Position on Gender Roles in the Church

As the elders of Life Bridge Christian Church, we continually scrutinize our beliefs, customs, and practices in the light of God’s Word to be consistent with the Scriptures in faith and practice. As issues or concerns are brought to our attention, we will be faithful to search God’s Word for how we should conduct ourselves as a congregation. We have no desire to become legalistic in our practices at Life Bridge; however, we also realize that God has given some specific principles and guidelines for His church.

Our purpose for developing this position on gender roles in the church is solely for making every effort to be obedient to the Word of God. Hopefully, our interpretation of God’s Word will help men and women understand that their value in the church has nothing to do with their role, but rather that their value resides in their relationship with Jesus Christ. Our goal is not to keep anyone from serving in the church in a way that God has intended, but rather to help people see how the Word of God defines their roles so that they can be in step with His will and come under His authority. We believe one of the reasons many marriage relationships are struggling today is that the pattern of authority that God established for the home isn’t being demonstrated in the church. Men and women today seem very confused about their roles, and it is the church that must pattern what God intended, in spite of what our culture says. The more we follow God’s divine plan for His Church, the more effective we will become at being the church, His called out ones.

This said, the following is our understanding of what God’s Word says regarding roles in the church.

EQUALITY AND VALUE OF MEN AND WOMEN

We understand that the Bible affirms the equality of men and women concerning value, personhood, and spiritual inheritance.

“So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.” Genesis 1:27

“You are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus, for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There in neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. If you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s seed and heirs according to the promise”. Galatians 3:26-29

In God’s eyes, men and women have equal worth; Christ died for the salvation of both. Our standing with God depends solely on our relationship with Him through Jesus Christ, and not on our gender, social standing, or ethnic heritage.

DISTINCTION OF MALE AND FEMALE ROLES

The Bible also affirms certain distinctions among men and women in the home and church, and because of those distinctions, He has certain roles for each to fulfill. These differences have nothing to do with value or ability, but rather God’s designed order for authority in the home and the church. When we operate outside of His design, we become more vulnerable to the attacks of the enemy on our families and our churches. We don’t have to look very hard to see those affects today in our society.

“For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior. Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything. Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word…” Ephesians 5:23-25

“Now the overseer must be above reproach, the husband of but one wife…” 1 Timothy 3:2

“I also want women to dress modestly, with decency and propriety, not with braided hair or gold or pearls or expensive clothes, but with good deeds, appropriate for women who profess to worship God. A woman should learn in quietness and full submission. I do not permit a woman to teach or to have authority over a man; she must be silent. For Adam was formed first, then Eve. And Adam was not the one deceived; it was the woman who was deceived and became a sinner. 1 But women (she KJV) will be saved through childbearing – if they continue in faith, love and holiness and propriety.” 1 Timothy 2:9-15

THE ROLE OF ELDER

Elders are to function as the leaders of the church in the areas of spiritual direction and guidance (including the teaching ministries). One of their main ministries is to guard the doctrine of faith and insure that correct doctrine is being taught. They must also be men of good character.

“Since an overseer is entrusted with God’s work, he must be blameless – not overbearing, not quick-tempered, not given to drunkenness, not violent, not pursuing dishonest gain. Rather he must be hospitable, one who loves what is good, who is self-controlled, upright, holy and disciplined. He must hold firmly to the trustworthy message as it has been taught, so that he can encourage others by sound doctrine and refute those who oppose it.”
Titus 1:7-9

“Here is a trustworthy saying: If anyone sets his heart on being an overseer, he desires a noble task. Now the overseer must be above reproach, the husband of but one wife, temperate, self-controlled, respectable, hospitable, able to teach, not given to drunkenness, not violent but gentle, not quarrelsome, not a lover of money. He must manage his own family well and see that his children obey him with proper respect. (If anyone does not know how to manage his own family, how can he take care of God’s church?) He must not be a recent convert, or he may become conceited and fall under the same judgment as the devil. He must also have a good relationship with outsiders, so that he will not fall into disgrace and into the devil’s trap.” 1 Timothy 3:1-7

The role of the elder in these verses is clearly defined as a male role. The scriptures above use all masculine forms of the Greek words to qualify this person as male. In fact, there is nowhere in the New Testament where we see a woman referred to as an elder or an overseer. The argument is frequently made that because of His unique treatment and acceptance of women, Jesus would have no problem allowing women to be placed in a position of leadership. However, if Jesus desired to set a precedent that women should be leaders (elders) in the church, He could have easily chosen a woman to be an apostle. Or, we would have seen Paul appoint a woman elder in one of the Gentile churches. In spite of the fact that we see women following Jesus and being involved in ministry in many valuable ways in the New Testament church, we see no indication that a woman was ever called by Jesus or the other apostles to be in a leadership (overseer) role.

There seems to be a clear directive in the Scripture that God never intended for a woman to serve in a position of spiritual authority. Sadly, in many situations, men have failed to assume their God-given role and women have been forced into positions of authority that they were not created to be in. Because of our desire to be obedient to God’s plan, we will not ordain women in this role at Life Bridge.

THE ROLE OF DEACON

As we can see in 1 Timothy 3:1-13, there is a clear distinction between elders (overseers) and deacons (servants). However, if you look at the qualifications for each, they are practically the same. The main difference is that in verse 11, we see qualifications for women in a deacon role. In some English translations it refers to the wife of a deacon; however, in the original language there is no qualifier that would indicate Paul was referring to someone’s wife. The Greek text starts off with the word gune (goo-nay'). This word can be translated either woman or wife. There is not a separate word for each that is used in the New Testament; however, it is usually only translated “wife” when it is referenced as “his” wife or “their own” wives. This verse simply says “In the same way, women…”. For this reason, many translators feel that this verse is most likely referring to women deacons. To support that idea, we see in Romans 16:1 where Paul refers to a woman named Phoebe as a deacon in the church at Cenchrea.

The word in Greek that is translated deacon in the ew Testament is diakonos (dee-ak'-on-os). This word is translated throughout the New Testament as deacon, minister, or servant. Because the role of a deacon is a role of service or ministry and not necessarily a role of authority, we see no reason why a woman cannot serve in a deacon role as long as it does not place her in a position of spiritual authority over a man. Deacons at Life Bridge can serve in many ways, such as ministry team leaders, trustees, church clerk, treasurer, financial secretary, director of children’s ministry, or youth minister. Deacons at Life Bridge are chosen by the eldership to lead various ministries.

MINISTRY OF PREACHING AND TEACHING

The two passages that give us insight to help define the role of teaching/preaching in the church are, 1 Corinthians 14:34-35 and 1 Timothy 2:11-14. We’ll look at 1 Corinthians 14 first.

“As in all the congregations of the saints, women should remain silent in the churches. They are not allowed to speak, but must be in submission, as the Law says. If they want to inquire about something, they should ask their own husbands at home; for it is disgraceful for a woman to speak in the church.” 1 Corinthians 14:33-35

This verse certainly does not imply that women cannot speak at all in a church gathering; otherwise Paul would be contradicting what he wrote in 1 Corinthians 11:5, where he speaks of women praying and prophesying in church. We must look at this verse in the context of the entire chapter where Paul is giving instruction to the church as to how to conduct themselves in their worship services, particularly regarding the prophetic gifts. It isn’t completely clear as to what Paul is referring to here, but here are two good possibilities that we believe fit well into the context:

1. To address a particular problem with women disrupting the service in Corinth by questioning the speaker and disrespecting his authority during the service (see 1 Corinthians 14:35). This helps us understand the idea of inquiring of their own husbands at home, or
2. To prohibit women from testing prophesies (1 Corinthians 14:29), because to test prophecies would have placed them in a position of spiritual authority. “What Paul is calling for is not the total silence of women but a kind of involvement that signifies, in various ways, their submissive attitude to the leadership of the men God has called to be the guardians and overseers of the flock…”.

1 Timothy 2:11-14 seems to be a much more problematic passage for many people, primarily because there are so many different interpretations of what Paul is saying here.

“A woman should learn in quietness and full submission. I do not permit a woman to teach or to have authority over a man; she must be silent. For Adam was formed first, then Eve. And Adam was not the one deceived; it was the woman who was deceived and became a sinner.” 1 Timothy 2:11-14 NIV

Many want to interpret 1 Timothy 2:12 in a strictly cultural context, and therefore say it is not applicable for us today. But, because the reason Paul gives for not being allowed to teach or exercise authority over men is an appeal to the creation order, not just to a specific cultural situation, we don’t believe we can do that. Paul appeals to God’s design for roles of authority, not what was socially acceptable or preferred. We must do the same.

Just as with any interpretation it is usually skewed toward a position that one has been taught in the past or toward a personal conviction. If that was not the case, there would not be so much controversy regarding this passage of scripture. In situations such as these, it would be much easier to just ignore this passage and avoid the controversy, but we believe what Paul says in 2 Timothy 3:16-17 is true:

“All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work”.

Based on this, we believe that all scripture, including 1 Timothy 2:12 was inspired by the Holy Spirit and is saying something to the Church. What we must do as elders, is to do our best to understand how what was written to the church in Ephesus nearly 2,000 years ago speaks to the Church today.

We can’t ignore this passage, but neither should we read into it more than was intended. So how should we handle these verses? First, we must understand the context and to whom it was written. The books of 1 and 2 Timothy and Titus are referred to as The Pastoral Epistles, primarily because they address issues for the church that deal with leadership and instruction on how the church should conduct itself when meeting. There is even debate on the authorship of these epistles. There are many scholars today that believe these were written by someone else using Paul’s name. This is due to the type of language that is used in these letters not being consistent with Paul’s other writings; in fact, there are words used in these letters that are not used anywhere else in the New Testament. In spite of that debate, we accept the authorship of Paul for these letters.

As we said, the purpose of these verses is to give guidance for leaders on how best to provide order to the church and what they should do when they assemble. If we look at it in the context of what Paul said to the church at Corinth regarding their assemblies, it becomes much clearer. Both situations have nothing to do with a lack of intelligence of women, their gifting, or ability to add anything to the situation, but rather are dealing with the idea of women being in submission to the God-given authority of men in the church just as in the home.

What is Paul saying about women speaking in the church? The word here translated “quietness” in verse 11 and “silent” in verse 12 is hesuchia (hay-soo-khee'-ah). The word is the feminine form of hesuchios (hay-soo'-khee-os). According to Strongs Greek and Hebrew dictionary, the definition of this word can be “undisturbing” or “to remain in your seat”. It is translated in 1 Peter 3:4 as having a “quiet spirit”. In 1 Thessalonians 3:12 it is translated “quietness” (KJV) or “settle down” (NIV). Just as in the 1 Corinthians passage, we must put this word into proper context. If Paul allows women to pray and prophecy in Corinth, why would he prohibit them from speaking in Ephesus? We believe here again Paul is instructing women to be submissive and respectful to the authority of men in their worship services. It is totally unrealistic to assume women are restricted from any kind of speaking in the church.

To understand verse 12 we must also understand the word authentien, translated “to exercise authority” (NIV). This is a very unique word, and this is the only place in all of the New Testament this Greek word is used. Because this is the case, we really have no other example of how this word may be translated. This word is the verb form of authenteo.

The definition of authenteo according to Thayer's Greek Lexicon is “one who does a thing himself, the author”. In view of the context, the definition, and the fact that we have no other references upon which to understand Paul’s meaning, it is hard to say definitively what the meaning here is. This is what leads to the confusion regarding the interpretation of this verse. Because of that, all we can do is put it in context with the other teachings in the New Testament regarding a woman’s requirement to submit to the authority of men with a “quiet spirit”. We believe, based on the definition of this word, what Paul is restricting women from is placing themselves in a position of authority over men. We take it to mean that even though a woman may be capable of doing something, in this case teaching, she should restrain herself from participating in that role for the good of the body.

Our next step is to figure out how Paul’s prohibition of women teaching a man should be understood? Just as with the rest of this verse there is much controversy here as well. There are those who believe it means that a woman can never teach a man in any circumstance. However, we see an example in Acts 18 where a woman named Priscilla along with her husband Aquila, taught a man named Apollos. Acts 18:26 says: “they invited him to their home and explained to him the way of God more adequately”. We must not read too much into this passage; however, it was recorded for a reason. Therefore, we believe that it is within the bounds of Paul’s instruction, for a woman, in conjunction with her husband, to teach a man in a more private setting. So disqualifying women from any type of teaching to men would be a contradiction, and for that reason we don’t believe that is what Paul is saying here.

So then, what do we think he is saying? The most likely answer, we believe, is explained by Douglas Moo, who says that the word “to teach” (didaskien) and its noun forms “teaching” (didaskalia) and “teacher” (didaskalos) are mainly used in the New Testament to describe the careful and authoritative transmission of Biblical truth. Furthermore, in the Pastoral Epistles, “teaching” always has the sense of authoritative public, doctrinal instruction. (cf. 1 Timothy 4:11-16, 2 Timothy 3:16; 4:2) 2

Because of this, we believe Paul is most likely referring to the authoritative teaching of the doctrine of the church in public, in the midst of the congregation, or what we would consider preaching. So, in reference to Paul’s restriction for women teaching men, we believe this restriction applies mainly to the role of what we consider preaching. Based on this verse and Paul’s other writings, there doesn’t seem to be enough evidence here to justify a greater restriction than that.

Again, this restriction has nothing to do with gifting or ability, but rather a God-ordained order between men and women. We also believe that Paul’s restriction was not to demean or invalidate women, but rather to protect women and provide order to the church.

There are many opportunities for women to teach in the church, outside of preaching to the congregation. Based on our interpretation of what Paul is saying in 1 Timothy 2, and in conjunction with what we see happening in Acts 18, we believe that there is opportunity for a woman to assist a man in teaching in a small group setting as long as she is not the primary teacher who is seen as the one in authority.

We do not see leading worship, giving a personal testimony, giving prophesy, reading the Word, or praying as what Paul is referring to here as teaching or necessarily having authority over men. In fact, as we have seen, Paul encouraged women to pray and prophesy. We desire to allow women to be able to use their gifts in ministry, but at the same time, we wish to honor God’s emphasis upon male leadership in the church.

CONCLUSION

In the light of the above discussion, we desire the Holy Spirit to have full freedom in our church to work through the gifts of everyone in the church within the parameters of the Sprit-inspired Scripture. We never want to become legalistic, but we do want to do what we believe to be God’s best for His Church. In this instance our goal is to ensure that the example of male leadership and spiritual authority is presented to the congregation and to the community. We never want to believe that we have the only correct interpretation, especially in situations that can be interpreted several different ways. But, we also realize that we must give guidance to provide order in this particular congregation. To that end, we find it appropriate to establish the following guidelines for men’s and women’s roles at Life Bridge:

1. The role of elder, lead pastor, or anyone in a position that has perceived spiritual authority over men at Life Bridge will be held by a man.
2. It is our position that the role of preaching/teaching in our corporate assemblies should be done by one of the elders or a man who has been approved by the elders to preach.
3. Anyone who has the gifts and qualifications to fulfill the role of deacon will be allowed to do so at the prayerful selection of the elders.
4. Women will be encouraged to use the gift of teaching wherever possible as long as the elders feel it does not place them in a position of spiritual authority.
5. Home Fellowship Group leaders at Life Bridge will be men because of the authoritative role of the Home Fellowship Group leader as a shepherd of a small flock, which usually includes men. However, a woman will be allowed to be a Home Fellowship Group leader if the group consists of only women or youth.

Because it is impossible to list every activity that a woman may be involved in, they will be allowed to use their gifts and participate in ministry in every way except in the roles of elder, pastor or Home Fellowship Group leader, unless it places them in a position of spiritual authority over men.
Since the responsibility of overseeing the church is given by God to the elders, we will continually seek God’s guidance regarding what roles women will have in the church. These decisions will be prayerfully considered based on the circumstances of the role and the character and submissiveness of the woman involved.

We realize that you may come from a church tradition that allowed women to hold positions of authority or preach, or maybe didn’t allow women to do anything in ministry. Just as in most areas of church doctrine, there are many interpretations on both sides (i.e. baptism, communion, spiritual gifting, etc.). As the elders who have been called to serve and lead this body, we believe this is what God’s Word is saying to us, and we must be faithful to His Word. Because we understand there are many different views on this topic, we don’t claim to have the definitive answer in regard to what Paul is saying in these verses. We do believe, however, based on our study, that the above guidelines are what Paul had in mind for the church.

We would ask that if you have made a decision to be part of this congregation, you would respect our teaching on this subject. We encourage you to study this issue for yourself and allow the Holy Spirit to confirm in your heart what His word says.
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1 Paul shows that verse 15 applies to women in general when he switches from the singular “she” referring back to. Eve in verse 14) at the beginning of the verse to the plural “they” in the middle of the verse. What is true of Eve is true of all women. They are not saved through the meritorious work of childbearing, but when by faith they embrace their role as women they show that they are born again. The most prominent way in which women embrace their roles as females is through childbearing, which men cannot do. But lest anyone think Paul is talking about women accomplishing their own salvation through childbearing, he adds, “if they continue in faith. . .” I take this to mean that childbearing is evidence that a woman has embraced her role as a woman, which is evidence that she has genuine faith. Verse 15 explains the manner in which Eve and her daughters can be saved, even though Eve fell to temptation.
Dr. James M. Hamilton Jr, What women can do in Ministry, 19. Similarly, in more detail, William D. Mounce, Pastoral Epistles, WBC (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 2000), 148, and Schreiner, “An Interpretation of 1 Timothy 2:9-15,” 146-53.

2 Douglas Moo, What Does It Mean To Teach or Have Authority Over Men? 1 Timothy2:11-15, Rediscovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood, 185.
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If you desire to read more thorough studies on this subject, see the following transcripts online. We don’t necessarily agree with every conclusion in these articles, but they will allow you to see how there can be so much confusion on this topic.

What Women Can Do in Ministry: Full Participation within Biblical Boundaries by James M. Hamilton Jr.
http:// www.swbts.edu/faculty/jhamilton/documents/4-12-05.pdf
Rediscovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood by John Piper and Wayne Grudem.
http://www.cbmw.org/rbmw/rbmw.pdf
Living Out God’s Order In The Church by R. Kent Hughes D. Min.
http://www.tms.edu/tmsj/tmsj10g.pdf