Backstory
They cancelled the trip, and I was devastated! I had traveled to Mexico as a translator with our church four times in the last year, and on one of those trips, I had the privilege of leading a husband and wife to the Lord. Now they were getting baptized, and they scheduled it to coincide with our trip. But none of the leaders were available for this one. Of course, I volunteered to lead the trip, but I was told that, because I’m a woman, I was not qualified. Instead, they cancelled the trip.
This threw me for a loop because while I was raised pretty conservatively, our family was church-planting missionaries. If there was a hole, we plugged it. So other than preaching to the congregation or leading a Sunday school class of mixed adults, my mom, my sisters, and I filled every ministry position possible. There were times when we led music, handled the nursery, led discussions in youth group, and took American groups around the city for ministry opportunities.
A few years later, we were attending a different church, and the pastor asked me if there was any particular passage in Romans 12 I would like to teach on a Sunday night. This shook me because if I wasn’t qualified to lead a team on a missions trip where I wouldn’t even be teaching, how could I be qualified to stand in the pulpit and exposit a Bible passage for the congregation?
That is when I decided it was time to find out for myself what the Bible actually teaches about women in ministry.
This is not a subject I ever wanted to dive into. Don’t get me wrong, I know this topic is important, but it is not a fundamental of the faith. So I think it is important to define a few things.
In matters of faith, there are primary, secondary, and tertiary issues. Here are the broad strokes.
Primary Issues
Primary issues are what give us different religions (Galatians 1:8-9, Philippians 1:27, Romans 16:17). They define what you believe about
- who God is,
- who Jesus is,
- which sacred text you adhere to,
- what problem man faces and how to solve it, etc.
Primary issues are what make Christians Christian. They define what we believe about right and wrong, and they shape our worldview. While these issues have been muddied recently and many who don’t hold to the fundamentals of Christianity are now calling themselves Christian, the topic of women in ministry does not fall in this category.
Secondary Issues
Secondary issues are what give us different denominations (1 Corinthians 8). Again, these are broad strokes, and there are issues that might straddle the lines depending on how vehemently someone holds to his position. Secondary issues include topics like
- speaking in tongues,
- baptism,
- healing ministry, etc.
While we wouldn’t question each other’s salvation, we probably would not sit in the same church for worship on a Sunday morning.
I believe the topic of women in ministry falls squarely in this category. I have heard arguments on both sides of this issue from people who truly believe they are right and feel they can support their position biblically. They are trying to hold true to what the Bible says, yet they come to different conclusions.
Tertiary Issues
The third category is tertiary issues, and they are issues that are open to debate within the same congregation (Romans 14). Not only are these issues not salvific, but they also don’t interfere with worshipping together in the same pew during a Sunday service. They fall clearly in the “Christian liberty” category. These issues can include things such as
- tithing,
- who can take the Lord’s supper and how often it is practiced,
- which translation of the Bible you use, etc.
While it may seem like these issues don’t matter as much, Paul does put boundaries on our Christian liberty, so we need to make sure we apply them.
You can find a more detailed discussion on this topic here.
It is important for us to understand that in discussing what the Bible teaches about women in ministry, we are not questioning whether or not someone who disagrees with our position is saved. So now that we have the boundaries set, let’s get into it.
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