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What does Johnny Cash have to do with biblical manhood? Russell D. Moore shows us compellingly in a new post which Justin Taylor summarized on his blog yesterday:

From Justin Taylor:
Russell Moore answers. "If you can understand what's going on when Johnny Cash sings this song from the point of view of a young boy who has been abandoned by his dad, who is given a name that emasculates him, then you can understand what is really going on in a lot of the conversations that we're having in our culture, and a lot of the conversations we're having in our churches, when it comes to masculinity." Moore goes on to argue that we need to define masculinity in terms of Jesus Christ, and not the other way around.

You can listen to Dr. Moore's entire podcast here.

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Later this month, a much-anticipated move on manhood will hit theatres and early reviews indicate that it is well-done, Christ-centered and is must-see viewing for believers who want to see fathers assume their God-ordained place as thehead of homes.

            The theme of Courageous surrounds the meaning and importance of fatherhood, and the story centers around four police officers "all in various stages of fatherhood trying to figure out what it means to be a great dad."  Directors state that "The film's desire is for men to leave the theater making the decision that Joshua made when he declared in Joshua 24:15, 'As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.'" That alone makes it noteworthy.

Of course, this comes as no surprise as the film's producer is Sherwood Pictures, a ministry of Sherwood Baptist Church in Albany, Ga. Sherwood's previous releases include Fireproof and Facing the Giants. Fireproof hit theaters in 2008 and featured actor Kirk Cameron, a devoted evangelical Christian and apologist, and celebrated the power of reconciliation within marriage.

From all early indicators, Courageous is a celebration of biblical manhood and powerfully portrays what happens within a family when a father takes seriously the mandate of Ephesians 6:4 to raise his children in the discipline and instruction of the Lord. Courageous will open in theatres nationwide on Sept. 30.

My plan is to have a group of fathers from the church which I serve as pastor to attend on opening night and I am praying that many other pastors will plan similar "guys nights out" as well. This movie will serve as an excellent tool to open discussions in local churches about the crucial nature of biblical fatherhood. No doubt this movie is going to dramatically portray the truths of Scripture that many of have been preaching and teaching for years. Much more will be forthcoming from Gender Blog on this movie in the weeks ahead.

For more information and to view the movie trailer, please see: http://www.courageousthemovie.com/

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[Editor's note: Sarah Bubar writes for Unlocking Femininity]

As the youngest in a family of four children, there were a lot of benefits to the birth order God gave me. For starters, I had an automatic posse wherever I went. There was also an expectation put on my older siblings to "look out for your baby sister." And by the time I came around, Grandma just couldn't say "no" any longer (I particularly leveraged this benefit around Christmas time!). But I think the biggest advantage to being the youngest is that you rarely got in trouble, not because you weren't bad (believe me), but because you could watch what your older siblings did, and if they got in trouble for something you could either figure out a different way to do it or avoid it all together. I was able to learn quite well from my brother's mistakes.

"If you do not learn from history, you are doomed to repeat it."

This is a quote my history professor used to say to us every so often in my undergrad history class. History repeats itself unless you learn from it and change. Church History is no exception. It has its good guys, the ones you admire and seek to emulate; and it has its bad guys, the ones you shake your head at and say, "What were you thinking?" I've introduced you to some of its heroines of the faith, now it's time to be introduced to Church History's Bad Girl's Club.

Bad Girl #1: Julian of Norwich.

Julian was a young lady devoted to the church. She lived in Norwich, England at the end of the 14th century. By the time she was 30, Julian fully embraced the aesthetic lifestyle of self-inflicting poverty and suffering. After falling ill Julian began to receive her "visions." Deemed one of the first mystics of the Catholic's church history, Julian focused much of her writing and teaching on her revelations in which she often refers to God, as well as Christ, as "Mother." She also taught the idea that God was so loving that sin was easily overlooked. In fact, Adam's original sin was really an accident, a mere mishap. Mankind was really innately good, we just mess up every once in a while. Christ's atonement was more like a partnership where He made up for what we left off.

The problem is that none of these teachings were supported by Scripture. It was all Julian. The longer she taught her visions as divine revelation, the further and further she got away from actual truth of Scripture.

Bad Girl #2: Ann Hutchinson

Ann Hutchinson was a spit-fire of a woman. She and her husband were members of the Reverend John Cotton's church in Boston in the early 17th century when America was first being established by the Puritans. Ann would hold weekly meetings inside her home to further discuss the sermons Rev. Cotton would preach the previous Sunday. While these meetings may have seemed innocent enough at the start, they soon escalated to the point where they caused divisions within the church and in the colony over key doctrinal issues. Ann began to take over the meetings and expounded on more than just the sermons. She started preaching entire sermons herself. Ann was ordered by the Court of Massachusetts to disband her weekly meetings, but she refused. Then she began to speak about her personal revelations, telling the court that the colony would be annihilated because of their treatment of her. Mrs. Hutchinson, unfortunately, did not listen to the authorities given to her by God.

Bad Girl #3: Margaret Fell Fox

Margaret Fell Fox was an interesting lady. She adhered to the Quaker life and belief system which allowed women to preach. She claimed that women's subjection to men was a part of the curse, and was eradicated when Christ came. She wrote a book called, "Women Justified, Proved, and Allowed of by the scriptures, all such as Speak by the Spirit and Power of the Lord Jesus." (Long title, huh?) In this book, she bypasses Paul's addresses to women preaching in 1 Timothy 2 and 1 Corinthians 14, chalking them up to merely culturally restrictive mandates and not timeless principles of church practice. Interestingly enough, Margaret and her husband, Quaker-founder George Fox, spent very little time together, lived in separate homes (and sometimes separate countries), and had more of a spiritual bond - mutually advocating for Quakerism -rather than a biblical marriage.

Bad Girl #4: Phoebe Palmer

Phoebe Palmer and her husband, Dr. Walter Palmer, were part of the Holiness Movement of the 19th century in New York. Early in their marriage, one of the Palmer's children died and as a result Phoebe became very depressed. Around this time she received what she called a "second blessing." In her opinion, salvation was the "first blessing," but this second one was an added anointing of the Holy Spirit. She began to write about the true meaning of holiness and much of her early work is very good. She saw holiness as something given by God for the present, not simply for the future. She coined the phrase "laying all on the altar" which many evangelists still use today. But however positive her beginning, Palmer ended up way off the mark. She began holding weekly meetings- to promote this spiritualized "holiness." Hundreds of men and women would come every Tuesday to hear Palmer preach. As a key part of the Holiness Movement, she gave much authority to "spiritual encounters" and visions, encouraging people to let their personal experiences trump Paul's teachings which were supported by Christ and Scripture.

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So there you have it. The Bad Girl's Club of Church History. Sure, these aren't the worst women that history can dig up. Scripture has some doozies of its own. But what makes these women particularly interesting (and equally dangerous) is that where they started out is not where they ended up. Each of them began on the right track, wanting to serve the Lord, seeking to know Him more, desiring His Word to be preached. All of those are great and noble aims. The problem lies in how they went about making their goals happen.

The sobering lesson from history is that you and I are not above falling into the same lines of reasoning in our desires to attain to our goals. God gives us certain gifts, and in our finite knowledge, we think that there is only one way to use that gift - if we are talented Bible teachers, then surely God wants us to be a pastor; if we are talented public speakers, then God must want us to have some huge public ministry. We can quickly forget the portions of Scripture that mandate our role as women to proclaim the Gospel. Or we may not even forget them, but like Margaret Fox, we justify them into being inapplicable to us and our situation. So how are we to guard ourselves from being inducted into the Bad Girl's Club of Church Present?

1. Have humility

It seems like the first thing to go when we sin is humility. When we start thinking that we know best, better than our leadership, better than God, better than His Word, we start down a path that will end in trouble. We must have humility, and to have this we must realize that God's ways are not always our ways (Isa. 55:8). He has a way and order of doing things that always has a reason and ultimately makes perfect sense, whether we get it or not. The question is do we have the humility to trust in that way when it doesn't make sense to us? There is a trust in God's goodness and perfect will that comes into play.

2. Have absolute adherence to the Word of God.

If God's Word says it, it's so! Pure and simple. God's Word must be your ultimate trump card. It must take its rightful place of ultimate authority in our lives if we want to be sure not to go off the deep end. This was a major problem for each of these women mentioned. Each of them viewed God's Word as subpar authority in their lives. If they hadn't, they would have seen 1 Timothy 2 as defining their role in the portrayal of the Gospel, and sought to live out that role in their lives regardless of their gifting or desire. Because the bottom line is, God's calling in our lives is never going to trump His Word. Never. And if we think it might, we are the ones that have it wrong about His calling, not Him.

3. Have accountability.

Accountability is one of the surest ways to keep yourself on track. Having other people in your life who can hold you to a standard of absolute and humble adherence to God's Word is vitally important. Seek it out.

"If we don't study history, we are doomed to repeat it." Let's learn from these women's mistakes with humility, obedience and accountability so that the Gospel can be most effective to a watching world here and in the future....when WE become a part of Church History.

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[Editor's note: The following post was originally published on the Unlocking Femininity blog earlier this month]

The most popular English Bible, the NIV 1984, has undergone a makeover and it's not exactly a good transformation. This year, Zondervan released the new NIV 2011 which will completely replace the soon-to-be discontinued NIV 1984. This 2011 NIV is a revision of the highly controversial and inaccurate gender-neutral TNIV of 2005, which got rid of most of the uses of "him/he/his," "brother," "father," and "man," replacing them with the gender-inclusive plural "them/they" or "that person."
 

The NIV's translators, the Committee on Bible Translation (CBT),  has made some improvements from the NIV 1984, such as changing Philippians 4:13 to now read "I can do all this through him who gives me strength." The "this" refers to contentment in all circumstances, which is the previous context rather than "I can do everything through him who gives me strength" and corrected many of the controversial gender-neutral renderings in the TNIV. However, they have still kept 75% of the 3,699 inaccurate gender-neutral translations found in the TNIV translation. These "slight" changes can make significant changes in one's theology, teaching, personal relationship with God and in the end, the Gospel.

Here are just a few examples of these inaccurate changes:

1. Endorses feminist-leaning translations:

1 Timothy 2:12 (NIV 1984)- I do not permit a woman to teach or to have authority over a man; she must be silent.

1 Timothy 2:12 (NIV 2011)- I do not permit a woman to teach or assume authority over a man; she must be quiet.

This new rendering favors the egalitarian approach and can be used to argue that women can become pastors/preachers as long as they don't "assume" the position of power without having been given it first. All other modern English translations translate authenteo as "have authority" or "exercise authority" and even the most liberal translation NRSV translates it as "have authority."

Interestingly enough, the CBT which is trying to be politically correct and gender-inclusive does not change any of the feminine pronouns (she/her) or change "mother," "daughter," or "woman" which leaves the reader wondering if they only have a problem with any references to men but not women. To be truly gender-neutral, one must change both the masculine AND feminine word usages.

Other evangelical feminist interpretation leanings have been chosen with changes to Na. 3:13; Rom. 16:7; and 1 Cor.14:33-34.

2. Changes "mighty men" to "mighty warriors."

2 Samuel 23:8 (NIV1984)- These are the names of David's mighty men: Josheb-Basshebeth, a Tahkemonite, was chief of the Three; he raised his spear against eight hundred men, whom he killed in one encounter.

2 Samuel 23:8 (NIV 2011)-These are the names of David's mighty warriors: Josheb-Basshebeth, a Tahkemonite, was chief of the Three; he raised his spear against eight hundred men, whom he killed in one encounter.

This change may seem insignificant but after doing some research into the Hebrew you find that the word used for "mighty men" is related to the adjective gibbor which means "strong, valiant man." It does not mean "warrior." This change leaves open the possibility for saying that women were included in David's "mighty warriors," his "special forces" unit which are referred to elsewhere as his "thirty mighty men" and also his "three mighty men." (2 Sam. 23 and 1 Chron. 11) These are no longer men but ambiguous warriors. This change, made 20 other times as well, is consistent with the NIV's tendency to change male-oriented words used in the original text.

3. Changes "he" and "him" to "they," "them," or "that person."

John 14:23 (NIV 1984)- "Jesus replied, "If anyone loves me, he will obey my teaching. My Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him.""

John 14:23 (NIV 2011)- "Jesus replied: "Anyone who loves me will obey my teaching. My Father will love them, and will we come to them and make our home with them.""

These changes from singular to plural remove the significant emphasis on the personal indwelling of the Father and Son in an individual. The "if" Jesus said is also removed and the 3 masculine singular pronouns are replaced with plural pronouns which are not in the original text. Jesus specifically chose to use a male pronoun but the CBT chose to correct Jesus' words because they weren't gender-neutral enough, rendering them objectionable.

This NIV 2011 rendering also confuses the reader and makes you ask the question: "Is God going to love and make His home with a group or an individual?" "Does a group have to obey or does an individual?"

How can the reader know what was actually said since the translators are making subtle changes to shift the meaning of the text? Preachers and teachers can no longer rely on the NIV for teaching because they will always have to consult other translations or the biblical languages every time to figure out what was actually said; they'll have to tell their audiences to do the same or go through a confusing speech about how the NIV's translation isn't actually correct.

Why Words Matter:

Since most Christians do not have access to or the knowledge of Biblical Hebrew or Koine Greek, they put their trust in the translator's hands to correctly translate the original text for them so they can correctly read God's Word. The CBT has decided to purposefully change exactly what God's Word says so that it is more politically correct in our culture. This leads to readers not knowing which words they can trust, and most cannot check to see what the Hebrew or Greek says.  This leaves them even more confused when reading Scripture. Some of the changes even make verses (such as Rom. 4:8) sound awkward and grammatically incorrect. Other verses now sound cold and impersonal with the use of "that person" (Rev. 3:20) instead of using the personal and intimate "him."

God would never want us to change His perfect, holy words to fit our own agendas or personal preferences. He even warns us against this (Rev. 22:18-19)!

When you replace God's Words with your own preferred words, they are no longer inspired by God, but instead become the thoughts of men.

Many of the pronouns "he/him/his" are used for general truths, applicable for both men and women, which the Committee has sought to make evident in their translation. However, they have confused application with translation, leading their readers to not know what the Bible actually says. They have jumped too quickly to application which is the job of the individual reader, not the job of the translator.

This isn't a fight to keep masculine pronouns because we prefer masculinity over femininity; it's a fight against any changes to Scripture. Those subtle changes change our theology, our interpretations, our personal intimacy with God, and, inevitably, the Gospel message! God is no longer revealed as He chose to reveal Himself. His wisdom and unique relationship with His children is now lost in man's "corrections." If God had wanted the Bible to be gender-neutral, He would have made it that way.  This isn't a battle of the sexes, but a stand for the Gospel and what we believe are God's very words, because His Words matter!

Because of these changes made to God's Word, we, Unlocking Femininity, cannot recommend the NIV 2011. There are, however, several accurate translations such as the ESV, NASB, HCSB (Holman) and even the New KJV. These are very readable and great options for all readers wanting to dig into the Bible!

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[Editor's note: This post was originally published a couple of years ago on C.J. Mahaney's blog, but is well worth a revisit in an effort to encourage local church pastors and their wives as they serve on the front lines in the war for the glory of God.]

In March of 2008, C.J. and Carolyn Mahaney addressed a room full of couples being trained for pastoral ministry at the Pastors College. Soon these couples were to return to their home churches to begin (or resume) the public and transparent life of pastoral ministry.

A question asked by one of the wives was simple: How should a wife respond when her pastor-husband is criticized? The question was asked in the context of pastor's families, but the answer will likely benefit all married couples.

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Question: Carolyn, as a pastor's wife, how do you handle situations where your husband is criticized or there is grumbling in the church about your husband?

Carolyn: Obviously, it certainly isn't easy to have your husband criticized. But as wives, we must recognize our role as our husband's helper and make sure we don't take up an offense, which would not be helpful to our husbands. And that does not take place without a fight. This is the person you love the most in the whole world, and if someone is criticizing him, you can be easily offended and want to defend him. Yet, I must realize that taking an offense would be a disservice to my husband. So it's important that we as wives guard our hearts, making sure we don't take up an offense, seeking to serve our husbands as helpers.

C.J.: Your point is an excellent one. There have been many times that I have desired Carolyn to take up an offense-"Join me in my offense against this individual." I'm not immediately happy that she hasn't taken an offense, but I have learned that eventually she has served me invaluably when she does not take up an offense. In no way is she defending or justifying what others have said or done, but helping me monitor my heart, and impressing upon me that a sinful reaction from me would be more serious than whatever they are saying or doing, are the most effective ways she can serve me.

Sadly, over the years we have witnessed couples in ministry where wives have taken up an offense.

And this doesn't just apply to sinful criticism, but also to when a husband is legitimately corrected by a member of the pastoral team or a member of the church. So you need both those categories. It's difficult when those serving with your husband correct him in a certain area or bring an unfavorable evaluation. A wife might find herself more vulnerable to taking up an offense when her husband has been corrected. I am grateful for the way Carolyn has served me by not taking up an offense. And numerous times she has agreed with the correction, protecting me from arrogantly dismissing the correction and preventing me from sowing discord among those I serve in ministry.

So, whether it's sinful criticism or legitimate correction of me, how do you guard your heart, Carolyn?

Carolyn: Wives should carefully listen to what's being said. If there is something legitimate, bring that lovingly and carefully to your husband. I don't think it serves a husband for a wife to just take the side of the person bringing criticism. But if there is a degree of truth, bring that in a way that serves him.

And just helping to mirror back to him what you are hearing him say. If he is sinning in response to the criticism, where appropriate, lovingly mirror that back to him: "It seems like this is how you are responding. Is this true? Are you offended at this person? Are you bitter?" Asking skillful questions.

It takes a lot of prayer and soul-searching in our own hearts to keep our hearts free from taking up an offense. But we must have a conviction about our role as our husband's helper and ask, "What will truly help my husband?" It will not help him if I'm adding to the temptation he's already experiencing. If he is being corrected or criticized, he's already got a battle he is fighting. And if I come along and agree and participate in that, it makes his battle more difficult.

My husband has gone through seasons of correction, and it's a temptation and fight. So I find myself having to pray for those who bring criticism or correction and filling my own heart with appropriate Scriptures so I can be a true helper to him during that time.

C.J.: Yes, but where they have been accurate observations-whether critics analyzing or friends correcting-you have courageously transferred that to me. Too often I have not been grateful in the moment. Eventually, I am grateful.

Would you say that one of the biggest challenges these ladies will confront as pastors wives is will be-when they hear the criticism or correction and they find there are aspects they agree with-how to inform their husbands of that without appearing to support any sinful attitude of others?

Carolyn: Yes. And I have through the years seen wives not do that, I've seen the effect and the outcome, and it has put the fear of God in me. At the moment it's not always easy to take a stand and say, "I don't think you're responding humbly to this situation right now." And it takes courage. Yet we've seen, because we've been in ministry for as many as we have, some very sad situations where I think wives really could have been the difference-maker if they would have challenged or confronted their husbands.

C.J.: So wouldn't you say that over the years that some wives misunderstood submission and honor (or so it appears)? I think that has played a role. And for some it could be fear of man-fear of husband.

I can tell you this: For any marriage, correction of the husband by the wife would be one category on my short list of most important. If I observed a wife who was reluctant to correct her husband I would be concerned with that marriage. Obviously, I'm not arguing for a contentious marriage, but correction, humbly communicated, must be part of every marriage.

Part of what Carolyn has modeled personally and taught well is what she taught at the last Leadership Conference-"Watch Your Man"-in broadening an understanding and application of "helper" to include appropriate correction. I would argue that correction is not just part of marriage but an aspect of what it means to be fellow heirs of the grace of life.

Carolyn's encouragement has been of immeasurable benefit to me, but equally so or more, on balance, has been her correction. She has protected me when sin was deceiving me. What a gift this has been to me!