Women in Ministry: Egalitarian or Complementarian

Our church has started preaching from the Pastoral Letters 1 and 2 Timothy and today's passage was from 1 Tim 2:8-15, with these problematic verses:

1 Timothy 2:11-15 ESV

Let a woman learn quietly with all submissiveness. I do not permit a woman to teach or to exercise authority over a man; rather, she is to remain quiet. For Adam was formed first, then Eve; and Adam was not deceived, but the woman was deceived and became a transgressor. Yet she will be saved through childbearing-if they continue in faith and love and holiness, with self-control.

I have had sessions from the previous church I attended where the pastor had brought us through his Complementarian view, which I don't fully agree with. 

But I have not delved in deeper on my own. 

Until today. I had to dig out my copy of Two Views on Women in Ministry and I have just started reading. It will be a long read. 

Two Views on Women in Ministry

by Linda L. Belleville, Craig L. Blomberg, Craig S. Keener and Thomas R. Schreiner.

I just remembered I also have a copy of this book by Craig S. Keener who holds the Egalitarian view. I need to dig into it as well.

Paul, Women & Wives: Marriage and Women's Ministry in the Letters of Paul

by Craig S. Keener

It looks like I'm in a church with two opposing views to my own. Their Calvinism and Complementarian views to my Arminian and Egalitarian stand. And I'm not even sure of it's eschatological view yet.

So what does it mean for me? Does it matter?

I am okay with differing views on eschatology and women in ministry. It's only the Calvinism-Arminianism that I am more concerned about. 

But that will be for another blog post. 

pearlie

Back to the School of Christ: CEP/KVBC 2016 Day 1

I attended the first day of the CEP Preaching Conference today followed by the KVBC in the evening. It was a long 16-hour day having left my house at 7 am and only arrived back home at 11pm. It was indeed strenuous but a most blessed day as well. 

The speakers we had were David Cook, Paul Barker, Andrew Reid and DA Carson. It felt so wonderful to be again soaked in the Word of God with good insights from these excellent speakers.

I must say I wasn't very sure why when I signed up for this. I had not been attending this conference since the last one I attended in year 2010. I just thought I should get back to it and without much of an after thought, I just went ahead to register and paid for it. 

It was only after this day one of the conference that I know that it was the Spirit who drew me to it. I needed it. Thank you Jesus. 

The best years of my life was when I was pursuing my theological studies, when I was happily wading and swimming deep in the word of God. Ever since I graduated in year 2011, I have not been steeping my life in his Word as much, and I miss it so much. 

And so this is really a back to the school of Christ for me. As a result of the day and night long conference, a yearning for the Word is again growing from the inside. And I look forward to the next two days and from there to more and more of Christ in my life. 

pearlie

Questions I had with Genesis

In my recent commute to work, I was listening to Genesis on mp3 and it was very interesting as I began thinking as I listened. These were the few thoughts and questions I had.

1. I realised Adam and Eve actually had quite many years in the garden of Eden before they became discontented and wanted more. They bore another sin names Seth after the death of Cain, when Adam was 130 years old (Gen 5:3). So they would have had many years in Eden before they sinned and were banished.

2. Adam and Eve didn't seem sorry for what they did when they disobeyed God. They did not feel that they needed forgiveness. Was forgiveness something that "existed" then?

3. If Genesis counted for the hundreds of years men lived as literal years, why do we take each of the creation day as millions and billions of years? Moreover, other parts of Scripture interpreting the creation days as single days. 

4. Why did God go through all the trouble with the flood? Why don't he just wipe them all out expect Noah?

pearlie

A dangerous fallacy

Our preacher spoke about Watchman Nee in his sermon yesterday and he gave Nee's books high commendation, which I feel is worrying.

I have heard many times from reputable theological speakers and scholars say that Nee's theology is not very sound. And though I have not read anything by Nee, I would take these scholars' word for it.

When I brought this up amongst my friends, one of them commented that even though Nee is not theologically trained, it is good to read something different, something more spiritual and experience based.

I find that a dangerous fallacy.

When we read and learn about God and his truth, his gospel, we must only take God's word for it. Yes, we interpret what he says to understand it better and yes, we interpret it hermeneutically to apply his truth in our lives to live as his children. But we still interpret Scripture with Scripture, not based on our spirituality or experience (what "spirituality" really means warrants another long discussion altogether).

I'm not saying that our spirit and experience are not important. They are but they must rest on the Holy Spirit and the Word of God.

I was reading James M Hamilton's commentary on Revelation for devotion today and what he says here is relevant:

We must know the gospel, know our Bible, and know Christian theology so that we can tell the difference between someone who increases our faith in Jesus by telling us the truth about his greatness and someone who makes us feel good about ourselves by giving us pep talks and “encouragement” to rely on our own resources."

Do what the Bereans did when we listen to sermons and when we read Christian literature: "And the people of Berea were more open-minded than those in Thessalonica, and they listened eagerly to Paul’s message. They searched the Scriptures day after day to see if Paul and Silas were teaching the truth." (Acts 17:11, NLT)

That is one thing we do not do enough. We do not spend enough time meditating and studying God's Word. We do not need something different. We need the very Word of God. We need to dwell in it, to mull in it, to wade in it, to swim in it.

It's time we pull up a chair, sit, read and study Scripture.

pearlie
Source: 'Revelation' by James M. Hamilton Jr.; R. Kent Hughes, gen. ed.

Not so sure anymore

I led bible study today on Daniel 7 in CG and it was quite interesting for someone who have not really studied much on prophetic passages in Scripture. I don't avoid it, but I don't delve in it either.

And in preparation for Daniel 7, Rodney Stortz's Preaching the Word Commentary on Daniel interpreted chapter 7 with the premillennialism stance.

I used to be an amillenial. Now I'm not so sure. And so is take it as undecided as I would need to relook into all the passages and details before deciding.

pearlie

DA Carson is back in KL (9-11 Sept 2013): The God who is There

pearlie

Presuppositions, huh?

I read this in page 44 of Graeme Goldsworthy’s “According to Plan” in Chapter 3, “How Can We Know?” on the topic of “Presuppositions”:

Presuppositions, then, are the assumptions we make in order to be able to hold some fact to be true. We cannot go on indefinitely saying, “I know this is true because…” In the end we must come to that which we accept as the final authority. By definition a final authority cannot be proven as an authority on the basis of some higher authority. The highest authority must be self-attesting. Only God is such an authority.

The presuppositions we must make in doing biblical theology are those of Christian theism. The alternative to this is to accept the presuppositions of some form of humanism. Either we work on the basis of a sovereign, self-proving God who speaks to us by a word that we accept as true simply because it is his word, or we work on the basis that man is the final judge of all truth. The Christian position, to be consistent, accepts that the Bible is God’s Word, and that it says what God wants it to say in exactly the way he wants to say it.

Thus, when the biblical theologian sets out to describe the theology that is in the Bible, he must understand the presuppositions that he accepts as the basis of his method. Many of the bible theologies that have been written over the past hundred years have been shaped by the presuppositions of humanism. In such cases the Bible is not allowed to speak for itself, but is subjected to a continuous assessment on the basis of human reason, which is seen as quite independent of God.

The presupposition of an independent and self-sufficient human reason has resulted in the writing of biblical theologies that tend to be descriptions of the supposed development of religious ideas among the biblical people. Such descriptions are complicated by the refusal to accept the Bible’s own testimony of the history of Israelite faith. When evolutionary philosophy was popular it was applied to the biblical documents to test their historical accuracy. The assumption was that religious ideas undergo a natural development from simpler to more complex forms. The possibility was excluded that the God of the Bible actually exists and reveals himself in the way the Bible depicts. Man is in control of the whole process of knowledge-gaining and God is only a religious idea that many people hold in varying forms.

I need help in understanding this section. I am okay with it until the third paragraph. My question is this: what are some of the many “bible theologies written over the past hundred years” that have been shaped by the presuppositions of humanism? What are these “writing of biblical theologies that tend to be descriptions of the supposed development of religious ideas among the biblical people”, that are “complicated by the refusal to accept the Bible’s own testimony of the history of Israelite faith”?

I would like to know because if it has been around for the past hundred years, it would have been instrumental in shaping my thoughts, and I would need to know in order to correct my understanding to a biblical theology that will take on a Christian theism and not humanism.

pearlie

The Plan or The Drama?

I have a book review to work on for my TEE module on Bible Theology. The list of books to pick from consists of:

(a) G Goldsworthy, According to Plan (IVP, 1991)
(b) T D Alexander, From Eden to Promised Land (IVP, 2008)

(c) M Strom, Days Are Coming (Hodder & Stoughton, 1989) [= The Symphony of Scripture (P&R, 2001)]
(d) E P Clowney, The Unfolding Mystery (IVP, 1988)
(e) V Roberts, God’s Big Picture (Paternoster, 2009)
(f) C G Bartholomew, The Drama of Scripture (Baker, 2006)

I have briefly checked out all the books, and decided on either Goldsworthy's According to Plan or Bartholomew's The Drama of Scripture. I bought both the book, started on them and like them both. Now I am not sure which one to pick. Though they speak of the same topic, i.e. the bible story as a whole, their approach is different.

Goldsworthy goes into it by giving an excellent and simple introduction on what biblical theology is and why is it important to us. He then tackled the storyline of the bible from the beginning right up to the end of the Old Testament but linking every theme to the New Testament, he completes the study by looking into the New Testament with "new creation" as the theme.

Bartholomew on the other hand approaches it using the model of a play, i.e. the Drama of Scripture. He divides it into 6 acts:
Act 1: God Establishes His Kingdom – Creation
Act 2: Rebellion in the Kingdom – Fall
Act 3: The King Chooses Israel – Redemption Initiated
Interlude: A Kingdom Story Waiting for an Ending – The Intertestamental Period
Act 4: The Coming of the King – Redemption Accomplished
Act 5: Spreading the News of the King – The Mission of the Church
Act 6: The Return of the King – Redemption Completed

I started reading The Drama of Scripture about a month ago but I stopped a third way through. Now that I try to pick it up again, I found that I have forgotten what I read. So I have decided set it aside and start on According to Plan instead. I find According to Plan much simpler but The Drama of Scripture more creative in its presentation. I am not sure yet which I will end up reviewing. We’ll see how it goes.

pearlie