Theology in the Raw - S2 Ep1043: Neither Complementarian Nor Egalitarian: Dr. Michelle Lee-Barnewell

Episode Date: January 19, 2023

Michelle has a BA from Harvard, 3 master’s degrees, and a Ph.D. from Notre Dame university. In other words, she’s smarter than you and I combined. Anyway, she’s also a lovely person who’s written a killer book called Neither Complementarian Nor Egalitarian, which addresses the pros and cons of where the current debates about men and women in the church lie. This book forms the topic of our conversation. We talk about Ephesians 5 and the meaning of Kephale (“head”), the meaning of leadership in the NT, and 1 Tim 2, among other things. Find out more about Michelle here: https://www.biola.edu/directory/people/michelle-leebarnewall If you would like to support Theology in the Raw, please visit patreon.com/theologyintheraw for more information!

Hello, friends. Registration is now open for next year's Exiles in Babylon conference, and I cannot wait for this conference. Here's a few topics that we're going to wrestle with. The future of the church, disability in the church, multi-ethnic perspectives on American Christianity, and a conversational debate on the problem of evil and suffering. We have Eugene Cho, Elise Fitzpatrick, Matt Chandler, Michelle Sanchez, Justin Gibney, Devin Stalemar, Hardwick. The list goes on and on. Joey Dodson's going to be there. Greg Boyd and Clay Jones, they're going to be engaging in this conversational debate on the problem of evil and suffering. And of course, we have to have

Ellie Bonilla and Street Hymns back by popular demand. And Tanika Wya and Evan Wickham will be leading our multi-ethnic worship again. We're also adding a pre-conference this year. So we're going to do an in-depth scholarly conversation on the question of women in ministry, featuring two scholars on each side of the issue. So Drs. Gary Brashears and Sydney Park are on the complementarian side and Drs. Cynthia Long-Westfall and Philip Payne on the egalitarian side. So March 23rd to 25th, 2023 here in Boise, Idaho. We sold out last year and we'll probably sell it this year again. So if you want to come, if you want to come live, then I would register sooner than later. And you can always attend virtually if you can't make it out to Boise in person. So all the info is at theologyintheraw.com. That's theologyintheraw.com.

Hello, friends. Welcome back to another episode of Theology in the Raw. My guest today is Dr. Michelle Lee Barnwall. And Michelle is a scholar, a writer, a professor. She has, listen to this rap sheet here. She has a BA from Harvard University, an MS from Pensacola Christian College, an MA from Talbot School of Theology, another MA from University of Notre Dame, and a PhD from University of Notre Dame. And her dissertation was published in the very prestigious Society of New Testament monograph series, I believe it's called, which is the hardest place to get your monograph published in. Her dissertation was on Paul, the Stoics, and the Body of Christ. She's also the author of Neither Complementarian Nor Egalitarian, Reframing the Gender Debate,

which is the topic of our conversation today. Michelle does a fantastic job kind of critiquing, pushing back on, reframing the debate over women in so-called ministry or leadership or however you want to frame it. So I read her book last summer. It's absolutely outstanding. Everybody needs to read her book. And that's why I'm excited to talk to Michelle. So please welcome to the show for the first time, the one and only Dr. Michelle Lee Barber. So excited to talk to you, Michelle, because your book, Neither Complementarian Nor Egalitarian, A Kingdom Corrective to the Evangelical Gender Debate, is an absolutely outstanding book. I read it last summer in my...

You probably can't even see. I've got a stack of all my women in ministry books and yours is in the midst of that stack. But thank you so much for being on the show, Michelle. I really appreciate you taking the time. Thanks. Great to be here. Thanks for inviting me. So the title is pretty provocative. Neither Complementarian Nor Egalitarian. Can you unpack what you mean by that? Are you really neither one or the other? Not you personally,, give us a summary of what the book's all about. How somebody could be neither complementarian nor egalitarian. Yeah, well, the basic idea of the book is I question the positions. I have a lot of respect for both of them. I think they make great arguments. I appreciate the people on both sides

of the debate. But kind of throughout, I've had some questions about whether any of the two sides can sort of fully capture what I think Scripture is trying to say about men and women in Scripture. And so the title is a bit of a play on Galatians 3.28, right? In terms of neither male nor female in that. And actually, I guess maybe here's like the secret thing. There's a little bit of a double meaning to it, you know, in that regard, because if you take it literally, I'm saying that there is neither complementarian or egalitarian. Is there a third way or so, you know, in this? I mean, really in the book, what I'm trying to do is give a different framework, give, you know, alternative positions, you know, and maybe a different way of looking at it. But I'd also say that in the Galatians 3.28

context, even though Paul says, like, neither male nor female, neither Jew nor Greek, there is a sense in which it can't continue. Because the way Galatians 3.28 goes on, right, he says you are all one in Christ. So in there's a sense is, you know, I try to tell people I'm not necessarily trying to convert people. You know, I don't want complementarians to be egalitarians or egalitarians to be complementarians. You know, in that regard, what I want is foritarians or egalitarians to be complementarians, you know, in that regard. What I want is for each person, each side, maybe to kind of question, you know, their position, you know, in that regard. And sometimes I say, ultimately, I want complementarians to be better complementarians. And I want egalitarians to be better egalitarians, because I feel like sometimes perspective is maybe a bit narrow.

And there are more things that we can do to, you know, broaden it in that regard. So really what I'm trying to do is kind of, you know, reframe things. Maybe in the end, we will say it's either complementarian or egalitarian. But mostly right now, I'm trying to ask questions. Can you, thank you. And that came out really well in the book. And if I remember correctly, it's almost like, I mean, after you kind of set up the book, it seems like some of the, like each chapter kind of alternated between like, kind of critiquing some parts of an egalitarian argument and then

the next chapter kind of critiquing some parts of a complementarian argument. Is that kind of how it's set up more or less? Or did I read into it too much yes yeah you very you read it you read it well and that i kind of start out with a little bit of american history trying to kind of think about like where did um sort of like where did these categories come from you know where did these concerns come from because a big part of the book is saying that the debate seems to be centered around these questions of authority and equality you know do men have a particular authority or is authority shared is there a certain type of equality instead? I definitely do alternate in terms of that. I have two chapters in terms of ministry and then two chapters in terms of marriage. your journey? Like, did you grow up in a complementarian or egalitarian context? And were you ever like, committed to one side or the other? Or what kind of led to you writing this book? Well, I would say that in some ways, just kind of growing up, I had maybe a little bit of

a mixed background. I mean, I grew up in a pretty traditional family, where my father was a bread winner. And he, in a sense, had sort of the authority and the helpful. My sister and I were encouraged to pretty much do everything our brothers did, you know, when it came to vocation and education. And so there was, there really wasn't a sense in terms of, you know, women are like this and, you know, our brothers are like this. I have to say that when I first became an evangelical and I heard about the debate, I was a little bit kind of befuddled by it. As far as my own journey, I would say maybe a big point for me in that is, as I began to, it was more like when I was a seminary student. And as I looked at, you know, the arguments for

both sides, and I approached it generally the way that, you know, we normally do. Here is the complementarian argument and here is the egalitarian argument. And, you know, which one do I prefer? You know, which one do I think is better? And so I kind of I put it in that way. But even then, I think there was this kind of nagging sense in me that I would I would think, you know, that's not the best argument, or this is a good argument, or, you know, this side makes this point, and that's really good, but I'm not sure about this point. So I think I just always had a little bit of a dissatisfaction, you know, with that. And then I think that another, well, I guess one turning point came to me, too, is when I was a graduate

student, and I was, my dissertation was on the body of Christ in 1 Corinthians 12. And so of course, naturally, as I'm studying this, I'm, you know, deep into the primary source material and antiquity in terms of how the body metaphor is used. And I'm going to come across some references to the head. And, you know, it was in that when I, because, you know, in terms of Ephesians 5, a big question in the debate is, you know, it was in that when I, because, you know, in terms of Ephesians 5, a big question in the debate is, you know, is this a universal principle or is this, you know, sort of cultural in that regard? And as I began to look into the primary source material, it just kind of dawned on me. And I wasn't even directly looking at this in regards to the debate. It's for my dissertation.

I began to think, well, well, it is cultural. I mean, the head metaphor is very similar in that regard, but the point doesn't seem to be as much whether it's cultural, but how it's being used. And that's when I began to see that, wow, Paul is using a metaphor in a very cultural way, but what he does is he basically turns it on its head. And that's the reason why that was so impactful for me is it began to make me realize I have all these assumptions

about how I approach the debate. I have all these assumptions about what leadership is. I have all these assumptions about, you know, interpreting the text and maybe not all of my assumptions are correct. So I would kind of say those are kind of the turning points for me. While we're on it, you just mentioned Ephesians 5. And obviously, one of the key terms there is kephale, the Greek word translated head.

And that was one of the more fascinating parts of your book. Well, you even used a phrase and it's a title of your article, Turning Kephale on its Head, which is a brilliant title. Can you unpack that a little bit for us? How do you understand what Paul's doing there? And then obviously that goes into what does Kephale mean? Is it authority? Is it source? Are those the wrong questions to even ask?

Well, as you know, so the basic conscience of the debate is what does head mean? When Paul talks about in Ephesians 5 that the husband is the head of the wife, does it mean authority, complementarian version? Does it mean source or preeminence in terms of the egalitarian argument? And so basically what I did is what I basically came across in my dissertation research is when you look at how the idea of headship, the idea of the head is used in the ancient writers, mainly a lot of ancient political writers, that it is used metaphorically and it used in terms of the position of the body. And so basically, the way they would use it is they'd say like, well, you know, as you look at the position of the body, if the head is on top, it must be the most important part because it's on top. That's why the feet are lowly because they are on the bottom.

And so the head metaphor is very useful to be used in political arguments if you're talking about, say, the emperor or a general, you know, in that regard. But what's interesting about that, so I felt like in terms of the ancient literature, that's a pretty common use of the metaphor. So you could just sort of say, oh, well, that must mean that the husband is head of the wife. He's in charge and, you know, and he gets all of these things. But what became to me so interesting, you know, in terms of the metaphor, is that in the ancient use, there are certain things that go along with a metaphor. If you are the head, you have privileges. You know, you get these basic privileges, and you are the one who is to be loved because you're the most important part. When you look at how Paul used the metaphor, he actually does the very opposite in that regard.

When he talks about the husband being the head, the head doesn't get the privileges. The head actually is the one who is supposed to sacrifice. And the head isn't the one that is supposed to receive love. The head is the one who is supposed to give love. So in other words, it's a kingdom reversal, you know, in this regard, it's kind of a paradox. And the other reason why this is important is because it really goes against the structures of you're supposed to work according to your station. So if you're the head, and you're supposed to have all these privileges privileges and you did the opposite, it's, well, on the one hand, it would be a shameful thing to do.

But the other thing is, according to antiquity, it would have to be suicidal for the body. There are these quotes in antiquity will say something, well, of course, if the body's in danger, you have to do everything to protect the head. Because if the head dies, the whole body is going to die, because the head is the most important part. So when Paul says for the husband as a head to sacrifice himself, he's actually doing something that would sound nonsensical, suicidal in that regard, because in that regard, if the head dies, the whole body dies. But in the kingdom, just like Jesus died so we could have life. Paul says the head dying in this regard is what brings about the unity in Ephesians. Because Ephesians 5, there's so much

talk about women submitting and the husband being the head, that what is not always seen is Paul says the purpose of all of this is to fulfill Genesis for the two become one in that regard. So I sort of see this really gospel outline, you know, in terms of this, which is supposed to be nonsensical, incomprehensible to the world. So would you, if I'm hearing you correctly, and please, if I'm not hearing you correctly, let me know. But yes, Kephale head does convey some idea of authority, but that the nature of authority just completely redefined and turned on its head almost. So, or are you saying that we shouldn't even use the concept of authority there as a translation

or understanding? Well, the idea is that how it's used and then sort of like sort of gospel redefinition, you know, in this regard. And to me, it makes me think about Matthew 20, where Jesus sort of says, well,

you know, here's, you know, the Gentiles, the rulers lord it over you in this regard, but whoever wants to be first must be the slave or the servant, you know, in this regard.

So it's not that, you know, say it's not that everything is kind of erased but what what paul seems to be doing is but we have to kind of ask what happens in that regard i mean what does you know if the husband is the head in this regard but he's the the servant you know in in this regard i mean i guess it does ask the question well what does that mean in terms of you know authority it's it's a play on that so so trying to redefine it or trying to define kephale as source and not authority would you say that's

just kind of a bit misguided or isn't would you say that that translation is a legitimate way to understand the source material that paul's reflecting on or um well i think in terms of i say personally source to me is is a bit vague you know like source of what you know you know in that regard so to me that's a little bit more difficult one um if you were to say something like preeminent i would say yes you know i mean these are all aspects you know i would say in terms of the way the metaphor is used things like authority leadership preeminence um you know which kind of encompasses both the complementarian and egalitarian definitions are kind of both in there. But what becomes important is not simply saying, we know what head is, you know, and therefore

we're going to take how it was understood in antiquity, you know, and sort of apply this. The point is, what is the gospel redefinition in this regard? How does Jesus, in a sense, turn it upside down to where it becomes paradoxical? Because I think what happens is often when we're talking about these different terms, we talk about, it's like a gospel modification, but it's more than that. It's a gospel complete redefinition of it which when you when you look at the household code in ephesians 5 and compare it to other greco-roman household codes it's like you have some semblance of similarity you have the shell that's still there but it just reads

so differently than aristotle that's like wives submit to your husbands because the woman is inferior and she's kind of half of a man or whatever and like at least she's a little better than a slave that's not even a human you know like he just has all these i mean typical uh hierarchical ways of viewing humanity and paul just obliterates that um or even like you know if i remember correctly like women were never directly addressed in the household codes. It was men keep your women in submission. It was like you, right, you dominate, you know, keep them in submission. Whereas here the woman is given agency and dignity by being addressed to submit to your husbands.

Is that correct? It's been a while since I looked at the source material. Yeah, and some of it too. That's helpful for me as you kind of reiterate that. I think one of the things we have to keep in mind is that when Paul is talking to culture, he's going to be talking in terms that they are familiar with in this regard. And so that's why it becomes so important. It's sort of not just does he use these terms, how does he use these terms? You know what I mean? And so much of what Paul does is the gospel is a critique of society,

you know, in this. It's a critique of that, you know, the societies that he's in. And one of the big aspects of the critique is, of course, the cross of Christ, right? You know, what the world thinks is going to be weakness is actually God's power. We see this in 1 Corinthians. What it thinks is foolishness is actually God's wisdom. So again, he's using their terms and redefining that, you know, sort of in a sense, turning them inside out, turning them upside passage you cited earlier about the first shall be last and the Gentiles lorded over them, but not so among you. I mean, that theme of reversal, and we'll get to the whole, like what leadership even is and how that theme is radically reversed in a second. Your chapter on that's pretty brilliant.

I want to go back to one of your beginning chapters where you... Oh, actually, no, no. Before we go there, the whole feminist kind of context of where this debate kind of has not started from, but kind of been influenced by, if you will. One more thing on Ephesians 5, the idea that Ephesians 5 is teaching mutual submission. So 521, submit to one another in love, wives to your husbands. Do you find that to be a helpful lens to say Ephesians 5 is actually teaching mutual submission? Or how would you respond to that argument? Yeah, well, I think definitely you have to take a look at 520 in terms of mutual submission. And I think maybe that is something.

I think maybe it's kind of Paul's signal. I mean, it's sort of like, hey, everyone, you know, this is going to be seen in terms of this, you know, in terms of this context. One of the things I think is, you know, Paul does quite a bit of this, you know, in his letters. He'll kind of say something and then he kind of qualifies it, you know, in this regard. So I definitely think Paul would sort of say, well, you know, in a sense, the whole church is built upon mutual submission, right? I mean, on the one hand, we're supposed to, we're all supposed to submit to one another. I mean, that's basically the posture of Christ. Right.

All right. It's the idea of, you know, being willing to sacrifice for one another. For Paul, this is what leads to unity. This is loving one another. So, yeah, it completely makes sense to me that Paul is going to start out with this, like, you know, remember, you know, this is in the context of you are all brothers and sisters in Christ. I guess my one hesitation, I think, is that, you know, when you read on in the household code with parents and slaves, and again, we're, you know, yeah, it's even if it's kind of like offensive

to even kind of talk about it like this. But I mean, like this, but you do have children obeying the parents, not parents obeying the children. You have slaves obeying their masters, not masters obeying the slaves. Now, even those are very redefined. You don't have the same course of authority or abuse or even hierarchy that you have in the ancient world. And yet there is still a certain directional, you know, children obey your parents and that. So when it does say, like nowhere in scripture does it say explicitly husbands submit to your wives.

Of course, there's a general sense in which all believers are to submit to one another. But again, there can be specific relationships where children are to submit to their parents, not vice versa. I hesitate saying, no, Ephesians 5 is all about mutual submission. But clearly he is redefining what headship means, as you already said. I'm almost okay with saying like functional submission and like the way the husband is to love and lay down his life for his wife is so absurd in that world that somebody, that the head would do something like that,

that I'm fine maintaining the language of husbands love your wives. And here's what that looks like. Wives submit to your husband so love and submission these are kind of somewhat different concepts but they're so overlapping in function that it does kind of sound like mutual submission without using that actual language is that in my own i mean i'm just kind of thinking out loud here because i just wouldn't they just say well 521 kind of controls the whole thing i'm like well not does it though i mean i don't know um it certainly doesn't carry over into the again the children and parents and wives and And then you say, well, 521 kind of controls the whole thing. I'm like, well, does it though? I mean, I don't know. It certainly doesn't carry over into the, again, the children and parents and slaves and masters.

Well, when I think I say, I think we're talking about 521 as being sort of like the overall context. Yeah. You know, for Paul, there are layers. Okay. And what these layers are going to look like, okay, are then, you know, sort are then more detailed examinations of text. That's why Paul can say in Galatians 3.28, there's neither Jew nor Greek. And then in Romans 9-11, there is very clearly Jew and Greek, right? So some of it depends on, that's why I started thinking, what is this overall theme? Can Paul have these things within it? Because there was clearly in Ephesians 5, an asymmetry, okay? When Paul is talking,

it is the love of the husband, okay, that is the one that becomes a fulfillment of Genesis in terms of the one flesh union. And what I kind of bring out in my book, the other part of Genesis is this idea for the unity of the husband and wife is pretty much put on Adam, you know, for that in terms of unity, the one flesh. And so Ephesians 5, in a sense, becomes kind of fulfillment of Genesis in terms of the one flesh union. And here, I think it's kind of mirrored in that it is the husband, you know, you know, being like Christ for this to, you know, come about. And so that's why I say maybe in terms of, as we're looking at, in terms of an asymmetry here, what is the nature of that, you know, you know, asymmetry. And I

would kind of say like, that's kind of where I think, as I've talked to complementarians, egalitarians, in terms of how they kind of see the implications of the passage, that's something where that is, you know, continuing to be kind of, I guess, hashed out. Yeah. That's good. That's good. Let's go back to, so one of your, I think it's your second chapter. Oh, the stuff on evangelical women and social reform is really, really good.

I think it's a chapter after that where you, oh yeah. Okay. Chapter three, egalitarianism and equal rights. And you kind of, you know, address and critique this whole secular quest for equal rights saying this doesn't really resonate with kind of like the what what new testament writers are passionate about this kind of modern concern for equal rights and you said that that's at least some kind of modern even christian egalitarian approaches seem to reflect this kind of secular paradigm can you unpack that for us a little bit i thought that

was really really helpful yeah first of all sort of, you know, as I said in the book, you know, I think that the debate tends to turn on authority and equality. And, you know, definitely, I think you see those themes in scripture. The question is, is this sort of a primary theme for the gender debate? And kind of what I'm kind of arguing in terms of, you know, I critique authority in the complementarian position, then I critique equality in the egalitarian position. And what I tried to do in that chapter was, as I'm trying to kind of show how a particular concern gets shaped, you know, in the debate. And it seems like for egalitarians, the concern tends to be, you know, equal rights. And what's so interesting to, in that section was, I had looked at earlier period, at the turn of the century, the beginning of the 20th century, when you had what people call the first feminist movement, which was a lot more corporate concern, you know, in that regard, when people were fighting for women's rights, they didn't use an argument for equality, you know, in that regard. Basically, they're basically the same, because during that period,

it's more Victorian. And the idea was that women are more virtuous. And so therefore, women, for example, need to take the lead in social reform, benevolence, or, you know, or the right to vote because their moral influence is needed, okay, you know, in that regard. And the idea of the argument, say, for the right to vote based on women's rights was seen actually more as a selfish concern, you know, in that regard, because it's just about, it would just be about the women and their wanting to vote, as opposed to the argument that went out was women should vote because they're so virtuous that we need their vote in order to make society better. OK. And so to me, that was really interesting that, you know, people didn't really like this argument from right. OK, now you kind of fast forward to more the 60s and the 70s, where you had the impact of the civil rights movement.

And now the argument for rights is more accepted, you know, in this regard. And now the argument for, you know, let's say for women's roles in ministry. Now, you can bring in the argument that it's about rights because the culture is more accepting of that, you know, in that regard. So the reason I want to bring in, it's not necessarily argue whether it was good or bad, but just to kind of show that the debate seems to be shaped by a cultural concern. And that I do see that in, in, and again,

I'm fairly new to the kind of contemporary debate. I've read a decent amount of books now, but like, I do see that language pretty frequently, you know? And it does, it's hard because of course we want but like, I do see that language pretty frequently, you know? And it does, it's hard because of course we want equal rights, right? I mean, we're all created in God's image and there's something really attractive about that. And yet, I don't know, sometimes I just feel like, are we reflecting secular concerns? And I don't know where to draw that line, you know, because the Bible is, we're all created in god's image and yet it is a very modern this whole idea of equal rights is such a modern concept there was a great article um by a guy

he's not even a conservative like biblical scholar um i forgot his name you might know it because everybody who enters this debate cites it it's it's called that jesus was not an egalitarian even though i think the author is egalitarian but he's like yeah we're just imposing modern western categories on these ancient authors do you remember his name i forgot his name if you're talking about an article with the john elliott's article yes yes john elliott yeah he's written he wrote two of them uh that were along those lines even some scott scott mcknight McKnight, he's an egalitarian, but I've heard him kind of say,

he gets a little nervous importing our kind of modern framework on these ancient authors. Yeah, this is going to slide easily into, I think probably my favorite chapter in the book on, I think it's chapter four, the kingdom themes chapter, where you talk about, yeah, yeah, the whole idea of leadership. So here, I want to, let me think out loud before you, because this is, as I came into this book, here is what I was thinking. And then you put so much language to what I was kind of feeling.

It seems like at least by, at least some people come at this very question with kind of a secular view of leadership that you have somebody with the power at the top and he or she is the most important person or more important. And if you're not a leader, then you're just a non-leader. You're simply a deacon, a servant. You're relegated to just serving people, but you can't actually ascend to the top of the pyramid and lead people and have this kind of power. People put it necessarily in those terms, but they come really close sometimes. And I'm like, wait a minute, like the we could almost frame the question of, you know, can women serve in Christian leadership as are women allowed to wash the feet of men? To put it in very almost offensive terms. But you know where I'm going with that. To be a leader is to be the servant of all. I mean, Jesus literally washed people's feet and says, this is what it means to be Lord and teacher. And Philippians 2 just does a magisterial job, counterintuitive job of just turning this whole paradigm on its head so that no longer are leaders in the Christian church, you know, the person with power and coercion and are more important.

Even if, and I'm not even talking about like abuses in today's church because people say, well, no, that happens all the time today. I'm like, I'm not even, yeah, in today's church because people say, well, no, that happens all the time today. I'm like, yeah, we're all screwed up today. I'm talking about the framework of how the New Testament even conceives of leadership. So anyway, from my vantage point, I think sometimes the very question from the very beginning assumes a secular view of leadership. So am I on to something? You did something similar in your book. It's kind of reframing the very question. Yeah, I think you're kind of talking about like, I think a lot of us kind of have this intuitive sense, like, oh, wait, we're talking about leadership and what, you know what I mean? There's something that's kind of bothering us. And I think maybe because we associate so much of leadership with power, you know what I mean, with power. And that's kind of our model in this regard. And I think we also tend to have this view of leaders. Yeah, they are the ones that are up there and they're different than us and they're better than us. And, you know, they have more say over our lives, you know,

in this regard, the kind of like the sort of better, you know, quality of person in that regard, which in one sense is kind of a natural way of looking at it, right? If someone's talented, they become a leader. But maybe it's kind of part of the aspect too, because the gospel is supernatural, right? You know, it kind of does the opposite. So if it's, I think we would have a natural tendency to kind of, you know, elevate leaders to think about leaders, you know, in this way. But then again, you're looking at what the gospel says about, you know, leadership, and you look particularly about, of course, Jesus's example, you know, in this regard. And that's when we begin to see, oh, the gospel idea of leadership is different, you know, in this regard. And in particular, in the book, one of the things I talk about that, you know, so I think there's been kind of attempts

to kind of modify this in terms of, you know, talking about servant leadership. But I think from my vantage point, often, not all the time, because I've been under some wonderful, you know, servant leaders. But it often seems to be that servant leadership is defined as leadership is the big thing, kind of like you talk about, right? Yeah. And then servant is kind of this qualifier, right? Okay, it means kind of be gentle the way you do it or be nice or just, you know, make sure you're keeping the, you know, I'm keeping your best interests in mind, things like that. But if we're looking at, you know, how Jesus talked about leadership again, and, you know, in the gospels, he says, if you're going to be first, you have to be last. Okay. You have to be the servant. You have to be the slave. And when you're be the servant, you have to be the slave.

And when you're looking at that, well, what are the implications of being a servant and slave? You know, antiquated means no status, no privileges, you know, in a sense, no, you lose basically everything that made your identity, you know, in this regard, it's, it's seen, it's supposed to be seen as a complete sacrifice of your identity, presumably so you find your identity in Christ. And then you can be that leader. It's not a modifier. It is actually, again, a paradox in that regard. It was either you or maybe Andrew Clark who said what you're saying now, that the whole idea of even the modern

concept of servant leadership doesn't go too far. It's kind of like, yeah, leaders should also have a servant-oriented heart kind of thing rather than the servants should be the leaders. Putting the emphasis on the servitude aspect of it. What do you do with... Because I can hear people pushing back and saying, yeah, but still, yes, okay, leaders should be serving. They shouldn't have this high status. They shouldn't think of themselves as more important than others. But they're still making spiritual decisions. Hebrew says submit to your spiritual, your leaders, the ones who are leading you.

The leaders are the ones teaching and controlling, in a sense, the doctrine of the church. And again, I may even be playing on modern kind of church structures. Maybe that's the problem. But is there still a sense in which these servant leaders still have some level of power? And I'm going to leave that term undefined because I want to hear what you have to say. Well, I'll make a few points here, you know, in that regard. First, I think one critical point is in 1 Corinthians, the first four chapters, Paul is talking about a battle over leaders. And this is kind of the point kind of we see there.

You know, the Corinthians are fighting over leaders. I follow Paul. I follow Paulus. I follow Cephas. And what Paul does in the next few chapters is he wants to reorient their perspective. He says, what is Paul? What is Apollos? We're only the servants. You know, I planted Apollos' waters. God gave the growth. So first of all, he says, part of the expect that it's like we need to sort of take our perspective from, you know,

focusing upon the leaders to realizing that they are just servants through whom God works, okay, you know, in that regard. And I would also say, maybe this is more from the sort of spiritual formation perspective, as I look and I see what I think some of these passages might have, you know, how they might have been read in antiquity, for someone to become a slave really meant to, you know, as I said, to give up all these things that gave them their sense of identity and worth. In order to do that, you really have to be completely submitted to God. You know what I mean? You have to, you know what I mean? Your ego, your pride has to be submitted if you power rather than someone who says, I have this power, but don't worry, I'll be, you know, I I think there's that. I don't think we give enough attention to, you know, what that means for a person to

be submitted to God in that. And then the other point I want to make is in terms of Ephesians 4, where Paul talks about the body of Christ. And he says, and this has kind of really impacted my understanding because you talk about, you know, the church structure. And he says, you know, God has given apostles, prophets, evangelists, shepherds, and teachers, okay? And then he says, for what? You know, I mean, for, you know, to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for the building up of the body of Christ.

And when I look at that, and honestly, when I look at the rest of the New Testament too, the, Testament too, the, I guess, leaders, however you're going to define them, you know, elders or pastors, they're the ones a lot who are kind of equipping the others for doing that. It's not necessarily that they're in front, always doing everything and, you know what I mean, having all the attention. Their job seems to be to equip other people to do the work of ministry. And I think that kind of impacts how we look at leadership as well. This episode is sponsored by Abide. Abide is the world's most popular Christian meditation app, guiding hundreds of thousands of people around the world into biblical truth and personal reflection.

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If you subscribe now, you can receive 25% off your first year when you sign up for the premium subscription by texting the promo code THEOLOGY to 22433. Okay, so if you text 22433 and type in THEOLOGY, you will get 25% off your first year in the premium subscription. Sleep better, pray more, and meditate on God's life-changing word with life. When you reflect on the New Testament vision for leadership, do you find that vision lacking in a lot of churches today in your honest evaluation? Or what would it look like if you can just kind of describe a contemporary church that's reflecting accurately a New Testament vision for leadership? What would that look like? And in your opinion? Yeah, well, I can say, first of all, as I said, I feel very fortunate in the places where I worked in the churches I've been that I think that they do have a very, you know, healthy view of leadership, you know, in that regard. I will say, you know, in terms of when I look more broadly, and I hear stories, you know, I mean, from my students, you know, other people, it does seem that there is this kind of sense of, yes, the leaders are the ones.

It's great to be a leader because you're in this position and you get to kind of, you know, have this power. They, you know, what's happening. And I hear stories about people saying, like, I had a concern. I brought it up. I wasn't you know, it really wasn't taken seriously, you know, in that. and I brought it up. I wasn't, you know, it really wasn't taken seriously, you know, in that. So I do think that sometimes I do think that there is a little bit too much of a top-down model, you know, in this regard, where we put a lot of emphasis upon our leaders are the ones who are, in a sense, you know, doing most of it, you know, in this regard. I think our leaders have a responsibility, but I think it can result in congregations that become a little bit passive and kind of expect, well, our leader, they're the ones

who went to seminary. They're the ones who know this, you know, we'll just kind of sit under them, you know, every week and kind of listen, you know, to them. But I actually think that, no, actually it is the congregation that is supposed to be doing more. And in some sense, the leader is kind of stepping back from that. And also, if you were to look at, in a sense, churches, like the impression that I get when I read 1 Corinthians 12 to 14, is you do seem to have a church where, you know, Paul says, in a sense, everyone participates. You know, everyone has a song, a teaching, you know, in this. And I think I would like to see our churches be a little bit more, you know, like that, you know, in this regard, because to me, that seems to be a big aspect of, you know, the role of the Spirit, the role of the

Spirit distributes. And we are, in a sense, empowered by the Spirit, not just to go out into the world in the missional aspect to evangelize, but we are empowered to build up the body of Christ. Right, right. And I think I'd like to see, I think scripture reflects a little bit more of that, rather than kind of Sunday morning, it's a few people up on stage. Do you think that there's different kind of like ecclesiologies in the New Testament? Because I mean, scholars often say, you know, the Corinthian letters reflects this very kind of democratic, kind of messy. Everybody's jumping in. By the time you get to the pastorals, you know, Paul's like, man, Jesus hasn't come back yet.

We got to start sure. We got to start reigning in these wild charismatics, you know, some leaders in place. I mean, do you, whether it's a straight line development or just some diversity, I mean, do you think that there is diversity that Paul was fine with the Corinthians being more democratic and fine with the church of Ephesus and Crete being more, maybe more, a little more structured or is that, am I reading too much into that? You know, I think that that is a difficult question, you know, in that regard, but I do think, I mean, I would say, you know, to your question, I think Paul does seem to be fine with the Corinthians,

you know, being a little bit more like loose, you know, in that regard, he's kind of giving them principles, you know, whether he's that way because they're a young congregation, you know, I think, you know, you kind of see there's so many problems in Corinth, you know, is it possible that Paul is just saying there, you know, there's so many things here I can't deal with everything at once. So I'm just going to, you know, give you folks this. But I certainly don't see a tension, you know, within if you're going to say something about, oh, we see a little bit more structure in the pastorals and you see in Corinthians. I certainly don't see a tension, you know, you know, within that, you know, could be something where things develop. He says, OK, yeah, we are waiting a little longer. Let's have some, you know, more structured

leadership, you know, in that regard versus the Corinthians. I think certainly that is, you know, that is possible, but kind of over, I kind of like throughout Paul, I think Paul does seem to say that there is still is a need for kind of mature leadership to have oversight, you know, in this regard, because of, you know, the nature of the church, because the church is so special. Now, whether, you know, I said, the Corinthian church is so young, he says, well, I'm kind of your oversight right now, you know, in this regard. But for Paul, the church is so important that, you know, it is so important that the church remain, you know, holy, that the church remain faithful to the gospel, that there

is, there does have to be at least some kind of oversight. I wonder, I've never thought about this, but like you mentioned earlier that like 1 Corinthians 1 to 4, Paul's really concerned about this kind of warped view of leadership and there's factions surrounding certain personalities. And maybe in that day and and age it was probably people that were like had you know wealth and power and it seems like he's almost critiquing like a parent like a patron client kind of division that a church where you have these patrons at the top and people are like oh i'm of this person i'm over that person i think again i think andrew clark um did some work or talked about that but then like, later on the letter is,

I wonder if that's why Paul has more of a democratic vision of the church. I just thought about this, but like in first Corinthians five, he, when he's telling them they should have disciplined this person out of the church, that the guy sleeping with his, what is this?

His stepmother or whatever. He tells the whole church, like the whole church has power to you. You all should have removed this person. He doesn't say, you know, you leaders should have had a meeting and then taking care of this guy. stepmother whatever he tells the whole church like the whole church has power to you you all should have removed this person he doesn't say you know you leaders should have had a meeting and then taking care of this guy and exercise church discipline he really invests the whole congregation with power and 12 to 14 you know everyone comes to the teaching the psalm the prayer and the prophecy you know um he's seen again he seems to invest the whole congregation

with power is is there a reason why again i, I don't even know what my question is. You clearly have leaders at the beginning, but he's kind of critiquing that. Is that why? The solution to the chaos in Corinth isn't you need to have leaders in place. It's like, no, maybe that was part of the problem at the beginning. I don't know. That's a really interesting observation. I hadn't thought about it that much, but maybe there is something to that.

Because one of the things is that, you know, in 1 Corinthians, there is this theme of unity throughout, you know, in this. And so, like, Margaret Mitchell argued, she made an argument that, you know, when Paul talks about that he doesn't want divisions, that's, you know, the theme for the whole letter. And I think she makes a good case for that. Whether it's not his purpose, I certainly think it's reflected throughout. So I think it's certainly possible because there is so much about the body of Christ and unity and loving one

another that runs throughout 1 Corinthians. So yeah, I think it's certainly possible that one of the things Paul is teaching them is how to live together. You know, now that you're Christians, now that you're in Christ, you're used to fighting for status. You're used to, you know, having paid, wanting to be a patron and having the status. But what I'm showing you is what it means to actually now be all of you who are in Christ in this and what that means to love one another. So yeah, I certainly think that that's possible. Right, right, right. I just wonder if that, going back to the leadership thing, if that... I was part of a congregation in Scotland.

It was kind of a post-brethren congregation to where they had one traditional brethren service and then a more contemporary service. But in the traditional service, there was no leader. There was no organization, no plan. We all show up and there's one guy that can play the piano and everybody else kind of sits there and somebody would stand up and read a passage of scripture. Another person would say, hey, let's sing Psalm 98 or sing hymn number 98. And then the guy goes up to the piano and plays the hymn and we all sing. And then it's silent for a little bit. People are just kind of

praying and reading scripture to themselves and somebody else would just get up and pray somebody else would give a kind of a word of exhortation and uh if you had told me before whether something like that was possible in church i would say that would that would never work and maybe it wouldn't work in america but it was it first of all is my service. It was the most genuine service I've ever been to. There was never – well, rarely were there kind of weird moments where you're like, I've got to get the mic away from that person. And it was part of the culture of the church. If we just tried to create that out of thin air or something, that might – I don't know.

Might be different. It was also small. It 50 people you know maybe 75 i wonder too if like is it the sizes of our churches that makes it to where we feel like we have to have one or two or three leaders on stage and the rest kind of look forward and don't participate because what would it look like for a first corinthians 12 to 14 type of service with a thousand people you know i don't know right well some of it i think is yeah i think as humans there's this natural move towards institutionalization right i mean as things get bigger you have to have more organized system structure i kind of see it everywhere i kind of see it you know at my school as you know

as it gets bigger you know there is kind of it just sort of seems seems that there is a need for you know um to create more structure in this regard. And so maybe it is as we're talking about the first century churches and if they're house churches, maybe it is a bit easier. You know, when you have, you know what I mean? Or it's more feasible when you have, you know, you know, 30 people or something, which I guess the thing is scripture doesn't really talk about that. Right. Because, you know what I mean? Scripture doesn't say like, you know, and then like, you know, two millennia later when you're going to have these mega churches, you know, here's how you can do it. And so I guess, I think that's a really good

question because maybe sort of the underlying idea is how do we, you know, even if we have these huge churches, how do we bring in more of this idea of everyone being able to participate in the spiritual gifts? Because the idea of the spirit is not just, again, it's not just, I have this, you know, empowerment, I'm going to go out and evangelize. You know what I mean? Paul says, seems to indicate that these are to edify the congregation when, you know, when we're gathered together in worship in this regard. And I don't know if somehow we kind of shy away from that.

And I've been to Quaker churches, which sounds similar. You know, the experience is similar to what you talk about. And I think because we tend to think about, you know, sometimes spiritual movement in terms of like, do we still believe in the spectacular charismatic gifts? Are we, you know what I mean? Are we cessationists? But are there other ways in which, you know what I mean? Sort of beyond that, are there other ways in which the spirit can move in the, you know, in the service? Because Paul does envision that as a sort of, you know, sort of spirit empowered, you know, service.

Although actually, let me add this point too. He does impose order too, right? In 1 Corinthians 14, he'll say when the prophets are speaking, which is very interesting because he says the prophets want to speak, but only let two or three of them speak. So they're like, what if you're the first prophet and you're like hey i've got a prophecy and you're like paul says no only two or three of you can speak but god gave me this prophecy i'm like i'm not sure you know what happens in that situation but it does seem to be yeah how do you you know spirit led and yet with yeah um i don't know yeah with a bigger gathering i i am personally drawn to and i don't i i don't think there's one a one size fits all ecclesiology i just i

you know i don't want to be too dogmatic i personally am drawn to models that are are are pretty intentional about keeping the numbers of the gathering small. Maybe it's part of a big church or whatever, but like the guys over at Tampa Underground, they've got this network of like a hundred, you know, kind of, I don't know, they call missional communities or something. And so when, no, they do have a Sunday gathering where I think everybody does come together, but the primary kind of location

and rhythm and identity of the Christian is in this missional community. It's more than just a big church with small groups. It's almost like the whole system's inverted where it's a bunch of small gatherings. Oh, and they also happen to meet for big optional gatherings every now and then or whatever.

And then we are church Francis Chan's thing out there in San Francisco does something similar. And there's, they're kind of popping up everywhere because I think there is this like, I think there is this hunger or the, you know, you read the new Testament and you, and we all now know like, yeah, these are smaller gatherings, but there's something kind of sweet and maybe even necessary about the size of the gathering that allows us to kind of embody the church rhythms that we see in the New Testament. I don't know.

It's hard. Or even communion in a large gathering. It's like, are we doing what the New Testament was doing? Right. Right. Everyone gets like the little cup or something, you know, you have your own individual cup and yeah, it's hard to know how to sort of balance the practicality of it, you know, versus, you know, it's like, you know, how can we keep churches, you know,

30 to 40, you know, in this day and age. A cornerstone church, again, where Francis Chan was at, I was on leadership there when he was there and when he left. And they started this thing on, I don't know if they still do, but I think it was on Wednesday nights. They would have a communion service where it was a huge potluck in the sanctuary. Everybody was invited. It was chaos. It was messy. It was stressful.

But it was, I don't know, at least they tried to say, okay, we're a big church, but let's try as best we can to reflect what, you know, the Lord's Supper would have looked like. So, yeah, big meal. And then one of the pastors would get up and kind of lead us in a communion as part of the meal, you know. So, I don't know. It was a good attempt, I think. Yeah. So, I have to ask, and you can plead the fifth, but so do you not ultimately publicly, I'll just say publicly land on a certain view? Would you ever serve as an ordained pastor elder to church or do you feel like that is not scripturally allowed or do you not want to answer the question?

I have to ask. Well, let me just say, I think my ministry is more being able to, you know, to hopefully to speak to this topic in this way. And so I like to stick with what I think I do best. And yeah. That makes sense. And that allows you to be able to speak, I think, with a voice that you maybe wouldn't have if people knew, well, she does ultimately land here. So I get that. How about, okay, so as a kind of follow up, what do you think is the best exegetical argument for whatever term we want to use, complementarian view? And what's the best exegetical argument for egalitarian being in your in your opinion well i would say that maybe sort of the strongest uh point uh that uh let's say like each side has and i know each side will have a rebuttal for this too but the gender distinctions um in genesis to me are so clear you know in that it is so you know i mean if you were to compare the genesis account with other ancient accounts

you know i mean uh adam is created first and then eve and you know and eve is created you know, I mean, if you were to compare the Genesis account with other ancient accounts, you know, I mean, Adam is created first and then Eve, you know, and Eve is created, you know, from Adam. And, you know, and then if you look at other ancient accounts, you know, men and women are created at the same time. OK, so, you know, I mean, or if you were to look at, you know, the Gospel of Thomas says, you know, I mean, for a woman to be saved, she has to become male in this. So these sort of like extra, you know, non-biblical accounts don't always hold to the importance of these gender distinctions. But Genesis, I think, is very clear in the way it presents it. And then by the time you get to Revelation, of course, you have, you know, it's kind of played on this with the bride of Christ. And so I know that egalitarians will say that we also believe in gender distinctions, but I haven't yet really heard something satisfactory

in terms of what those are. Right. And I think you may disagree, you know, one may disagree with what the compliments say on the gender distinctions, but at least I see them coming up with something. You know what I mean? And, you know what I mean? This is a really core idea for the complementarian position, you know, whether or not you agree with it. And so to me, I think to see this as foundational is something that is kind of their strength. What I would say for the egalitarian position is I think they bring in acts too, better than the complementarians do. The whole idea that in this new creation and the spirit comes and, you know, I mean, the spirit empowers everyone for this missional sense. Now, the open question for that is, are those distinct from, you know, offices?

Okay, like pastor elder, also were things like prophecy, is that considered, you know, the highest authoritative gift? There's a lot of, you know, you know, question about that. But I would say that, again, the strength of the egalitarians is they, I think they bring in Acts 2 more and better than the complementarians do. So I'm not sure if I would say it's a final argument for either one of them. Yeah. But I would say that is their, you know, a particular strength.

Do you, again, in your opinion, and maybe you can't, well, yeah, if you, if you don't want to say, do you know who has a stronger interpretation of first Timothy two or do you just, do you feel like it's just really complicated or? Well, I will say that. Yeah. First Timothy two is one that, um, I'm, I'm still, uh, wrestling with in that regard. Um, there's a lot of information that's coming out in terms of the cultural background of it to me a big question is yeah how do you use that cultural background um and then also what's paul's use of you know the creation imagery you know in that um and so to me i said that's one passage i'm still really wrestling with you know in that regard how do you fit it how do you fit it with

everything that that paul is saying and i would say yeah that's a really complicated passage and i think that's probably one i would really like to see um people wrestle with more uh beyond the kind of traditional arguments um because i think that that is a key passage i think that's kind of sort of like often a make or break passage you know for a lot of people um and i think it may be uh deserving of some you know some some looks. Do you know who's doing good background? Because I know there's been previous books and stuff that have talked about the Artemis Colt and stuff. But I know Sandra Glan. Sandra Glan. Yeah.

She's been doing a lot of good work. So that's one person that I would look to in that regard. I know that it's been a while since I looked at it too. I know that there's been a lot of work done in terms of just the linguistics of it. You know, Andreas Kossenberger and some of the folks, I think, at Trinity came up with a very detailed book in that. I think it'd be interesting to just kind of look at the linguistic material and then the background material and then kind of see what. I'm knee deep in all that research right now on first timothy too i haven't landed at all on that passage i guess the frustrating thing for me and it's i guess it's shouldn't be a surprise but um

most exegetes i read already have already kind of passionately hold to a certain view and you know that you maybe they would say, well, yeah, I arrived at my egalitarian position after studying 1 Timothy 2. And maybe that's true. But I feel like there are... I don't know. It just seems like there is a lot of bias

that goes into which exegetical arguments people highlight and which arguments they don't really deal with. And like if, if first Timothy two was in the Quran and we were looking at, you know, a Muslim text and we read first Timothy two, we would just be like, yeah, see, I mean, they, women are allowed to do these things, you know, like, I don't know if it would be, if we would be scrambling to, you know, um, say, what does this really mean? Cause it can't mean what it says it means but then at the same time so that's kind of like the complementarian but at the same time

there are there are there is some just strange stuff like okay so adam was created first what does it have to do with teaching though like that i mean i don't know like that that's kind of a bold assumption that because he's created first, therefore he's a qualified teacher. Like you can say he's preeminent or whatever. Maybe even authority. But the teaching part, like that seems weird. And there is some stuff in the background of Ephesus that is, yeah. Bruce Winter, I think, to my opinion, has probably the most provocative stuff on that chapter with the whole new women thing.

And I think if he's right that that was happening in Paul's day, I could easily see some of the language Paul uses there to be kind of maybe addressing that particular movement. Anyway, yeah, it's tough. I know everybody's kind of sick of researching authenticity, but that really is a weird word when you look at how it's used elsewhere. And we don't have a lot to go on. So it's kind of like, man, this is, you know, but anyway. I think you're right in terms of it's a difficult passage. There's so much out there. It's kind of hard to know, you know, what it is.

I'll just kind of let you know that this is not going to help solve your question about 1 Timothy. is. I'll just kind of like let you know that this is not going to help solve your question about First Timothy. But one of the things I've been kind of considering in terms of as I've kind of like after the book is done, what are you know, how what are some other things I can think about in this is I did write an article called for the man and woman in the new dictionary of Paul and his letters that's going to be coming out. And the idea that I'm trying to develop there is that what if we're looking at gender in terms of the intersection of creation and new creation imagery? Because, and I kind of like go into that in the article, because what you kind of have here is creation, the creation imagery is man and woman, right? Okay, sort of like male and female. And then you kind of, you know, get this in Genesis, and you kind of see this in Ephesians,

the new creation imagery is neither male nor female and so maybe kind of like what we're as we're trying to kind of figure this out and you say we kind of have like we all kind of come to the text with our own biases right you know i mean i have this view and then i'm going to it's kind of easy for me to interpret first timothy according to you know my view because i don't think with the information we have right now there's like a clear correct answer you know, my view, because I don't think with the information we have right now, there's like a clear, correct answer. You know what I mean? People make arguments, some are better, you know, than others. So that's why I just kind of like, that's kind of the thing I've been kind of, you know, kind of playing with right now, in terms of this, in this new age, how does Paul

take this idea of creation of male and female and how is this played out in new creation where you kind of have both male and female and neither male nor female so and i said it doesn't really help you and maybe not necessarily help the answer timothy but i kind of use that in terms of some of the passages and say what would it look like if we're thinking about you know a passage like first timothy well that i mean okay so first timothy 2 12 i do not permit a man to teach or exercise authority over women but verses 13 14 and 15 just get weirder and weirder and weirder all the way to like being saved through childbearing which you know i've looked at all the different interpretations of that and and they're all like why does paul say what he okay

so that so 215 is the last verse in the chapter to my mind and this would help more the egalitarian argument clearly he's drawing on some kind of viewpoint he's he's combating something going on specifically in ephesus or a viewpoint in that. It seems to be, this comes out of nowhere. It has nothing to do with anything unless he's correcting some kind of aberrant interpretation of Genesis 2, which here, and I'll let you go in a second, but I got to ask you this. So you do have, I think, you would know more about this than I would, in later Gnostic texts, a lot of stuff about Eve and Eve being created maybe first or whatever. Like he,

I could see where people say that first Timothy is like a second century rebuttal against Gnosticism because he sees, he seems to be kind of combating that, but we now know that Gnosticism wasn't around the first century, but could there have been some kind of proto Gnostic views of Eve and the creation account that was at least in the air that wasn't written down yet that Paul's addressing in Ephesus? Is that something people have talked about? I think that definitely can be brought into it. Yeah, the whole idea.

And I think we certainly can expect that if these views are formed later, you know what I mean? How early would they have their start? I mean, that becomes kind of a big question because sometimes as we're dating, you know, some of these texts like Gospel of Thomas, how early is it? Is it, you know, is it sort of like contemporary with the Gospels? Is it a couple of centuries later? So that is a big question. But certainly we can't rule out the idea that some of these things could have been formed, you know, in that. And so, but I wonder in terms of this, as we're looking at first Timothy, maybe one of the big questions would be is as we're looking kind of like throughout the new Testament. And this is kind of where I'm at right now, as I'm kind of thinking about this, how does Paul use the creation arguments, you know, in that,

to me, I would look at that. How does he use them in, you know, Timothy, how did he use them in first Corinthians? And maybe, as I said, this is is the I don't know question, but this might be one where it's like, would this be where it might look? Is there a consistency to the way he uses the creation arguments, you know, in that regard? And does that help us? So maybe there's a way in which, because we tend to look at the text in isolation, you know, in this. You know, it's sort of like, I'm really going to analyze 1 Timothy 2. I'm really going to analyze 1 Corinthians 11, you know, in this regard. but is there a way that we can kind of you know kind of go and we of course people are trying to be consistent with this kind of come up with a consistent theology of gender here

but is there another way in which we can kind of use all these texts is there um a larger world view and and i think here's the thing that i think about often in interpreting um because it's even dealt with we're very good we look at the text very carefully, right? I mean, we're good literalists. But what's the story behind what, you know, what's the story behind, you know, Paul's worldview? You know, he's got a fascinating story, you know, in Romans 5 about, you know, Adam compared with Jesus in this.

Is there a story behind this? Again, these are just my interpretive questions that I haven't answered yet. But as we're trying to think about, you know, if we feel kind of stuck, you know, in these passages, is there another way we can look at it to give us something? Because we've dug so hard in these passages, you know, maybe there's something else that we're missing. That's good stuff. So you're working on that right now? Well, I don't know. Actually, you know what? It kind of came to me by not talking with you. So maybe I need to talk with you some more so I can get some more ideas. Okay. Well, Michelle, I've taken you over an hour here. So thank you so much for your time. Thank you for your outstanding book. Again, it's neither commentarian nor egalitarian.

I would highly... Anybody that's interested in this debate has to read this book. If you're really strongly committed to one viewpoint or another, you'll love half of the book and maybe get annoyed at the other half. But your arguments are so careful and strong that I think we all should consider it and really wrestle with what you have to say. So thank you so much for your time, Michelle. Many blessings on your life and ministry. Welcome. Thanks so much for having me. This show is part of the Converge Podcast Network.