Tag: elders

Discerning a calling (1) A process for the local church

The place where potential pastors, youth and children’s leaders and women’s workers are likely to be identified is in the local church and that’s exactly where it should be.  A healthy church wants to encourage members of the church family to use their gifts to serve the Gospel.  In some cases, this will mean considering… Continue reading Discerning a calling (1) A process for the local church

Do you take the role of pastor/elder seriously enough?

What exactly does it mean to be a pastor or an elder in a church?  First of all, you will notice that I am in effect using the words “pastor” and “elder” interchangeably because we are essentially talking about the same thing. An elder is someone who carries leadership authority within a family/clan/tribe linked to… Continue reading Do you take the role of pastor/elder seriously enough?

Men Women and Leadership … in practice

I hope you’ve found the recent #FaithrootsLive series helpful. The aim has not been to court controversy but help us to think better about how to honour Christ and love his church. Here’s the last in the series where we Consider some of the potential objections and criticisms of complementarianism Begin to think about how… Continue reading Men Women and Leadership … in practice

Male and female leadership questions (5) Implications for church life

First of all, I think we can rule out two extremes.  We cannot take the egalitarian approach but nor can we endorse the traditional Brethren approach and a number of traditional approaches which in effect fail to recognise that women are equal in nature.  We should recognise that sadly churches have got this badly wrong… Continue reading Male and female leadership questions (5) Implications for church life

Male and female leadership questions (4) Pulling things together theologically

We are now in a position to see how the boundaries function together in order to create theological principles which should shape church practice. We’ve seen that there are both permissions and restrictions for women in Paul’s letters in terms of leadership and teaching. We’ve also seen that these relate to Creation and The Fall… Continue reading Male and female leadership questions (4) Pulling things together theologically

Male and female leadership questions (3) Boundary texts

In this section, I want to have a look at some of the key and at times controversial Bible texts and give a bit more exegetical detail on how we are to understand them. 1Timothy 2:12 “I do not let women teach men or have authority over them.” This forms part of Paul’s instructions to… Continue reading Male and female leadership questions (3) Boundary texts

Male and female leadership and teaching roles (1) Introduction

I’ve been serialising some of my work on the Biblical view of men and women (The complementarianism v egalitarianism debate). Here I begin to look at the implications for church leadership. These following articles are based on a discussion paper which was used in a specific church context. I’ve attempted to make it more generally… Continue reading Male and female leadership and teaching roles (1) Introduction

Provision and protection

I have been preparing some stuff on the Doctrine of Humanity and the next section will include a look at Genesis 6, the Nephilim and the sons of God.  I start by saying “Man and woman are together made in God’s image to complement one another. God blesses them by providing for them and protecting… Continue reading Provision and protection