bigger platforms than they might have had years ago because of the Internet, we are able to point out even more of their flaws. It's all on display, and we can re-watch the video over and over again until we puke. We also don't give anyone a break in that plenty of the old school teachers/preachers had lots of sins and mistakes that they committed, it was just in front of a smaller population of viewers. I think this can also go along with the aforementioned fact that we have pet preachers/teachers that we like and who can do no wrong. Until, of course, they have an affair and have to step down from their pulpit. That's the unforgivable sin, but the rest...oh we'll just ignore them. 

Anyway. Yeah I get a bit riled up about this subject. In an age where we can scrutinize people a lot easier, and slander them with a quick couple taps of some keys, it can be frustrating to see how ill-informed and down right mean Christians actually are. Like I said in the beginning of this blog, I don't always agree with everything Mark Driscoll teaches. And there are legitimate issues that people have with him. But I have seen a lot of people who dislike him because they have either taken what he's said way out of context and/or because they just don't like how he delivers a point. Then they go on to post lots of articles and blogs about it, when they didn't actually listen to the whole sermon or read the whole book. Another issue I've found is that the disagreements are rarely on a biblically-based point. It's usually just because Driscoll rubs them the wrong way. 

Now this really isn't all just to defend Mark Driscoll, although I'm sure that it comes off that way. I do like listening to his sermons, and I have been taught many good things by God through Him. He isn't the only guy I listen to though. And this is more about the fact that Christians are getting caught up in a nasty habit of being ill-informed, lazy, slanderers, just like everyone else around them. That's a big problem. We seem to have forgotten that we have an imperative to think about what we are learning and also that we are intimately attached to some of the people we dislike. The image of the Body of Christ wasn't put in the New Testament just so we could pull it out when we like or agree with our fellow Christians. It was put there so that we could know that we can't just decide when to pick up or throw out a brother or sister in Christ. God's the one who decides these things. And I'm pretty sure He's not too keen on us just spitting out our opinions every which way without actually studying and praying about what might be going on with the teacher/preacher we disagree with. 

All of this to say, please think, and pray, and read your Bible. You don't have to like Mark Driscoll, or any of the other preachers/teachers I post. You don't even have to agree with me (unless it's about all of the stuff in here: http://www.creeds.net/ancient/nicene.htm). It would just be nice to see more well thought out discussions about our teachers, and more grace given to those we disagree with. We tend to forget that we are just as sinful, just as prideful, just as ugly, just as in need of Jesus as the next guy. So let's start treating each other like we need each other...because we do. 

"What Is A Worldview?"

"Few people have anything approaching an articulate philosophy--at least as epitomized by the great philosophers. Even fewer, I suspect, have a carefully constructed theology. But everyone has a worldview. Whenever any of us thinks about anything--from casual thought (Where did I leave my watch? ) to a profound question (Who am I? )--we are operating within such a framework. In fact, it is only the assumption of the worldview--however basic or simple--that allows us to think at all.

What, then, is this thing called a worldview that is so important to all of us? I've never heard of one. How could I have one?  That may well be the response of many people. One is reminded of M. Jourdain in Jean Baptiste Moliere's The Bourgeois Gentleman, who suddenly discovered he had been speaking of prose for forty years without knowing it. In fact, it is a significant step toward self-awareness, self-knowledge and self-understanding. 

So what is a worldview? Essentially this:

     A worldview is a commitment, a fundamental orientation of the heart, that can be expressed as a story or 

     in a set of presuppositions (assumptions which may be true, partially true or entirely false) that we hold 

     (consciously or subconsciously, consistently or inconsistently) about the basic constitution of reality, and 

     that provides the foundation on which we live and move and have our being. 

This succinct definition needs to be unpacked. Each phrase represents a specific characteristic that deserves more elaborate comment.

Worldview as a commitment. The essence of a worldview lies deep in the inner recesses of the human self. A worldview involves the mind, but it is first of all a commitment, a matter of the soul. It is a spiritual orientation more than it is a matter of mind alone. 

Worldviews are, indeed, a matter of the heart. This notion would be easier to grasp if the word heart bore in today's world the weight it bears in Scripture. The biblical concept includes the notions of wisdom (Proverbs 2:10), emotions (Exoduse 4:14, John 14:1), desire and will (1 Chronicles 29:18), spirituality (Acts 8:21) and intellect (Romans 1:21). In short, and in biblical terms, the heart is 'the central defining element of the human person.' A worldview, therefore, is situated in the self--the central operating chamber of every human being. It is from this heart that all one's thoughts and actions proceed.  

Expressed in a story or a set of presuppositions. A worldview is not a story or a set of presuppositions, but it can be expressed in these ways. When I reflect on where I and the whole of the human race have come from or where my life or humanity itself is headed, my worldview is being expressed as a story. One story told by science begins with the big bang and proceeds through the evolution of the cosmos, formation of the galaxies, stars and planets, the appearance of life on earth and on to its disappearance as the universe runs down. Christians tell the story of creation, Fall, redemption, glorification--a story in which Jesus' birth, death and resurrection are the centerpiece. Christians see their lives and the lives of others as tiny chapters in that master story. The meaning of those little stories cannot be divorced from the master story, and some of this meaning is propositional. When, for example, I ask myself what I am really assuming about God, humans and the universe, the result is a set of presuppositions that I can express in propositional form. 

When they are expressed that way, they answer a series of basic questions about the nature of fundamental reality. I will list and examine these questions shortly. But consider first the nature of those assumptions. 

Assumptions that may be true, conscious, consistent. The presuppositions that express one's commitments may be true, partially true or entirely false. There is of course, a way things are , but we are often mistaken about the way things are. In other words, reality is not endlessly plastic. A chair remains a chair whether we recognize it as a chair or not. Either there is an infinitely personal God or there is not. But people disagree on which is true. Some assume one thing; others assume another. 

Second, sometimes we are aware of what our commitments are, sometimes not. Most people, I suspect, do not go around consciously thinking of people as organic machines, yet those who do not believe in any sort of God actually assume, consciously or not, that that is what they are. Or they assume that they do have some sort of immaterial soul and treat people that way, and are thus simply inconsistent in their worldview. Some people who do not believe in anything supernatural at all wonder whether they will be reincarnated. So, third, sometimes our worldviews--both those characterizing small or large communities and those we hold as individuals--are inconsistent. 

The foundation on which we live. It is important to note that our own worldview may not be what we think it is. It is rather what we show it to be by our words and actions. Our worldview generally lies so deeply embedded in our subconscious that unless we have reflected long and hard, we are unaware of what it is. Even when we think we know what it is and lay it out clearly in neat propositions and clear stories, we may well be wrong. Our very actions may belie our self-knowledge. 

Because this book focuses on the main worldview systems held by very large numbers of people, this private element of worldview analysis will not receive much further commentary. If we want clarity about our own worldview, however, we must reflect and profoundly consider how we actually behave."

-James Sire

from: http://www.amazon.com/The-Universe-Next-Door-Worldview/dp/0830838503/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1369851397&sr=8-1&keywords=the+universe+next+door

Sire, James. The Universe Next Door. Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2009.

Obedience To Christ

"It's not easy to walk forward in obedience to Christ. Obedience to Christ is painful. Even Jesus learned obedience painfully from that which he suffered (Hebrews 5:8). Doing the right thing, making the right decisions, often entails pain for a Christian. It hurts to be struck on the cheek (Matthew 5:39). It's not very fun to turn the other cheek, so that that  cheek can be struck too. But there's a power to be found when someone becomes willing to absorb the pain of being hit and then continues to walk forward in the same direction as before. When a person takes a risk to follow Jesus, he or she must be willing to suffer. Christians must be willing to suffer and not revolt. 

I am reminded once again of the words of Peter: 'For you have been called for this purpose, since Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example for you to follow in His steps...and while being reviled, He did not revile in return; while suffering He uttered no threats, bu kept entrusting Himself to Him who judges righteously (1 Peter 2:21, 23).

Remember, it was Simon Peter to whom Christ said, 'Simon, Simon, behold, Satan has demanded permission to sift you like wheat; but I have prayed for you, that your faith may not fail; and you, when once you have turned again, strengthen your brothers' (Luke 22:31-32). Jesus also said to him, 'Truly, truly, I say to you, when you were younger, you used to gird yourself, and walk wherever you wished; but when you grow old, you will stretch out your hands and someone else will gird you, and bring you where you do not wish to go' (John 21:18). The Bible says Jesus was signifying the kind of death that Peter would die. It also says that 'when He had spoken this,' Jesus said specifically to Peter, ' Follow Me!'

The call of Jesus Christ is for us to follow him. We are commanded to go where we do not wish to go. We are also commanded not to revile back when we are reviled, but to suffer for his sake. 

The feminist movement is not famous for producing women who do not revile back. That particular glory is reserved for the women of the church. There is power in becoming a suffering servant. There is power in speaking the truth. There is power to be found whenever we entrust ourselves to him who judges righteously.

I am not saying that any woman should continue to be physically abused or financially destroyed if someone is attacking her body or squandering her provision. In those kinds of cases, a woman is reponsible to expose the hidden truth and protect herself along with any children she might have. It isn't biblical for wives or mothers and children to subject themselves to violent or reckless behavior. On the contrary, the biblical command is for women to speak the truth in love (Ephesians  4:15). No one enjoys confronting the truth when there is something dreadful to hide. But the one and only way for people to be freed is by the truth. Make no mistake--love doesn't set people free.1 Truth sets people free. Jesus said it plainly, 'And you will know the truth, and the truth shall make you free' (John 8:32).

1 God loves everyone, but not everyone is free. Many people's souls are deeply loved by other people, and yet they are still not free."

- Sarah Sumner, P.H. D.

from: http://www.amazon.com/Men-Women-Church-Consensus-Leadership/dp/0830823913/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1367863639&sr=1-1&keywords=men+and+women+in+the+church

Sumner, Sarah. Men And Women In The Church. Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2003.

The Church and Human Trafficking

"Erwin McManus writes: 'There may not be a more dangerous weapon for violence and oppression than religion.' However, wherever there is authentic faith [in Christ] expressed through genuine compassion, the church can be the most powerful source of hope and courage to victims of trafficking.

Many trafficked women and children have internalized their shame and see themselves as worthless and somehow deserving of their degrading abuse and exploitation. They hunger to know that they have value, that they do matter to someone and that there is a hope and a future for them. Genuine compassion rooted in the knowledge that they are loved by their Maker offers a way forward. 

The oppression inherent in human trafficking often includes an overt negative spiritual component. For example in the Caribbean, I found that it is common practice for traffickers to place a voodoo curse on the women. The women are told that the curse would come into effect should they ever talk to the authorities or testify in court. For those involved, this is a very real and very powerful form of spiritual enslavement, one that can only be broken by placing their trust in a spiritual power greater than the black magic. Field workers from the International Organization for Migration who worked with many of these women told me that only after their conversion to Christ would the victims agree to talk about their experiences. 

With a mission to fearlessly expose evil and rescue those oppressed and enslaved, the church has been called to be the perfect abolitionist. Indeed the church has a rich history of courageous men and women who have selflessly rescued and restored the exploited women and children of their day. 

During the first centuries of the church, baby girls were considered by many to be a liability. Female infanticide was common and pagan society not only approved of the practice but also encouraged it. It was permitted by law to simply leave them outside the city on the garbage dumps to die. But the early church refused to accept their culture's assessment of baby girls and went outside the city to find and rescue them.

Since then the church has played an integral part in setting captives free from slavery and injustice. With small groups of believers, missionaries, relief and development organizations, priests, and committed disciples operating in almost every corner of the world, church and parachurch organizations are often the only ones with the necessary language ability, cultural understanding and local knowledge to document various forms of oppression and injustice within their own communities." 

- Daniel Walker

from: http://www.amazon.com/God-Brothel-Undercover-Journey-Trafficking/dp/0830838066/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1369153068&sr=1-1&keywords=god+in+a+brothel

His organization to help combat human trafficking: http://www.nvader.org/

"Going To Heaven"

"It comes as something of a shock, in fact, when people are told what is in fact the case: that there is very little in the Bible about 'going to heaven when you die' and not a lot about a postmortem hell either. The medieval pictures of heaven and hell, boosted though not created by Dante's classic work, have exercised a huge influence on Western Christian imagination. Many Christians grow up assuming that whenever the New Testament speaks of heaven it refers to the place to which the saved will go after death. In Matthew's gospel, Jesus's sayings in the other gospels about the 'kingdom of God' are rendered as 'kingdom of heaven'; since many read Matthew first, when they find Jesus talking about 'entering the kingdom of heaven,' they have their assumptions confirmed and suppose that he is indeed talking about how to go to heaven when you die, which is certainly not what either Jesus or Matthew had in mind. Many mental pictures have grown up around this and are now assumed to be what the Bible teaches or what Christians believe. 

But the language of heaven in the New Testament doesn't work that way. 'God's kingdom' in the preaching of Jesus refers not to postmortem destiny, not to our escape from this world into another one, but to God's sovereign rule coming 'on earth as it is in heaven.' The roots of the misunderstanding go very deep, not least into the residual Platonism that has infected whole swaths of Christian thinking and has misled people into supposing that Christians are meant to devalue this present world and our present bodies and regard them as shabby or shameful.

Likewise, the pictures of heaven in the book of Revelation have been much misunderstood. The wonderful description in Revelation 4 and 5 of the twenty-four elders casting their crowns before the throne of God and the lamb, beside the sea of glass, is not, despite one of Charles Wesley's great hymns, a picture of the last day, with all the redeemed in heaven at last. It is a picture of present  reality, the heavenly dimension of our present life. Heaven, in the Bible, is not a future destiny but the other, hidden, dimension of our ordinary life--God's dimension, if you like. God made heaven and earth; at the least he will remake both and join them together forever. And when we come to the picture of the actual end in Revelation 21-22, we find not ransomed souls making their way to a disembodied heaven but rather the new Jerusalem coming down from heaven to earth, uniting the two in a lasting embrace.

Most Christians today, I fear, never think about this from one year to the next. They remain satisfied with what is at best a truncated and distorted version of the great biblical hope. Indeed, the popular picture is reinforced again and again in hymns, prayers, monuments, and even quite serious works of theology and history. It is simply assumed that the word heaven  is the appropriate term for the ultimate destination, the final home, and that the language of resurrection, and of the new earth as well as the new heavens, must somehow be fitted into that. 

What we see in today's church is, I think, a confused combination of several things. For one, the old heaven-and-hell view has been under attack. Many now refuse to believe in hell at all, but we find over the last century, as this denial developed, that paradoxically it has led to a diminution of the promise of heaven since if everybody is on the same track it would seem unfair to allow some to go directly to the destination rather than continue to the long postmortem journey. The idea of such a journey after death is itself now frequent, though again it has virtually no warrant in the Bible or early Christian thought. We see too the rehabilitation of a modern, sanitized, version of the old theory of purgatory: since at death we are still quite unready to meet our Maker, we will need (it is suggested) a period of refinement, of growing toward the light. (People who think like this tend to prefer to put it that way rather than emphasizing purging or other uncomfortable things.) Many embrace a universalism in which God will endlessly offer to the unrepentant the choice of faith until at last all succumb to the wooing of divine love. Some declare that heaven as traditionally pictured looks insufferably boring--sitting on clouds playing harps all the time--and that they either don't believe it or don't want to go there. Others declare, rather sniffily, that a God who simply wants people to adore him all the time is not a figure they would respect. Those of us who protest that the orthodox picture is of a vibrant and active human life, reflecting God's image in the new heavens and new earth, are sometimes accused of projecting our go-getting contemporary life onto the screen of the future." 

- N. T. Wright

from: http://www.amazon.com/Surprised-Hope-Rethinking-Resurrection-Mission/dp/0061551821/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1368592956&sr=1-1&keywords=surprised+by+hope

Ephesians 5:22-33 - "Wives be subject to your husbands..."

"If the truth sets us free, as Jesus said it does (John 8:32), then we ought to be eager to embrace every drop of truth that we can find. Though it's scary for some people to admit, the truth is that Scripture nowhere explicitly commands the husband to be subject to his wife. It's the evangelical feminists who keep saying that husbands should submit to their wives. Evangelical feminists have little motivation to bring attention to the fact that mutual submission is not mentioned in the context of Paul's teaching on marriage found in Ephesians 5:22-33. 6 The truth of the matter is that when the passage narrows to the more specific audience of husbands and wives, Paul tells only wives to be submissive. 

If we're going to be truthful, then there's something else we have to say. Nowhere in Scripture is a husband told to lead his wife. The idea is very popular, but it doesn't derive directly from God's Word. Complementarians are the ones who keep saying that husbands should lead their wives. The apostle Paul never says that once in all his letters. Jesus doesn't say it either. Neither does Peter or John. No one in the New Testament ever says it. In fact, God never says it in the Old Testament, though many people like to think that it's found somewhere in Genesis 1-3. Complementarians are not interested in publicly pointing out that the words lead , leader , servant leader and spiritual leader cannot be found in any Bible passage on marriage.

One of the main reasons I don't take sides in this debate is because Ephesians 5:22-33 says something different from what I hear either side saying. Look at the text, and then I'll show you what I mean. 

     Wives, be subject to your own husbands, as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife, as 

     Christ is also the head of the church, He Himself being the Savior of the body. But as the church is subject

     to Christ, so also the wives ought to be their husbands in everything. Husbands, love your wives, just as

     Christ also loved the church and gave himself up for her that He might sanctify her, having cleansed her           

     by the washing of water with the word, that he might present to Himself the church in all her glory, 

     having no spot or wrinkle or any such thing; for no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and 

     cherishes it, just as Christ also does the church, because we are members of His body. For this reason a 

     man shall leave his father and mother and shall be joined to his wife; and the two shall become one flesh. 

     This mystery is great; but I am speaking with reference to Christ and the church. Nevertheless, let each 

     individual among you also love his own wife even as himself, and let the wife see to it that she respect 

     her husband.  

Three couplets are present in the passage:

1. The wife is to be subject to her own husband in everything, and he is to sacrifice himself for her. The dynamic is for her to submit and him to sacrifice; thus the first couplet is submission/sacrifice.

2. The wife is the body, and the husband is the head. Together they form one flesh. The second couplet, then, is body/head.

3. The wife is commanded to respect her husband while the husband is commanded to love her. As you can see, the third couplet is respect/love...

...Just to make sure that everyone can see exactly where this comes from biblically, let's attach each observation directly with the words of the text. Regarding the first set, Ephesians 5:22 says for wives to be subject to their husbands 'in everything.' Correlatively, Ephesians 5:25 says husbands are to 'love' their wives sacrificially, just as Christ also loved the Church and 'gave Himself up for her.'

Regarding the second set, two or three verses describe the wife as the body of the husband. To begin with, Ephesians 5:23 parallels husband as the head of the wife in correlation with Christ as head of the church, he being the Savior of 'the body.' Implicitly, then, we see that the church is the body of Christ and the wife is the body of her husband. The same concept is reinforced in Ephesians 5:28, which says that husbands ought to love their wives 'as their own bodies.' He is  the head of the wife, and she is as the body of her husband. This makes sense in light of Ephesians 5:31, 'The two shall become one flesh.' Head and body form one flesh. It also explains the rest of Ephesians 5:28. 'He who loves his own wife loves himself.' As it turns out, she is not just 'as' his body; she is  'himself.' Thus in Ephesians 5:33, the husband is commanded to love his own wife 'even as [the body of] himself.'

Regarding the third set, the wife is told in Ephesians 5:33 to see to it that she 'respects' her husband. The husband's instructions, however, are repeated three times. Three times the husband is instructed to 'love' his own wife (Ephesians 5:25, 28, 33)...

6 There is no 'mutual submission' between Christ and the church either. " pgs 159-162

- Sarah Sumner, P.H. D.

from: http://www.amazon.com/Men-Women-Church-Consensus-Leadership/dp/0830823913/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1367863639&sr=1-1&keywords=men+and+women+in+the+church

Sumner, Sarah. Men And Women In The Church. Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2003.

Defining Biblical Manhood

"What is manhood? If you ask conservative Christians, some will say that mature manhood is a 'sense of benevolent responsibility to lead, provide for and protect women.' This definition, drafted by John Piper, is just that--a definition. In other words, it's not a quote from Scripture. Nowhere does the Bible say that God designed men to be leaders, providers and protectors of women. Nor does the Bible say, as Piper furthermore does, that women are designed by God 'to affirm, receive, and nurture the strength and leadership of worthy men.'

I respect John Piper as a brother in Christ. I also recommend his other books. But I do not affirm his definitions of masculinity  and femininity . It's good for men to be leaders and for fathers to provide for and protect their families. It's godly for wives, as he puts it, to nurture the strength and leadership of their husbands. I benefited from having a stay-at-home mother and a father who provided for me. For a mother to be at home caring for the kids and a father to be present leading, protecting and providing for the family is a marvelous approach, if it fosters genuine love and gratitude. But it's just one model and it's not the only way to function biblically. 

I don't question Piper's intentions. To me, it's evident that he's a fervent man of God who, like Wayne Grudem, truly wants nothing more than for Christians to be biblical in their relationships at home. But it concerns me, even so, that Piper's definitions guide people to think in terms of making it their goal to strive for 'biblical manhood and womanhood.' The Bible never commands us to strive for mature masculinity or mature femininity. Instead, the Word of God calls people to become like Christ. The right question is not 'Am I fulfilling my call to become a biblical man or a biblical woman?' The right question is 'Am I imitating Christ?' 11

I am also concerned that Piper's definition (at least of femininity) leaves it to the woman to decide whether or not the man's strength and leadership is worthy enough to be affirmed. As Piper explains it, 'Mature femininity... is discerning in what it approves.' Thus every man, according to Piper's plan, is subject to the test of earning a woman's approval. To me, that doesn't make sense. How can he say that men are leaders of women, if women are endowed with the prerogative to decide if men's leadership is worthy?

The Bible includes no such prerogative for women. On the contrary, the Bible says something quite different. To begin with, it never tells the woman that it's her responsibility to 'affirm the leadership' of her husband if he is 'worthy.' In fact, the Bible doesn't even say that the husband is her leader. There is no commandment that says, "Husbands, lead your wives.' The commandment, instead, is for husbands to love their wives as themselves (Ephesians 5:33). The Bible says that the wife is responsible to submit to her husband (Ephesians 5:24). But it also says that it is her responsibility--regardless of her husband's behavior--to see to it that she respects her husband (Ephesians 5:32). In other words, respect for a husband is not a feminine option. Just as Abigail in the Old Testament respected her husband Nabal, so every wife is commanded by God to respect her husband too, even if his conduct is foolish (1 Samuel 25). According to Scriptures, a wife's respect for the husband depends not on the husband but rather on the wife...

...The most ironic thing is that although Piper sees men as women's leaders, he charges women--not men--with the final responsibility of making sure that men 'feel' manly. Anytime a husband starts to doubt himself as a man or feels that his manhood has been violated by a woman's expression of strength, Piper says it's her responsibility to figure out a way to adjust...

...From the time they are boys, men are challenged to attain manhood. Their consciences are trained by society and church and also by women such as myself. Every time I long for my husband to sweep me off my feet so that I don't have to walk the difficult path of Christlike suffering, in essence I am asking him to prove that he is a man so that I don't have to prove that I am a Christian. 

When Jim and I were first married, I wanted him to be my Superman. I didn't like it when he felt afraid. I wanted him to rescue me from my fears and not have any fears of his own. My picture of marriage called for me to be human and for him to be superhuman. For me to be vulnerable, and for him to be invulnerable. I expected our marriage to be a comforting refuge where I would be held safe in the arms of my hero and where he would be admired by me. Jim would be Zorro, and I'd be Cinderella. And we would serve Christ in our home. 

I am on a journey of repenting from my worldly view of marriage. I am letting go of my selfish expectations. I am surrendering my selfish desire to feel sorry for myself when my husband doesn't save me from my fears. I am in the process of learning to accept the full responsibility for my stuff. And through it all, I am discovering a new vision of marriage, one that's based on love instead of fantasy. 

That's my story. As for Piper, he does not equate manhood with being macho. His objective, I believe is to prompt Christian men to be responsible. 'At the heart of mature masculinity,' he says, 'is a sense of benevolent responsibility to lead, provide for and protect women.'

If all men everywhere adhered to this definition the world would be a far better place. If men were esteemed as the caretakers of women, the world would then embrace the tacit claim that women are worth being taken care of. As a result, there would no longer be any wife battering, or sex trafficking, or sexual molestation from males to females. Mothers would be assisted financially by the fathers of their children, and husbands would spend a lot more time at home. If all men would commit to follow Piper's way, the cultures of the world would be renewed. 

But it wouldn't solve the issues. Instead, another problem would arise. The rest of the world would face the same problem that many Christians in the United States now face. Though Piper's definition of manhood is congenial toward women, it fails women. It also inevitably fails men. Christian men are continually being taught to measure themselves against women. Instead of being trained to be macho, men at church are trained to establish their identity in terms of how they rank against women.

11 As my friend Lydia puts it, 'The right question for people is to ask What does Christ look like in a mother of two children? What does Christ look like in a teenage boy? What does Christ look like in all the particulars that make me me ?"  -pgs 85-90 

- Sarah Sumner, P.H. D. 

from: http://www.amazon.com/Men-Women-Church-Consensus-Leadership/dp/0830823913/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1367863639&sr=1-1&keywords=men+and+women+in+the+church

Sumner, Sarah. Men And Women In The Church. Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2003.

"God Is Not Mother"

"The Bible says that God is Father and Lord and King, not Mother and Lady and Queen. Yet nothing in the Bible even hints of a description, as radical feminists have accused, of a chauvinist male God who runs an ol' boys' network of male pastors and husbands and men. In fact, the female imagery that describes God in the Scriptures flies in the face of that. No chauvinist on the planet wants to be described as a woman. And yet the God of the bible reveals himself comparatively as a woman who has lost a silver coin (Luke 15:8-10).

God is Father, not mother. But that doesn't mean he is male and not female, any more than Jesus is 'the door' means that Jesus is wooden and not glass. God is Father and Lord and King, and yet that doesn't mean God is masculine. It means, rather, that God is separate from creation. This is an extremely important point. For whenever it is believed that the world is derived from a female deity, people start confusing the biblical distinction between God the Creator and creation. 

Think of what happens if we imagine God pregnant with the world. A pregnant God strongly suggests that the world is part of God. For whenever it is believed that the world is derived from a female deity, people start supposing that the universe emerged from the body of the deity. Within such a framework, all of nature is imagined to have come forth from the womb of a female creator, Mother Nature. It says all of created nature is imagined to exist with her as one. Once that happens, Christianity collapses into pantheistic pagan religion. 

According to the Scriptures, God is physically separate from his creation. Every person bears his image. But as Father, he is separate nonetheless. Granted, the biblical metaphors is limited. After all, a father's genes are passed on to the offspring no less than are the mother's. But even so, the physical relationship of a father and child is nonetheless more separate than the physical relationship of the mother of that child, especially when she's pregnant. 

God is Father, not mother. But that doesn't mean that God is male. Nor does it mean that God is masculine. The metaphor is masculine, but God is not. Carl. F. H. Henry puts it this way, 'The God of the Bible is a sexless God. When Scripture speaks of God as 'he' the pronoun is primarily personal (generic) rather than masculine (specific); it emphasizes God's personality...in contrast to impersonal entities.' The same thing is true when Scripture speaks of God in feminine terms. For instance, when Moses sings of the God who 'gave [Israel] birth' (Deuteronomy 32:18), metaphorically he proclaims that God is like a mother to Israel. And yet, in that same verse, Moses sings of the Rock who 'begot' them. In other words, Moses suggests that God is like a mother and father. 

Someone might argue on the basis of feminine imagery that it is biblical to refer to God as mother. My question then would be, 'Is it biblical to refer to God as "a heavenly bird"?' The Psalms, in particular, are filled with imagery of people hiding beneath 'His wing' and being covered by 'His pinions' (Psalm 91:4). But that doesn't make it proper for anyone to pray, 'Dear Bird.' Instead, it is better to pray as David did, 'Hear my cry, O God....Let me take refuge in the shelter of Thy wings.'

Biblically we can say that God is more motherly than a nursing mother (Isaiah 49:15). But with that, we insist that he is not to be confused with a female mother goddess physically giving birth to the world. The same principle applies whenever we call God Father. The Lord Jesus taught us to pray, 'Our Father' (Matthew 6:9). In fact, everywhere in Scripture that God is named, his name is rendered in masculine form. But again, that doesn't mean that God is masculine. It means, rather, that the metaphorical names for God are masculine. 

God is God with a capital 'G.' He is not a male deity as if he were merely a god. God is not a god or a goddess. The Scriptures make it clear--God is God. That means he is inscrutable, above that of being male or female. And yet it was his will to reveal himself in Scripture as Father. For regardless of anyone's culture, the metaphor of father universally reflects the biological fact that fathers on earth are physically more separate from their offspring than are mothers. Moreover, fathers are physically less vulnerable than mothers. Hence, the metaphor of Father implies something different than the metaphor of mother can convey."  - pgs 119-122

- Sarah Sumner, P.H. D. 

from: http://www.amazon.com/Men-Women-Church-Consensus-Leadership/dp/0830823913/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1367863639&sr=1-1&keywords=men+and+women+in+the+church

Sumner, Sarah. Men And Women In The Church. Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2003.

Biblical Metaphors - "Father" and "Mother"?

"As a professor of theology, one of my priorities is to urge my students to develop a respect for the authority of biblical metaphors. To begin with, biblical metaphors should never be mistaken for anything other than metaphors; they should always be left intact. Metaphors aren't meant to be taken literally, but neither are they meant to be ignored. It is wrong to disregard a biblical metaphor. It is wrong because the metaphors are inspired by God and therefore profitable as well as authoritative. 

Let's take a look at one biblical metaphor. In John 10:9, Jesus said, 'I am the door.' Notice, there is no debate about what kind of door Jesus is. A screen door? A wooden door? A sliding glass door? People aren't squabbling about this particular metaphor, because it is obvious that Jesus isn't literally a door. 

But what if people started calling him 'the window'? Would that be acceptable? No, that would be unacceptable because Jesus didn't say he is the window. Jesus said, 'I am the door.' Indeed, the metaphor of a window communicates something different from the metaphor of a door. A window is an opening, but a door is something a person walks through. Your whole self goes through the door. Your whole self enters the kingdom of God not through a window but through one special door, Jesus Christ. 

On the one hand, everybody knows that Jesus isn't literally a door. But on the other hand, some of us don't know that the fatherhood of God is metaphorical. One of my students, for example, recently said, 'I can concede that Jesus isn't literally a door. But God really is our Father.' 

'Yes,' I said. 'God really is our Father. That is totally true, and it's not just a figure of speech. But we must understand that God is our Father in the very same sense that Jesus Christ really is the door. It's a literal fact that there is no other way to God but through the one door, Jesus. It is also a literal fact that God has adopted us as his children. Thus you are correct--God "really is" our Father.

'But if you try to press the issue of God literally  being our Father, then to be consistent, you will also have to say that the Son within the Trinity literally is God's Son. In other words, you will drive yourself into a corner by forcing yourself to say that within the Trinity, the Father is older than the Son. For if we insist on being literal, then we will have to accept the unorthodox conclusion that God as a literal father is, by definition, older than his literal son. And yet, we cannot say this and still be orthodox. Indeed this explains why orthodox Christianity has always maintained that the fatherhood of God is metaphorical .' 12

Someone else may ask,'But if the fatherhood of God is metaphorical, does that mean we can just as well refer to God as Mother?' No, it doesn't. I am opposed to calling God 'Mother,' not because I believe that God is male. I don't believe that at all. I am against it because to do so is to disregard the authority of the God-inspired biblical metaphor. To call God 'Mother' is to tamper with the text. It changes the biblical message when God is proclaimed to be our mother. If it didn't, no one would be clamoring to address him as Mother when they pray. 

The Bible indicates that God indeed is motherly. Nevertheless the Scriptures do not teach us to address him or conceive of him as 'mother.' God is Father, and yet the Bible says that he mothered the children of Israel. In Isaiah 66:13, the Lord says, 'As one whom his mother comforts, so I will comfort you, and you shall be comforted in Jerusalem.' 

Bearing this in mind, whenever anyone motherless asks me whether or not God can 'be their mother,' I say to them that he can be their God--which is better. With that, I explain that it's unbiblical to pray 'Dear Mother' to God. But it's acceptable to pray, 'Thank you, God, for mothering me.'

12 If we try to say the converse, that the Son is younger than the Father, then we accidentally suggest there was a time 'when the Son was not,' which is classic Arianism, an age-old heresy in the church."

  - pgs 117-119

-Sarah Sumner, PH. D. 

from: http://www.amazon.com/Men-Women-Church-Consensus-Leadership/dp/0830823913/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1367863639&sr=1-1&keywords=men+and+women+in+the+church

Sumner, Sarah. Men And Women In The Church. Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2003

"Christianity vs. Feminism"

"People who know me understand that I am a Christian, not a feminist. Here's what I mean by that. I am a follower of Christ (Matthew 16:24). I confess with my mouth that 'Jesus [is] Lord' and believe in my heart 'that God raised Him from the dead' (Romans 10:9). My vocation is to become like Christ (Romans 8:29). With that, my number one goal is to love God foremost (Matthew 22:37). If I were a feminist, my focus would be on women and equality and power. But since I am a Christian, my focus is on Christ and truth and grace (John 1:17). As a Christian, I don't function in a feminist paradigm. 

Christians don't have to be feminists in order to believe in social justice. Feminism is not something that must be added to Christianity in order for the church to honor women. The gospel itself is pro-women. It is quintessentially Christian to be pro-people. Hence it is just as unnecessary for a Christian to be a feminist as it is for a Christian to be a humanist. There's no need to blend a humanist worldview into a Christian worldview, because Christians already have the highest view of humanity in the world. Our Lord Jesus is himself the all-time greatest Advocate for men and women and children. Anyone who thinks that treating women fairly is a feminist thing to do, not a Christian thing to do, doesn't understand Christianity. 

The point of Christianity is to unite the people of God as one in Christ. When any of us squabble about power and personal status, we display a lack of faith in God's plan. God has arranged for each member of the body to make a contribution--though not as the head of the church. Christ is the head of the church (Colossians 1:18). None of us are the head. The pope is not the head. Billy Graham is not the head. No woman is the head because no man is the head. Christ alone is the head. 

And yet, here we are, as members of Christ's body, debating over who can be the head. We're clamoring for power because we keep overlooking God's plan. God's plan is for us to be united to the Head. That's what the church is all about. It's about us being one with Christ. About us growing up 'in all aspects into Him who is the head, even Christ' (Ephesians 4:15). God also has arranged for us to reign (Revelation 22:5; 2 Timothy 2:12). Someday each of us will reign, but none of us will reign as the head. 

Until we learn this, until we have it settled in our minds that Christ--and no on else--is the church's head, I don't think we're ready to talk about other matters of church order. For whenever we attempt to inaugurate someone other than Christ to be the head, inadvertently we forfeit an aspect of our freedom. Unwittingly we end up subjecting ourselves to the very yoke of slavery (that is, slavery to sin) from which Christ has effectively released us. Galatians 5:1 says, 'It was for freedom that Christ set us free.' He did not set us free so that we could attempt to displace him. Christ set us free so that we would be free. Free from death. Free from sin. Free from selfish ambition. Free from deception. Free from dishonesty. Free from religious hypocrisy. God wants us to be free so that we can show the world what it means to be reconciled to God through Christ (2 Corinthians 5:18).

God also intends for Christian men and women to be fully reconciled to one another. In Christ, we have been made one (Galatians 3:28). While to some it may appear that Christian men and women are already fully unified, the indicators say that we are not. If we were unified, we would not be embroiled in such a heated debate about the parameters for women in the church. Instead, we might be focused on mobilizing laborers for the gospel. 

This is where repentance comes in. Some of us need to repent from feeling threatened by the giftedness of others. The Bible says, 'But if you have bitter jealousy and selfish ambition in your heart, do not be arrogant and lie against the truth. This wisdom is...demonic' (James 3:14-15). Selfish ambition is of the devil. It is not from God above. I know firsthand how destructive my own selfish ambition can be. As James puts it, where selfish ambition exists, there is 'disorder' and 'every evil thing' (James 3:16). This verse couldn't be more relevant to the subject of women in the church. For if we want to establish church order, then we have to put away the disorder that arises from our selfish ambition. In other words, we have to repent. 

To be clear, I am not saying that people must repent from their doctrinal differences. Nor am I saying that diversity of conviction isn't good. Instead, I am saying the mere topic of women in ministry is uncomfortable. Many of us dread it because we know it's complicated; thus we'd just as soon not try to sort it out. I understand. Just as I didn't want to write this book, others may not want to read it. It's painful for the church to consider our sins against women. It's hard to come to terms with what we've done and what we're doing. It is humbling to realize that we have failed to treat men and women lovingly without partiality. I have failed in this. Who hasn't?

Overall, I believe that the debate on women in ministry has been improperly reduced to a debate about roles. The church is prone to say that women should do this and not do that when her activity is not the issue. As I see it, the confusion in the church ultimately stems from a more fundamental question of relationships. The church has not yet learned how to relate to Christian women, who in light of their ministry calling, have chosen to walk an unconventional path. Though I am getting ahead of myself, let me try to illustrate what I mean. 

I have been told that Christian women in Korea feel devastated socially if they turn thirty before marriage. Evidently they feel challenged, even in the church, to find their role. As I see it, the issue of their role is not the problem. The problem, rather, lies in everyone around them who feels at a loss to know how to relate to them as single Christian women. My single female friends in the United States, especially those over the age of forty who have never been married, constantly describe the same ordeal. They feel that many Christians do not know how to relate to them comfortably. Instead, people want to know 'how they're coping' with their singleness and lack of motherhood. In other words, they want to know how they're coping with their conventional rolelessness. 

Conversely, it seems that Christians also feel uncomfortable when a women in the church begins to obtain an excessive rolefulness, if you will. In other words, we begin to squirm when a woman accepts a visible position of public leadership. Thus we start to wonder about Anne Graham Lotz, a daughter of Billy Graham, because she is a she, and she is a preacher in our midst. 

Granted, on the surface the debate about women has to do with proper roles. But underneath, it has to do with the more complex question of the God-given nature of women. Followers of Christ are struggling to figure out how it is that female human beings can be made in the image of God who reveals himself as 'he.' On top of that, we're arguing about culture and perspectives and the authority of the Bible. In truth, we are arguing about a multitude of things because the question of women's identity inevitably is connected to a multitude of other related factors. So many questions come to mind. For instance, what does it mean to be a woman? What does it mean to be a man? Why do an inordinate number of men avoid the church? Would even fewer men attend if women served as pastors and preachers? What are we going to do about the divorce rate? What about women who feel convicted to stay at home and rear their kids? What about the Bible? What about the church being true to obey God's Word?..." 

- Sarah Sumner, PH. D.

from: http://www.amazon.com/Men-Women-Church-Consensus-Leadership/dp/0830823913/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1367779052&sr=1-1&keywords=men+and+women+in+the+church