I've just finished reading Men and Women in the Church, by Sarah Sumner. Its a refreshing and challenging stab at the decades-old issue of how men and women should relate, looking at headship and leadership both in the home and in the church. It challenges both those who hold to Grudem/Piper-esque Complementarism, as well as those who believe more in Egalitarianism.
She points out that both camps make assumptions and both camps depart from the teaching of the bible. In doing so, she points to a third way. She isn't the first to do this (Craig Blomberg has suggested something similar). Nevertheless, her book is a fresh and provocative overview of the whole issue, and left me reconsidering my beliefs.
At the end of the book she looks at some issues surrounding the core debate, one of them being the issue of sexual sin in the church.
It should be normal for men and women to fight together for sexual purity. Most of the time the subject it so taboo that we feel way too ashamed to admit out temptations, much less to confess to our sin. Thus we tend isolate from each other rather than ministering to each other. We practically pretend that none of us have any hormones. Consequently, many Christian men are rarely held accountable for the suggestive and demeaning kinds of things they sometimes say to Christian women. And women in the church are rarely held accountable for the way they dress.
How can the people of God win the world for Christ when we are unwilling to modify the way we express our sexuality? Much of us know that the issue of sex and modesty is a hypersensitive subject in church.
I believe the church could greatly recover from a lot of our sin if Christians would be more willing to confess our sins out loud and repent.
-- "Men and Women in the Church", Sarah Sumner. 2003.
What do you think? Do you agree with Sarah? Is she on to something here?
6 comments:
Regarding the author's quote, good points, but what she says begs the question in that there is no a priori agreement among Christians (of whatever era or denomination) on appropriate conduct for men or dress for women (or vice versa!) What *is* needed is for open *discussion* between us as members of a Christian community on these issues.
Thanks Adam. I agree with you, and from reading her book it appears her standards might be a tad prudish for me. Nevertheless, its something I think its church needs to discuss. Her main point is, however, that we don't even talk about this stuff, and then end up sinning...
Hi Paul, thanks for your comments.
I agree with you that sexual sin is not our only problem! However that was the context of Sarah's observation, as she reckoned it was issues of sexual sin, over and above other sins, which may cause problems with men and women working together in leadership. Indeed, such a topic is one we have blogged on in the past! Her point is basically is if we can get past this, it will be easier for men and women to work and lead together. I think this is a very insightful point.
I agree with your wider point, you are basically summing up's Paul's doctrine of the "stronger believer" helping the "weaker believer".
Its clear to me that there were local issues with women that caused Paul and Peter to suggest they dress more modestly. Sarah insists that in her context, the problem still exists and women continue to dress inappropriately.
You bring up the topic of the "third way", I'll start a new comment to answer.
The "third way" is basically a moderate position between Grudem's/Piper's position and that of say, Gordon Fee. Without having the book in front of me its difficult to summarise, but basically she advocates that women should be leadership in the church but that we should not ignore gender differences, they have not been removed by the cross. Its not that
- men and women and created equal BUT different (Piper/Grudem)
OR EVEN
- men and women and created different BUT equal (Fee)
BUT SHE ASSERTS THAT
- women and men are created different AND equal.
She also reminds us that a husband is the head of his wife, and no amount of fudging will change that. Head does not mean "source" or even "ruler", it simply means head. In other words, Paul is using a metaphor. And it does not collapse simply into meanings such as leadership. The bible doesn't say the husband is the leader of the household, its says he is the HEAD of the WIFE. Likewise, she is the BODY of the husband. Neither head nor body is better. Its a mystical picture, a one flesh union.
Its a very good book and I recommend you read it.
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Thanks for the info, Zack.
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