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Record Live is a conversation about life, spirituality and following Jesus in the Seventh-day Adventist Church.
Headship _part 1_
[00:00:00] Hi there everyone. I'm Jared. And I'm Sunita. We are your hosts of Record Live, a podcast where we talk about church faith and living well. We believe as followers of Jesus faith is more than just a set of beliefs. It's a way of life, something we'd put into practice. Let's go live.
Jarrod Stackelroth: Welcome back, record Live Family. It is great to be with you today and it's a real privilege to have with us , the Doctors, the Good Doctors, Darius and Aita. Yitz. . .
Darius Jankiewicz: It's a pleasure to be here for us. Thank you for invitation.
Jarrod Stackelroth: Now, we've had you both on this show before and obviously my esteemed co-host, Anita, you are all familiar with her and so [00:01:00] it's just a real privilege to have this conversation today.
We're talking about an issue that we have covered in the print magazine recently, the conversation around headship theology. Headship Theology in a nutshell is the idea that, , essentially the male is the head of the home, the head of everything, the head of the church. There's an order or a hierarchy in the family, in, in the created order.
And that, , the Bible supports this idea and that this should be, , followed, principles that are followed in terms of how we. Conduct our interpersonal relationships, how we conduct business in the church, et cetera, et cetera. So, , Darius, you've done some study in some of this space and so. We're grateful for you to be joining us today.
And Aita, you've got, or your current in your current roles, I should say. , Darius, you're working for the SPD as a [00:02:00] field Secretary, ministerial. , Adita is working with Family Ministries, , has worked with women in ministry. I'm not sure if that's still part of your portfolio, Adita? , Not at the moment.
But both of you have a wealth of experience and. Research and study in this area, so that's why we're very happy to have this conversation with you today. First of all, I'd just like to get to know you guys a little bit. Tell us a little bit about what you like to do outside of work. Who are Darius and Aita and Aita on a Sunday afternoon at home, Sunday afternoon at home?
Darius Jankiewicz: Well, first of all, we've been married for almost 36 years, and what we do like do best is walk together.
Edyta Jankiewicz: Yeah, so we, we walk but not on a Sunday afternoon. Usually on a Sunday morning you'll find us out walking on a Sunday afternoon. We're probably finishing up, in our garden. And then, , sometimes if the weather is good, [00:03:00] we'll head out to the entrance for a walk at the beach.
So yeah, that's our Sunday afternoon.
Darius Jankiewicz: Oh, we're traveling.
Edyta Jankiewicz: Oh. Oh, we're traveling. Yes. We do a lot of travel in our jobs. And so, yeah, so Sunday afternoons at home and in the garden are actually, a real treat, and we
Darius Jankiewicz: both love to read. This is, this is the favorite activity when we can sit together on a couch in winter, in front of the fire.
And we've got this book, good book to read and something that's,
Edyta Jankiewicz: We tend to read our separate books at the moment, but when we had children at our home, we were a read aloud family for a very long time. I would read and everybody would sit around and listen and yeah. , But
Darius Jankiewicz: we big readers reader family.
Zanita Fletcher: They're all great hobbies on all of them. I think it was, . Mary Poppins who said allegedly stroll is a gift. , And I'm sure you can relate to that. Now we are talking about headship and yeah, like Jared said, you guys have both studied this and thought about this a lot. But I would love to know as we kind of kick off this [00:04:00] conversation, why is this something that you are both so passionate about?
Darius Jankiewicz: Well, we are passionate about it because we believe that scripture teaches us. On this topic and because of sin, when sin entered the world, it destroyed really, the human relationships became alienated from God. We became alienated from, , the opposite sex and we can became alienated from within.
And we believe that the whole issue of male headship is a result of sin, but it's not a design, original design from God. In the Garden of Eden. We do not find this in, Genesis chapter one and two, and we do not find it when we go to heaven. It does not exist. So we have, we've got this process of, , creation.
Then there's a fall, and then there's a restoration. And we as a Christian Church, those who believe in the Bible, those who believe in Jesus, we are part of that restorative. Movement and this what drives us in this issue really.
Edyta Jankiewicz: I was just gonna say some of you might be familiar with that [00:05:00] statement from Ellen White in the book education, which I think if she were writing today, she would write, she would call it discipleship.
But she says the goal of education or discipleship is to restore in man the image of his maker. And , yeah, in the Garden of Eden with perfection and at the end of human history, when Jesus restores us, there will be perfection in. We live in a sinful, broken world, but that does not mean that we aspire to a Genesis three life.
We should aspire to a Genesis one and two life.
Darius Jankiewicz: And and actually the interesting point is that Paul, the Apostle Paul in two Corinthians five 17. Actually says that if anyone is in Christ's a new creation and the whole pur and he clearly speaks about recreation of the original conditions. So the whole purpose of Christianity, and you can see it in the New Testament, is to bring as [00:06:00] close as we can, the original conditions of Genesis one and two.
Jarrod Stackelroth: And that seems to be a very Adventist thing, right? We've got. The picture of the Sabbath, we believe that was instituted at creation. So we practiced the Sabbath to get back to , that time in that space, we believe in a vegetarian diet. Many of us also, that was the original diet. , And we say, you know, people like Daniel.
Aspired to that, but it came from the garden. And so we want to get back to that place later on. The Bible says, man started eating meat. But that wasn't the ideal. That wasn't the original. And so what you're saying is that. Men and women were created in a way that is no longer reflected in our relationships in this day and age after the fall.
And can you unpack that a little bit for us? How do we get idea, how idea, how we get this idea that there is inequality.
Darius Jankiewicz: [00:07:00] Well, what we can see that when, when you really deeply study Genesis one, you will find out that, , men and women, men, men and a woman, were created equal. There's no other way to read this.
They all created in the image of God In Genesis 2 24, we find those words that they, they are supposed to be one. And there is this word ahha. And the word ahha means one, it's repeated all over New Testament as the word hace. And the interesting thing is that the word ahha not only represents men and a woman, it represents God within the Trinity.
So as we have equality within the Trinity, we've got equality between men and women. And later on in New Testament, you can see this word. Uh, that we are all one in Christ. There's no Jew, no Greek, no, male or female. Male or female. No slave or free, but we are one. In Christ Jesus. That word one is this exact translation of the word ahha in the Old [00:08:00] Testament.
So basically God's order is ahha order from the beginning, just as we have equality within the trinity. So the And and there's no graduation, definitely. No. It's a non Adventist. Teaching, if we introduce any kind of graduation within the Trinity. Our 28 fundamentals clearly teach that Jesus is equal to God, and Ellen White affirms that, of course.
So when we look at the Trinity, it's a model for equality between men and a woman, and that will eventually be recreated when Jesus comes and takes us home.
Edyta Jankiewicz: , And that equality, was broken by sin. And you can , see when, , we read in Genesis three, what happened after the fall.
God is saying, where are you? They were hiding. Because they were afraid. , They were ashamed, they were covering themselves. They were blaming each other and they were blaming God. So you can see that sin destroyed that perfect relationship that they had. And that's where the inequality, I guess, [00:09:00] comes from.
, Because sin broke the equality,, God. Pronounced a judgment for both man and woman and the snake and the part of that judgment was he shall rule over you. Now, , I don't know if you would like to speak about that, but, , Al Testament scholars have a variety of opinions, , about this. , Some say that it's a pronouncement that this is how it must be going forwards.
, Others say This is how it's going to be because of. Sin And there, there really is some ambiguity in, in the wording of that., And so some believe it's prescribing forever. This is how it's always going to be. Others say it's de scribing, re reality. We believe that it's describing our sinful world because,
Darius Jankiewicz: because when you look at the entirety of the scripture, yeah, when fall happened, [00:10:00] God brings a rescue.
God wants to restore the original condition as much as possible. So that's the purpose of covenants. And throughout the Old Testament, you see the movement of restoration and the ultimate pinnacle of that restoration is a new Christian Church. And in within the new Christian Church, there was a hope that it'll recreate the original conditions, as I stated already.
So the, that's why we cannot say it's really prescriptive that this is how it's supposed to be, because the whole process of sanctification, as we know, is adventism, is recreation of, of what God wants us to be, of recreation of the image of God in us, how it was in the beginning, so that the whole tenor of scripture is moving us that direction.
And of to the eventual ultimate restoration in heaven. So that's why , we cannot say that this is prescriptive, because why? If the scripture does not speak to us in this way.
Edyta Jankiewicz: Yeah. As Ellen White said, to restore in man the image of his [00:11:00] maker, and that's equality. Was, that was the image we were created in God's image as male and female together in God's image.
And that was his ideal.
Darius Jankiewicz: And in the New Testament, this word ahha that I was speaking about is represented by the word, Greek word hace. And Jesus says, I am hace with the Father. I am one with the Father. We are one. So we can bring from this, understanding that, , from Genesis one and two and throughout the rest of the scripture, that original.
Idea was that men and women will be equal to each other.
Edyta Jankiewicz: And Jared, as you said, I just wanna underline that again. As Adventist, we aspire to a Genesis one and two life in our, , observance of Sabbath, rest in our observance of a plant-based diet. Why would we not aspire to this in the area of relationships, which are, , so foundational to human life and so much a part of our being [00:12:00] created in the image of God.
God in the trinity is relational. As human beings, we are relational. Why would we not want restoration in that part of our life, or at least progress towards restoration in this world when we believe God will restore? I mean, I don't believe that there'll be hierarchy in heaven that just doesn't. That goes against everything that we know from the whole of scripture and that God created equality.
So why would we not aspire to that?
Zanita Fletcher: Yeah, it makes a lot sense. I like how you put it in your article, a detail. You said, is it permanent prescription or predictive prescription? And there was another, , person in the comments of these articles over the weekend that said. Men and women were never cursed by God.
This along with the difficulty in tilling the soil was a description of the awful result of sin, not a prescription on how to live. And then she asked, since when are we supposed to settle for the result of sin and live under it? Should we not thrive for [00:13:00] more? , So I thought that was interesting
Edyta Jankiewicz: thing.
That's just so beautifully said. I totally agree. Yeah, totally agree. Just like we today, most men don't till the soil, in our society, at least. Most women today do not give birth without pain relief. , Those are consequences of sin, not a prescription for from God that we can't have pain relief, for example.
Zanita Fletcher: In looking at some of these verses where people get this idea of male headship, are there any other verses that we can kind of unpack and explore? Because I think there's a few that people typically refer to, but people look at them in different ways. What are some of those other common verses that we turn to?
Darius Jankiewicz: Well, , you speaking about in support of equality, right? So we've got Genesis one, , Genesis two, uh, when we've got this verse ha. And we've got this word, aha. And [00:14:00] we've got New Testament where God basically cause this no, , distinction between male and female in Galatians three 20, especially especially, but we are one in Jesus Christ.
, And there's an underlying thing as well here that is not often mentioned is that in Genesis one and two , we see Adam Andif as priest in the first sanctuary on Earth because Garden of Eden represents the sanctuary. There's lots of, words that connect sanctuary of Garden of Eden with the sanctuary on the earth and sanctuary in heaven.
And we can see that they function as priests. Okay? And in the Bible, in the New Testament, we are all men and women called priests. We are fulfilling the role of within the framework of pursuit of all believers. And we function in the temple that is the Christian Church for God until Jesus comes and takes us home.
And Revelation teaches that we will all be priest in heaven with, , God reigning there as well when we go there. So there is just. [00:15:00] Plenty of indications that men and women work together towards the mission fulfillment of the mission of God. That's interesting. That's interesting, Darius,
Jarrod Stackelroth: because one of the main, , things that I hear over and over again with the priesthood is that, females weren't in the priesthood in ancient Israel, so the fe females weren't anointed in that time.
And people often liken that to the whole ordination. Conversation the whole, should women be leaders in the church and what the role of a priest is. You are saying, when we get to heaven, we'll all be priests, male, female, irrespective of our gender , or anything else. What is it? How do people mix up that area?
Darius Jankiewicz: Well, you know, it's easy to get that wrong actually. But one thing that we often forget, okay, what we often forget is that when Jesus died on the cross, [00:16:00] the old. Way of doing things was done. The old priesthood was done the way that they were doing you, you can't actually take the model of old priesthood and bring it to New Testament Church because it's illegitimate because the temple of , the curtain of the temple was.
Edyta Jankiewicz: Tone
Darius Jankiewicz: torn apart. It is the Catholic church that eventually brought the idea of priesthood within, , within the church that men ordained men are priests, be for God. They are channels of God's grace. And with that came the idea of male hadie in the church. That the church should have male hadie, but it was not like this.
In the New Testament, when you look at the New Testament, it's almost reversal of the. Old Testament ordered to in many ways where you see, we men and women working together , in the gospel, they're preaching and teaching and we do not have ordained pastors. In the New Testament, , we talk a lot about ordination of pastor.
We do not have or [00:17:00] ordination in the New Testament. It's a foreign word actually. , To the New Testament. But what we see in New Testament is men and women working together. There's this beautiful Greek word used with reference to those who worked with Paul, not under the Paul, but with Paul. And the Greek word is soon ergos working with.
And you can see that there were not only men who were soon ergos, like Timothy Titus , and others, but they were also women who were soon ergos. So, , Yia and from. , Philippians chapter four, , they called ergos working with Paul together in the same, , same way as Paul did. , Priscilla is called Ergos as well, , together with her husband.
So we see in the New Testament, men and women working together and the fact that New Testament Church allowed for that, it was absolutely revolutionary already then. So we can see that what happened in Genesis three impacted a lot of history. But [00:18:00] when Christian Church came, it's a new covenant, completely new order, new way of doing things like things that were not done before.
So that's , we cannot take Old testament as a model for new testament ministry because it's illegitimate.
Edyta Jankiewicz: It's a new creation,
Darius Jankiewicz: it's a new creation.
Zanita Fletcher: Yeah. Yeah, this is definitely a contentious issue, obviously in the church and it makes a lot of sense. But I kind of was also thinking today about the other denominations that we have, other religious denominations, and not even just Christianity.
When you look at Catholicism or when you look at, , the Orthodox Jews, it seems like this is a trend still in a lot of. Different denominations and religions where it's the man that is the head and the man in these big positions. Like I don't think we've seen a female pope ever. I think there's like a myth that there was one for a few years, but I don't think, I think that's a myth.
Basically. It's a story, it's a fable. , So, so when I think about that, I start to think, hmm, like is there validity to it? Like why have these other [00:19:00] religions and these other denominations not? Well, the
Darius Jankiewicz: interesting thing, the interesting about Catholicism, there will be never a woman pope, and there will be never a woman priest.
It's impossible. According to Catholic religion, ordination of women is absolutely impossible. As I pointed out in the article , a teaching developed that a priest represents Christ, and because he represents Christ, he functions. As a person of Christ, he has to be male just like Christ was because church is represented as a female.
So you can see with the introduction of priesthood in the, third century, you can actually see that the Catholic Church borrowed from Old Testament and introduced the Old Testament elements. Basically, I, I like to say it in my classes in the past, that the Catholic church stitched up the curtain in the temple and brought back priesthood.
Into Christianity, you see? And , in this way. Actually, this is very interesting that in this way the Catholic Church demolished the need for the heavenly [00:20:00] sanctuary because every Catholic church today on the Earth has its own priest, its own sanctuary on Earth is no need for heavenly sanctuary. And we Adventist teach completely opposite on this issue.
We believe that Christ is the only head of the church. In the heavenly sanctuary. Therefore, there's no need for male hardship in the church at all. , And I can say this, that we can argue on the basis of scriptural evidence whether to have women in ministry or women in leadership, and we can disagree.
It's perfectly legitimate, but let's not bring foreign arguments and biblical arguments that, that we borrow from other denominations as far as, the issue of. Other groups of people like Hinduism or somewhere else, , where you see still male dominating. That's a general trend that's been historical trend and historical result of Genesis three.
Yeah. Okay. Because when you really see an environment where men and [00:21:00] women work together in the mission of Christ, there is a power there. It brings glory to God and there's nothing wrong with this, in fact, bringing the categories like ordained past and so on, it's foreign to the New Testament.
We've got leadership in the New Testament. Of course, we've got bishops and we've got overseers, but they are selected on the basis of spiritual gifting, not on the basis of gender necessarily. We do not see that.
Jarrod Stackelroth: Let's just talk about, , that concept of head, the head. , You referenced it , in your article, Darius, about the church, that , the husband is the head of the home or the wife as Christ is the head of the church.
And so people interpret this idea of. Males should rule in the church. Christ is the head of the church. , They get some of those ideas conflated. , But your article was very interesting in the way that you suggested that perhaps as Christians we shouldn't be so ready to jump up and down and [00:22:00] be the head like it's, , actually counterintuitive to what Christianity.
Is teaching, and yet there's biblical use of the word head. So can you just dive a bit deeper for us into the, that phrase and how it's used and how we should understand it as Christians.
Darius Jankiewicz: Well, that's a very interesting things because we're touching on the issue of what the second article was all about, about, , our biases and the things that we bring into reading of the scripture.
When in today's world, you see the word head, you instantly think hierarchy. It is, like a normal thing. , You see head, he's the head of organization, headquarters, , and so on. This is when the ruling happens and everybody else does. What happens in the headquarters? , Interestingly, the New Testament puts it all on its head.
First of all, the word head cannot possibly be interpreted with ruling over because Jesus says not. So with you in, , mark chapter 10 and ma Matthew [00:23:00] and, , Luke. , There's this passage. So Jesus says that rulers and gentiles rule over you and the exercise authority over you. This is the wrong interpretation of the word had means not so with you, Jesus says.
Because those who want to be first have to be lost, have to be slaves of all for even the son of men came not to be served, but to serve. And this is a radical redefinition of headship of Christ, that Christ actually came not to rule, but to serve. And, and then , you can see , when Jesus is called the head, he's not ruling over the church like a king would rule or , like a earthly king.
And, but he gives us freedom. He woos us to himself. He loves us., And ultimately he dies for us. So all of those passages that, that, speaking about headship,, that we think about husband being the head or Christ being the head, we need to think about what Jesus did for us, the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross.
So this is not [00:24:00] about ruling over, it's about giving your life. So in this way, this whole idea of headship. It's turned over its head, and the problem is that we often bring our own interpretation into the reading of the scripture rather than bringing the meaning from the scripture. Yeah.
Edyta Jankiewicz: I, I'm just reflecting on, , I don't know where you might know where this passage is, where, , we've always thought it's about Lucifer where he says, I will ascend.
I will. Yes, I will. And compare that with Jesus, who the New Testament says He made himself nothing. . Compare those two phrases, I will ascend. And
Darius Jankiewicz: our rule,
Edyta Jankiewicz: he made himself nothing. And so if you think about Jesus as the head of the church, just as the husband is the head of the wife and Jesus made himself nothing, [00:25:00] and that's what the head means.
It's very different to what we think of usually as ruling over
Darius Jankiewicz: and, and when New Testament calls, God, the head of Christ, you can see that what does God do for Christ? He serves him. He's there , and I mean, serves Christ. , And God is there to help Jesus to fulfill the mission that Jesus came to fulfill for us, which was ultimately dying on the cross.
So we've got this reversal. Of understanding of what headship actually is, , and the interesting thing is, and we talked about it in our article that we published in the record in 2021, I believe that , the whole, , passage of Ephesians chapter five, where we find those words, husband is the head of wife.
So often it is misinterpreted. So many people believe that the husband is the boss. And the woman should listen. The wife should listen to the husband and follow husbands, or the final word is always with the [00:26:00] husband. That's not what this is talking about at all. Because the larger context is, within what Jesus did for us , in vision chapter, , five and verse one and two, we see this giving.
Away , and then soon after , the passage when Christ, , husbands love your wives because Christ loves the church. What did Christ do for the church? He dies for the church. , So we see the radical reversal of any kind of hierarchical thinking. That man is the boss and woman is subservient in any way.
, You just don't see that , when you read this within the context of what Jesus did for us on the cross.
Zanita Fletcher: Yeah, that really flips it upside down on its head when you think of it in that perspective. , Darius, you wrote in your article that Ellen White wrote Christ, not the Minister, is the head of the church, and God has never given a hint of his word, that he has appointed any man to be the head of the church.
So. It seems kind of crazy that there's so much debate around this conversation when it all comes down to language. So is it really [00:27:00] all just about, we've misinterpreted this word in this verse, or how much does like culture and history have to play into this? Because I think for probably centuries, men have led in a lot of things.
They've been the prime ministers, they've been the leaders, , they've been the ones in power. So does that also play into our reading of these texts as well?
Edyta Jankiewicz: Well, I just wanna think about history and, women's roles in history. , You're saying yes, , men have been the prime ministers and the leaders.
, And if you think historically women were the bearers of children or, and still are the bearers of children. And in the past, women were often, . Bearing a child and then nursing, breastfeeding, and then pregnant again and bearing a child and nursing and then pregnant again and breastfeeding. And, , the, and dying.
And dying in [00:28:00] childbirth. Of course. That's right. , So in many ways, women , have always been in a more vulnerable position than men. And I think that that's part of that genesis three judgment, that God says this is how it's going to be, , that women will be more vulnerable. Men are larger, men are stronger, men are often louder. And then there's the whole, the whole childbearing aspect of it. You know, a Darius' grandmother comes from a family of 17 children. You think about the great-grandmother, what her life would've been like. . And so, , it's not surprising that men have been the leaders, the hunters and the gatherers, , whereas women have been the nurturers because , that's was just life.
, But that does not mean that women are somehow less than. , It's just the reality of living in our world.
Darius Jankiewicz: Or do not have women a gift of leadership because the New Testament clearly speaks that [00:29:00] anybody, any church member can have gift of leadership that Romans 12, we all have those gifts, , different gifts, and we can function within our gifting.
Edyta Jankiewicz: And if you think about the gifts, there's nowhere in scripture that we think of, , that the gifts being gendered, like, you know, we sometimes say, well, there's the gift of hospitality. Well, you know, does that belong? Just to men or just to women? , There's the gift of teaching, you know, is that just a gift for men or just for women?
We don't gender any of the others except preaching and leading. And
Darius Jankiewicz: the interesting thing is that when you look at the Greek word pro status , in, , Roman 12, eight, I believe you find that this word later on, this is pros, is being a leader in the church. This is the same word that is used with reference to elders.
In one Timothy three. So you can see that eldership is based on gifting mostly. Some people say that husband of one wife means that he has to [00:30:00] be, , the bishop has to be a man. But nowhere in your testament, actually, Paul says Bishop has to be a man. There's no such state. We imply people believe that there's a implication of this, but it's not a prescription.
If Paul really wanted to say that women cannot function in ministerial roles, he could have simply said, Bishop should be a man. , He does not. And , we can just on this topic, we can find very, and another, the same phrase is applied to a deacon just a little bit later in chapter three, that deacon should be husband of one wife.
And interestingly, Phoebe. In, , Roman 16 is described as a deacon, a male word, and Phoebe cannot be a husband of one wife, of course. So the argument that husband of one wife means that bishop should be only, can only be a man falls apart on the deeper reading of the scripture. But I want to come back to your point, , Anita, about Ellen White that you.
, Mentioned that quote. It is very, very interesting., When I was at [00:31:00] Andrews, I, I made a, , there was a task that I created for myself to go through every single issue of review in Herald from the very beginning when it be started being published in the early 1850s. Up until then. At the end of the 19th century, every page I looked at every single page.
I scan the pages. I look for words, not once I see the, the word headship applied to men in church, not even once. So the Adventist Church did not use this terminology. Why? Because Ellen White was attacked using the same kind of words, she was attacked because she was preaching, she was evangelizing. She preached many sermons and she rebuked many, , pastors with some strong words sometimes.
And the people from outside would look at Adventist Church, and this is a false church. This is a false church. You have a woman [00:32:00] preacher. They have a woman who is exercising authority, woman is taking over the male headship role. And, , our church was different. And , that's probably why within the early 40 years, within functioning all roles, there were women pastors, there were women evangelists, there were women preachers, and women.
They established numerous churches. , I can think of one particular woman, Lulu Whiteman in New York alone. She established 17 churches, , so this all came to a head when Ellen White died, and we bought into culture a little bit more, but you do not find the idea of male headship in the church at all in the early literature of our Adventist church.
Zanita Fletcher: It's interesting. I think going back to what you were saying, Aita also about, , women were often at home raising children. That is an emphasis. Ellen White's writing and in the Bible and just probably culturally in Christianity, that women will tend to the children and raise the children.
, And [00:33:00] typically it's the men that will go back to work. And I actually spoke to someone, , on Sabbath about this whole article and this topic, and she said, well, why do we entrust 'em with children? Which is such an important task, but as soon as they're adults, we can't trust them with the church family.
Which I thought was just . An interesting comment by a local church member, but I swore not to say her name, so we'll keep that one secret.
Jarrod Stackelroth: I was just reflecting on what you said about the gift, the gifts not being gendered, , it's not just a New Testament thing. What came to mind when you were speaking is this verse in Joel, , Joel two verse 28. It says, it shall come to pass afterward that I will pour out my spirit on all flesh. I'm assuming that means men and women.
It follows by saying, your sons and daughters shall prophesy. Old men shall dream dreams you. Young men shall see vision. So to get back to that restoration that you're talking about, it's even something the Old Testament prophets dreamed of. It's a vision that they had , to bring this new creation.
Darius Jankiewicz: You see the, the whole of Old [00:34:00] Testament is speaking towards the new covenant.
It beginnings in Genesis three 15. Yes, we've got those curses, but then it's redemption coming in Genesis three 15 and all of the Old Testament points to Christ and restoration of the, original environment. So yes, , we find this, the interesting thing is that. In, , the Book of Acts, , Paul Eck.
Peter actually quotes Joel, right, and he talks about mate servants and man servants. And, , in Greek, the word is DNOs. Okay? Servants. And that is the technical term for ministry. In the New Testament, there were DNOs and doulas, servants and slaves of Christ and the congregations. They never, the apostles have never projected themselves as heads in the church.
They never said, I'm the head, and nobody treated them as the head. In fact, when people try to treat the apostles as heads, they said, no, no, no, no. We just servants. We are slaves, treat us as slaves of [00:35:00] Christ. That all over throughout the New Testament, and it goes back to the Joel two, , prophecy that is repeated in acts where clearly God says that he will pull the Spirit on maid servants and men servants, and those people are ministering in the church together.
So that's , when you look at this picture, you can see a beautiful picture of a church that came together in the New Testament and preached the gospel together and fulfilled all the functions within the church together.
Edyta Jankiewicz: And ultimately it's about restoration.
Darius Jankiewicz: Ultimately it's about restoration all across
Edyta Jankiewicz: the Old Testament.
You know, that's what God's desire is, that people would come to him and love him and that he would restore them. And then the New Testament is the kind of the fulfillment of that Old Testament dream. And, we are part of that trajectory. .
Jarrod Stackelroth: And even Peter, I mean, Jesus said he's the rock on whom I will build my church, et cetera.
But you're saying, Peter's saying this, he's opening it up and he's [00:36:00] declaring that the servant, servant declaring that their servant, that Greek word that you mentioned, you mentioned it sounds a bit like deacons. Is that where we get the term from?
Darius Jankiewicz: Yes, it's DNOs in, in Greek and , that it's, it's a male noun and it was applied to a female Phoebe in Roman 16.
But interesting about Peter, whether there's of course debate about Peter being rock. , And within our church we actually. The Catholic Church uses that argument that Peter is the rock upon him. God will build a church. , And this is the, , theological argument for papacy. We believe that people was just a small rock and part of the bigger picture, but even Peter is quoting Jesus in, in chapter five.
He says he uses the word. That bishops should not Lord it over. This is all going back into this whole headship thing that bishops are not to be above. Not to be. There's [00:37:00] not supposed to be hierarchy in the church. Bishops are the servants. And they lead by example rather than ruling over. And he follows , this is the same, exactly same word that Jesus using in Mark 10 ruling over that Jesus does not want this to be in the church.
And as I, as we say in, in the article that Ellen White says, Peter was never. Considered as the head in the church. And why? Because according to the Bible, there's only one head in the church, Jesus Christ, and there's no replacement of his headship by any male or female.
Thanks for listening to this important conversation today. We will be back next week on record live with the second part of this conversation. Until then, God bless. [00:38:00]