Does God discriminate against women? May 3rd

Our study from Sunday night looked at two areas of gender leadership:
1. How does scripture view men and women with regard to leadership in the church?
2. How does scripture view men and women with regard to leadership in a family unit?

We opened our discussion with a story about a congregation calling a new pastor and some of the discussion of the pastor being a female. One of the congregation members brought up 1 Timothy 2:11-14.

11 Women should learn quietly and submissively. 12 I do not let women teach men or have authority over them.[a] Let them listen quietly. 13 For God made Adam first, and afterward he made Eve. 14 And it was not Adam who was deceived by Satan. The woman was deceived, and sin was the result. (NLT)

From this point, we had some really good discussion on how context should play a part of how we read Bible verses for our own application today. Some scholars have stated that this verse should be read in the original context, where the author was writing specifically to Timothy and the people in Ephesus, but it is not necessarily meant for all places and all times.

Other scholars and leaders believe the author's words rise above a particular context and apply across cultures and centuries, much like the words of Jesus throughout the gospels.

Two big words can be discussed here: Complementarians and Egalitarians. The first believe men are the spiritual leaders of the church. Women can play important roles, but not lead men. The latter generally believe men and women are equal in the church and members from either gender can lead. It's also important to note that many church traditions fall somewhere between these two positions.

There are of course examples of women leading, in both the Old Testament and the New Testament. Here are a few you can check out. Miriam- Exodus 15, Deborah- Judges 4-5, Huldah- 2 Kings 22, Anna (Luke 2), Priscilla- Acts 18, Pheobe, Junia, and others- Romans 16.

As for home leadership, some Christians believe God designed men and women with equal value but to play different roles, in particular in the husband-wife relationship and the leadership of the family overall.

For example, read Ephesians 5:22-23: 

22 For wives, this means submit to your husbands as to the Lord. 23 For a husband is the head of his wife as Christ is the head of the church. He is the Savior of his body, the church.24 As the church submits to Christ, so you wives should submit to your husbands in everything. (NLT)