Women's Roles (Part 2)

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Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry coming to you from Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston.

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No Compromise Radio is a program dedicated to the ongoing proclamation of Jesus Christ. Based on the theme in Galatians 2, verse 5, where the apostle

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Paul said, but we did not yield in subjection to them for even an hour, so that the truth of the gospel would remain with you.

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In short, if you like smooth, watered down words to make you simply feel good, this show isn't for you.

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By purpose, we are first biblical, but we can also be controversial. Stay tuned for the next 25 minutes as we're called by the divine trumpet to summon the troops for the honor and glory of her

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King. Here's our host, Pastor Mike Abendroth. Welcome to No Compromise Radio ministry.

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My name's Mike Abendroth. I'm your host. I'm also privileged to be the pastor of Bethlehem Bible Church, just north of Worcester in West Boylston, the town that is famous for giving water to Boston.

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And we today will talk about the issue, the very spicy topic, the picante topic of women's roles in ministry.

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Lots of people have different views. There are cultural views. There are sociological views.

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There are political views. There are so -called evangelical views. And frankly, I'm glad everybody can have their own view.

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After all, this is 2010 and people like to weigh in, comment, blog, contribute, all kinds of other things.

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But I only have one source of authority and that authority is not my gizzard. That authority is not your gizzard.

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That authority is not what the culture says, what majority says, moral majority, whoever has the most votes we determine.

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Ultimately, decisions like this are determined by the word of the living God. Scriptures are our only authority.

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And last time we talked about this topic, we talked about radical feminism. And today

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I want to continue talking about men and women's roles in the gospel ministry. We are not talking about, can women be secretaries of state?

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Was Margaret Thatcher sinning because she was the prime minister of England? Those aren't my issues.

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Can you submit to a woman at work if she's your boss? All those may be asked in terms of questions, but today we want to talk about how does a local church function?

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If you have a woman pastor, a woman elder, is that biblical? Most people say when

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I tell them the ground rule is the scripture, it is our only authority, so the scriptura, and if you'd like to add tradition, mysticism, emotions, pragmatism, then you're acting like a

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Roman Catholic who would say it's not just what the Bible says, it's also what church tradition,

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Roman Catholic tradition says, and it's what the Roman Catholic magisterium says. At least they're honest, and they say we have three ways that we can learn from God.

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Well, if you're a Protestant, you have one way, and it's not what society says, it's not to what the voting booths say, it's not what your parents taught, it's not because you have a current pastor who's a woman and she was a better teacher than the man pastor, it's not because the men won't step up to do their thing, so somebody's gotta step up and do it, the wrong way is better than no way, it isn't any of those things, it's what does the

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Bible say? That is the issue. Remember there was a lady at this church, oh, it was probably 12 years ago now, and she said that she was an

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English teacher and that she could read the Bible better than I could for public scripture reading. First Timothy chapter four makes it clear we are to read the scriptures as an act of worship, and this particular person said that she was a better reader than I was and she's probably right, but that is not the issue.

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Culture cannot determine who reads, expertise cannot determine who reads, what does the

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Bible say? And so we had a big verbal knockdown drag out that is talking about it, and I said, well, you can read the scriptures here in this pulpit over my dead body, and that is the issue, isn't it?

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Where are the men of God to stand up to say this is the truth? If you wanna have a different religion and say we have a religion and we have a

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Jesus who doesn't speak in his word through the apostles, and it's a small

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J, or we call him Jesus or somebody, I don't know what you call him, and we have different scriptures, fine, just don't call it

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Christianity. Historically, biblically, we have a

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God who has spoken. Now, last time we learned that the Bible, far from being some kind of tread on me, patriarchal, suppressing women and not letting them have their full potential, we saw that there's all kinds of ways that women would minister in the

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New Testament and in the Old. In the New Testament, Romans 16, in the list of people that Paul greets who are wonderful ministers of the gospel, when

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I say ministers, that is servers of the gospel, he greets many, many ladies.

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He commends Lois and Eunice for teaching Timothy the sincere faith that these ladies have, that these ladies had.

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We talked about how you can serve the Lord wherever you might be, but today we wanna talk about what does the

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Bible say about ladies in gospel ministry, and if they're submitting to one another, submitting to men, does that make them worse?

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We know that there's neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, neither male nor female, all are one in Christ Jesus.

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Nobody's better than anyone else. Men and women are equal in God's eyes.

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Women are not inferior, men are not inferior. The biblical view is that men and women have a high status as image bearers of God himself.

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The low status of women is not biblical. So don't ever say, well, the

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Bible does that to ladies. It does not. Just because the Bible calls ladies to be submissive to their husbands doesn't mean they're not equal.

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Just because men are called to be submissive to their bosses does not mean that they are not equal.

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And so the place that I'd like to look at today is 1 Corinthians 11. Did you know that you can be submissive and still be equal?

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And we find that in the Godhead, Christ the Son being submissive to the Father, yet we know they're both equally and fully

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God by essence and by nature. I want you to understand. 1

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Corinthians 11, verse three says that Christ is the head of every man, and the man is the head of the woman, and God is the head of Christ.

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God is a head of Christ. Is Christ inferior to the Father? No, you could read

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John 10, John 17. By no way is the Father greater than the

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Son in essence and in nature. But Jesus the Son willingly submitted himself to the

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Father. He humbled himself in obedience. He submitted.

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And so we know Jesus is equal to God. Jesus is God. God the Father, God the Son, God the

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Spirit are co -equal, and they are both, excuse me, they are all three God.

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And so we wanna make sure that when it comes to submission, you don't say to yourself, that makes me inferior.

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The private is not inferior to the general when he submits to the general's order. And we look at 1

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Peter 3, verse one, in the same way, wives, be submissive to your own husbands, so that even if any of them are disobedient to the word, they may be won without a word by the behavior of their wives.

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Be under the husband's authority. Be ranked under in a military sense, because it's

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God -ordained, and it's for harmony. And then it says in verse five, maybe you don't like these verses, but they are in the

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Bible nonetheless. 1 Peter 3, five, for in this way in former times, the holy women also, who hoped in God, used to adorn themselves being submissive to their own husbands.

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Thus Sarah obeyed Abraham, calling him Lord, and you have become her children if you do what is right without being frightened by any fear.

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It is a very difficult thing, I agree. It is very difficult, certainly, because the curse has happened.

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First book in all the Bible, Genesis chapter three, the curse happened, the fall happened, and this is what

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God said to the woman. I will greatly multiply your pain in childbirth. In pain you shall bring forth children, yet your desire shall be for your husband, and he shall rule over you.

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You'll wanna take over that position of authority from your husband, but he will rule over you.

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Submission is part of the fabric of life. The church has to submit to the elders.

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The elders submit to the Lord. We submit to our bosses. Wives submit to their husbands, and the list goes on and on.

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We submit to the government. Nobody's better or worse because of submission. Titus chapter two, verse five.

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What should you teach ladies? To be sensible, pure. If you're an older lady, what do you teach younger ladies?

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To be workers at home, kind, be subject to their own husbands, that the word of God may not be blasphemed.

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Do you know, you can yell out four -letter words and curse people and blaspheme God by that.

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God, I don't trust you. God, you're not loving. God, you don't do this, that, or the other. But you can also blaspheme

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God by not being subject to your own husbands. Ephesians 5 .22,

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wives be subject to your own husbands as to the Lord. The verse goes on in verse 24.

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But as the church is subject to Christ, so also wives ought to be to their wives in everything.

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Short of asking you to sin, you should submit to your husbands. It's proper, Colossians 3 .18, wives be subject to your husbands as is fitting in the

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Lord. Certainly submission isn't wrong, is it? No, it's biblical, it's commanded.

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When Jesus submitted to his sinful parents, Joseph and Mary, was he less than they were?

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Of course not. Demons submit to disciples, citizens submit to the government, the universe submits to Christ, servants submit to masters, children submit to parents.

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This is not a novel concept, although it is a very unpopular one.

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It is very, very unpopular. Submission is hard because you have to submit to sinful leadership.

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So what I want to talk about today is leadership in the local church. Can women be pastors?

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Can women be elders? Well, they can be, but should they be? Is it biblical? Is it honoring?

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Should they do that? Should you go to seminary to learn how to be a pastor if you're a lady? And again, I can listen to myself as I have my headphones on and realize how quaint this might sound, how barbarous this might sound, how caveman -ish it might sound.

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But the issue is, what does the text say? We are men and women bound by the

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Word of God, are we not? And so 1 Timothy 3, the book that teaches us what to do in a local church tells us exactly what happens when it comes to pastors, elders, overseers, bishops.

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Should they be women or men? 1 Timothy 3, it is a trustworthy statement.

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If any man aspires to the office of an overseer, it is a fine work he desires to do.

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So man and he, personal pronoun. An overseer then must be above reproach, the husband of one wife.

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So you should be a one -woman man. It shouldn't be the other way around. Titus 1, what are the qualifications for elders, overseers, shepherds, bishops, pastors?

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If any man be above reproach, the husband of one wife. And that's what we do.

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That's what we do in gospel ministry. 2 Timothy 2, verse two, we have these sayings, we have this truth, and we are to entrust this in the ministry to faithful men so that they can teach also.

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After all, this is what the Bible teaches us to do in a local church. 1 Timothy 3, verse 15, you need to know how to act in church.

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Paul says, I write so that you may know how one ought to conduct himself in the household of God, which is the church of the living

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God, the pillar and support of the truth. We're talking today about men's roles and women's roles.

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They're different. Specifically, we're talking about the role of men and women in a local church.

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And I know you're saying, well, we don't have good leadership, all these other kind of things.

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If you don't have qualified men leadership, men who are leaders in your church, it's not a church. It might be tax -exempt, might be good social club, there might be good things that happen, the

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Lord might bless the word that comes out of there, but you've got to have leadership to have a church. It's like if you don't have Jesus, you don't have a church, you don't have

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Jesus as leaders, you don't have a church either. And you can't say, well, for pragmatic purposes, we'll just change the

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Bible around a little bit because Jesus would understand. He'd understand our situation. Yeah, he does understand your situation, and it is wrong, and you ought to do the right thing.

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It's never too late to do the right thing while you still have your breath. Listen to 1 Timothy 2.

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If you want to go to one passage that talks about men's roles and women's roles in a local church service, you ought to go to 1

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Timothy 2. People spill all kinds of ink on it trying to do the hop, skip, and jump. They try to pull vault over and around it because any child, any

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Martian would come to the world and read this and go, oh, that's what that means. But when you have to take the plain reading of a text and twist it all around with some kind of Stretch Armstrong material or some kind of Gumby kind of material, you are in big trouble.

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Likewise, I want women to adorn themselves with proper clothing, modestly and discreetly, not with braided hair and gold or pearls or costly garments.

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When you're going to make yourself up and it comes to a local church, you just don't want to be so consumed with yourself that you want to just show off what you look like and how much money you have.

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No, it should be an internal issue. Verse 10, but rather by means of good works as befits women making a claim to godliness.

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If you want to be godly in a local church, you should be concerned about the internal disposition.

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And then, of course, the internal will determine the external. Verse, 1

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Timothy 2, verse 11, let a woman quietly receive instruction with entire submissiveness.

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No women teachers in the local church. Learn, let them learn.

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That's an imperative. Women should be taught in a church. By the way, that is not something that was very common.

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Women were to be seen, not heard. They are also not to be taught, let alone vote.

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You don't teach the ladies this stuff. Paul says here, you teach the women. Why, because they're image bearers, because they're equal in Christ Jesus, but they have different roles.

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And they are to learn in silence. They are to be quiet with submission. They're to line up underneath that male qualified teacher.

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Verse 12, in case you're wondering, here it comes. But I do not allow a woman to teach or exercise authority over a man, but to remain quiet.

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I don't allow that, Paul says. He is forbidding that. You can't be a woman pastor.

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You can't be a woman preacher. You can't be a woman elder. You cannot do that. If you want to go evangelize, and you want to go serve, and you want to teach your children, and you want to teach other ladies, those are all fair game.

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But here, Paul says, no women teaching. Now, what does it say to a culture, an evangelical culture, that can take this verse,

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I do not allow a woman to teach or exercise authority over a man, but to remain quiet, and turn it around to mean the opposite?

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Here's what people want to make this verse say. But I do allow a woman to teach and exercise authority over a man, and not to remain quiet.

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What does it take? I'll tell you what it takes. It takes an agenda. It takes a sinful agenda. It takes an agenda that says,

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I don't care what God says. God doesn't know the culture. Paul's got a problem, and all this strikes at the authority, inspiration, and inerrancy of the scripture.

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Paul says, I do not allow, this is the local church context, a woman to teach or exercise authority over a man, over children, over other ladies.

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That's all fine and dandy. But here, over a man, the answer is no. And you say, well, why?

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I'd like to have some reasons. Certainly, if the text ended there, that would be reason enough.

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But God, in his mercy, his kindness, his generosity, has told us more. He says there's two reasons that should happen.

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One, because of creation order. First Timothy chapter two, verse 13. My name's Mike Ebendroth.

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This is No Compromise Radio Ministry. We're talking today about women's roles, how women are equal in Christ Jesus, but they have different functions in the local church, and they ought not to be pastors, and teachers, and elders over men.

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And if you're at a church that has women pastors and elders, it's no church and you ought to just get on out of there.

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You ought to just giddy up and move on over. Should you approach the leadership first? Yes, but pastors, women pastors are like grape nuts.

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They're not grapes and they're not nuts. And I guess that falls short of my analogy, because they would be women, but they would not be pastors.

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So we'll just move right on. The creation order determines why there should be this kind of order.

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For it was Adam who was first created, and then Eve. And so Paul says this doesn't happen because there's a fall.

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Back in the Garden of Eden, before the sin, there was still a pecking order. There was just still submission, even when there was no sin.

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So don't say, since sin has come into the world, everything is messed up, and therefore now women have to submit.

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Yes, sin came into the world and everything is messed up, but even before it was messed up with the mire of sin, there was a submissive woman and a leading man.

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What's wrong with that? That's simply what the Bible says. God established this as part of his plan, his creation.

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And when you go against that, you're going against God himself, his plan, his order, his creation.

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At the end of the day, it's no different than saying, let's kill a baby.

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That same logic that says, let's kill part of God's creation, a baby. Let's kill an abortion.

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Let's kill part of God's creation, a marriage. That's divorce. Let's kill God's way of order, men and women.

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Let's have women preachers, women pastors. That's the same kind of thinking. I know at the end of the day, one is not, one's real murder and the other ones are not.

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But just the concept, the philosophy, the thinking that would do that very thing. Eve was not to be the one who was the head.

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Adam was. And then he gave another reason. And the first reason was creation order. Second reason was because of the fall, 1

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Timothy 2 .14. And it was not Adam who was deceived, but the woman being quite deceived fell into transgression.

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Eve was the one who was deceived. Adam was not deceived. Adam knew exactly what was going on.

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Eve was prone, more prone by nature to be deceived because she was born a follower.

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And so she followed Satan. Adam was the one who gets credit for the sin. He should have protected her.

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Shame on Adam. His headship should have been exercised. He should have leaded.

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He should not have followed her. He should not allow her to do that. And Adam has the one,

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Adam is responsible ultimately for this fall. But it was not because of deception. In a pastoral ministry, there's all kinds of people that try to deceive.

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Oh, certainly congregants could deceive, but there's theological deception that goes on, satanic deception that goes on.

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Theological discernment is needed. And while women excel in other areas where men don't excel, that's why we need each other, women in general don't excel in the area of this very thing because of the fall, more prone to do certain things.

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I mean, I'm not trying to say men are better because God said before the fall, men work. And after the fall, men don't work as much.

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And we're prone to laziness. We are more prone to laziness than a woman would be prone to laziness.

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You see women and they're busy bees and they're workers and they're industrious in general. And men, they've got a problem and their problem is laziness.

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Well, the problem for a woman is she's gonna try to rule her husband and she has to be careful because there's a creation order and there's something called the fall.

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The fall should tell us when Adam and Eve plunge the race into sinfulness, that there is a problem with being deceived.

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So we have to be careful. Here's what we want. First Corinthians chapter 14 talks about orders, order in services.

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There's gotta be some kind of order. And that order is not made up by Robert's rules of order.

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That order is not made up by Oprah. That order is not made up by loud, zealous ladies, by loud, zealous men, by weak, mousy men.

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I'll tell you what, if you let women go sinfully, they'll try to rule.

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And if you let men go sinfully, they'll let them rule and they'll be lazy and they won't rule.

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They meaning the men. And so we have the word of God and the spirit of God to help us do the right thing according to God's way.

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You say, well, it pleases me to have my woman pastor. It may please you, but it doesn't please the

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Lord. It doesn't please the Lord. There's plenty for ladies to do in gospel ministry.

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We looked at that last time. There's women who have been widowed and they have been godly, 1

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Timothy chapter five, and they're to be put on a list, a list of honor and a list of financial support, a list of put these women in high esteem, local pastors.

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Make sure you look at them and say, this woman has served the Lord. Let's honor her financially.

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Titus chapter two says, older women likewise are to be reverent in their behavior, not malicious gossips, not enslaved to much wine, teaching what is good.

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Should women teach? Yes, but not men and not in a local worship service, that they may encourage the young women to love their husbands, to love their children, to be sensible, pure workers at home, kind, being subject to their own husbands, that the word of God may not be dishonored.

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So you say, well, there were women leaders in Israel like Deborah. Well, that's true.

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But David, who is an Old Testament king, could not be a New Testament elder. New Testament elders are the leaders in the local church.

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David would not be above reproach and he would not be able to do that. And so just because we have Deborah in the Old Testament does not throw out the

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New Testament rules for male leadership. Show me a church with godly male leadership and I'll show you content ladies.

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I'll show you men who want to serve and want to lead and ladies would love to follow real leaders.

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We don't believe in the ends justifying the means. We believe in what the Bible says. Men and women are equal.

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Men and women have different functions in life, at home, at work, and in ministry. This is

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Mike Abendroth at Bethlehem Bible Church and NoCompromiseRadio .com. No Compromise Radio with Pastor Mike Abendroth is a production of Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston.

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Bethlehem Bible Church is a Bible teaching church firmly committed to unleashing the life transforming power of God's word through verse by verse exposition of the sacred text.

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Please come and join us. Our service times are Sunday morning at 1015 and in the evening at six. We're right on route 110 in West Boylston.

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You can check us out online at bbchurch .org or by phone at 508 -835 -3400.

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The thoughts and opinions expressed on No Compromise Radio do not necessarily reflect those of WVNE, its staff or management.