Hello Hello, it’s Jojo (again) haha

Thanks for the love on my first episode. 

I really appreciate it. I felt the love.

In my first episode, I spent time on how I believe God instructs us to share the Truth. 

TL;DR: Be kind, don’t be a jerk. 

In this episode, I wanted to focus on whom I believe God uses to share the Truth. 

And oh, what a time to be alive. 

Very recently, Evangelicals have seemed to be pretty stuck on the topic of women in the pulpit. 

Not the salvation of souls.

Not the pandemic of racism in evangelical spaces..

Not Christian nationalism masquerading as true Christianity in the United States.

Nope, my brothers and sisters. Nothing but the good ol’ Battle of the Sexes 

Alas, it appears, one of the biggest threats to the integrity of the gospel is a pair of XX chromosomes with a co-ed audience. I mean, we have no issue with women in our children's classrooms  and absolutely killing the game in the lecture halls of our best universities  , but God forbid they teach a group of men and women in the sanctuary.

*sigh*

If you haven’t smelled the sauce I’m simmering by now, I believe that women can teach wherever they are received and to whomever receives them. I address y’all as brothers and sisters because it is my expectation that this project can bless the Church as a whole, not half of it. 

I’m not speaking to the formal roles of priesthood and pastorhood, because I believe that the system needs an overhaul anyway, what with all the current narcissists and abusers weaponizing the Bible to oppress, subjugate, brainwash, and control-- but that’s a topic for another time. 

In doing my research, I listened to what others had to say on the topic. It’s quite the can of worms that I’m not looking to open any time soon in this project, but I believe I’ve gauged the overall temperature of these troubled Church waters.

My approach to defending a woman teaching is not overtly academic, but I believe it is biblical. 

From what I’ve discerned, the root issues with women teaching arise from two things:

1. Pride
2. A convenient disregard for the context of scripture

I’ll address the first issue in this episode, because I believe that it is the most important. 

Pride: 

: inordinate self-esteem : CONCEIT

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think many evangelical men don’t agree with women teaching because their pride is hurt when a woman can school them.That might be a part of it, but mostly I believe they take issue with a woman teaching because they grossly overestimate the importance of their role in the spreading of the gospel. 

They’re stuck serving that part of us that feels that, in order to reach me, you  must be like me. A mirror of ourselves, rather than a window to God’s heart.

Picture this.

You’re a gardener, and you are trying to transplant some recently sprouted seedlings from an egg carton to a larger container to promote growth. You have a few containers that you purchased at a high price. 

You choose one and get to work. 

But wait!

Oh no, you notice that the one you chose has a massive crack in it and will likely break if used.It needs to be repaired before you can use it. 

But do not fear! You grab a different planter that is not identical, but will serve the purpose that the other could not. You paid a huge price for both planters, and you’re irritated that you cannot use the initial one, but that quickly fades as you remember the goal in mind. The first one could not serve its purpose, so you chose another with the ability to hold the soil, fertilizer, and seedling so that it may grow. 

You get to it and soon the seedling is in a container better suited for its  growth. 

And crack free 

In this metaphor, the planters are teachers--the first planter is a male teacher and the second, a female teacher.

“But Jojo! Not all planters are the same! Some are created for a specific purpose and do the job better than others.”

Absolutely. I agree with you. But I argue that rather than these differences arising from gender, they arise from our gifts and experiences. You can’t tell me that a man is automatically better at teaching because he is a man. 

Isaiah 64:8

But now, O Lord, you are our Father;

    we are the clay, and you are our potter;

    we are all the work of your hand.

Jackie Hill Perry can reach certain crowds that John MacArthur could never. And for many reasons that I won’t get into, for fear of getting in my feelings. 

As a quick aside, recent issues in the Church arising from a lack of pastoral integrity, abuse, and indiscretion of male leaders doesn’t leave much material to be confident in. In one way or another, be it spending your modest pastor salary on Gucci slides, sleeping with someone you’re not married to, or using your power to intimidate your victims into silence, we’ve seen that male leaders are very, very fallible. 

We’re all crooked sticks being used to draw straight lines. 

But what I see is one set of sticks telling another that they aren’t good enough to be used. Alas. I digress. 

I agree that there are a few flaws in my metaphor. Firstly, a woman teacher, though different, is not a consolation prize for the lack of a male teacher. They are equal in value, though not identical. 

In my example, I point out that planters were bought at a high price. In reality, this means that Christ died for both male and female. The blood wasn’t subsidized for a woman. 

But let’s continue. . .

The seedling grows and grows, and soon becomes too large for the container that was once perfect for it. It needs a new one. So a new one capable of handling its growth is provided. 

This cycle continues until the plant is able to handle itself outside, and grow into the tree it was meant to be.

“But Jojo! What about all the containers used up in this metaphor? What happens to them?” 

Well, they are either reused or thrown away. They’ve served their purpose. Nothing less, nothing more. 

Do you see what I’m getting at here?

We, believers, teachers--we are the containers. 

We have anywhere from an audience of one to an auditorium of learners, eager to grow from our supposedly fertile soil. Once they grow too large to benefit from us anymore, they move on. It’s healthy. The planters are cleaned out, replenished, repaired, and reused if possible.

Or, take this--

Often in the Bible, the Church is described as a Body. We make up that body. Each of us is a cell, and together we form tissue, then the organ, then the organ system, and then the entire shebang. Basic biology teaches us that cells are constantly being created and destroyed for differing reasons, but yet--in a healthy body--the organ lives on. How is this so? How is it possible that the destruction of a necessary part does not lead to the destruction of the entire system? 

Because the body can compensate for its deficiencies. You get a cut, cells die, but platelets quickly rush to the area of trauma to help form a scab. The scab acts as temporary protection so that the body can heal, replace, and replenish the tissue.

Whether we are the platelet, blood cell, skin cell, etc is determined by our gifts. 

Romans 12:3

3 For by the grace given me I say to every one of you: Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the faith God has distributed to each of you.

We are built and bought to serve a purpose, and once that purpose is served, we die and enter into our eternal reward. We serve an important role, but we’re replaceable. If one of us got up one day and decided that we didn’t want to be used for seedlings anymore, another planter would rise up and take our place. 

*gasp*

Did I just imply that it isn’t all about us?

Yes. Exactly.

But in our current age of influencers (particularly the Christian ones) we make ourselves wayyy too important. And then, because we have an inordinate view of our role, we prescribe characteristics needed of a person able to fill the role--even in areas where the Word of God does not prescribe such restrictions.

We connect a social media following to a hierarchy of importance that God didn’t ordain. A gold-plated planter is still just a planter, and even then there also comes a point at which the planter loses its purpose if the seedling dies--no matter how beautiful the planter is.

The success of a planter is in how successful their design allowed them to promote growth for the seedling. Was there enough width? Depth? Were there holes to allow for drainage? Did it fulfil its purpose? 

In fulfilling the great commission, we are charged with important roles depending on our gifts, not our gender.  

Matt. 28:19-20

19 Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in[a] the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

One podcast I listened to while doing my research on this topic argued that women can spread the gospel, but they can’t teach beyond that. That’s an extremely underdeveloped and incomplete understanding of our roles.

So, if I lead someone to Christ after having developed a relationship with them, I now go and hand them off to a man just because they are a man and dust off my hands because my job is done? I think not.

One could argue that men won’t listen to a woman teach, and therefore arguing about it or refuting complementarianism is pointless. To that I say that neither gender is a monolith. Not every man thinks that same way. Same with women. Church hurt runs deep and frankly, there are many injured people of either gender that would rather hear the Gospel presented to them by a woman considering the spiritual abuse and inconsistency they encountered at the hands of a male preacher. 

The success of the Gospel is not contingent upon the fact that it is preached by a specific person, because as I said before we’re replaceable. The Gospel can handle Itself. We literally have only one job. Spread it. And if evangelicals treated gospel like a virus and satan like a mask mandate, then the whole spreading aspect really wouldn’t be that hard.

2 Timothy 3:16-17 

All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be competent, equipped for every good work.

A footnote explains that the term man of God is often interchanged for messenger of God, as commonly expressed in the old testament

Women can teach, rebuke, correct, and train up those they lead in righteousness. The scripture isn’t so weak that it only works in the male to female direction. 

I’ve attended women’s conferences and talks and often thought, “Wow, this is so rich. Why are we marketing this conversation exclusively to women?” 

You’ve seen it. The girls get a Galentine’s day cookie baking party to talk about the gift of singleness, having a servant's heart, and essential oils while the guys go into the wild to camp and grill meat they bought at the grocery store. 

Again, I’m arguing that we’re equal. Not identical. I’m not saying that women and men don’t need different forms of interaction and fellowship at times in order to be effectively taught, and many of these forms can only come from someone of the same gender. I respect that.

I’m just saying, don’t think too highly of yourself that God must use someone like you to reach someone like you, if that makes sense. He used a donkey. And all of a sudden we believe He lacks the ability to use a woman. 

Shame on us for limiting God. 

Brothers and sisters, if you’re sent the truth and refuse to listen to it because you don’t like it’s container, it’s your loss at the end of the day. A window to God’s heart is a window to His heart.  If you’re more preoccupied with the surface being a reflection of your likeness, ask yourself what you’re really looking for. 

So yeah. 

There’s a high chance that you don’t agree with me on this issue, and I can live with that. I just truly believe that a woman’s highest position in the Kingdom of God is not limited to being the “smokin’ hot” pastor’s wife. 

Hehe 

It might have been a bit of an interesting take on the issue, but I think I offered an interesting perspective and important reminder to sort of recenter us as we spend time arguing on the internet with each other. 

You know, when being of one accord becomes too boring. 

It is my hope that rather than insulting each other on social media, we can have these conversations in love and aim to view the teachings of God rightly, not to be right in an argument. As I heard someone say before, My fear is not that I am wrong, it is that I am unfaithful.

So yeah. 

That’s all she wrote. 

Until the next episode. Take care.