JBMW Forum: Q & A on the Local Church

JBMW: What advice do you have concerning how the gender debate is currently affecting the local church? Where do pastors and church leaders need to focus their attention? In addi­tion to faithful preaching and teach­ing, what steps can pastors take to en­courage the growth and expression of biblical manhood and womanhood in their congregations?

Russell D. Moore: The problem with preaching on manhood and womanhood in most evangelical churches is that it is simply not being done. Sure, pastors will preach on "gender" occasionally, in­cluding on male headship and on female submission, but it is done in an abstract, vague manner that doesn't hit at the cosmic seriousness of this issue. Ab­straction cannot replace the avalanche of cultural influences toward feminism on the one hand and a predatory form of pagan patriarchy on the other.

A pastor must be willing to lose his pulpit in order to save it. He can­not simply denounce the same "culture war" opponents that might be demon­ized by Fox News. He must talk about issues that will be sensitive to people in his own congregation—a dating culture that by its very definition anticipates fornication, the outsourcing of parent­ing to daycare "professionals" in order to carry out duel-income households, and so forth. A pastor who addresses such issues will find some hostility, but he will also find Christians—and seek­ing lost people—who are willing to give him a hearing because of his honesty and conviction.

This means, first of all, that com­plementarian pastors must give up on the notion that one can be comfortably anonymous in the ambient culture and still hold to biblical ideas of manhood and womanhood. If that ever were the case (and I doubt it), it is not the case anymore. A man who really gets Ephe­sians 5 is the kind of man who will be willing to work two jobs and live in a trailer to enable his wife to be the pri­mary caregiver of his children. A wom­an who really understands Proverbs 31 is going to seem to be a "Stepford wife" to those who are accustomed to women making ribald jokes about men and loud complaints about incompetent hus­bands. A college student serious about biblical manhood and womanhood is going to set parameters for his inter­actions with the opposite sex that will seem ridiculous to his roommates.

It also means that the pulpit can­ not be the only place where disciple­ship in this area is carried out. Our pastors must give time and attention to discipling younger men, not through some curriculum purchased at the local Christian bookstore but through spend­ing time in an authentic Paul-Timothy type friendship in which the pastor has the credibility—earned through proven wisdom and undisputed love—to en­courage and to rebuke. Christian wom­en must put Titus 2 into practice, not with simply another DVD series from a female celebrity but through women spending time with one another, learn­ing together what it means to be daugh­ters of Sarah. That takes more time than a stadium event or an emphasis Sunday, but it will change our churches for the better.

Paige Patterson: Pastors today most importantly need to do two things. First, the church and society need pas­tors who will become superb Bible teachers and excellent exegetes. Second, the world needs pastors with courage to preach against the grain. Leo Eddle­man, when president of New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary, was once told that a certain church to which he was going did not like him because he rubbed the cat's fur the wrong way. Ed­dleman responded, "Then turn the cat around." I am not advocating an un­charitable or unkind approach. I am not in favor of running roughshod over the saints, but unless we have some pastors who will exhibit significant courage in addressing these issues, the future will be bleak. No issue is any more diffi­cult for the faint of heart than to ad­dress gender differences. Much of the social order is unified in a position that is contrary to what the Bible teaches. To preach against the grain will take a courage borne only of deep conviction nurtured by the presence and power of the Holy Spirit of God. May God help us to do so.