In my thread, "Please be specific", I was accused of manipulating a debate between men and women.
Now, if you read the post or the title, there is absolutely nothing to suggest that such a debate was being initiated, nor did the first responders reply with such a thought in mind. I was also accused of pretending to be a new believer.
It's amazing... well, I'm not going to get started.
Suffice it to say that I am more than a little upset, because the point of my thread was very simple. How someone could read anything so convoluted and contrived into it is beyond me. But now that I have been accused, after some thinking, I felt the only way to comfort myself was to address the issue, because it seems that anyone who would draw such a conclusion out of thin air is clearly having issues of inferiority, or may simply have issues with women.
I'll say from the start that, yes, I have a high admiration for women, and that was not come by easily. When I was a young, southern male, I was the traditional, typical image. You'll probably hate me for this, but I believed that women could only be girlfriends, never friends; and it was my intent, once I broke my shyness bubble, to collect every girl for my own, which I did. My reason, I realized later, was just that I was insecure because of all those years of being unpopular. But also, it was just before Christ came into my life, and it was clearly a desperate attempt to fill my heart and life with worldly things, when inside only God knew that He was what I really sought.
I swore off women after finding Jesus. I renounced all my ambitions and desires in fact. I wanted nothing between us; however, I maintained my view of women, and the churches I knew of had a patriarchal hierarchy which only furthered my chauvinist view. But I had a friend, the first person to witness to me, whose wife was responsible for the family finances. He was apostolic and very zealous. When I saw her doing their books, I was taken aback and asked very bluntly, 'You let your wife control the money?!' He answered very frankly, 'Oh, well, I can do everything else but she's better than me with finances, so we agreed that she would handle that.' Then he chuckled with a red face.
That was my first encounter with a non-chauvinist view of women, and over the years it grew as with great, painful difficulty, I saw one thing after another that made me realize how wrong I was about God's place for women.
One day I was on a bus, which was rare, and I saw a gang of teens in the back, laughing and talking, and it was both guys and girls. They weren't paired. There was nothing romantic. They touched and punched, and both equally shared. They looked like a box full of baby bunnies or kittens bouncing off each other with youthful vigor. There was total respect, and it was all taken for granted. In my seat I could feel tears streaming down my cheeks because I envied them for growing up that way, and wondered what all I had missed. How much better their development would now be by the time they were adults shaping the next generation.
Later, another friend surprised me when he lamented somewhat, that his wife was on the phone with his adult kids in college. 'Oh, they only talk to me when they need money...' I felt so sorry for him and asked, 'Why don't you say something?' 'Well, he said, I used to feel bad, but then I realized, I'm the big guns. Momma is the one who handles the little stuff, but when things get really bad, when there's a crisis, they call out the big guns. That's me!'
Hmmm. The plot thickens. So, since my shell was cracked, my eyes began widening and I saw all kinds of things I never could before. How did I miss it? In church, the women's lib movement began to attack the patriarchal structure, and to accuse Christianity of being misogynist. This forced the male leaders to reevaluate both themselves and the bible to see if this was true. It was good, because they started to acknowledge that Jesus -who is the definition of Christian- actually changed the relationship that Jewish men had with women, and to radically upset the historical image of the women of God. He was found talking alone to a Samaritan woman, of all things, who was known for having more marriages than Elizabeth Taylor! The disciples just held themselves back from asking, 'Why are you talking to her?' He defended an adulteress who had literally been dragged out of the bed from her lover, and told her, 'Neither do I condemn thee.' Although the apostles were decidedly male, the place of the women who followed and served their band were so prominent that Jesus even said of Mary, that her actions were to be recorded in scripture for posterity! Who was at the foot of the cross as He died, but where were the apostles? These women took care of the apostle's needs out of their own finances and kitchens.
Jesus turned the rabbonical tradition on its ear, when he allowed, not only a woman, but such an immoral, demon possessed woman as Mary of Magdella, to take hold of His feet, and wrap her hair around them, rubbing them against her cheeks, and later to repeat the act with perfume. One one of these occasions she even went so far as to crack a container of spice laden perfume and pour it over his head. It clearly pointed to the ancient rite of anointing the priests, but I could be wrong. She must have massaged it into his very scalp, I'll bet.
At the last passover they shared, Jesus dressed himself as a servant to wash the disciple's feet in order to point out how they had been too proud to wash each other's feet in the absence of a house servant. But Mary had gone even farther, and washed His feet with her very hair!!! Hadn't they learned anything from her example?
Looking back, we must remember the famous Rahab the harlot, who saved only her own family by risking everything through her faith by rescuing the spies. But before this the midwives of Egypt defied the Pharaoh's command to slay the boys, and were rewarded. But let's not forget that Moses got his name by being drawn out of the water, by the very daughter of the King who made the edict to kill the Hebrew boys (I'll bet she heard it over that!), where he had been placed by his mother - another woman, and his sister Miriam, who volunteered to found a nurse for the princess to raise Moses.
Imagine how history would be without these women that God honored in the pages of His holy word.
This is not to justify all women. Who would name their daughter Jezebel? Who doesn't lament for Eve? Who knows the famous Semiramis, the mother of the goddesses, who birthed and then married her son, Nimrod, and deified him as Bal? Athaliah was the only queen of Judah, and she was the most notorious of all the regents!
But oddly, every time a good king appeared in the chronicle of Jerusalem's royals, the mother was said to be from Jerusalem. Those Jerusalem girls were a cut above the rest spiritually speaking, apparently. The bad mothers are also mentioned, so God hints to the importance of the influence of the mothers and wives.
We won't forget to mention the women who cared for the prophets, one of whom even Jesus mentioned. And lets also recognize the Syro-Phoenecian woman that Jesus commended for that remarkable reply 'Even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from the children's table'
If I have a high view of women it is because Jesus - God has a high view of them. I make it a point to honor them whenever it is due; but to suggest that I somehow created a forum whereby I could create a debate between men and women is more than I can tolerate.
I have only one thing to say about women on this forum, and I pray that the men will take this to heart: History records more prominently the great men of faith, no one can deny this. But here on this forum all are equal and anonymous, and this has given me the ability to make an odd observation that I never expected. There are places that women don't even seem to tread, and I wonder why. In the apologetics, or any place there is a debate, I have yet to see a single woman. I admit I haven't been everywhere; but I noticed that in those places, men are more likely to insult and attack, rather than discuss amicably and Christlike. They don't even care. They have no fear of God's commands to be gentle and courteous in love and fear of the Judge. They get nowhere in the arguments at all, and after awhile they aren't even talking about scripture. They just make personal attacks! Is this what a Christian forum is for? Didn't Jesus say that we would be known, not for our intellectual acumen, or our ability to be right and have the last word, but for our love for one another?
On the other hand, I noticed that women use very few words, not like me, and tend to leave a thread if they get a bitter reply. I don't know where they go, but they don't come back. There seems to be a common instinct in women that they all do this! I want to know but I know I never will. It's just another of the divinely hidden mysteries of women that only their Father is privy to for now.
Women, I noticed, are very, very likely to swing the thread from whatever the original point, to love. They insert it and incorporate it, as if to say, 'Now boys, lets just calm down and play nice. We're all family here.'
So, by way of long defense as only a male will do, I guess, if there is a debate between women and men in my threads, the reason is because of these differences of approach to God and godliness, and not because of anything I say.
George Foreman, who won the heavyweight title at 50 ripe years old, was interviewed later. George has about 8 kids or more ALL named George! Don't quote me, look it up. They asked him. 'George, you've been married (x amount of) years, and have (x amount) kids. How did you manage to keep your marriage together?' His humorously answered, 'Well, once I learned who the boss was, everything was fine from there!'
Maybe you brothers could try making peace by just agreeing with them.
Now, if you read the post or the title, there is absolutely nothing to suggest that such a debate was being initiated, nor did the first responders reply with such a thought in mind. I was also accused of pretending to be a new believer.
It's amazing... well, I'm not going to get started.
Suffice it to say that I am more than a little upset, because the point of my thread was very simple. How someone could read anything so convoluted and contrived into it is beyond me. But now that I have been accused, after some thinking, I felt the only way to comfort myself was to address the issue, because it seems that anyone who would draw such a conclusion out of thin air is clearly having issues of inferiority, or may simply have issues with women.
I'll say from the start that, yes, I have a high admiration for women, and that was not come by easily. When I was a young, southern male, I was the traditional, typical image. You'll probably hate me for this, but I believed that women could only be girlfriends, never friends; and it was my intent, once I broke my shyness bubble, to collect every girl for my own, which I did. My reason, I realized later, was just that I was insecure because of all those years of being unpopular. But also, it was just before Christ came into my life, and it was clearly a desperate attempt to fill my heart and life with worldly things, when inside only God knew that He was what I really sought.
I swore off women after finding Jesus. I renounced all my ambitions and desires in fact. I wanted nothing between us; however, I maintained my view of women, and the churches I knew of had a patriarchal hierarchy which only furthered my chauvinist view. But I had a friend, the first person to witness to me, whose wife was responsible for the family finances. He was apostolic and very zealous. When I saw her doing their books, I was taken aback and asked very bluntly, 'You let your wife control the money?!' He answered very frankly, 'Oh, well, I can do everything else but she's better than me with finances, so we agreed that she would handle that.' Then he chuckled with a red face.
That was my first encounter with a non-chauvinist view of women, and over the years it grew as with great, painful difficulty, I saw one thing after another that made me realize how wrong I was about God's place for women.
One day I was on a bus, which was rare, and I saw a gang of teens in the back, laughing and talking, and it was both guys and girls. They weren't paired. There was nothing romantic. They touched and punched, and both equally shared. They looked like a box full of baby bunnies or kittens bouncing off each other with youthful vigor. There was total respect, and it was all taken for granted. In my seat I could feel tears streaming down my cheeks because I envied them for growing up that way, and wondered what all I had missed. How much better their development would now be by the time they were adults shaping the next generation.
Later, another friend surprised me when he lamented somewhat, that his wife was on the phone with his adult kids in college. 'Oh, they only talk to me when they need money...' I felt so sorry for him and asked, 'Why don't you say something?' 'Well, he said, I used to feel bad, but then I realized, I'm the big guns. Momma is the one who handles the little stuff, but when things get really bad, when there's a crisis, they call out the big guns. That's me!'
Hmmm. The plot thickens. So, since my shell was cracked, my eyes began widening and I saw all kinds of things I never could before. How did I miss it? In church, the women's lib movement began to attack the patriarchal structure, and to accuse Christianity of being misogynist. This forced the male leaders to reevaluate both themselves and the bible to see if this was true. It was good, because they started to acknowledge that Jesus -who is the definition of Christian- actually changed the relationship that Jewish men had with women, and to radically upset the historical image of the women of God. He was found talking alone to a Samaritan woman, of all things, who was known for having more marriages than Elizabeth Taylor! The disciples just held themselves back from asking, 'Why are you talking to her?' He defended an adulteress who had literally been dragged out of the bed from her lover, and told her, 'Neither do I condemn thee.' Although the apostles were decidedly male, the place of the women who followed and served their band were so prominent that Jesus even said of Mary, that her actions were to be recorded in scripture for posterity! Who was at the foot of the cross as He died, but where were the apostles? These women took care of the apostle's needs out of their own finances and kitchens.
Jesus turned the rabbonical tradition on its ear, when he allowed, not only a woman, but such an immoral, demon possessed woman as Mary of Magdella, to take hold of His feet, and wrap her hair around them, rubbing them against her cheeks, and later to repeat the act with perfume. One one of these occasions she even went so far as to crack a container of spice laden perfume and pour it over his head. It clearly pointed to the ancient rite of anointing the priests, but I could be wrong. She must have massaged it into his very scalp, I'll bet.
At the last passover they shared, Jesus dressed himself as a servant to wash the disciple's feet in order to point out how they had been too proud to wash each other's feet in the absence of a house servant. But Mary had gone even farther, and washed His feet with her very hair!!! Hadn't they learned anything from her example?
Looking back, we must remember the famous Rahab the harlot, who saved only her own family by risking everything through her faith by rescuing the spies. But before this the midwives of Egypt defied the Pharaoh's command to slay the boys, and were rewarded. But let's not forget that Moses got his name by being drawn out of the water, by the very daughter of the King who made the edict to kill the Hebrew boys (I'll bet she heard it over that!), where he had been placed by his mother - another woman, and his sister Miriam, who volunteered to found a nurse for the princess to raise Moses.
Imagine how history would be without these women that God honored in the pages of His holy word.
This is not to justify all women. Who would name their daughter Jezebel? Who doesn't lament for Eve? Who knows the famous Semiramis, the mother of the goddesses, who birthed and then married her son, Nimrod, and deified him as Bal? Athaliah was the only queen of Judah, and she was the most notorious of all the regents!
But oddly, every time a good king appeared in the chronicle of Jerusalem's royals, the mother was said to be from Jerusalem. Those Jerusalem girls were a cut above the rest spiritually speaking, apparently. The bad mothers are also mentioned, so God hints to the importance of the influence of the mothers and wives.
We won't forget to mention the women who cared for the prophets, one of whom even Jesus mentioned. And lets also recognize the Syro-Phoenecian woman that Jesus commended for that remarkable reply 'Even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from the children's table'
If I have a high view of women it is because Jesus - God has a high view of them. I make it a point to honor them whenever it is due; but to suggest that I somehow created a forum whereby I could create a debate between men and women is more than I can tolerate.
I have only one thing to say about women on this forum, and I pray that the men will take this to heart: History records more prominently the great men of faith, no one can deny this. But here on this forum all are equal and anonymous, and this has given me the ability to make an odd observation that I never expected. There are places that women don't even seem to tread, and I wonder why. In the apologetics, or any place there is a debate, I have yet to see a single woman. I admit I haven't been everywhere; but I noticed that in those places, men are more likely to insult and attack, rather than discuss amicably and Christlike. They don't even care. They have no fear of God's commands to be gentle and courteous in love and fear of the Judge. They get nowhere in the arguments at all, and after awhile they aren't even talking about scripture. They just make personal attacks! Is this what a Christian forum is for? Didn't Jesus say that we would be known, not for our intellectual acumen, or our ability to be right and have the last word, but for our love for one another?
On the other hand, I noticed that women use very few words, not like me, and tend to leave a thread if they get a bitter reply. I don't know where they go, but they don't come back. There seems to be a common instinct in women that they all do this! I want to know but I know I never will. It's just another of the divinely hidden mysteries of women that only their Father is privy to for now.
Women, I noticed, are very, very likely to swing the thread from whatever the original point, to love. They insert it and incorporate it, as if to say, 'Now boys, lets just calm down and play nice. We're all family here.'
So, by way of long defense as only a male will do, I guess, if there is a debate between women and men in my threads, the reason is because of these differences of approach to God and godliness, and not because of anything I say.
George Foreman, who won the heavyweight title at 50 ripe years old, was interviewed later. George has about 8 kids or more ALL named George! Don't quote me, look it up. They asked him. 'George, you've been married (x amount of) years, and have (x amount) kids. How did you manage to keep your marriage together?' His humorously answered, 'Well, once I learned who the boss was, everything was fine from there!'
Maybe you brothers could try making peace by just agreeing with them.
