Emerging Diversity - Part 3 - Women/Gender
Gender: Humanity's Most Basic Diversity - Genesis 1:26-31
Few topics have so consistently divided Christians throughout history than the topic of the role of women in the Church. Fortunately, in recent years, a greater freedom and equality for women is being experienced. Women are being released in their unique giftings and callings, breaking down barriers of the formerly insurmountable walls. But again, to go deeper in this is so key to our growth as the Church in this age, that our failure to do so would be one of the greatest failures in history.
While the increased involvement of women in every aspect of ministry has been a phenomenal breakthrough for much of the Church, there still remain more subtle barriers to their full involvement and investment. It is not enough to acknowledge the equality of women in both value and position, if we maintain systems, structures and even theological understandings that remain exclusive and patriarchal. Let me try and explain it in other terms.
Again using the model of First Nations people, let's consider the role the government has to play in making restitution for the wrongs committed against these people in the past. When settling land claims and treaty rights, the government often faces a great deal of resistance from the non-Native population. Many of them do not understand why the aboriginal people should get special treatment. A common question is, “If they want equality, shouldn’t they have the same laws, limits and freedoms as the rest of us?”
Few topics have so consistently divided Christians throughout history than the topic of the role of women in the Church. Fortunately, in recent years, a greater freedom and equality for women is being experienced. Women are being released in their unique giftings and callings, breaking down barriers of the formerly insurmountable walls. But again, to go deeper in this is so key to our growth as the Church in this age, that our failure to do so would be one of the greatest failures in history.
While the increased involvement of women in every aspect of ministry has been a phenomenal breakthrough for much of the Church, there still remain more subtle barriers to their full involvement and investment. It is not enough to acknowledge the equality of women in both value and position, if we maintain systems, structures and even theological understandings that remain exclusive and patriarchal. Let me try and explain it in other terms.
Again using the model of First Nations people, let's consider the role the government has to play in making restitution for the wrongs committed against these people in the past. When settling land claims and treaty rights, the government often faces a great deal of resistance from the non-Native population. Many of them do not understand why the aboriginal people should get special treatment. A common question is, “If they want equality, shouldn’t they have the same laws, limits and freedoms as the rest of us?”
What this question fails to account for is the difference between equality and equity. Simply put, equality is the condition or quality of being equal. Equity, on the other hand, is more specifically concerned with the fair determination of equality, according to proper reason. Therefore, to say that equality is to treat two very different people of very different cultures the same way, would be like saying that a person with a severely severed leg should not receive treatment before someone suffering from a headache, all in the name of equality. In the same way, when striving to celebrate gender diversity, we cannot equate equality with commonality.
Generally speaking, men and women have differences in the way they view and respond to the world around them. Rather than contradictory, these differing perspectives reflect the intentional complimentary nature of humanity that God instilled. While this does not limit either gender to “boxes” into which they must fit, it does recognize that like culture, God has invested something unique of Himself into each gender, something we can more fully understand and appreciate through mutual relationship and unity. It is also something that can be lost if kept repressed, instead of released and valued as a necessary part of the whole.
However, as we study history, women have been humanities most consistent victims of subjugation and oppression. Sadly, the Church has too often been the leader in such repression, both through blatant prejudice or unwitting ignorance. Due to this, Western Christianity (which has gone on to be the dominant expression of the faith in missions) developed its systems, structures and theological understandings from a narrow, exclusively patriarchal perspective. And while these are all good and valuable within the context of the whole, their distinct exclusion of the other half of humanities view has left a huge deficit in our understanding of God and our practice of the Christian faith.
The reality we face as the Church, then, is to know God in a truer and deeper sense. We need to begin to encourage the development of not only women leaders, but also women theologians, thinkers, administrators and pastors. We need to allow the way we do, see and understand things to be changed to include the needed “new” perspective they have been given by God. We need to explore the fullness of God through the context of His most precious creation, humanity- both male and female. All of humanity is made in His image, neither gender being more central or significant. Until we can grasp this, our maturity and effectiveness as believers in this age will be seriously crippled.
Again, this dedication to the diversity of humanity should in no way compromise the basic doctrinal truths of the Word of God. This understanding does not add something new to the character of our Creator, but rather rediscovers a very old, lost truth. This becomes very difficult, as many Scriptures can be (and have been) wrongfully understood and applied to uphold the false prejudices. These have never been, nor will ever be, easy problems to resolve. However, failure to try and work through these key matters has much too high a cost to ignore, even in the face of disagreement and conflict. (For a thorough treatment of this issue, read the book "Why Not Women?" by Loren Cunningham & David Hamilton, YWAM Publishing, 2000. Download the free PDF version of "I Commend To You Our Sister" by David Hamilton, considered one of the most researched thesis on the topic ever done).
Part Four of this series will briefly examine some of the pitfalls of this journey and wrap it up with a final challenge.
(taken from my book, "Looking Forward: Facing the Future of Christian Leadership")
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