Complementarianism Clarified: Women, Leadership, and 1 Timothy 2

Show Notes

In this follow-up to Pastor Zack's sermon on 1 Timothy 2:11-15, Pastors Josh and Zack sit down to answer your questions about women in the church, complementarianism, and what the Bible teaches about gender roles in leadership, the home, and beyond.

They recap the key passage—"Let a woman learn quietly with all submissiveness. I do not permit a woman to teach or to exercise authority over a man..."—and explain why Paul grounds his instruction in creation order (Adam formed first, then Eve) and the Fall, rather than temporary cultural issues in Ephesus.

The pastors affirm that men and women are equal in dignity, value, and worth before God, while exploring:

• The differences between egalitarianism, complementarianism, and patriarchy.
• Practical applications: Can women be CEOs, worship leaders, or kids ministry directors? What does "exercising authority" actually mean in the local church?
• Missionary contexts where qualified men are lacking.
• The beauty of distinct male and female callings, including the high value of homemaking, nurturing, and childbearing as part of God's good design.
• How healthy male leadership and delegation foster flourishing for everyone.

This episode is pastoral, biblical, and hopeful—encouraging the church to be faithful rather than cultural, and calling men to step up as servant leaders while honoring the vital contributions of women.

Sermon on 1 Timothy 2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c9WeTVuROtI

Creators and Guests

JH

Host

Josh Hutchens

What is Wisdom for the Wilderness?

Join Dr. Josh Hutchens, director of Gateway Seminary's Rocky Mountain Campus and pastor at Overland Church in Fort Collins, Colorado, as he explores spiritual faithfulness amid life's challenges and suffering. Through discussions on theological questions and inspiring stories, Wisdom for the Wilderness offers guidance and hope for navigating the complexities of faith in a broken world.

speaker-0: Welcome to Wisdom for the Wilderness, a weekly podcast by the pastors of Overland Church where we talk about the Bible, theology, practical things, and we answer questions. And so today we're going to answer a question coming from a sermon that was preached on 1st Timothy ⁓ chapter 2 verses ⁓ 11 through 15. And so that's the passage on women. And in that we talked about, I talked about as I preach, complementarianism, egalitarianism, and patriarchalism. And some from, from that sermon, first, I would just say overwhelmingly got a really lot of positive feedback in our church and a lot of affirmation. And a lot of it came back to me as, thank you. I've never heard it explained that clearly. And so.

speaker-1: Right.

speaker-0: If you haven't listened to that sermon, I would encourage you to go and listen to it. think it's important to know why you believe what you believe, why we function, why we.

speaker-1: Try to remember to put it in the show notes. always say on the episode, I'm going to put things in the show notes and then I forget. So I'll try. But you can find it on the sermon podcast if you if it's not in the show note.

speaker-0: So, specifically in that sermon and some of the things that sparked questions was 1 Timothy chapter 2 verse 11, where Paul says, let a woman learn quietly with all submissiveness. He says, I do not permit a woman to teach her to exercise authority over a man, rather she's to remain quiet. For Adam was ⁓ formed first, then Eve, and Adam was not deceived, but the woman was deceived and became a transgressor. Yet you will be saved through childbearing if they continue in faith and love and holiness with self control. When you're listening to this, you will have also heard a sermon on deacons, where we also address some of these questions. And so as we start today, want you to hear our hearts in it pastorally is man, we want to be faithful to the Lord, do what the Bible says and we're going to love and shepherd the church well. We want to. Again, I want you to hear me say that women and men are equal in dignity, value, and worth, and we believe that both are very, very important in the kingdom of God. And our aim today is just to show you more clearly what the Word teaches and how it even applies ⁓ outside of the church. yeah, Josh, as we get started,

speaker-1: Yeah. Right. Absolutely.

speaker-0: ⁓ let me kind of give a recap of the sermon and then you can kind of like pop, let's start working through the questions. this, the specific.

speaker-1: Yeah.

speaker-0: instruction that this passage is giving us is saying that qualified men are who can be the pastors of a church to serve in the... and you've got the elder, pastor, overseer, shepherd, bishop. It is in the level of leadership in the church that is teaching to the whole congregation and holding authority over the whole congregation, being the under shepherd, ⁓ submitting to Jesus and his teaching. Right. So the question that we answered is about teaching. That's what, that was the sermon. So what were the questions that came from that?

speaker-1: Yes. Yeah, so, ⁓ you know, I think one thing before we get into that, ⁓ one thing you mentioned in the sermon that's really helpful is that when we look especially at chapter 2 verse 12, you know, that's a very straightforward passage. ⁓ So, on the face of it, it's very clear. I do not permit a woman to teach or to exercise authority. And this ESV translation is a quite literal translation. ⁓ And so, you know, if you look at the Greek, I could translate it, you know, it's going to be almost exactly like this. ⁓ Right. I mean, the word ordering in Greek is a little bit different, but the meaning is pretty much exactly this. And so, ⁓ there are, you know, if you don't want this to be true, that women are outlawed ⁓ from exercising authority or teaching men in the church,

speaker-0: No matter what you do with it

speaker-1: there's essentially two moves that people will make. ⁓ Number one will be that, and this is the kind of classic theological liberal move, is to say, well, Paul's a sexist. And classic theological liberals do not hold that the entire Bible is authoritative and inerrant. There are errors in the Bible, so this is just one of those errors. Paul is just a misogynist, and that's outdated, and so that's what it means, but it doesn't apply to us anymore. Just dismiss it. But if you want to be an evangelical who ⁓ believes that the Word is authoritative and inerrant, then the move is to say there's something cultural going on in the background of this text. that means that this applied to this specific situation and does not apply to all churches everywhere at all times. And so, there's a few different ways that ⁓ people will argue for this, and one is to say, well, this was the case in this instant in Ephesus because women were uneducated. and now that we live in a society where we value women equally and we educate women equally, that it doesn't apply. Or to say, you know, that you had in Ephesus the cult of Artemis that was such a big deal in Ephesus, these women had been kind of indoctrinated into that cult, and so, ⁓ therefore, the women in Ephesus were particularly ⁓ kind of predisposed to teaching false teaching, and so Paul is barring those women in that particular place from that. Now, the problem with those arguments is the grounding that Paul actually gives in the passage, isn't it? So, he says, four, Adam was formed first, and then Eve. He doesn't say... for the women are uneducated or for the women are misinformed appeals to creation in the fall, right? Yeah. And so, that's something that doesn't just apply in one place. I mean, it's the most universal reasoning for this teaching that there could be. Yeah, that's right. And so, ⁓ Adam was created first, and then Eve, there's an authority structure.

speaker-0: He appeals to creation order. both things.

speaker-1: in that creation order that is in the family, that husbands are in authority, that wives are to submit to their husbands, that's said repeatedly, and also that Adam was not deceived, but the woman was deceived. So, even when Satan comes to disrupt creation order, what does he do? He turns the authority structure on its head, and he deceives the woman ⁓ in order to bring, take God's design for creation and just turn it upside down. ⁓ So, you know, God designed man in authority over woman, and then as humanity in authority over creation, Satan comes as a creature, as a serpent, and deceives the woman, who then ⁓ gives the fruit to the man, and so the entire authority structure of creation is turned upside down. And so, the Paul is saying, I think, that in the church we need to go back to the created order, ⁓ and that's going to safeguard us from deception, from false teaching. It doesn't mean it's the only thing that needs to be done, because men can be false teachers, too, as he already said. But in this particular issue, ⁓ women... have a certain role and responsibility in the home that the church reflects. The church is a family. The church is the household of God, as it's going to say in 1 Timothy chapter 3, and so the same authority structure that's in the home is going to be reflected in the church. And so, ⁓ you know, I think that's kind of the big picture of you know, how we're reading this passage. And of course, there's a lot more that could be said. There's a lot of books and commentaries and everything.

speaker-0: And disagreement, everything else. The second thing that I mentioned in the sermon, the second way you can go about a lot of the Assemblies of God, brothers and sisters, in some I would just say like more like Babtacostal kind of people, which is, you know, in a lot of ways that's the Assemblies of God, but Babtacostal kind of people, ⁓ they're looking at gifting.

speaker-1: Yeah.

speaker-0: And, our, know, they're going from a verse in Acts where it says, our, you know, your sons and daughters will prophesy, which was quoting Joel. So, ⁓ we are very much on the same page. And I said in that sermon, just upfront, I'm a complimentarian. So we'll jump into, we'll, we'll, we'll walk further into that, but some, so some questions came from that, right? Like, so outside of the church, can a woman be a CEO? Should she do this? Should she do?

speaker-1: Yeah.

speaker-0: That should, you know, I think, ⁓ in a patriarchal society, we'll talk about this more. It's like women should submit to all men. And I don't think the Bible teaches that. think the Bible teaches you submit to your husband. So, ⁓ you, you submit, you know, there is a level of submission where you submit to your employer, your boss or the government or like there's weak.

speaker-1: Right. Yeah.

speaker-0: We don't like this submit word, but what we generally are people that are called to submit. ⁓ so let's jump in. Let's, let's, let's talk through some of this.

speaker-1: Yeah. So, one of the questions was just to kind of unpack that kind of spectrum, patriarchy, complementarianism, egalitarianism, especially patriarchy and complementarianism. Egalitarianism is the idea that men and women are equal, and yeah, they'll recognize that there are kind of different predispositions in men and women, but that both should be able to do whatever. Interchangeable, you know.

speaker-0: interchangeable. You know, role distinctions in church or home or work are anywhere ⁓ across the board.

speaker-1: right. And so, I think, you know, that our approach to Scripture is going to pretty much just outlaw that. ⁓ You know, we're not going to go there. It's more culture that's going to lead you there. But the main difference, I think, people struggle with understanding is the difference between what we're calling patriarchy and complementarianism. And so, I think patriarchy one of the markers of patriarchy that's different, and people will call themselves patriarchists. It's not just like something we're calling them. It's right. They claim this and they they will say, I'm not a complementarian. I am a... ⁓ That's a good question. I don't know if he would or not, but a lot of people kind of influenced by him would claim that. Right. I think one of the the markers of it is that

speaker-0: Would Doug Wilson say that?

speaker-1: infantilization of women. So, women in the home and the church simply become treated like children. And so, I mean, I've seen this in some couples where the wife has to ask the husband for an allowance, or has to, like, any purchase, she has to call her husband, and, you know, or another marker of this, a Vodi Bacchum would be really big on this is that daughters should not leave the home in order to go to college or live on their own. That's right. So, it should transfer directly from the father's authority to the husband's authority. ⁓ And so, you know, those would be the types of things that patriarchy is marked by. And then, in complementarianism,

speaker-0: should get married and then leave the home.

speaker-1: There is even a spectrum within complementarianism between hard and soft complementarianism. so, hard complementarians would tend to say, answer that question, you know, no, women shouldn't be CEOs. I would never vote for a female president ⁓ because this applies across the board, whereas soft complementarians would say, you know, that's really going beyond Scripture, and ⁓ so we're not going to hold those types of things because Scripture does not address that. ⁓ And that's not to say that because of the difference between men and women, there's not going to be predispositions that ought to be affirmed. For example, ⁓ you know, are men more likely to go into law enforcement? Absolutely. like men are geared and created in such a way that they're going to be more attracted to being a law enforcement officer or being in the army. And some of these things where, you know, the left is saying, because of DEI policies, we ought to have ⁓ equal representation in the Marines between men and women. That's just never going to happen because men and women are different. and more men are going to want to go into the Marines than women.

speaker-0: So to be clear here, you know, there are things about male and female where we're created to compliment each other and that we're going to have dispositions to things that the others aren't. That doesn't mean, so like you would say that there are going to be more men who are willing to take risk than there are females that are going to be willing to take risk. That doesn't mean that there are plenty of men that are risk adverse. And there's some women that are willing to take risk.

speaker-1: Yeah, right. So and on the flip side there's gonna be like jobs and roles that women because they're more nurturing by nature are going to be more predisposed and better at

speaker-0: And better at than, than men. so you can't, you can't just put this in black and white categories when it comes to how, how we're all created. And so I would generally say, you know, if you look at, uh, CEOs of, uh, fortune 500 companies, you know, you're talking less than 10 % are, are women. And I think there's, I think there's, there's a lot of reasons for that. And you go back. You know, there's, there's even reasons with opportunity and the good old boy system from years ago, where it wasn't an opportunity for women. would just generally say there's going to be way less women that aspire to it to want to be the CEO of a company. ⁓ then there are men that aspire to it. And let's just be honest, there's, there's way fewer people, there's way more people that aspire to it than people that are actually gifted for it. So, you know, I really think.

speaker-1: Yeah. Yeah.

speaker-0: in this, and we may get further in this in a minute, but the kind of the feminist movements that have pushed, hey girl, you go do this thing, you go be the boss, babe, you can be the lawyer, you can be the doctor, you can be the thing. I believe absolutely they can. So many of them get there and go, I hate this. I don't want to do this. I was told I should want this. And this is a real conversation that we have. I had it pastoral ministry.

speaker-1: Yeah. Yeah.

speaker-0: Many times where, you know, it's like, wait a second. spent all this time in school. I spent all this time chasing this dream, climbing the ladder. got at the top of the ladder and I just want to stay home with my kids. I just want to have babies and be a wife and a mom. And it's like, but now I've got all this debt and I can't do it. And so, ⁓ I'm not saying that by any means that, that women shouldn't pursue careers. I'm just saying we shouldn't look down on the ones who go. Hey, I wanna stay home and be with kids.

speaker-1: And that's where Paul goes, isn't it? That she will be saved through childbearing. And I think the point that Paul is making, obviously, it's not saved in the sense of justification, or justified by faith alone. Women are not justified, declared righteous before God by childbearing. But salvation here in the New Testament uses this salvation in this way a lot of times, is more in terms of sanctification. progressive way that we're living out who we are in Christ, and He's reminding women that they have something that is really unique to them. Only women can bear children. No matter what the left says, only women can bear children, and that's not a small thing, an insignificant thing to be dismissed. That is a beautiful, wonderful, necessary important thing. And that doesn't mean that women have to be June Cleaver, as you're saying. I think that's a very narrow understanding of what it means to live as a woman, where we live in this industrial society. And I mean, if you go back to farming families, women worked. You go to Malawi, women work.

speaker-0: Absolutely. They're, I mean, all hands on deck and even, even in places where they're, you know, you look at the proverbs 31 woman, ⁓ you know, obviously if she was able to, her husband was successful, you know, that's, that's one thing I would say that her husband was successful. He's thought it well at the gates and those things, but she obviously was pretty business savvy and could turn a profit and make a profit herself. So

speaker-1: Yeah. Yeah. But ultimately, all those things, and even as husbands, I think we need to remember that our careers are in service to our home, and it can't be upside down. And so, if our home is suffering because of our careers, then we need to pause for a second and rethink things, whether we're men or women, but especially as women and as husbands seeking if our wives want to spend more of their energy and time ⁓ know, raising the kids, managing the home, then trying to find ways to make that happen if it's at all possible. Yeah. Yeah. So,

speaker-0: Can I just say something about homemaking real quick? And this may offend some people.

speaker-1: But go right ahead. I'm usually the one that offends people on this.

speaker-0: I don't think when you say homemaker, I would just tell you, I see a trend in Christian culture where the woman ends up staying at home. She doesn't take care of the kids. She doesn't disciple the kids. She looks at a lot of Tik TOK reels and she makes her house a pretty place to be. Like she spends a ton of money on decoration and time and, those things. And not that there's anything wrong with any of that, but you like the job is, it is to care spiritually. physically nurture the home that is, that is the job. ⁓ and, and, and, you know, that's the job, whether you have a job or not, you know, you're a full, full-time school teacher. You still have the same.

speaker-1: Yeah. Yes. Yeah. Job. That's right.

speaker-0: And so, man, I just think you can't undersell that job. You can't undervalue that job. It's like incredibly, incredibly important.

speaker-1: Yeah. So, of the other questions, kind of application questions, especially to the church. You mentioned in the sermon going to Jamaica and seeing a woman preach in a church, and you asked about it, and I think the missionary said, well, there's no qualified men here. And so, you know, the question was, what do we think about in these church situations, especially missionary situations, where there are no qualified men, what do you do? So, you told the story, so maybe you follow up, and then I have an opinion from my time in Malawi.

speaker-0: I mean, I would say, if you think about who are, in our kind of culture and life, who are the missionaries that we celebrate?

speaker-1: a lot of women, Lottie Moon, Annie Armstrong, which wasn't a missionary, but a supporter.

speaker-0: And then, ⁓ you know, there's a female missionary in our state that gets celebrated. Nancy Murphy.

speaker-1: Yeah. Amy Carmichael would be another one. Mary Schlesser, a lot of female missionaries that are celebrated.

speaker-0: Nicey Murphy. So. ⁓ I don't know. What's your answer?

speaker-1: Okay, so, I mean, this is something I actually dealt with in Malawi, ⁓ because ⁓ you would have churches that were majority women, and you would have, a lot of times, pastors who ⁓ maybe were qualified and then disqualified themselves, especially with sexual sin, and then there was a vacuum. ⁓ This was, this is an issue we talk about, you know, when you talk to missionaries all around the world, this is an issue. ⁓ I think that still there is wisdom in the complementarian reading of Scripture that we should not undercut ⁓ in missiological areas. And so, there are other ways to solve that issue rather than say, well, we're going to have a female pastor. And the other ways are primarily through having outside help come in for a time until there are men raised up in that church. ⁓ So, you know, the idea in the West, and, you know, in pioneer times, but we're going back to it, is circuit writing. So, even in Colorado, we have pastors

speaker-0: help come in. that are essentially circuit, essentially circuit riding in Colorado. You know, think about like an Alan Carr, he's, he just pastors two churches, one on Sunday morning, one on Sunday evening. But I know like up in Wyoming, in Montana, I mean, there's like legit circuit riders. They're preaching, ⁓ different places.

speaker-1: Yeah. Yeah, four churches, one Sunday a month, things like that.

speaker-0: Yeah. That kind of thing is, is happening and it's going to happen more and more in the past oral crisis that we're, we're.

speaker-1: in. Yeah, and so I think that's those types of things are the better answer to that issue, ⁓ and to, ⁓ you know, lean on outside help until people are raised up or can move in to offer that type of leadership, because of, you know, this is not ⁓ the grounding in chapter 2 verse 13 is, again, that creation-fall grounding. It's not situational. It's not a pragmatic issue. It's a bigger issue. And if you go down that road, it's going to be really hard to reverse it once you have qualified men. And the church is already going to be in this kind of unbiblical way that it's set up.

speaker-0: I would have leaned towards thinking back to that church in Jamaica as a young man going. You got to get, you got to get outside help. But I mean, that, that just all comes back down to, want to see healthy churches, healthy disciples make healthy churches. And we don't want there to be a shortage of healthy men. And, you know, I would just say church, one thing that's something we should celebrate is the number of healthy men in our church. I would, I would also tell you to look at our college ministry.

speaker-1: Yeah. Right. Yeah. Yeah.

speaker-0: and look at the number of young men in our college ministry versus a lot of other college ministries. Like we have a crop of healthy young men aspiring to health. Let me say it that way, that want to be healthy young men. So that would be one encouragement.

speaker-1: for us. Yeah. Another question, what does it mean to exercise authority in the church? you know, we have a female kids director. and she ⁓ schedules men for teaching different classes. Or what if we had a female worship leader? You know, sometimes we have women leading songs or leading prayers or that kind of thing. So, what is the definition here of exercising authority, and how does that work out practically?

speaker-0: So I think we're talking about the ultimate authority of teaching the congregation, teaching the Bible to... And I mean, that's what it is. So let's say, let's use serve six, eight and Christmas, you know, that toy distribution. Who's in charge of that? A woman, right? And it'll probably always be a woman.

speaker-1: Yeah. Yep.

speaker-0: And let me just say, praise God it's a woman because they do it with, I mean, the women that have done that job, uh, they do it very, very well. Yeah. Uh, much better than if any of our pastoral staff or manager were doing it, right? They're just gifted and they're better at it, but they stand up and they, they give instruction and Hey, this is what we're going to do. And here's, need you to do this job. You know, in some ways you're going, well, is that authority? It's not what he's talking about.

speaker-1: So, these two things that are mentioned here in chapter 2 are the distinctives of the office of overseer in chapter 3. That's even different from deacons. an overseer must be able to teach, and he must manage his household well, because he has to manage the church. And so, I would say, you know, this is the unique teaching of the entire church, which is authoritative.

speaker-0: manage this church.

speaker-1: But it's not just that, it's also that whole church level of exercising of leadership and vision and authority over the church that the office of overseer ⁓ is tasked with, okay? And we ensure that through the way that we organize all of our ministries. So, we have five departments that have leadership pipelines in those five departments, and ⁓

speaker-0: ⁓ I'll name them real quick. NextGen, Adult Discipleship, Worship, Missions, and Stewardship.

speaker-1: Yeah, go ahead. Yeah, and over each of those departments is pastoral leadership, which is male leadership. But then when you get down within that...

speaker-0: even at the director level, the highest level there, depending on the ministry, there can be women in that.

speaker-1: Yeah. And, you know, you think in terms of delegation, like, real authority and leadership always involves delegation. ⁓ And so, this is the distinction between patriarchy and complementarianism. Even in the home, in patriarchy, there is no delegation. You know, like I was saying, the woman has to call her husband before she swipes her debit card. Because she can't be trusted. That's authority. That's... No. I mean, I... wife spends money all the time without having to ask me. And the same thing is true in the church in other ways. You know, I have a church card. I don't ask you or Brandon every time that I swipe that thing. There's a lot of times I know there's no problem with me swiping it. I've been delegated that authority. I do it. But there are also times where, you know, maybe it's a certain amount or something

speaker-0: That's part of our process and procedures that hey, anything over this Mount has to be approved.

speaker-1: then I'm going to call you or I'm going to call Brandon. We're going to make sure everybody's on board with it. It's, you know, green lighted and, you know, and so we're all kind of exercising delegated authority under authority. so and so we have no problem with Stacey being our kids director because there are there are elders and overseers that are overseeing what she's doing. ⁓

speaker-0: And that would be true, by the way, if she were male, we're not... Right. I'm not putting any different parameters on Stacey because she's a female than I am on justice. Like they're both at their level. But we do believe she can exercise authority over kids. think a question that churches have to answer is where does a man become a man? So can you have a...

speaker-1: Right, absolutely. Same with justice in the student. Yeah.

speaker-0: female student director, right? I think that's a question to answer. ⁓ I'm not going have a strong, like, I'm not going to talk about other churches. I would just say our church, I choose that to be a male. You know, I choose that to be male leadership.

speaker-1: Mm. I mean, and there are sociological, psychological reasons to do that, because you you have, when boys hit puberty, they naturally have this kind of rebellion against their mothers, against, and that they don't have with male teachers, or... That's right. And so, I think, you know, there's a created, you know, order in...

speaker-0: created design in there that comes out. That would be where I would find

speaker-1: But to be clear, you know, when we're talking about the teaching office of the church, teaching doctrine, especially in the Sunday morning sermon, we wouldn't have a woman ⁓ preach on Sunday morning. Right, absolutely. Because that's authoritative teaching of Christian doctrine. That's something that belongs to that office of overseer and elder, it doesn't mean that we would only have pastors preach, but that it would be someone who at least meets that qualifications and is perhaps on the road to becoming a pastor or elder.

speaker-0: And, and ultimately, no matter if it's a guest that's invited in or however you do that, it's still is under the authority of the pastors of the church, the over, the over the people who are giving oversight of the overseers to the church. ⁓ so in that, like, let's just, what, what are the things women can do in the church?

speaker-1: Yeah. They can do almost anything. Right. Yeah. Almost anything that isn't teaching or exercising authority over men. Yeah.

speaker-0: can pray publicly. I think they can lead in worship and congregational singing. There is some people who disagree with that, but I think they can. I think administratively, organizationally, you know, I think there are places where, you know, like it's totally right for, you know, the leader of a hospitality's

speaker-1: Right.

speaker-0: ministries of female and she's got men serving under her and they are coming under her authority in that leadership role. think that's totally fun. I think they can serve as theological voices in the church too. I mean, think we can be sitting around in a conversation and somebody can have a question. And I think my wife who's a great theological mind,

speaker-1: Yeah.

speaker-0: It is every right and ability to say, God's word says and answer. Yeah. And, know, I think that. This is going back to complimentarianism, right? To say that men and women, when we are working together, there's a flourishing that happens and that you need. I would never want to go to a church of only men. You know, I just wouldn't.

speaker-1: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

speaker-0: I think you need both and you need the both serving, linked together in unity and that's when the church can really flourish.

speaker-1: Yeah, absolutely, absolutely. ⁓ You know, and I think that what you said is going to answer another one of these questions, how are women's voices heard? Well, women are involved in every area of ministry. They're involved, you know, our wives are involved, know, women are respected and honored, and their gifts are utilized, then their voices are going to be heard, but ultimately, the office of pastor is going to be held by men in the same way that in the home, the husband is going to have a unique office in the home that only he fulfills. ⁓ And so, but we would say in the home, that husband, if he's a good husband, he's going to listen to his wife and take her opinion seriously. learn from her when ⁓ she knows more about something than he does.

speaker-0: Yeah. Let, let, let me just give an illustration of that in the home because I mean, it might be helpful for us to even talk about complimentarianism in the, in the home. That be a full podcast episode maybe. But you know, in our home, ⁓ there, there are certain things that like one I'm in charge, like the ultimate responsibility falls up to me. Right. Right. And if it goes south, it's my fault. Like leader leadership always flows up problems always float. there's something wrong in the family.

speaker-1: Yep.

speaker-0: ultimate responsibility God has placed on the husband and the father. But like what's something that I would say, here's something I've said and I expect my wife to submit to, right? I have said, my wife, I'm gonna tell her a little bit, but she like loves serial killer documentaries. Like she would like listen to the podcast, would watch the things, and then she walks around the house like, what was that noise? You know, like scared. And so I have like banned them.

speaker-1: Right?

speaker-0: To say, listen, we're not doing that. Yeah. And I'm saying my authority as the leader of this house.

speaker-1: Yeah.

speaker-0: We're not doing that. Right. And I expect her to submit to it. And for the most part she does. And so easy example, right? Okay. He's got the right to, to say that like that's good leadership at the same time. I would, I would just say my wife was an educator for many years and it's great at school. And guess what? I'm not, I'm not an educator. I'm not great at school. And so like, we're making decisions ⁓ about our child, our children's education. What do I do?

speaker-1: Yeah.

speaker-0: I go to her and say, I really like what, what's the play here? What's your input? Ultimately the decision's mine, but so far in her marriage, we've never gone against what she said. Right. Because I value her, her opinion. That's just a simple.

speaker-1: Yep. Yeah. Yeah. that's going to be different in every couple. And so, in premarital counseling, usually it'll reveal that one person's better at finances than the other. And in the marriage, that person's probably going to do the books and keep track of the budget, and that may be the woman.

speaker-0: And so their strength and weakness. ⁓

speaker-1: And that doesn't mean that she has ultimate authority over that, but that she's better skilled, and those skills are going to be used, and the husband's going to delegate that authority, and, you know, and maybe they'll have a place where he has to make a decision for them because there's different opinions. Maybe that's going to come up, but most of the time, it's going to be a come about through consensus, right? Yeah, that's right. And so, I think in our marriage, don't know, there may be two or three times in our entire marriage we'll be married 20 years where I've had to say something and say, no, this is the way it's going to be. Hardly ever does that ever happen. Most of the time it's just consensus between the husband and wife.

speaker-0: So maybe here, cause I realized we're probably starting to go long on this podcast and we need to land the plane, but. We look to the Bible and we see the Bible and we see the way that Jesus treated women. We see the way that Paul treated women, even though Paul gets called a misogynist. Like if you look at how he speaks of Priscilla or Phoebe and like you read Romans 16 and all the women listed in it, like he obviously treated women well. I think there's a sinful abuse of women that sometimes has in the Christian tradition has got gotten called patriarchy outside of the Christian tradition, like in Islam, but like it very much is this way. Everything, like the, all the negative effects of it, you see it in other, other cultures are our answer to the sinful treating of women can't be a sinful response to God's creation order at the same time. And so while I would go back and look at the first wave of feminism where

speaker-1: Yeah.

speaker-0: we're talking about the legal rights of voting and owning property. And there were general things that that was that they were fighting against that align with Christianity, that Christianity and a lot of Christians were at the forefront of that. I would look at things in the workplace and go, yeah, if the woman and the man are doing the exact same job, guess what? They should make the exact same pay, you shouldn't be able to discriminate their pay against the

speaker-1: We shouldn't turn a blind eye to harassment in the workplace and those types of things.

speaker-0: Absolutely not. And it's, and that's a huge thing, by the way, that's a huge thing. Like those, those are sinful things. The response shouldn't be though, to go the other, other way. Right. And what our world has done now in, you know, fourth, fifth wave feminism, wherever we are, it has labeled men as bad. And we've fallen into the intersectionality and critical race theory. That's just been totally co-opted that says,

speaker-1: Yeah. Yeah.

speaker-0: men are bad, particularly white men are bad and they're toxic. They're part of the patriarchal structure. Let's put a target on their back. And so, you know, just as it's wrong to oppress, ⁓ to oppress a woman, to step on a woman and lift a man up. So is it to step on a man to lift a woman up. Right. And all of it is rebellion against God's design. So when there is a sinful problem,

speaker-1: Yeah.

speaker-0: Rebelling against God's design to fix the sinful problem is just going to end you up in a bigger sinful problem. It's not going to, to fit. And so what we have to say is we really do believe that God has, has created a good design. is good. He's created, he has given male authority in the, in the home. He's created us a lead in a certain way in the, in the, in the church.

speaker-1: Yes.

speaker-0: think there's some general stuff that applies to the world in how we lead, but there is, there is equality. There is equal value and worth and we just need to embrace those. And we need to walk in, walk in God, how God created us to be. you know, we can't go, we can't, the culture question is this fair? The Christian's question has to be, is this faithful?

speaker-1: Yeah. Yeah, that's right.

speaker-0: This is how God designed it because how God's designed it is fair. It is better. It is best. So, you know, as, as a leader of a church, I want our women to feel like they can show up to church and they can work and serve in ways that matter because they do. ⁓ I want our women to show up and, and truly feel.

speaker-1: Yeah.

speaker-0: like not a secular empowerment movement, but a truly empowered to be the Christian leader and disciple maker that God has called them to be. All right. All right. Well, Josh, got any closing words of wisdom for us?

speaker-1: Yep. Just to echo what you just said, I think that we should embrace what Scripture says and stop feeling like we have to be apologetic for Scripture. ⁓ You know, you have people teaching on gender roles in the home and in the church, and immediately they go to kind of, well, yeah, well, we don't mean this, and we don't mean that. And we want to be clear, but at the same time, I think We need to be more proactive in saying, this is beautiful, this is good, this brings joy, and, you know, and embrace it rather than just be apologetic and say, well, we kind of have to do this because the Bible says we have to do this, but I know it's not really the best because the culture, you know, let's not have that attitude towards it. Let's embrace it because it's good, and it's great.

speaker-0: Here's my final word of wisdom. And it's this men lead, men step up and lead and step up and lead and love your wife and like Christ love the church and disciple your kids and, and step up and lead with like, like have the character that we've been talking about that we want that, that overseer pastor to have, like have that kind of character and lead and we'll see beautiful things come from it.

speaker-1: Yeah. That's right.

speaker-0: Thank you so much for joining us for Wisdom for the Wilderness. Be sure to tune in again next week. Like always, if you have any questions, can email them to us at wisdom at overlandchurch.org. Thank you so much. Go and be blessed.