[...]Moore to the Point – Women, Stop Submitting to Men[...]…

[...]Moore to the Point – Women, Stop Submitting to Men[...]…

Thank you for your perspective.

There is mention here of girls performing oral sex on boyfriends. To be worthy of Christ all men should be abstaining from all experience, in thought word and deed, of sex until they marry and they should only have sex with the person they marry. Men, collectively, should be working far more effectively than they are at present at resisting and reducing the alure of advertising and internet pornography than women, because advertising and pornography disempower self control in men [as leaders] far more than they warped the expression of the sexuality of women, which I see as a symptom of men’s collective weakness.

If enough young men collectively and publicly said ‘no’ to all pornography and campaigned for restrictions to sexual expression in advertising then women would find themselves a lot less harassed. Needless to say an asexual mixed social space is a basic requirement for such a resistance to sexualisation, and seeing each other as sexualised consumer goods. It is a matter of resetting personal boundaries with each other for improved self control.

I say young men, they are the men who are single and at their most hormonal, and hormones are real and part of the way humans are made. Self control vs hormones is the crux of the matter.

Thank you for making this point, I was wondering about the same thing. Scripture says more than “women should only submit to husbands” in Corinthians.

However gender roles are twisted in general life and in church, and submission to society’s views of beauty is just wrong. Moore did so well writing on these things.

I am a college student receiving alot of crap from my current church because I am friends with boys. They think I shouldn’t be hanging out with just guys, if I am the only girl present. I disagree because the guys are my friends. This church likes to stress make and female roles. I guess my question is: How are the women of this culture “far too submissive?”

I truly appreciate and am deeply sympathetic to what you are trying to do here. But, I think you’ve pushed the complementarian logic to its breaking point (as some of your commenters above seem to realize).

As I see it, you can’t argue (at least, not well or consistently) for a very narrow reading of female submission from Eph 5:21-33, but then turn around and argue for all women being barred from positions of church authority (pastors, elders, etc) based on a very broad reading of 1 Tim 2:11-15 (where you and other complementarians believe that women, in general, are understood to be prevented from “exercising authority” over men, in general). I’m sorry, but I just don’t think it works. Certainly, Eph 5:21ff. should be understood to mean that women are only expected to submit to their own husbands. But, the corollary logic of “male headship” doctrine in the church works on the basis that women (as a group) are not allowed to exercise authority over men (as a group). This has logical implications (that complementarians often want to avoid) for the interaction of women and men beyond the home and the church. Indeed, as we all know, the boundaries of these “spheres” are very porous and infinitely overlapping. Where does “the church” end and “the world” begin? Where does “the home” end and “the church” begin? And, if Christ is Lord of all, they why wouldn’t God’s ordained gender roles for women and men function in all areas of life?

Again, I’m deeply sympathetic to your overall point. And, as an evangelical feminist, I fully agree with your rejection of “pagan patriarchy” and its bitter, oppressive fruit for women. But, I think your logic in this post is faulty and the complementarian position you try to hold together within it ultimately unsustainable.

Grace and peace,
Emily

I must also say that women are equal to men. The difference however, is a matter of roles (see Eph. 5:22-34). Many people think that if the roles of men and women are different, then it makes them un-equal. When in actuality nothing could be further from the truth.
Even in the Trinity, the roles of each member of the Trinity are different; yet they are equally God. A few examples of Jesus submitting to the Father are found in John 5:30 & and in Jesus prayer in Luke 22:42 in Jesus prayer to the Father.
I ask you then, if it is true that Jesus submitted to the Father and He was not inferior to the Father. Why then, would it make a wife inferior to her husband if she submits to him?

“Ok, let me ask you, [my husband], to go first because God made man first and you know, women….second.”

I rolled my eyes. Inwardly!! On the outside, I smiled sweetly. My husband, bless him, replied with “Oh that’s fine, I’d like my wife to go first because, you know, ladies first.” HAHA…..I have to laugh because honestly, I had no issues with it. It matters little to me that the counselor’s idea of submission to my husband extended all the way to women submitting to men in general, because they were created second after men. My husband was more riled up by it in comparison and told me after that he felt it was an insult to me, his wife. I shrugged it off and told my hubby that it only matters to me what he thought of me because ultimately, I go home with him at the end of the day =)

Thank you for this post =)

And then I got to the save-yourself-for-submission-to-your-husband part. This is still a patriarchal lens over the beauty of mutuality and otherliness that husbands and wives are commended in scripture.

Telling women to submit to their husbands is to tell a woman to detach from her personal sovereignty and give responsibility for her life to another. This is what we do with our children. And our pets. Women are not children nor pets.

Women are fully endowed with the same moral, spiritual and authoritative characteristics that make her equal with men, including her husband. Equal partners have no ranking with one another, but mutually submit and defer to the other.

-LBC

I would cite two verses that affirm a woman’s proper activity outside of those two roles: 1) Deborah the judge in Judges 4 who “held court”, “decided disputes”, and gave God’s word to army commanders; and 2) the virtuous woman, described in Proverbs 31, who “considers a field and buys it”, “sees that her trading is profitable”, and “makes linen garments and sells them, and supplies the merchants with sashes”. To me, these verses clearly show that a God-honoring woman — in addition to her roles as wife and mother — can take up roles in government, industry, and the military.

I believe the trick for both men and women is to put their family-oriented roles first — husband/wife, father/mother — with neither person neglecting their household responsibilities in preference to their career-oriented roles. This is another way that Madison Ave and Hollywood have subverted us all … I know, having been a consumer marketer and advertiser myself … but that is a subject for another whole blog.

Here’s one aspect of the discussion which needs more teasing out, though - where do Christian single women, with no real prospect of a husband, fit into your ’submission model’?

Thank you for pointing out the “patriarchy that is endemic in modern evangelical culture that simply is not biblical”

It saturates a large segment of the homeschooling movement in the evangelical church.

Godly men need to speak up.

Thank you for saying something.

Is it really empowerment to have more and more women economically at the mercy of men who freely abandon them and their children, often with little legal recourse?

When then is it that women are more likely to divorce there husbands than vice versa? (The research seems to suggest that one of the causes is that family courts and child support laws favor women rather than the reverse).