In 1983, the insurance money from a robbery gave Tony and me the opportunity to travel to the Far East.  While we were there, we spent four days at Dr. Paul Yonggi Cho’s church in Korea, at that time the largest church in the world with around 350,000 members.  We learned many lessons from our time there.  One morning, we were wandering through the administrative building, when someone approached us offering an interview with Dr. Cho.  During our 20 minutes with him, one of three things he said to us was...

“You will never see revival in the West until you are willing to use your women.” 

A small group of women with whom I work closely, recently looked at revivals from the perspective of women.  One of the things that struck us was that moves of God that seem to last for decades rather than being a quick flash in the pan, use women in strategic roles.  Examples include John Wesley and Methodism, Count Zinzendorf and the Moravians, or more recently, the Pentecostal movement that started in Azusa Street.  (Other common features include a small group structure and the development of an infrastructure.) 

One of the main reasons that women are so restricted within the church is that certain Scriptures apparently forbid their taking any role of significance.  And all of us, both men and women, want to obey the Bible.  But these challenging verses can, with integrity, be understood differently. 

Let’s take, for example, this passage from 1 Corinthians 14.  At first reading it is quite clear: women are not to speak in church!

Women should be silent during the church meetings. It is not proper for them to speak. They should be submissive, just as the law says.  If they have any questions to ask, let them ask their husbands at home, for it is improper for women to speak in church meetings (verses 34-35).

The first clue that there might be some other interpretation than the obvious one is the fact that nowhere does the Old Testament talk about women being submissive. 

The context of these verses is a letter is a response by Paul to some questions posed to him by the believers in Corinth (1 Corinthians 7:1).  Other passages, however, make it clear that women are not expected to keep totally silent.  For example, 1 Corinthians 11 tells us that women are to pray and prophesy with their heads covered.

There are actually three sets of people who are told to be silent (Greek sigao) in 1 Corinthians 14.  In each of the other two situations, the problem is mentioned, they are told to be silent, and then a solution is given.  The first occurs when someone wants to speak in a tongue but there is no one present to interpret (verses 27 and 28).  The solution?  They are to be silent and to speak to God privately.  The second happens when more than one person has a prophecy (verses 29 and 30).  Solution?  The first person is to be silent and the second deliver what God has given them.  However, in the verses about women, Paul doesn’t describe the problem, perhaps because he thought it was obvious from his answer.  Presumably some women were causing a disruption by asking questions loudly in the meeting.  Solution?  Rather than cause a disruption, they were to ask their husbands at home.  No one assumes in either of the first two situations that the instruction to be silent was for every situation and for all time, but these verses on women have been used to keep them silent for centuries.

The verses in 1Timothy 2 can be equally interpreted in a different way.  Clarity comes in the singular and plural uses of the word “woman.”   There are certain instructions given that apply to women (plural), but the challenging verses apply to a woman (singular).  A good explanation would be that there was one particular woman who was causing problems with wrong teaching, and a description of some disciplinary action taken to stop her is described in this passage. 1  This would be similar to the discipline prescribed for an unnamed man in 1 Corinthians 5.

Could it be that the attitude of the church in the West towards women is actually preventing the move of God we all long to see?  Could a fresh look at the challenging passages with an open mind change this situation?

The Parallel of Slavery 

In 1833, slavery was abolished in the British Empire.  The person responsible for this immense change in society was William Wilberforce, who fought at times almost singlehandedly over many years to accomplish this feat.  He was a committed Christian. Many of his antagonists, those who wanted to keep slavery in place, however, were also Christians.  They were very vocal and clear that the Bible supports slavery.  After all, the Old Testament gives laws about it, Jesus mentions it without any apparent condemnation, and the apostle Paul discusses it in his letters.  Therefore it has to be something God approves of.   

Both the Old and New Testaments say more about slavery than they do about women in the church.

I have never met a Christian who believes that slavery should be reintroduced in society.  The reason?  We know the character and nature of God.  We understand instinctively and through His word that God desires all of His people to be free, no matter what their race or background.  The whole tenor of Scripture is towards liberty.   Jesus came to bring freedom to the oppressed and to set the captives free.   The reason the Bible mentions slavery is because the culture of the day accepted it as normative.  It does not imply God’s approval or condoning of it. 

Why would it be any different with what the Bible says about women?  Jesus’ attitude towards women was remarkable.  He willingly put Himself in what might have been considered compromising situations in order to minister to them (think of a Jewish man having a conversation with a Samaritan woman of doubtful reputation alone without a chaperone!)  We never have any impression from Jesus that the women he worked with were of lesser value or served lesser roles than the men.  It instinctively goes against all one knows about God’s character that half of His people would be marginalized. 

Another Scripture that is used to “keep women in their place” comes in Genesis 2:18, God says “I will make a helper fit for him (Adam).”  Women have long been told that this is their role—to be a helper to men, there to serve them.  It is an enlightening exercise, however, to look at the other occasions on which this word “helper” is used.  Of the 21 times, the Hebrew word “ezer” is used, in all but six it refers to God.  Typical examples include, “I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills from whence comes my help.  My help comes from the Lord, who made heaven and earth” (Psalm 121:1, 2) or “Our help is in the name of the Lord who made heaven and earth” (Psalm 124:8).  The impression is more of a valued consultant brought in to assist where man is lacking than some kind of divinely appointed personal assistant.

Change is in the air.  There is currently a ground swell—a sense of the brooding of the Holy Spirit—over the topic of women in ministry.  It’s like the calm before the storm.  I believe that very soon we are going to see a movement of men and women—not a radical feminist movement of women reacting to the injustice of the past, but a move of God’s Holy Spirit that frees women into their destiny.  We will see Galatians 3:28—“There is no longer Jew or Gentile, slave or free, male or female. For you are all Christians – you are one in Christ Jesus”—fulfilled in our lifetime.  What might happen when the other half of God’s army, the female warriors, begin to take their rightful place alongside the men to follow the Holy Spirit’s strategy in the world?

Felicity Dale, of House2House Ministries, is author of An Army of Ordinary People and co-author of The Rabbit and the Elephant. You can read her blog at www.simplychurch.com.