Women and the Kingdom

01/27PM Update: If you read nothing else please read (in the comments section)Barbara's experiences working for Campus Crusade for Christ. I believe it is at the heart of this issue of Women in Ministry. Read between the lines of her comments. Do you not understand a bit more about this issue. What do you think about male "team leaders" who rely so heavily on female team members. Is it sometimes about getting undeserved credit? Please don't dismiss Barbara's comments or the ones (about a dismissed university professor) rasied in iMonks posts.

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01/27AM Update: Excerpts from Internet Monk's
10 Questions for Complementarians:

1. Do you believe that Christian women should only work in the lowest of entry level positions, lest they inadvertently find themselves in authority over a Christian man? Or perhaps Christian women should only work in “women only” organizations? Or perhaps you think that women should not work outside the home at all?

2. Should Christian men avoid working in organizations where somewhere in the organizational hierarchy over them, there might be a Christian woman?

3. If you are pulled over by a female police officer whom you know to be a Christian, how do you make her understand that she has no authority over you (assuming you are male)?

Read more of iMonk's questions here.

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12/11/06 Adrian Warnock has a very interesting dialog going about "Women in Ministry" in the comments section of Wayne Grudem Replies to a Critic. Suzanne McCarthy has a connecting post titled Suzanne is Elsewhere. Here is the way that I responded to another blogger last week on this hot topic:

Our discussion began with my question around your view that the role of women in society is different from the role of women in church. Having dialoged with you a bit I have to say that I still have a concern with that view because it presents the church and the kingdom as a sub-culture of society. I think that society is a sub-culture of the kingdom and principles of the kingdom apply to society as a whole. Separating the sacred from the secular is the way that men in past (and present) ages have gained religious power and setup rules to their advantage.

I think that it is a bit more consistent to say that women should not hold leadership positions in society for the same reasons that they should not hold them in church. I think that many church leaders actually believe this to be true but don’t say it because it would expose what they really think about women. For me, I am comfortable knowing that kingdom principles are applicable in society. Whatever God calls a man or woman to is a sacred calling in the kingdom and I don’t think that we need rules about roles to determine if His calling is genuine or not.

And, so as not to confuse anyone, I think that a kingdom calling can either be to a church, a corporation, overseas or at the local McDonalds.