Her.meneutics

Her.meneutics

What is your response when you see the word her.meneutics?
I got to thinking about the word when I saw Christianity Today's blog called Her.meneutics. "Her.meneutics is the Christianity Today blog for women, and provides news and analysis from the perspective of evangelical women."
It made me think of herstory vs. history. Perhaps it reminds us that women are (or should be) included in the study and interpretation of Scripture? Is it reverse sexism? Do you like it? Is it even necessary? Is it clever?

What do you think?

Nothing but jealousy

The Pilgrim Holiness Church and the Wesleyan Methodist Church merged in 1968 to become The Wesleyan Church.
Here is a bit of history that you might find interesting and encouraging.

The Pilgrim Holiness church, founded by Seth Rees (father of Paul S. Rees, prominent in the founding of the National Association of Evangelicals in the 1940s), opened wide the door to women preachers who comprised 30 percent of its ordained elders in its early decades. Rees's wife served with him as copastor and coevangelist. Against those who opposed women preachers, Rees countered, "Nothing but jealousy, prejudice, bigotry, and a stingy love for bossing in men have prevented woman's public recognition by the Church."-Dayton, Discovering an Evangelical Heritage, 98

Who am I that I should withstand God?

As a result of Wesley's changing attitude about the role of female preachers in his movement and the testimony of many witnesses to the abundant fruit of their labor, the English Methodist Conference was eventually led to recognize officially a number of these exceptional women. In these later years, when Wesley was asked why he encouraged certain of his female devotees in this practice, the elderly sage replied simply, "Because God owns them in the conversion of sinners, and who am I that I should withstand God"-Chilcote, John Wesley and the Women, 182.

First Women's Rights Convention

Women’s Rights Meetings Held in Wesleyan Methodist Chapel-1848

"The first Women’s Rights Convention was held in Seneca Falls, New York, in July 1848, in the Wesleyan Methodist chapel. Four years later, when the New York State Temperance Convention refused to recognize delegates from the Women’s State Temperance Society or to hear Miss
Susan B. Anthony, Luther Lee defended the women’s right to participate. When his efforts to convince the conference failed, he opened his church, the Syracuse Wesleyan Methodist chapel, to the women for an evening meeting. The church was packed, while the convention was almost deserted." --Women in Wesleyan Ministry: A Brief History by Mari Gonlag

The Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood

In an earlier installment on this blog (1/29/09), I referred to the misconception called complementarianism. This position is taken by co-authors John Piper and Wayne Grudem of Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood: a Response to Evangelical Feminism. Dennis Bratcher of CRI/Voice Institute http://www.crivoice.org/index.html informs us about Wayne Grudem and the Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood:

Wayne Grudem...happens to be the president of The Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood. That organization, whose voice is primarily heard in opposing women's involvement in ministry, has roots deep in the Southern Baptist Convention. Basically, the position of this organization is that all problems in marriage and family come from a failure of the husband to be in charge. Note one of their statements of belief: "In both men and women a heartfelt sense of call to ministry should never be used to set aside Biblical criteria for particular ministries. Rather, Biblical teaching should remain the authority for testing our subjective discernment of God's will." In other words, God himself does not want women in ministry, and any who think otherwise, no matter how "heartfelt" their call, are simply wrong. -Dennis Bratcher

Miriam

"Sing to the LORD, for he has triumphed gloriously; horse and rider he has thrown into the sea." -Exodus 15:21

Did you know it was Miriam, the sister of Aaron, who sang this verse that we sing in our worship songs? She sang it celebrating the victory of crossing the Red Sea.

Deaconess/foremother

Romans 16 is a letter of recommendation, the earliest letter of recommendation for a Christian minister, and it's written for a woman, Phoebe, who is, in the beginning of the chapter, said to have been a deacon, not a deaconess--but a deacon in the sense of a preacher, a minister--because Paul uses the same word for himself. He calls himself, in a number of instances, a deacon of the new covenant in 2 Corinthians. -HELMUT KOESTER

One of the common arguments against women in ministry is that the word deaconess is used when referencing women in the New Testament with regard to calling and gifts. This point of view defines deaconess as one who helps only, not one who leads. If women are always denoted as deaconesses and not deacons in the Scripture, then clearly they are not meant to be lead pastors or shepherds. However, this quote is from an article that refutes the idea that women cannot be preachers/ministers. The author makes the argument that translators have commonly interpreted the same word as deaconess for women and deacon for men.

So, it looks like Phoebe could and should be a role model for women. She is our foremother. By the way, my computer didn't recognize the word foremother. But it did recognize deaconess.

Hmmm....