Moving the Starting Line

I know a pastor in a Bible-based Christian church -- a church that does not believe in the ordination of women -- who believes in the ordination of women. He just kind of keeps that to himself and goes along with the church's policy. No actual conflict, then. But it makes me wonder. Not so much about this pastor, but about so many like him. What is it that leads one to believe that it's okay to ordain women to be pastors of churches?

On the surface it seems like an easy answer. They just figured it out. But, historically, they would be newcomers, pioneers. Historically the church did not ordained women as pastors until the 19th century. Think about that for a moment. Something like 1800 years passed in church history before anyone stood up and said, "Hey, hang on a minute, we've been doing this all wrong for the past, oh, 2 centuries or so." Women were always a key part of any church. They had churches in their homes. They served, likely as deaconnesses. Paul referred to them as "fellow workers" who "shared my struggle in the cause of the gospel" (Php 4:3). They were encouraged to minister to women (Titus 2:3-5). They had jobs, tasks, ministries, key roles. But Paul clearly stated, "I do not allow a woman to teach or exercise authority over a man" (1 Tim 2:12-14). So, historically, the church had a policy ... get this ... to not allow women to teach or exercise authority over men. Amazing, isn't it? Now the modern church mind has come to the conclusion that nearly 2,000 years of Christians, male and female, were all wrong about this and now we've figured out that Paul did not mean that women couldn't teach or exercise authority over a man, that women "must quietly receive instruction with entire submissiveness" (1 Tim 2:11; 1 Cor 14:34-35), that God placed man as the head of woman (1 Cor 11:3) ... well, any of that. He was either wrong when he said it or we've misunderstood it ... again, for 2 centuries. Now, there are those who argue from Scripture that God did not mean to say that -- what we now have in our Bibles. "We've misunderstood," they argue, "and here's why." But it begs the question. Where did the Holy Spirit go wrong? I mean, Jesus said He would lead us into all truth (John 16:13), and it took Him 2,000 years to get this done? I suspect that this is not what's in play here. I suspect that modern thinking (where 19th century was definitely more "modern" than, say 1st century) infiltrated the church and modern thinkers said, "Wait a minute! That doesn't feel right ... in view of our modern thinking." So they searched about to "prooftext" their objections, not because the texts proved their point, but because, if you held your tongue just right, you could see their point. That is, they didn't argue from Scripture; they argued into Scripture. Instead of "Well, the Bible says this which means that that is true, so we need to adjust our thinking," it was, "Well, I feel like this is true, so I can only conclude that when the Bible appears to say that, it can't be true, so I'll try to find a way to approve of my feeling over clear Scripture."

Actually, Scripture is equally clear on this. One of the reasons Paul wrote to the Colossian Christians was, "so that no one will delude you with persuasive argument" (Col 2:4). What kind of persuasive argument? "See to it that no one takes you captive through philosophy and empty deception, according to the tradition of men, according to the elementary principles of the world, rather than according to Christ" (Col 2:8) The problem is not with Christ or His Word. The problem is "persuasive argument," with "philosophy" based on "the tradition of men" rather than the Truth. It's always dangerous when we start our theology with "I feel" over "God says." It's always dangerous to begin with "my way of thinking" over against what God has given us as truth. And the problem is, the more we allow this syncretism, this melding of worldly perspective with Christian theology, the less we have of Christian theology and biblical truth and ... Christ.