Participants: Julie Mesa, RN
Series Code: WOHII
Program Code: WOHII000016A
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00:14 Alright. Happy Sabbath. It's a blessing to be here
00:20 Before I begin I want to say that I have some dear friends 00:26 and family that are on the other side of this issue. 00:32 And I want you to know that 00:35 while I take a different position my love and my respect 00:39 for you still remains the same. And it's painful for me that 00:45 that we're even having to deal with this issue 00:48 in our church at this time. I grew up in a wonderful home. 00:53 My parents and surrounding family instilled in me 00:58 and in my brothers and sister my brother and sister 01:02 the idea that we could set our minds to do anything we wanted 01:06 to do. They believed in us and coming from a long line of 01:11 very strong women, and you can ask any of the women in my family 01:14 we are all very strong, opinionated and stubborn 01:19 I felt that the role of a woman was just as high and exalted 01:24 as that of a man. And I never felt deprived because there were 01:29 some positions that were not open to women; in fact I usually 01:32 didn't want those positions anyway. So when the issue of 01:36 women's ordination came up I wondered why women would want 01:42 to put themselves in that position. A minister's job 01:44 is a blessing. It's a high calling. I know because 01:48 for a while my husband was a minister and I was a minister's 01:52 wife. But it is stressful. I thought, I mean it's a hard job 01:58 to be a minister and when I thought about if I would want 02:02 to be a minister you know when this question was coming up 02:04 I thought do I want to be a mother and wife, and a minister? 02:09 No way! That would be too much. So for me I just said 02:13 I don't need to study this issue out, because for me 02:15 it's not really an issue. Then friends and family of mine 02:20 started taking sides on this issue, urging me to study it 02:25 out. I didn't want to. I just wished the whole thing 02:29 would go away, that I didn't have to focus on it. 02:31 Occasionally I would sit down and I would take some time 02:35 to study a little bit of it out and I would put it down again 02:38 it didn't interest me. But what caused me to pick it up again 02:42 was when I saw what was happening in our church 02:45 I saw that some of our Unions and Conferences were choosing to 02:50 ordain women despite being asked by our General Conference 02:56 to hold off on some of these steps. And when I saw that 02:59 I thought, what is it that would make our Conferences and some 03:05 of our Unions do what appeared very rebellious to me and 03:10 create disunity. What would cause that and so I said, 03:14 you know I really need to take the time and study this out. 03:18 And when I came to the conclusion of my study, I saw 03:25 a beautiful picture for the ministry of men and women 03:28 that I hope to share with you today. So before I get into 03:33 the main part of my talk, let's go ahead and have a prayer. 03:36 Lord I just pray that You would be up here with me, that You 03:43 would speak through me, that it wouldn't be my words that are 03:46 heard but Yours. I pray that the power of the Holy Spirit 03:52 would be felt in this place, hearts would be convicted to 03:56 follow You, in Jesus' name. Amen. 04:00 Sally Shaywitz in her book, Overcoming Dyslexia 04:04 talks about three regions of the brain that are very critical 04:08 to reading. One is called Broca's region and it's located 04:12 in the front of the brain, and there are two other regions 04:15 called the parietal temporal area and occipital temporal area 04:19 or region. Now what's interesting about dyslexia 04:23 is that people that are dyslexic generally only have broca's 04:28 region in their brain functioning during active 04:31 reading. So one study said, you know we're gonna take a group 04:36 of people that are dyslexic, that have only one region of 04:41 their brain working, and we're going to put them through 04:43 a period of tutoring and at the end of that time we want to 04:47 see what kind of an effect it has had on their brain. 04:50 And so they put them through several months of tutoring 04:52 and at the end of that time these people were reading 04:57 wonderfully, fluently. They'd been struggling before but now 05:00 they were reading wonderfully and they said I wonder what kind 05:03 of changes we're going to see in the brain when we look at it. 05:05 And so they looked at their brain and they found that 05:09 instead of just that one region working all three of the regions 05:14 were working at the end of that tutoring session. 05:17 And their conclusion was that in order for a person to be 05:23 a fluent reader they needed all three of the regions to be 05:28 involved. Now do you think any of those individuals 05:32 who were struggling to read before would wish to go back 05:36 and say, you know my broca region of the brain is pretty 05:40 amazing and it can do its own job and the job of those other 05:44 regions. We are discriminating against this region 05:49 by stating the other regions do a better job at their job 05:53 Now that's silly, right? We would quickly reply that Broca 05:57 has demonstrated that it can cover for the other areas 06:01 plus its own but the result will not be what God designed 06:06 it to be as when all regions work together. 06:10 God, my friends, has designed specific roles for men and women 06:23 It doesn't say male and male or female and female. 06:26 God created men and women of equal importance just like the 06:32 regions of the brain. And He designed us to work together 06:37 just like the regions of the brain toward a common goal 06:41 To accomplish this purpose He gave us different roles. 06:46 If one of us tries to do our job plus the job of the other one 06:51 we're going to leave a job undone. He created us male 06:56 and female, a team that is equal but with different 07:01 and important functions. Today the idea that men and women 07:06 are actually different comes as a surprise to some. 07:10 Did you know that? I just read a story of a woman, she's a 07:13 psychologist, Susan Pinker I'll quote some of her thoughts 07:17 later on. She says it came as a surprise to me that my husband 07:23 and I were not just alike, that they did not react the same to 07:27 to the birth of their first child. She said, I thought 07:30 everything he could do and like I was like as well as a result 07:35 of the whole feminist movement if you haven't heard Laurel 07:38 Damsteegt talk on the connection between feminism 07:41 and this whole issue. I hope you can go back and listen 07:44 to that. But ultimately my church family we have an enemy 07:50 the devil who would like to obliterate the image of God 07:55 within us. The blurring of distinction between the sexes 08:00 is one of his methods. When Ellen White saw this happening 08:04 a hundred years ago, in dress, when it was happening it was 08:08 something called The American Costume, they were trying to 08:11 blur the distinction of the sexes at that time and she 08:15 warned us about this. She said 08:41 Are we not seeing that great confusion now 08:46 between or regards to the role of men and women? Yet some 08:51 in our culture would like us to believe that males and females 08:54 are different not because God created them different 08:57 but because they're socialized to be that way, did you know 09:00 the new idea out now that we're only different because girls 09:06 were given little dolls to play with when they were little 09:08 and boys were given little cars to play with when they 09:11 were little and so of course girls are going to like dolls 09:15 when they get older and of course boys are gonna like cars 09:17 when they get older. They say it's just because that's how 09:20 parents trained them to be or that's how society trained them 09:23 to be. But just so that we can be clear this idea of 09:29 socialization is not the reason our Bibles give and it is 09:34 an idea questioned even today by biologists and psychologists 09:39 And I just want to take a little bit of time before we 09:43 get into other parts to just enumerate on some of these 09:46 differences. There's a book that's just been written 09:48 by a developmental biologist. His name is Lewis Wolpert 09:53 and the title of his book is Why Can't Men or Women 09:56 Be More Like Men? And he gives a whole list of biological 10:01 differences between men and women. 1. 40 hours after birth 10:06 girls will look around and choose to look at faces 10:11 of people more than boys will and boys on the other hand 10:15 instead of looking at faces, you know what they like to look at? 10:18 Mechanical objects. Fans and other gadgets. They don't 10:23 Their interest is in that. After 40 hours after birth 10:27 At four months of age, twice as many girls will cry when 10:31 frightened in a strange room as will boys. At 12, 18 or 24 10:37 months of age girls will look at dolls much more than boys. 10:41 While boys will look at cars much more than girls. 10:45 Do you know what Lewis says about this? He says, 10:58 Another difference. The hypothalamus which is part of 11:02 the brain is much larger in men than it is in women. 11:06 Women show their emotions more than men. Men tend to be 11:11 more aggressive than women. And interestingly even the words 11:18 we choose can reveal our gender. Did you know ladies that men 11:22 if we were to take a paper and write on it and send it off to 11:25 someone who never knew if we were male or female, if they 11:30 just took a look at our writing they could tell generally what 11:35 gender you are simply because women use more words related 11:39 to psychological and social topics while men use more words 11:44 that refer to properties of objects and impersonal topics. 11:48 Susan Pinker, psychologist who I mentioned before, says in her 11:54 book the Sexual Paradox, men women and the real gender gap 12:13 In fact, 80% of women will make adjustments to their 12:18 career to support these priorities. Men on the other 12:22 hand tend to have one passion and pursue it doggedly. 12:26 And interestingly she also states that women tend to have 12:32 about 10-12 career changes on average whereas men only have 12:38 about two. Again that's pointing to the fact that women 12:41 will change if it affects their social or familial relationships 12:46 whereas man, that's what he was called to do and he's just going 12:50 to pursue that. The List could go on and on and when applied 12:55 to the majority of men and women, in fact we see these 12:59 examples. You know sometimes, I find this funny, ladies do we 13:05 ever, you know when we can't get a jar open do we ever 13:09 call our daughters and say honey could you open this jar for me? 13:12 No. Who do we call, we call our husbands or we call our sons 13:16 or we call our fathers because in general men were created 13:20 stronger than women. But which parent do children typically 13:23 go to when they scrape their knee and they want comfort 13:27 and encouragement? They go to Momma. Because the mother tends 13:31 to have more empathy. My dear church family, we were created 13:37 different and God did this because we have special roles 13:42 to fill. We're going to spend some time on these special roles 13:46 but before I do I just want to mention that there are roles 13:52 like you've heard throughout the series, there are roles that 13:56 men and women are called to fill. And I'll just briefly go 14:00 over those again. There are teacher, missionary, prophet 14:05 cook, city builders. Did you know ladies that women were 14:08 called to be city builders? You can find it in 1 Chronicles 14:12 7:24. Business owners, agricultural workers, etc. 14:16 All these jobs were shared with men and women in the Bible. 14:21 But there are certain roles God has created which are 14:25 specifically unique to a man and to a woman. And these are 14:30 the ones that we're going to focus on. So let's start with 14:33 men. If you are married men God has called you to be husband 14:38 and not only a husband, but He has called you to be the 14:42 spiritual leader or head in your home. So what is the husband's role? 15:10 You know men, you are called to die for your families. 15:17 Just as Christ died for us. If necessary. That's your role 15:21 It's a beautiful, high, self sacrificing role that of a 15:26 husband. And I know God put that desire in men to be 15:31 protective. I see it in my husband, I see it in my son. 15:35 You know it's not my daughter who says, Mommy watch out! 15:38 Be careful. It's usually my son, Mommy watch out! 15:41 Watch out for that or be careful of that. He's very protective 15:45 and I love to see that. I saw this tendency growin up 15:49 in my father and in my brother. I remember a time when I was 15:54 a little girl that when my brother, sister and I were 15:58 coming home from school and I think it was probably getting 16:01 close to dark and our school was on one road and you just go one 16:07 road over and that's where our house was. But to get from that 16:11 road to this road you had to go down the scary gravel path. 16:15 It wasn't scary during the day but it got scary as it got dark 16:19 And so the three of us were headed home and I believe 16:22 it was getting dark and as we neared the beginning of the 16:26 little gravel pathway we heard a noise in the bush. And to me 16:30 it sounded like there was some one in that bush and I just 16:33 stopped. I was very scared, I looked at my sister and she was 16:36 scared and I looked at my brother and I thought he looked 16:40 scared but he never said if he was and he looked back at us 16:43 and he said, 'you girls, you run on home', and he couldn't have 16:46 been older than 10. He says 'you run on home and I'll fight them' 16:50 And so we ran and I had no idea who he fought, what happened 16:56 I just know that after that my brother was my hero. He was 17:01 strong and he would protect me that's what God calls men to do. 17:53 God calls you husbands, did you hear that, to protect, to lead 17:58 with wisdom, with kindness and gentleness. 18:02 Let me emphasize again, before we move to the next role that 18:08 God has also called you to the spiritual leadership in the home 18:13 To lead as Jesus leads the church. I just want to add here 18:18 that I have appreciated so much the spiritual leadership that my 18:25 husband gives in our family. Women want a husband that will 18:30 come home and sit and say alright family, let's gather 18:34 together for worship. Let's talk to God or we need to take this 18:39 to God in prayer. I appreciate that as a woman. Men, we want 18:44 husbands that are like that. This is a call for you. It says 19:07 Now if God has called you to be a father He has also called you 19:12 to a unique and high role. The Bible instructs fathers too, 19:26 The word nurture, this is an interesting word because some 19:30 times we think of this word as being a feminine type of word 19:35 but the word nurture according to Strong's is 19:46 Fathers it is your job to make sure your children receive a 19:51 complete education in the things of the Lord and since this is 19:55 your job it again makes you the spiritual leader of the home. 20:56 A father, new studies are also showing, has perhaps a greater 21:02 impact on the ability of his child to form trusting 21:06 relationships than a mother has as well. So listen to this. 21:10 This is from a recent study, taken from Science Daily, 21:16 June 12, 2012. That's where it's reported but it was a scientific 21:20 study where they took more than 500, actually it's a result of 21:25 more than 500 studies. And this is what it says: 22:06 Fathers you have a huge impact on your children and I know 22:10 from personal experience what it is like to have a good father. 22:15 My father was the kind of man that did help me form those 22:20 trusting relationships. I can remember being a little girl 22:23 and always thinking I could do whatever I wanted to because 22:28 my father and my mother were that example and said I could 22:32 And I always say my father spending time with God everyday 22:38 He would always take time and that impressed me, my church 22:43 family to spend time with God on my own as well. And whenever 22:49 I imagined God I always thought of Him as the God who loved me 22:54 even when I disagreed with Him because my dad did. 22:58 Whenever I imagined God, I thought He must be kind because 23:03 my father was. My father will always have my respect and love 23:09 for living out a beautiful picture of God. Don't you men 23:15 that are fathers want that for your children? What a beautiful 23:20 legacy to leave to them. I quote again from the Adventist Home 23:45 God has also called men to be providers of their families. 24:00 So you could be a Christian and if you don't provide for your 24:04 own family, it's almost as if you were not one. As a child 24:09 I used to think we were very poor. Because whenever we went 24:14 to the grocery store and we would pass that beautiful aisle 24:17 of donuts in the glass case and I would ask my mother for one 24:21 she'd say, Oh no we can't afford 'em. And so I thought 24:24 Wow, we must really be poor, we can't even afford a donut! 24:29 But even though, probably she did it for my health, we could 24:33 not necessarily afford extra because my mother chose to 24:36 stay home with us, we lived on one income back then. But even 24:40 though I thought we were poor we couldn't afford donuts 24:43 I never was concerned about the real necessities of life. 24:47 Because I knew my dad provided those for us with God's blessing 24:51 It was a very secure feeling, as a child to know I didn't have 24:56 to worry where I would sleep, what I would eat, what I would 25:00 wear, I never had to worry about those things. And men this is 25:04 a need that God is calling you to fulfill for your families 25:09 it's your job to be a provider for them. God has not only 25:12 called men to be leaders in their families however, but He 25:16 has called you to be leaders in your church. There are certain 25:21 spiritual roles in the Bible which are specific to men. 25:25 Now I'm just a lay person who's finally taken the time to 25:30 study these issues out, but I do have what my family describes 25:35 as a very strong personality and I believe in the fair and equal 25:39 treatment of women. But in my study I have not seen any 25:45 strong scriptural evidence to support women holding the 25:48 following positions. The first is deacon. 25:59 It does not read Let the deacons be the wife of one wife. 26:04 That would be confusion my brothers and sisters 26:07 This is the role of a man. It's plain to me who am not a Bible 26:12 scholar that this is what it's saying. Now I know Phoebe 26:15 has been brought up as an example of a female deacon, but 26:18 and so when I heard that I thought Oh I've gotta study that 26:22 maybe she was. And then I found this quote in the North Pacific 26:25 Union Gleaner, December 4,1907. 26:53 Now if she were really a deacon, why doesn't Mrs. White call 26:58 her one there? She could have. It seems to me that that's what 27:03 should've been done if that were the situation. And then 27:06 further on down in that same quote: 27:52 And I do believe she actually held a special role, but I will 27:57 talk about that a little bit later. 28:00 The priesthood was also very specific to men. Never once 28:05 in the Old or New Testament do you ever hear a referral to a 28:12 female priest. At least not one that was not an apostate 28:17 Israelite. Apparently in Judah there was a time when they 28:23 apostatized and there were women serving in that role. 28:27 And you also see it in pagan religions, priestesses 28:30 but you don't see it in the priesthood that God ordained 28:35 you don't see that once. Now, men and women and children 28:39 were called a kingdom of Priests in Exodus 19:6 but they still 28:45 had a male priesthood at the same time. So there was a 28:48 difference there between those two. Then there's the role of 28:52 elders or bishops, a role we often equate with our ordained 28:57 ministers and elders. And this is also very specific for men. 29:17 Again, this is a male role and anyone can see this. Like I said 29:22 I'm a lay person and this is very clear right here that this 29:24 is a male role. Listen to these quotes. 29:29 From the pen of Sister White. This is found in 5th Testimonies 29:33 page 60 and this really stuck out to me. 29:56 Do you see the differentiation right there? It was young men 30:00 an opportunity to study for the ministry and young persons 30:05 of both sexes to become workers in the various branches of the 30:10 cause. Another quote also from the 5th volume of Testimonies 30:37 Page 598 of the 5th volume of The Testimonies. 30:44 In closing, men - God has specific roles for you 30:49 He has called you to be husbands if you are married 30:52 fathers, if you have children but he has called all of you men 30:57 well He hasn't called all of you but those of you that He calls 31:01 are meant for these specific roles that are just for men 31:05 that of deacon, elder and bishop. Those are roles just 31:09 for you. That is the high calling. We need men to fill 31:13 those roles. If we don't have men who is going to fill them? 31:16 Ladies, this is the part that is exciting to me because there is 31:23 the special role for us to fill. But before we get to that one 31:27 we're gonna talk about some others as well. These roles 31:31 are specific. Just like the roles He gave to the different 31:35 parts of our brain. And they're of equal importance to that 31:39 which men are called to. They are just different. 31:42 That's it, they're just different. If you are married 31:45 one of the roles God has called you to is that of a wife. 31:49 We are designed to be our spouses' companion. 31:54 That Adventist Home, page 25 states: 32:22 Isn't that beautiful. We were created to be our husbands' 32:26 equal but also with distinctive roles. And notice this how 32:30 Mrs. White puts that we are equal and yet we are distinct 32:35 as well. Women should fill, this is a quote from Adventist Home 33:03 Do you see that? We are equal but yet we have distinctive 33:07 duties. We were also created to complement our spouses 33:12 not to lose our individuality or to let our powers lie dormant 33:18 Listen ladies, God doesn't call you just to be a doormat. 33:23 He wants you to have an education, to use all the 33:28 talents and skills that God has given you to the best of your 33:32 ability because He needs you and He has created and called you 33:36 to a high role in this day. Listen to this quote. 34:07 See, we're equal but we each have our job to do. And ladies 34:14 this is a tough one for me and I imagine that it's a tough one 34:18 for some of you but we are required to submit our judgment 34:22 to our husbands. And my husband will tell you that it's hard 34:24 for me to do sometimes. Some times he'll say, 'Husbands 34:29 submit yourselves unto your wives', when I'm getting up 34:32 on my high horse. We are required to submit but let me 34:37 continue, if it's not contrary to the will of God. I just have 34:42 to include here and this is very very important. Abuse in any 34:47 form or a husband who seeks to turn his wife against God 34:53 that is contrary to God's will. And we should not submit to that 35:06 If it is not fit in the Lord, we should not submit. But if it is 35:11 ladies, it is our duty to graciously acquiesce. 35:15 In a letter to Mrs. Loughborough June 6, 1861, Mrs. White wrote 35:45 Ladies, if God has called you as well to be a mother, He has 35:51 called you to one of the most sacred, important positions 35:57 a mortal could hold. Counsels for the Church, pg. 143 says 36:28 That is a high calling. And don't think because some of you 36:33 choose to stay home with your children that your role is less 36:36 important than if you were in the work force. I used to be 36:40 tempted to think that because I'm not out working I chose to 36:45 stay home with my children and because I'm not out working 36:48 sometimes I was tempted to feel that my role was not as 36:52 important. But then I would remember the sacrifice that 36:57 my mother made for my brother my sister and I when we were 37:00 little. She has a college degree and she could've chosen to 37:05 go out and get a job and help support our family but she chose 37:10 to stay home and take care of us children. And I can tell you 37:14 with great assurance that that is one of the reasons that my 37:18 brother, my sister and myself are still Christians today 37:22 and love the Lord. That is a high calling mother. You will 37:27 have stars in your crown if you do your work faithfully. 37:33 Again from Counsels to the church, page 143 37:52 Now ladies, this is exciting! God has also called us to 37:56 fulfill other spiritual roles in the church. I know in the 38:02 last session that we briefly went over the medical profession 38:05 but I just want to again add that God has a specific role 38:10 for men and a specific role for women in the medical 38:13 profession. He needs male nurses and female nurses. He needs 38:18 male physicians and female physicians. It used to be back 38:24 in the early 1900s that we thought of physicians role as 38:28 being more of a male role and the nurse role as being more of 38:31 a female role. But God needs both of us and just like our 38:35 brother said earlier, the reason for this was and I'm reading 38:40 from Counsels Upon Health page 364 38:55 I used to think this was silly as a nurse. As nurses we grow 39:00 callous to a lot of things like that, it just didn't bother me 39:05 But it hit me when I was visiting a patient and they 39:12 said I just feel so uncomfortable having to expose 39:18 myself in such a way and I thought, Really? You know it 39:21 didn't bother me as a nurse but it did bother them 39:24 and it's because God created us private and to keep our modesty 39:30 men and women and he needs men and women to fulfill these roles 39:35 in medicine so that men can treat men and women can treat 39:39 women if possible. I know some times there's situations where 39:42 that's not possible. But I didn't think this idea was so 39:46 silly when I needed to find an OBGYN because at that point 39:49 I wanted a woman as well. And you know when I worked in 39:51 maternity in OB nursing when I first graduated there were no 39:57 male nurses on my floor. You know why? Women don't want men 40:01 nurses helping them have babies. And I know we have male 40:05 physicians sometimes but if a woman had a choice, she 40:09 often would choose the female physician or the female midwife 40:12 over the male as well. Ladies you are needed to fill these 40:17 important positions. God also calls women to fulfill a specific 40:23 spiritual role in church that cannot be filled by anyone else 40:35 And I'm going to shorten that to Gospel Labor. Mrs. White expands 40:40 on this in Review and Herald, July 21, 1896 41:08 There is a call for women to do this kind of work, laboring with 41:13 the minister in the Gospel. This Gospel work designed for 41:19 women is a role that Ellen White says that a minister's wife 41:24 should fill when possible. But Jesus and Paul as far as we know 41:29 Paul didn't have a wife and Jesus didn't have a wife 41:32 so they needed these women to fulfill that part in the 41:37 ministry which they were called to fill. Manuscript 5, page 327 42:41 Ellen White goes on to say that our cause will suffer great loss 42:49 without this kind of work. And she says, 43:28 That is our appointed work. Manuscript 5 pg. 325 43:33 This work is a work for women by women. The cause would suffer 43:39 great loss without it. Women are just as greatly needed 43:44 to do the work which God has appointed them as are the men. 43:49 Just as greatly needed. And this role was considered important 43:53 enough in Ellen White's day that it was to be a paid position. 45:07 This role was considered so necessary that if a wife and 45:13 mother felt a call upon her life to do this work and she was able 45:19 to leave the high work of being a mother in the hands of someone 45:24 else then she was called to do so and go ahead and do the work 45:29 that God had called her to do. And I quote: 46:32 Manuscript 5, pg 324. Notice again, it's different but it's 46:39 just as important as that of a man. 46:45 My church family we are facing some options. You all have 46:50 heard about three different options. We have the first 46:53 option, the second option and the third option. 46:58 And this reminds me of a situation that took place 47:03 about 500 years ago, ok? Do you remember a man named 47:09 Martin Luther? And how he was called to give a message 47:15 that was not agreeable to many during his time? And when he was 47:20 called to stand up for his faith he did bravely. And later he 47:29 was not allowed to go in and so in his place 12 princes went 47:33 and if you read the book called Great Controversy you can read 47:36 their story in the chapter called Protest of the Princes. 47:40 And in that chapter we are told that the 12 princes went 47:45 and they presented their case and the opposition recognized 47:51 that their position was so strong and was creating such a 47:55 division that they said, well instead of taking the first 48:01 option, or the second option, one was to entirely stifle the 48:06 Reformation, the other was to let the Reformation continue 48:09 they said, let's make a compromise. Do you know that 48:12 they did that? They said, and I'll quote. This is from the 48:16 Great Controversy, page 199 49:15 You know this situation that we are up against, we have our 49:21 first option, our second option or we can choose our third one 49:25 which is a compromise. But is that really the right one? 49:31 It sounds to me very much like this situation which took place 49:34 back in Martin Luther's time. Would we lose ground by giving 49:39 in and compromise things? Again that was found in The Great 49:44 Controversy page 199. My church family I want to urge you 49:50 instead of ordaining women to the role of elder and bishop 49:56 create the position in the church which God has called 50:02 women to and without which the cause will suffer great loss. 50:09 Ministers need the co-laborer with them in the Gospel and 50:14 if that can be their wife that's who it should be. 50:17 But if that's not possible, then some other mother in Israel 50:23 needs to step up and take that position. Otherwise the cause 50:28 will suffer great loss. My dear sisters the devil has tried to 50:35 deceive us into thinking that we are missing out if we can't do 50:40 everything a man can do. And now we're paying the consequence 50:46 Suzanne Pinker in her book "The Sexual Paradox-Men, Women and 50:51 the Real Gender Gap" states 51:38 We women have tried to be like Broca's Region in the brain 51:44 and fulfill our own role and that of men as well. And it is 51:51 wearing us out. I don't have this quote here but you can 51:55 look up in the Forbes 2011 Issue and I will try to get 52:02 the date, I can put it up on the website later. It says that 52:06 women who are trying to fulfill the role of a man and woman 52:11 it says, their children are suffering loss because of it 52:16 even women who come from very well to do families, it says, 52:20 they're so worried about the direction their children are 52:24 headed in and the rates of depression are so much higher 52:27 among women as a result of trying to do everything. 52:31 It's wearing us out my sisters but even more serious than this 52:36 is the damage that gender blurring has done to the 52:39 Word of God. Secular website EHow.com, I'm sure some of you 52:44 have happened upon this when you're looking How do I do this 52:48 or How do I do that? You can go to EHow.com and they have 52:50 answers for everything. When I was looking up Biblical Bible 52:56 Role I thought EHow.com had something to say about it 52:59 I thought that would be interesting it's just a secular 53:01 website I wonder what they say about Biblical roles of men 53:04 and women. Well do you know what they say? They infer, I'll quote 53:09 Christians who don't follow the Biblical headship model 53:13 no longer believe the Bible to be the unerring Word of God! 53:19 You can find this when you search Bible Roles for men and 53:22 women on EHow.com and this is what it says. 54:28 Do you see what they're saying? They believe, we don't believe 54:33 the Bible to be the unerring Word of God. Is that how we want 54:38 the Christian world to view us? Is that the kind of picture 54:43 we want to leave with the world? 54:47 God has a higher calling for men and women 55:03 So what was that ministry? She goes on to say 55:21 That's true ministry. The ministry which we're all 55:24 called to. To reflect the image of Christ through us. 55:29 Not doing our will but the will of God who created us. 55:34 And just like the regions, the different regions in our brain 55:39 that help us to read, God has created men and women with equal 55:44 importance but different roles to fulfill. Men you have been 55:50 called to be Christ like husbands. You've been called 55:55 to be godly fathers, spiritual leaders in our church. Don't let 56:00 culture dictate the role you are to follow. Especially when 56:06 God has so clearly laid it out. Women you are called to fulfill 56:11 a role that is so exalted that even an angel would be honored 56:17 to have that assignment. Don't let our culture make you think 56:23 that this role is a low or demeaning one. Not when God 56:28 has shed so much power, light and honor upon it. Ladies, He's 56:34 also called you to fill a role in the church that men cannot 56:40 fill. If you leave that role to just be vacant, you leave that 56:47 role to go and fulfill a man's role then you're creating a 56:53 great loss for the ministry. You will leave a void that will 56:57 ultimately hurt the cause of God. 57:10 Let's go ahead and pray. Lord I pray that You would help us 57:18 to step up to the roles that You have called us to. Help us 57:23 to be men and women created in Your image, fulfilling the work 57:29 that You have called us to fulfill. In Jesus' name. |
Revised 2016-01-12