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A Woman's Place

Gender Bias In The House of God

Years ago, I was over Dr, Henry Johnson’s house when his granddaughter with the way-too-cold-hands was gleefully playing with me. In her eyes was all the promise of the entire planet. A great author. A great poet. A great physician. A great lawyer. She was, at age four, all promise. There was absolutely no deceit in her. She tells me she loves me and she means it, and I’m just a goner. I’d empty my bank account for her and I’d throw myself under a bus to protect her.

And, yet, my thoughts drift to the many lessons life has in store for her. That, sooner than we think, some boy or some man is going to wound her. And the day will come, far sooner than we expect, where those eyes that sparkle with life and trust will take on a more guarded aspect. Where just the smallest part of her innocence will be stolen away because somebody broke her heart. That’s how it begins. And, shelter her all you want, you simply can’t prevent it from happening, mainly because the boys, the boys, the boys are never really educated about girls. About how to cherish and protect them. About how to not abuse their trust and friendship. Far too many of our churches teach boys absolutely nothing.

Paul vs. Women

Old Testament Law was fulfilled by the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, which means we no longer are under the Law but under grace. Most of our pastors, therefore, look not to the oppressive Levitical Law to govern our modern-day attitudes toward women but look to the oppressive Pauline epistles—letters the Apostle Paul wrote to the emerging churches of Jesus Christ. Jesus Himself gave no gender-specific regs to women, and the biblical model of His divine personal example is Jesus treated women fairly, with dignity and respect. There are no biblical examples of Christ behaving in a sexist fashion or treating women harshly.

The Apostle Paul, on the other hand, seemed to dislike women intensely. His letters are fiercely oppressive and critical of women. He has very few kind words for the sisters, and he insists they exist mainly if not exclusively to service the men in their lives. Paul fiercely opposed marriage [I Cor. 7] and did not favor the education of women, but preferred they learn at home if their husbands so chose to educate them [1 Cor 14:34, 1 Timothy 2:11].

It is this teaching that forms the bedrock of our church doctrine today. Although we certainly teach women and give women what Paul would likely consider an unconscionable platform to share and express themselves, the Pauline Epistles remain, for conservative churches, God’s Law for His people, which we selectively apply. This is extremely bad doctrine and faulty exegesis. There is a wealth of good teaching within Paul’s letters, but accepting a plain-text reading of those letters as God’s Law and, for most churches, God’s Word itself, is terribly wrong. These are not God’s words. They are, by their own testimony, [I Cor 7] Paul’s words. When these letters refer to scripture as being divinely inspired and good for teaching, Paul was not talking about his own letters. He was referring to the Old Testament. There was no New Testament at the time of Paul’s writing. Paul, a fanatical Pharisee in love with God’s word, would be outraged to know his letters had been canonized, equated with the Holy Scriptures. This is not to take away any authority or divine inspiration from Paul’s words but to point out the words are, in fact, Paul’s and not God’s. Paul’s cultural outlook, his temper, his personality, saturates these words. He is also talking to specific people at specific times and about specific things. A plain-text reading of those words denies them their power and authority because we do not include the circumstances under which they were written.

The Ten Commandments are just that: universal truths written o everybody. But, to properly understand Paul’s teaching, we must invest ourselves in understanding who he was talking to and what was going on at that time. I have rarely seen this from a black pulpit. We just run around quoting Paul out of context and using his Rabbi’s disdain for women as our template for male attitudes within the church. I am, however, leery of female preachers and pastors.

My Roommate Puts Up With A Lot: she's minding her own business when suddenly a light is placed
next to her and a camera it thrust in her face....and she doesn't move out.

The Essential Sister

I was sitting in the pulpit next to a female minister at my former church when I glanced out at the first pew to see this pre-teenager, maybe fourteen or fifteen, had dozed off on the front pew. She was wearing an inappropriately short skirt—which is another sore subject for me, mothers who allow their daughters to dress like hookers—a skirt made all the more inappropriate because, much as this girl wanted to seem older and, I guess, sexy, she was still very much a child. So much so that she had dozed off the way a little kid does, kind of crumpled there in the pew, head back, mouth open, a rag doll with her legs splayed open, revealing polka-dot panties to the pulpit and choir stand which, on this particular Sunday, was filled with the church’s male chorus. Thirty or so grown men, the sinewy bulwark of the church, dressed in cheap, silly-looking matching polyester suits (memo to the men: PLEASE stop doing that), sat four pews deep behind me, Miss Thing and her privatewear in plain view of these gentlemen, none of whom made any effort to alert an usher. Failing to get an usher’s attention after many tries, I turned to the female minister sitting next to me and asked her to please go down to the front pew and cover up the kid. Which earned me a nasty look from the female minister, who said, “Well, why are you looking?” She then turned away from me and gave her attention back to the pulpit, ignoring me, the girl and the peep show the teenager was giving the male chorus.

All of which proved this woman wasn't ready. There are lots of women in pulpits across America who aren't ready. Who aren't submitted, not to the male but to God. Who wear their politics on their sleeve and whose main sermon topic tends to be about how tough it is to be a female minister. Oh shut up, already. Not allowed to preach in the pulpit? Oh, shut up, already. Sister, it is an honor and a privilege to preach God's word. If I have to stand out in the parking lot to do it, I am grateful. I am not against women preachers except to the extent that at least 90% of black women I've heard preach were, as this sister was, not ready. Not submitted. They were brassy and belligerent and defensive. They've taken on male attributes, male aggression, male mannerisms, which is contrary to God's plan. A woman should not have to be masculine to preach. A woman should be humble and broken and submitted and willing to help—most specifically in areas where she and she alone can be effective (as with this dozing teen).

Were I a female, a mother, a sister, this minister would have received my request less as a command than as what it was— a plea for help. Gender bias being what it is, it would have been unseemly for me, a male minister, to go down front and drape a towel over this girl’s legs. I’m sure her mother would have cussed me out and called me a pervert for looking in the first place. But, consequently, I’m surrounded by women so terribly wounded that they interpret everything every man says to them in the worst way possible. A female minister has certain powers and abilities far beyond what their male counterparts are capable of. Had this female minister gone down front, draped a towel over the girl's open legs, and thumped the child behind the ears, “Wake up!” nobody, and I mean nobody, would cast an accusing glance at her. Nobody would call her names or drag her into the pastor’s office.

“This is why the Mothers of the Church are simply essential,” the late Pastor Henry Johnson told. “In my day, the pastor would never have to ever deal with those kinds of things because the Church Mothers, the missionaries, the ushers, the First Lady— they'd catch this kind of stuff right away, offering to cover up the short skirts and plunging necklines and other inappropriate behavior inside the sanctuary. No pastor could effectively do his job without the church mothers there to step in and help him deal with women's issues.” I strongly agree. Young women and girls may sass me, but they'll think twice before trying to raise up on Mother, they'll be picking themselves up off the floor. See, that's Mother's super power: to love, to console, to encourage. And, when need be, to slap the ever loving daylights out of some fast, loud, arrogant girl who desperately needs boundaries and correction. She can do things we simply can't—under any circumstances. She can tell sister her skirt's too short. She can tell her her boyfriend's no good for her. And, yes, she can snatch ol' gal up when need be. The mothers of the church are there to take the younger ladies in hand and be a help to them. In many ways, the church mothers are more empowered than even the pastor. And, yet, the wise church mother, the spiritual church mother, is also fully submitted to leadership, and doesn't bring her unannounced luggage— gender bias towards men—to the church with her.

> Being able to navigate the tangled web of gender bias is one of the reasons female ministers are both essential and indispensable. But, if you haven’t been delivered from the hurt you had, as a child, as an adult, as a wife, if you’re still harboring resentment toward men and see enemies in all men, if you bristle and resent any request or instruction from a male in authority—you are utterly useless to the cause of Christ. I would that women in ministry, whether ministers or lay persons, receive input and instructions in a gender-neutral fashion. Which is to say, when I ask you to help me or to please assist me or to please do something, just act on those instructions as if a woman had issued them. Take the bias out of it and realize my asking you to do something means one of several possibilities: (1) it’s something that falls under your ministry; it’s your job to do this, (2) it’s something only you can do because you’re a female, otherwise I’d do it myself.

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I’m not asking you to cook me dinner. I’m not asking you to clean the house. I’m certainly not asking you for sex or trying to lord it over you. It drives me absolutely nuts that I have to over-explain and rationalize every request—these aren’t “orders” mind you—when, nine out of ten times, when I ask a brother for help, he goes, “Sure,” and just does it. With the sisters, I’ve got to play twenty questions.

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