Biblical Manhood and the lost gospels

I feel it is a abiout time for a rant. I have not had a good rant for a while. So when I read CBMW » The Gospel and Biblical Manhood and Womanhood it got the blood pressure up and I prepared to write while the steam was still coming out of my ears. However, since then time has passed and I am now writing this at a little distance from the initial reaction.

I am grateful that others have already responded and encourage you to read The Gender Debate – a Gospel Debate? - a Church by Dave Woolcott.

I so often find that beyond my concern for justice and the Kingdom of God that it is the poor tactics and the poor use of scripture that really gets to me when I read articles like this one. So here are a few challenges to the article:

• John Starke writes:

A good question to ask in order to gauge the importance of an issue is, "How closely related is this issue to the Gospel?"

Well yes, I would not argue with that. But what Gospel is it that we are talking about? The entire article is based on Ephesians. Now I love Ephesians, a fantastic letter for encouraging Churches. But to imply that "Ephesisans = The Gospel" is plainly ridiculous. If we are going to decide if something is important and consider how related it is to the gospel then it is more than a little odd to not refer to any of the four gospels at all. Or to the rest of Scripture. This is a strange beast, neither a Bible Study on Ephesians nor a full Gospel based examination of an issue.

• If we are going to refer to the Gospel (the Good News of Christ) then personally I want to hear more about Jesus. I want some theology that refers to the teaching of Jesus and to who Jesus is (the article has a low Christology - Jesus as fully divine is never recognoised except very obliquely).

• If we are going to use Ephesians then let us do so by recognising that this is not a letter to individuals but to a Christian Community, a Church (or more than one). This post individualises Christian faith, it makes it about individual men and women rather than about Christian communities (Churches) and Christian households (families). This individualisation puts a very different perspective on every issue including gender. Paul is writing about a household as he knew it. That does not match a Western understanding of an individual man and woman with or without 2.3 kids. Anything that tries to apply Paul's writing without any consideration of cultural differences is trvialising Scripture, not engaging with it.
• If we are going to use Ephesians then let us be sure to pick up some of the significant themes. Dave Woolcott points out that John Starkey ignores the demand for unity that is so powerful in Ephesians. Given that unity stands against the division of people and communities then it hardly supports the case for dividing people based on gender, maybe no surprise that this theme seems to be missing fcroim John Starkey's Bible.
• If we are going to use Scripture then let us be careful to not pick and choose and ignore verses that challenge our simplisitc viewpoint. It is therefore hugely significant that Ephesians 5: 21 "Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ." (TNIV) gets missed out. Instead the whole argument is built upon verses that follow and depend on the very verse 21 that is carefully ignored - Oops!

Finally the biggest failing of the argument and one that totally destroys the whole cae being presented comes in the last paragraph which I quote in full:

Second, a central concern of Paul in all his letters, especially Ephesians, is not only Gospel clarity, but also how the Gospel applies to the Christian life. If we have confusion as to how men and women ought to act and fulfill divinely intended roles in the Church, marriage, and family, then there will be confusion as to how to apply the Gospel to the Christian life. As we see in Ephesians 5, God has particular applications of his Gospel that are gender specific. If we lose the gender specificity, then we lose a divinely intended Gospel application.

Remember this is the edited version of the section that starts in Ephesians chapter 5 no mutual submission). He writes "If we lose the gender specificity, then we lose a divinely intended Gospel application."
Hold onto that  for a second.

Now go back to Ephesians 5 & 6 and review the other forms of submission that it requires.

6⁵ Slaves, obey your earthly masters with respect and fear, and with sincerity of heart, just as you would obey Christ. ⁶ Obey them not only to win their favor when their eye is on you, but as slaves of Christ, doing the will of God from your heart. ⁷⁸Serve wholeheartedly, as if you were serving the Lord, not people, because you know that the Lord will reward each one of you for whatever good you do, whether you are slave or free.

Does anyone believe that we should tell slaves to obey their earthly masters? Does anyone believe that today the gospel is better served by telling slaves not to rebel and seek freedom but to serve wholeheartedly? Should we be telling girls trafficed for msex today that they should obey thgeir earthly masters. Should we condone and support such trade on the grounds of Ephesians 6. Of course not. Yet the need for women to submit to men is taken from the very same section as the one for slaves to obey their masters. How can we treat the two differently?

John Starkey writes: "If we lose the gender specificity, then we lose a divinely intended Gospel application." But we have already lost the master/slave specificity and would anyone dare claim we have lost a divinely intended Gospel application.

In fact far more than that. We came to realise through using the whole of the Gospel of Christ - in particular the example and teaching of Jesus, the Christ, the Son of God - that to not condemn slavery was to deny and damage the Gospel of Christ. In the light of Ephesians 5:21 to continue to demand submission for women after after rejecting it for slaves is unsupportable.

Hat tip: Role Calling: The Gospel and Biblical Manhood and Womanhood.

Comments

[Dave]

Hi Dave!
I am very happy that we are of one mind on this article by Mr Starke. I am not sure when you visited but we were visited by Mr Starke who tried to point out my confusion. Sadly he did not stay for very long!
Dave

[Dave]

That is a common occurrence in these discussions ;-)

[A Different Dave]

I found another nonsensical statement in the Starke piece: "At a very significant level, the Gospel applies to a wife differently than it does to her husband."

What???

Contrast Galatians 3:28 - "There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus."

Obviously there can be discussion about exactly what John Starke and St Paul mean, but you could easily argue that the Galatians verse indicates that Paul understood the gospel to apply to men and women equally.

Your rant was thoroughly justified!!

[Bridget Jack Meyers]

Trying to keep up with what passes for "logic" at CBMW makes my head hurt.

My favorite argument is when male headship advocates try to say that the master-slave teachings still have application in our day and age in the form of employees obeying their employers. It's like, that's nice, but what about the places where slavery is actually still practiced? Are you in favor of slaves obeying their masters there?

Just point that out and watch them squirm.