This was a guest post for the Women in Ministry Series at In a Mirror Dimly in 2012. That website is now mothballed, but I found my post in the internet archives. I’m sharing it here.
As I walked out into the cool autumn air, I felt the familiar combination of elation and exhaustion. I had spent an enjoyable evening at a campus ministry speaking on the topic of faith followed by an engaging question and answer time. The evening had gone well. I had clearly sensed God working through me and felt the deep, satisfying joy of knowing I had used my gifts to encourage others.
Just as meaningful was the fact that my fiancé (now husband) was there to hear me speak for the first time. David’s eyes glowed with unmistakable delight and pride. His approval added to my overflowing heart of thanksgiving.
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It was another hurtful discussion. A male relative vehemently opposed my speaking ministry and told me yet again that the Bible puts extreme restrictions on women. I replied that I couldn’t answer his every argument, but I had clearly known the Holy Spirit’s empowering many times. His response? If I had been empowered by something while speaking, it wasn’t the Holy Spirit.
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Like many Christian women who are blessed with traditionally “male” gifts, I’ve experienced the highs and lows. I’ve never doubted my gifts or the source of them. I cherished my ministry opportunities. I longed to attend seminary, perhaps even teaching at the college level given my love for students and the university setting.
But, instead, I believe I was called aside by God.
In Men and Women in the Church, Sarah Sumner writes about coming to understand the struggles many women face. Throughout her time in seminary she was happily confident of God’s calling. But years later God opened her eyes to the hurt and frustration experienced by her Christian sisters. This new understanding enabled her to write and minister more effectively on the topics related to women in the church.
I believe God has granted me a similar experience. I’ve gone from freely and joyfully ministering in various settings to a time of what I can only describe as bondage and back out again. I’ve traveled unexpected paths. I’ve made choices that I can’t even quite explain when I look back. And yet I know that David and I have consistently prayed for the Lord’s guidance, wisdom and discernment. I know God answers His daughter’s earnest prayers, and so I believe that even these perplexing experiences and wilderness wanderings are a part of His big picture for my life.
In Streams in the Desert, Mrs. Charles E. Cowman writes of Paul’s imprisonment:
Restrained from the missionary work he loved so well, he now built a new pulpit–a new witness stand–and from that place of bondage come some of the sweetest and most helpful ministries of Christian liberty. What precious messages of light come from those dark shadows of captivity.
My bondage over the past several years had two parts. One has been physical limitations that often left me with little ability to minister outside of my own home. The other was the bondage of listening to men and women who believed they could more accurately discern the call of God upon my life than I could. My prison was not like Paul’s. It was not a literal prison. But I was called aside by God for this season, apart from the work I loved so well, so I could understand more clearly and minister more effectively in the future.
People remark online that they aren’t going to fight anymore about the women’s issue. It isn’t worth it. Nothing changes with it. I strongly disagree. I have been changed by it. I came out of a tradition that prohibited women from doing many things, found freedom, became enslaved, and found freedom once and for all. One of the primary means God worked through to free me was the wealth of information online.
I’m Gen X in my outlook and not terribly postmodern. Given the choice between truth and love, I freely admit that I gravitate toward truth. It isn’t that I don’t think love is important. Of course it is. But love was not going to convince me that women are free to exercise their gifts. Instead it was thoughtfully written blog posts and comments with logical explanations of the various Scripture passages written by people who honor God’s word.
There are many women like me who need to see the truth convincingly written. Women who need to be set free to use their gifts. Older moms with children who need to see their mothers set free to minister. I don’t want my now five year old daughter to deal with this question in the future. I want her to know from the very beginning that she is created in the image of God, created to serve the Body of Christ however God sees fit to gift her.
So while there are women and men who wish the arguments and endless discussions would go away… I have to disagree. Women are reading. Men are reading. People are being changed. The truth still sets people free. I know because it has set me free. I don’t know where God will lead me next on this path full of twists and turns. But I do know that His purpose for my gifts is being fulfilled each day even when the way may be unclear to me.
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