Quote:
Originally Posted by Nell
Let's see a show of hands of all the males who have been hindered in their roles as Christians because of domineering Christian women.
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Let's see. . Aimee Semple McPherson, Elizabeth Clare Prophet, Patsy Freeman, Ellen G. White, Jesse Penn-Lewis. The first and the last of those both negatively impinged upon my walk. But really, what of it? Life goes on. Let go.
But what of it? I notice precious little talk here of Jesus Christ, merely Paul's advice in epistolic format. Where are the gospels? Did Jesus get so thoroughly effaced by Paul's word?
Jesus clearly ran the show. If he wanted to allow women into the inner circle of disciples, there they were. And there they were. Jesus was Roberts Rules of Order personified. "Whatever he tells you, do it", his mother told the servants. There were women all around, functioning. Yet not as the twelve. Why? Because of convention.
In this Paul echoed Jesus. The days and years, post-Pentecost, were full of tumult, often with no center. Paul wrote to the Corinthians, who tried to re-create pentecostal ferver with each meeting, shouting each other down. Paul tried to restore order. In this context, his writings on women come forth. Everybody was now free - slaves didn't have to obey the master, children were free from parents, married men could abandon their children and go off to preach the gospel. The last days were at hand. The kingdome of God was poured out, for all to see.
"God has raised this Jesus to life, to which we are all witnesses. Exalted, then, to the right hand of God, He has received from the Father the promised Holy Spirit and has poured out what you now see and hear."
This overturned everything, as it should. Yet Paul desperately cautioned not to forget social convention. Slaves, women, children, fathers, all had to remember where they still were in society and not become dangerously unstable. In this he did echo Jesus, who was of all things an observant Jew.
Anyway, I haven't gotten to my point, which was to support Nell that there has been widespread systematized oppression. We should acknowledge this and repent. And secondly, to yet again raise the point that the movement of Nee started with women in the lead, yet 100 years later when women's rights have advanced, the "recovery" has clearly regressed, and become reactionary. It turns out that women were disposable, in the recovery. They served their purpose and then got abandoned when temporal power was amassed. Funny thing what power does to a man. (Or a woman.)