WWUTT 1613 Women Should Keep Silent in the Churches (1 Corinthians 14:34-40)

The Apostle Paul says to the Church that all things must be done properly and in an orderly manner.

God has built His Church and He gives instructions to His Church to follow when we understand the text.

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Pastor Gabe. Thank you, Becky. Well, our last day in 1 Corinthians chapter 14, as we have verses 34 to 40 that we need to cover.

I'm going to go ahead and read that out of the Legacy Standard Bible the Apostle Paul wrote to the Church in Corinth.

The women are to keep silent in the churches, for they are not permitted to speak, but are to subject themselves, just as the law also says.

But if they desire to learn anything, let them ask their own husbands at home, for it is disgraceful for a woman to speak in church.

Was it from you that the word of God first went forth, or has it arrived to you only?

If anyone thinks he is a prophet or spiritual, let him recognize that the things which

I write to you are the Lord's commandment. But if anyone remains ignorant about this, he is ignored by God.

Therefore, my brothers, earnestly desire to prophesy, and do not forbid to speak in tongues.

But all things must be done properly and in an orderly manner.

So we have the final instruction on this section, and then we have Paul kind of summarizing, closing it out, everything that he's been talking about since chapter 12, but especially in this chapter, as he's talked about, spiritual gifts for the edification of the

Church and the proper practice of speaking in tongues. In verse 34, we have this instruction, that the women are to keep silent in the churches, for they are not permitted to speak, but are to subject themselves, just as the law also says.

Boy, that is controversial in our feminist culture today, is it not? Understand, though, the context into which we come when we read this particular instruction.

What have we looked at here in this latter third of chapter 14? We had three verses that gave instructions on speaking in tongues, and it was to be two or at the most three.

That was verses 26 to 28. Verse 27 says, if anyone speaks in a tongue, it should be by two or at the most three, and each in turn, and one must translate.

If there is no translator, he must sit down and be quiet. Let him speak to himself and to God.

Then in verse 29, Paul gave instructions there about prophesying.

Remember back to the beginning of chapter 14, it was in verse 1.

Pursue love, yet earnestly desire spiritual gifts, but especially that you may prophesy.

For one who speaks in a tongue does not speak to men, but to God. For no one understands, but in his spirit he speaks mysteries.

But one who prophesies speaks to men for edification, for exhortation and encouragement.

So you have the proper practice of speaking in tongues, and the greater encouragement that you may prophesy.

For it is by prophesying the word of God that the church is edified, is exhorted, and is encouraged.

Speaking the word of God in a way that makes sense to the people who are present. You know, we see this even in the

Old Testament. It's in Nehemiah 8 .8 where it talks about the word of God being spoken to the people, and it says they gave the sense.

So they speak the word of God and they help the people to understand what it means. This is done in the language of the congregation, so that the people know.

It is not done in a foreign tongue so that they may not know. That they're left going, okay, what did you just say?

You can claim to be in the spirit all you want, but if it doesn't benefit the body, then it was not from the spirit of God.

For God is a God of order, not of disorder. And he is not a

God of confusion, but of peace. So Paul says in verse 33, as in all the churches of the saints.

So we have these instructions about tongues. We have instructions about prophecy. And when we get to, again, the latter third portion here, we have those first three verses, 26 to 28 about speaking in tongues, verses 29 to 33 about prophesying.

And just as tongues was supposed to be one, two, maybe three, and somebody has to translate or that guy has to sit down and be quiet.

So it is with those who prophesy. Let two or three prophets speak and let others pass judgment.

For you can all prophesy one by one so that all may learn and all may be exhorted.

That's in verse 31. Don't be talking on top of one another. All of this needs to be done in an orderly way so the church may learn.

They hear the word of God that grows them in godliness. So that's the last instruction we got before we get to verse 34, right?

We've been told about prophesying. But when it comes to prophecy, it must only be men.

Those who stand up and prophesy or speak, proclaim the word of God, according to his scriptures, they must be men who do this.

So Paul clarifies in verse 34, the women are to keep silent in the churches, for they are not permitted to speak but are subject themselves, just as the law also says.

Of course, it's the same kind of instruction that we have in 1 Timothy 2. And we have it in the same sort of manner delivered there.

Paul talks about prophesying in 1 Corinthians 14, and this must be done by men. In 1

Timothy, he reverses it. He forbids women to speak first and then gives the qualifications for men who prophesy, or the pastors and the elders and the teachers in the church that we have those qualifications listed for in 1

Timothy 3, 1 through 7. Before you get to the qualifications for an overseer or a pastor of the church, you have, of course, that controversial instruction in 1

Timothy 2 .11. A woman must learn in quietness in all submission.

I do not allow a woman to teach or exercise authority over a man but to remain quiet.

And then Paul grounds that by going back to the order of creation.

This is the way it was from creation, and so it must be in all churches and all places at all times.

For it was Adam who was formed first and then Eve, and it was not

Adam who was deceived, but the woman being deceived fell into trespass, but she will be saved through the bearing of children, if they continue in faith and love and sanctification with self -restraint.

So notice here in verse 34, that Paul says that the women are to keep silent in the churches.

They are to subject themselves just as the law also says. Well, he doesn't clarify exactly where in the law it says that.

What does he mean? I believe it's the same thing that he said in 1 Timothy 2, because Genesis is the law.

Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy, those were the books of law. So as it says there about the woman being made from the man, which

Paul had specified even earlier here in 1 Corinthians, that was in chapter 11, that woman was made for the man.

So it is in the creation order, she is his help meat. And even when you read of the curse, even after man and woman fall from grace to the woman,

God said in Genesis 3, 16, I will greatly multiply your pain and conception in pain.

You will bear children. Your desire will be for your husband and he will rule over you.

So that's even part of the curse. It's in the order of creation and it's in the curse that the woman must be subject to her husband and the man will rule over the woman.

So this is in the law. Furthermore, you can see even in the, in the order of worship that is given to Israel in the law, there were not women priests.

All of the priests in the tabernacle and in the temple were men. They were never women.

Now there were occasions in which prophets were women, but a prophet is a different order.

A prophet is not always a prophet. A prophet is only a prophet. When God has revealed a word to him that or her, that that person is supposed to communicate to somebody else.

So like Amos, for example, says that he is not a prophet nor the son of a prophet. He was a farmer and God revealed something to him that he was to speak in the time and place in which he was to be a mouthpiece for God.

So a prophet wasn't always a prophet and same. It was with a prophetess. There may have been a time in which

God was revealing something to a woman. Deborah is spoken about as being a prophetess, as well as a judge in Israel.

There was Holda talked about in second Chronicles 34. Isaiah refers to his wife as a prophetess.

And of course there was the prophetess, Anna, the daughter of Fanuel who was waiting for the coming of the

Messiah. We read about her in Luke chapter two. So there were occasions which God revealed something to a woman who would prophesy.

It was very rare and it is not the way that God speaks to us now. Hebrews one, one long ago at many times and in many ways,

God spoke to our fathers by the prophets. But in these last days, he has spoken to us by his son whom he is appointed heir of all things.

And even during that time of the prophets, when it came to those who actually administered worship in the holy places, that was only men priests, only in the tabernacle and in the temple, all of the apostles were men.

There were no women who were apostles, no matter what people want to say about Junia, whoever

Junia was man or woman, there's even dispute as to whether or not that's a man's name or a woman's name. He or she was not an apostle.

And you have no examples in the new Testament whatsoever of women being pastors.

This is an office that is limited only for men. Now, as Paul is addressing the

Corinthians here, he's using the word prophesy one who prophesies it's one who is speaking the word of God.

This is not the same order as a prophet that you would read about in the old Testament. We're talking about somebody who was speaking the word of God to the people in order to worship in church for the purpose of edifying, exhorting and encouraging the body through this word that is being spoken.

It's essentially the same role as a pastor. Paul is just using a different word here as though we speaking of the function of that office and not the office itself.

So he doesn't use overseer as he does in first Timothy three, but rather one who prophesies, this is a gift.

It is a gift of the Holy spirit that one does this and does so in a way that the people may understand, not only making sense of the words that are said, but explaining those words so that the people of God may walk according to these things.

That is for men to do. Women are not permitted to stand up and prophesy or preach as the word may go.

That's in the old Testament and that's in the new Testament and all these things again, back to verse 33 in all the churches of the saints, this is the order that things are supposed to be in.

God is not a God of confusion, but of peace. This is therefore his instruction.

It goes back to the law. It is present in the instruction that goes for the churches today.

The women are to keep silent. They're not permitted to speak. They are to subject themselves just as the law also says.

Now, as Paul clarifies in Ephesians chapter five, a submissive woman, one who submits to her husband and to submit means to yield to authority.

It doesn't mean that she is less than the man. You will hear feminists say that, but they slander the word of God.

When they say that that's not what submission means. It doesn't mean she's less of a human being than he is.

Her role is to submit to her husband who is to be the head of his household. As Christ is head of the church.

She is the model of submission for the whole church. The whole church is supposed to submit.

The church submits to Christ. He is supposed to be the model of headship for the whole church.

As Christ is the head of the church. Now, a husband is to submit to, but he doesn't submit to his wife.

He submits to Christ. All that you see there in Ephesians chapter five, there's context of submission going on there.

I have a what video about that, but we're not in Ephesians five right now. We're in first Corinthians 14. So as far as this role goes of speaking, the word of God to his people,

God intends for men to do that in verse 35. Paul says, if they desire to learn anything, let them ask their own husbands at home.

For it is disgraceful for a woman to speak in church. It's disgraceful for everybody in the congregation.

And it's disgraceful for the woman who does it. And when there is a woman that is standing over a church and preaching to that congregation, everybody is in judgment.

That church has already left sound doctrine and God is giving them teachers to scratch their itching ears.

As Paul had said to Timothy, Hey, this goes for even that church that puts a woman in the pulpit on mother's day.

There is at no point where this rule can be bent. God has called for men to be the leaders in the church and to administer the teaching of God to his body.

And so it must be a man. If there is not a man who will stand up and do it, then God will give them a woman to do it.

And that is to their shame. It is disgraceful for a woman to speak in church. Now it's a, it's no coincidence here as we're talking about the right practice of speaking in tongues.

We're talking about the right manner of prophecy and how that's revealed and communicated to the church. We then get to this instruction about women keeping silent because it is very, very common in charismatic churches that women preach happens all the time.

You can, you can pull up any one of these charismatic preachers online and you will find that there are women in that church who are preaching or who will stand up before the congregation and will lead the teaching.

They may even have pastors on staff that are women. So hence this instruction falls in with the speaking of tongues, the right way to handle prophecy.

And then there's Paul saying, women are to keep silent. This goes from the law, even to the new

Testament. If they desire to learn anything, let them speak to their husbands at home because he is the spiritual head of their household and he will be the one to guide her in the truth that God has spoken according to his word for it's disgraceful for a woman to speak in church.

And that speaking in church is in the context of preaching again, because it's just, it has just followed the instructions on prophesying.

It doesn't mean that women need to come into the church with duct tape on their mouths and can't say anything until church is over.

That's not the instruction there. So verse 36, was it from you that the word of God first went forth or has it arrived to you only?

This is like the questions, the rhetorical questions that Paul had asked at the end of chapter 12. Was it from you?

The word of God first went forth. No, that's the answer to that rhetorical question. Or has it arrived to you only?

No. Remember, we go back to verse 33 where Paul said that this is an instruction.

This applies in all the churches of the saints. It applies to you. It applies to every church everywhere.

These instructions that have been given verse 37. If anyone thinks he is a prophet or spiritual, let him recognize that the things which

I write to you are the Lord's commandment. Paul is saying what I, what I am addressing you with comes not from me.

This is not the opinion of a man. These are instructions that come from God. And if anyone thinks he is a prophet or spiritual, because what are the two things that we've talked about here in this chapter, mainly prophesying and speaking in tongues, the one who thinks he is a prophet, the one who thinks that he knows the word of God, that he may prophesy it to God's people and teach them, or the one who is spiritual, the one who believes that he's been filled with the

Holy spirit and now he can speak in tongues. Let him recognize that the things which I write to you are the

Lord's commandment. The one who truly speaks the word of God knows that this word that has been written to you, this epistle, this letter that comes from the apostle

Paul to this church. These are words from God. The true prophet will know that the one who is truly spiritual will know that the one who truly has the

Holy spirit of God, who is not chasing a feeling or who is not trying to be noticed and, and praised by the people of the church, by how spiritual he can be or how great these spiritual gifts are that he exercises.

The one who is truly filled with the spirit will know this letter is the command of Christ to his church and beware how many people there are out there who are saying that Paul's letters don't count or they speak in tongues as though what

Paul wrote was not from Christ and is somehow less than what Christ said in the gospels.

Beth Moore has done this a few years ago. She said, my basic take on life thus far, if tons of folks are saying one thing and Jesus says another,

I'd pretty well go with Jesus on it. I know this is hard for some to swallow, but Paul is not our savior.

Paul would be horrified. I believe by the way he has been deified unquote, she didn't clarify what she meant by that, but I can tell you exactly what got under her feathers.

It was the fact that, uh, people have been quoting Paul to her from first Timothy two, 11 to 12 saying that I do not permit a woman to teach rather she is to remain quiet.

And Beth Moore is taking that to mean that, Oh, people have deified Paul. She treats

Paul's letters as being less than Christ words. But folks, every word that we have in the new

Testament came from an apostle or the teaching of an apostle, even the gospels, even the stuff that you have written in red letters that was written down by an apostle.

Jesus said it, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Well, Matthew and John were the direct apostles.

Uh, Mark and Luke were students of apostles. Uh, but you understand what

I mean. So these apostles wrote these things down that Jesus said, but what

Paul writes is every bit as much the word of Christ. And that's what he's saying here in first Corinthians chapter 14, what

I am writing to you is the Lord's commandment. And if you are truly a prophet, if you were truly spiritual, you would know that Peter gives this warning in second

Peter chapter three, beginning in verse 14. This is a longer sentence.

So I got to start there. Therefore, beloved, since you are looking for these things, be diligent to be found by him in peace, spotless and blameless and consider the patience of our

Lord as salvation. Just as also our beloved brother, Paul, according to the wisdom given him, wrote to you as also in all his letters, speaking in them of these things in which are some things that are hard to understand, which the untaught and unstable distort as they do the rest of the scriptures to their own destruction.

Peter saying there that Paul's words, the letters that he writes to you, they are equal with all the rest of the scriptures.

And if anybody ignores them, if they twist them, they do it to their destruction.

So beware those teachers that try to say that Paul's words are somehow less than Christ words. They're not.

They are the word of Christ. This is Jesus Christ speaking through his apostle. And so what we have here in verse 37 is even

Paul saying, what I have said to you is the Lord's commandment verse 38.

But if anyone remains ignorant about this, he is ignored by God. Kind of, kind of scary then when you consider some of those teachers who will say then things about Paul's letters as being unimportant or even questioning the authenticity of the authorship of those letters as though to say, well,

Paul didn't really write that that came from somebody else. That wasn't even from the apostle Paul. If that's the way you're going to treat the word that has come from the

Holy Spirit to God's people, you ignore God and you're ignored by God. Verse 39, therefore, my brothers earnestly desire to prophesy and do not forbid speaking in tongues.

I've explained that earlier. So the greater instruction, the greater gift is to have a gift of prophecy.

Speaking in tongues is great. If it's real, if it's authentic, if it is truly from the Holy Spirit, as we see it demonstrated in the book of Acts, it's real human languages that are being spoken by people who did not know those languages.

And it must be done in a proper way. According to the instructions that Paul is given here, don't discourage someone from speaking in tongues if they do it, but it must be real and you must test and see there must be somebody to translate it or otherwise, whatever word they're saying is useless.

And then finally, verse 40, bringing this to a close, but all things must be done properly and in an orderly manner.

Amen. Heavenly father, thank you for the order that you have given to us here in your word and teach us to live by it, that we may encourage one another, that we may exhort each other, that we may edify according to the word of God, because it is by your word that we are grown in Christ.

We grow in our fellowship with the Lord. We grow in love for one another as your word and your commandments have led us to do.

And we read these commandments with joy, knowing that God loves us. So he has revealed his mind and his heart to us.

We are not burdened by these commands. We delight to walk in them as worthy sons and daughters of God.

It's in Jesus name. We pray. Amen. You've been listening to when we understand the text with pastor

Gabe Hughes, Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, Gabe will be going through a new Testament study. Then on Thursday, we look at an old

Testament book on Friday. And on Sunday, we take questions from the listeners and viewers. Tomorrow we'll pick up on an old